With a stem in his mouth, Xi Shen was leaning against a tree under the shade. The sun was in full swing sending its dreaded heat down in waves, but the sign of the weather becoming more rainy due to the end of the year was getting more obvious. Dark clouds could be seen forming in the sky.
While looking up at the sky, Xi Shen moved the stem to a corner of his lips and asked, “Yang Su, Fei Yin, do you think I’m too arrogant?”
“Thud!”
Yang Su swung his training sword against Fei Yin’s own before he turned to Xi Shen and said, “No Master I don’t think you are.”
Fei Yin nodded his head in agreement and reiterated, “I don’t think young master is as well.”
Hearing those answers, Xi Shen twirled the stem in his mouth before he looked at Yang Su and Fei Yin then said, “I’m only going to say this once, but I don’t need a bunch of yes men who only know how to follow orders. I want you guys to have your own opinion, and not be afraid to question my decisions and actions. I alone I’m not infallible so I need people by my side that can support me and not just say yes to everything I do. Do you understand?”
Xi Shen said seriously, but a sudden snicker came from the youth in white robes in front of him, the snicker sounded extremely weird as his nose was unusually big for a normal person’s, similar to a children’s story character named Mr. Shnoze.
After snickering the youth said mockingly, “What are you talking about? That’s not how you should treat your subordinates, they should listen to every and any of your commands. You should be the one calling all the shots, why have them give input when they are merely lowly subordinates? You would make a terrible leader in the future if that’s how you think a person under you should act. Like why… Ack!”
Before this person could continue any further, Xi Shen grabbed a familiar-looking metal pole by his side and sent it flying out to smack the arm of the youth.
The youth had his eyes bulging and he squirmed in his knelt position, but he didn’t let out another sound after his initial surprise.
“Bastard, did I ask you for your opinion? Why don’t you tell me why you were sneaking around my courtyard if you're going to be so talk-active?”
The youth lowered his head and went back to massaging Xi Shen’s bare feet without saying anymore.
Seeing this, Xi Shen snorted contemptuously before he turned back to Yang Su and Fei Yin.
Fei Yin showed a hesitant expression before he said, “Young Master, it would be weird if you weren’t arrogant. As the second prince of a family such as the Li Royal Family, you could say you have the right to be arrogant.”
Xi Shen thought for a moment before he looked at Yang Su. Yang Su had on a contemplating expression for a while before he shook his head and said, “I don’t think Master is arrogant, just that you could be temperamental sometimes.”
Xi Shen was taken aback by Yang Su's answer, and thought in his heart, ‘I guess it’s showing a bit more frequently for Yang Su to pick up on it. I should really visit that brother of mine soon then.’
Xi Shen leaned back against the tree after hearing both Yang Su and Fei Yin’s answers, he then ironically said rather arrogantly, “I’m not arrogant. You can’t confuse complete confidence in one’s capabilities with arrogance.”
‘What capabilities? Aren’t you just a trashy prince? He really is too arrogant.’
The youth rubbing Xi Shen’s feet thought in his heart.
‘But holy hell, why are his feet so soft?!! This skin would be perfect to create a mask from!!’
The youth's eyes sparkle as he gently caressed Xi Shen’s feet.
‘No, but how did he get his skin so smooth and jade-like? Why can’t I have skin like this? It’s being wasted on a brat like him.’
Xi Shen was about to open his mouth again to speak but had to pause and look at the youth with a confused expression. The youth had started to prod and pinch the skin on Xi Shen’s feet, he was way too into it for Xi Shen’s liking.
With a dark expression, Xi Shen’s hand that held the metal pole swung out.
“What the hell are you doing?!!”
“Swoosh!”
“Thud!”
“Ack!!”
This time the youth was unable to bear the soul ripping pain the metal rod gave him, and he began squirming on the floor in agony.
Xi Shen sat up and crossed his legs in a meditative position while staring at the youth with a serious expression.
“You refuse to tell me why you were sneaking around my courtyard. Who are you?”
The youth, after squirming around on the ground for a bit, sat up and said, “Second prince, I assure you I mean you no harm. As for why I was sneaking around your courtyard, well, I wasn’t expecting to get caught.”
Xi Shen frowned and glared at this youth.
After they returned from the Bai Clan a few weeks ago, Xi Shen had sensed this person sneaking around in their mansion.
His ability to hide his presence was extremely profound that even someone in the Late Foundation Realm or Early Core Formation Realm would have a hard time sensing his presence. What’s even more, judging from his cultivation fluctuations he was only in the 1st Stage of the Foundation Realm.
Xi Shen had his speculations as to who this person was, but he wanted to hear it from this person himself. Though from the look of things he was unwilling to say.
One other thing is that Xi Shen recognize this person’s Soul Signature, he was the Blacksmith Disciple who had confronted Bai Lu back at the Demon Sealing Pagoda. But he was wearing a different disguise then.
“The Zhi Clan.”
Xi Shen suddenly said with narrowed eyes.
Hearing the mention of his family, the youth’s eyes opened wide in shock, but soon his face turned to a bitter smile before he got up and cupped his fist towards Xi Shen, formally introducing himself, “I never expected the second prince to have discovered my identity. Please understand that I could not divulge my identity to anyone even if it was you, second prince.”
Seeing this person suddenly being so respectful to Xi Shen, both Fei Yin and Yang Su were taken aback.
Xi Shen looked at the youth and snorted.
“Your family is one of the Top Noble Families who deals with intelligence gathering for my father. Of course I’d recognize those Stealth Techniques. I also know that you’re actually a girl wearing a disguise as well.”
The youth who was revealed to be a girl stared at Xi Shen with even more shock. Fei Yin and Yang Su did a double-take as well, since all this while, they hadn’t realized that fact. The mask this person wore was very well made, and even his voice sounded like a male’s.
The disguised girl looked at Xi Shen and her expression suddenly became indignant.
“So the second prince actually knew I was a girl and still treated me as such? You even had me rub your feet -‘not that I was complaining’- and attacked me so viciously with that accursed pole!”
The girl pouted, but of course, due to the mask, it look extremely weird on a male’s face.
Xi Shen gave this girl a side-eyed glance before he said, “Oh? Then should I have treated you like a girl I captured trying to sneak into my courtyard?”
Xi Shen’s eyes roamed up and down the pouting girl's body as he said that.
Seeing the look in Xi Shen's eyes, the girl covered her chest with her hands and took a step back. She then shot a cautious but threatening glare at Xi Shen.
Seeing her reaction, Xi Shen rolled his eyes before he turned back to Fei Yin and Yang Su, and then said, “I didn’t say you two could stop, continue!”
Fei Yin and Yang Su jumped a bit at that before they went back to sparring with wooden swords.
Xi Shen ignored the girl and went to lean back against the tree again.
A thought flashed across his mind as he unfurled his cross-legs and used his toes the massage the grass with his bare feet, ‘Why am I running into girls with male disguises? Is it a norm I don’t know about in this Era?’
After thinking that, Xi Shen got lost in the familiar feeling of extreme comfort that his bare feet on the solid ground gave him.
Back in his past life, along with barely anything covering his body, he was without shoes all the time. When he reincarnated into this Era, one of the things he found very discomforting was wearing footwear. His mother would always scold him when he took them off, so much so he had to suck it up and wear them even if it made him uncomfortable.
But after experiencing the feeling without them after so long, he went straight back to the habit of not wearing any.
‘I don’t think I’ll ever be able to wear a pair of shoes ever again. This feeling is too liberating.’
Xi Shen thought in his mind.
But this bad habit was not without any merits!
Xi Shen was comprehending Earth Laws, one of the Six Basic Laws for his days of old cultivation/Heavenly Law comprehension. What better way to go about it than to be as close to the earth as possible. Feel its texture via touch, and gain a better understanding of its uneven and irregular structure.
Right now, it had been about two to three weeks after the events of the Bai Clan and Yang Su’s village.
Xi Shen had gone into seclusion for a week to break through the Meridian Opening Realm, and it went smoothly. Well, not quite as smoothly as he had expected it to go.
Like Yang Su, he had felt a strange force, or rather bottleneck, that was blocking him from opening his 100th meridian.
Xi Shen was extremely curious as to why it was like that. This cultivation system had gone through numerous revisions, he had established that fact. But until now, no one had reached the true limits of what this cultivation system could offer.
So he and Yang Su were the first to reach this stage. What comes after opening your 100th meridian, he didn’t know. He wanted to know though, it would irk him to no end if he just skipped over this fact and went ahead to breakthrough into the Sea Expansion Realm.
Xi Shen wanted to hit every milestone of this cultivation system he could, which was exactly what a perfectionist like him always strives to accomplish. So he went over and analyze everything about the cultivation system created from his research from scratch, so he could find out what this phenomenon was. But Xi Shen felt like he was one of those people in the past that were blindly fumbling around in the dark to understand what Qi Cultivation was.
Not only just the cultivation system, but Xi Shen was also thinking about the human body and how it relates to Qi Cultivation as well. Maybe the human body had a defined limit and was just not capable of withstanding 100 of its meridians open. But the thing was, half of Xi Shen’s body was not by any means ordinary. It was the physique of a God!
So this limit shouldn’t affect him! But at last, it did.
*******
~Fun Fact~
Mr. Shnoze is this world’s story of the ugly duckling.
Ps: Moon had me at gunpoint to write that in, lol jk...
Word Count: 1970
This content is taken from free web nov𝒆l.com