Chapter 15: Shen Liang’s Cultivation Bootcamp (Now with Extra Screaming)
By the next morning, I’d written 43 pages of notes, burned three pots of tea, and briefly passed out from overthinking.
But I’d done it.
I had created… a system.
Not a “Cultivation Method” in the usual sense.
No, this was a Clan-Wide Comprehensive Combat-Centered Competency Correctional Curriculum.
Or, as Aunt Mei dubbed it:
“Shen Liang’s Disaster-Prevention Bootcamp.”
Elder Zhang was the first to review the scrolls.
His lips moved silently as he read the first line:
“Step One: Identify the enemy. (Hint: It is you. You are the enemy.)”
He looked at me like I’d lost my mind.
“Patriarch… this isn’t a training manual, it’s an interrogation doctrine.”
“Exactly. I trained assassins on three continents.”
“We are… a rural mountain clan.”
“We won’t be rural for long.”
He continued reading, muttering as he went:
- “Breathing drills while blindfolded?”
- “Qi meditation with surprise slap tests?”
- “Obstacle courses that involve insult-based motivation?”
- “Emotional suppression conditioning?”
- “Why is there a section labeled ‘Snakes—Embrace Them’?”
“Character-building.”
I gathered the disciples in the main courtyard by noon.
They lined up. Crooked. Slouching. Some were still chewing buns.
I stood before them in dark robes, hands behind my back.
“Welcome,” I said. “To the new Shen Clan Training Program.”
They perked up slightly.
“Finally! New techniques?”
“No.”
“Secret scrolls?”
“No.”
“Cultivation manuals?”
“Still no.”
“…Then what is this?”
“Discipline. Pain. And crying. Mostly crying.”
They looked at each other nervously.
One brave fool raised a hand.
“Patriarch, respectfully, are we… being punished?”
“No. You’re being saved from yourselves.”
Phase 1: Awareness Training
Objective: Stop walking into trees during stealth exercises.
I blindfolded them, spun them in circles, and had them walk toward spiritual bells.
Out of 20 disciples, 12 walked off a ledge, 5 slapped each other, 1 slapped me, and 2 meditated in the wrong direction.
Phase 2: Situational Cultivation Drills
Objective: Learn to react under pressure.
I simulated “random enemy encounters” using Elder Ping in a large hat and a stick.
He would jump out at random and scream, “Surprise Bandit!”
Disciples either fainted, apologized, or offered him cabbage.
One tried to adopt him.
Phase 3: Qi Circulation with Adverse Stimuli
Objective: Maintain calm Qi flow while enduring pain.
Disciples sat cross-legged while Aunt Mei read from a book titled “Embarrassing Things You Did as Children: Clan Edition.”
Half of them couldn’t focus past page two.
Phase 4: Endurance & Focus Training
Objective: Don’t die during cardio.
I made them run laps around the courtyard chanting their worst cultivation failures.
“I tried to tame a cow and got kicked!”
“I stabbed myself during sword practice!”
“I thought my dantian was my bladder!”
By lap five, they were begging for spiritual death.
At sunset, Aunt Mei brought me tea.
She watched the disciples collapsed on the floor in a sweaty, broken pile.
“…They cried during lap three.”
“That’s better than expected.”
“…One of them bit a tree and said it ‘tasted like shame.’”
“I’m calling that spiritual growth.”
The next morning, I posted a list:
New Shen Clan Training Principles
- No one graduates until they can walk silently without punching a squirrel.
- No one meditates until they stop falling asleep sitting up.
- If your technique has the word “butt” in it, it is banned.
- Every mistake is followed by cabbage duty.
- Pain is temporary. Shame is forever.
A disciple stared at the list.
“Is this… effective?”
“We’ll find out.”
That night, I lay on the roof again.
“It’s not perfect. But it’s structure. It’s training.”
“We’ll never be the biggest clan.”
“But if I can turn one of these cabbage-chucking disasters into a real cultivator…”
“Then maybe this mountain isn’t cursed.”
A pause.
“It’s just under new management.”
[End of Chapter 15]
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