**Chapter 4: Roots of Iron and Walls of Wind**
The rhythmic, metallic hiss of heavy iron slicing through the air was the only sound on the farm, a steady metronome marking the birth of a new day.
Lin Mo stood in the center of his cleared dirt patch, his legs locked into a perfect, immovable horse stance. Sweat poured down his bare torso, tracing the lines of lean, dense muscle that had slowly begun to layer over his previously scrawny frame. The heavy iron saber in his hands, which had once felt like an anchor dragging him to the earth, now moved with a dangerous, fluid grace.
"Nine hundred and ninety-seven," he grunted, his breath exploding from his lungs in a controlled burst.
He swung the blade upward. *Splitting the Peak.*
"Nine hundred and ninety-eight."
He reversed the momentum, bringing the heavy iron down in a devastating chop that stopped exactly half an inch above the soil.
"Nine hundred and ninety-nine."
His arms were screaming, the lactic acid burning through his veins like liquid fire. His lungs burned, demanding more oxygen than his controlled breathing could supply. But beneath the agony, the Immortal Lotus pulsed a steady, cooling rhythm, washing away the micro-tears in his muscle tissue faster than he could create them, fortifying his body with an endless supply of pure vitality.
"One thousand."
Lin Mo completed the final swing, holding the extension for a long, agonizing five seconds before finally exhaling and lowering the blade. He stepped out of the stance, his legs trembling violently for a brief moment before the Lotus's energy rushed down his meridians, steadying him.
A familiar blue screen materialized in his vision.
**[Mountain Cleaving Saber proficiency +2]**
**[Mountain Cleaving Saber: Beginner (56/100)]**
He smiled, wiping the sweat from his forehead with the back of his wrist. Progress. It wasn't flashy, it wasn't the result of a heaven-defying enlightenment or a serendipitous encounter in a mystic realm, but it was absolutely, irrevocably his.
He didn't stop to rest. He walked over to the oak tree, picked up his hornwood bow, and spent the next hour firing five hundred arrows into the hay bale. His draw was smoother now, his fingers heavily callused to the point where the rough hemp string felt like silk. The arrows hit the target with a satisfying, rhythmic *thwack*, clustering tightly around the center of the bale.
**[Falling Leaf Archery proficiency +3]**
**[Falling Leaf Archery: Beginner (35/100)]**
By the time he finished his morning physical conditioning, the sun was fully cresting the Azure Mist Mountains, bathing the valley in warm, golden light.
Lin Mo walked over to the porch, pouring a bucket of cool well water over his head to wash away the sweat. He looked under the floorboards. Baozi was still there, completely immobilized in his evolutionary sleep. The fat Earth-Burrowing Hound hadn't moved a muscle in two days. However, Lin Mo could sense the subtle changes. The ambient earth-qi in the soil was slowly gathering around the dog, forming a faint, brown cocoon of energy. The hound's fur looked darker, richer, and his breathing was incredibly slow, almost imperceptible.
"Take your time, buddy. Growing is hard work," Lin Mo murmured gently.
He dressed in clean, gray linen robes and turned his attention to his empty two-acre field. The Golden Jade Spirit Rice was harvested, leaving behind rows of tilled earth that were slowly losing their spiritual luster. Soil, much like a cultivator's body, needed rest and rotation, lest its foundation be permanently damaged.
He couldn't plant spirit rice again immediately. The soil needed a different crop to balance its yin and yang, a crop that pulled different ambient energies and deposited different nutrients.
He walked to the center of the field, planting his feet firmly in the dirt, and began to cycle the *Azure Wood Breathing Art*. He didn't draw qi in; instead, he pushed his meager reserves down through his legs, connecting his consciousness with the earth beneath him.
"Earth Turning Technique," he commanded softly.
He formed a series of hand seals, his fingers moving through the rigid, blocky motions required for earth-attribute magic. He wasn't naturally gifted in earth magic, but the proficiency panel ensured his execution was flawless for his current level.
The ground beneath him gave a low, rumbling groan.
Starting from where he stood, the soil began to churn. It rolled over on itself, lifting the deeper, nutrient-rich layers to the surface while burying the exhausted topsoil and the remnants of the rice roots. It looked as though a massive, invisible mole was swimming through the field, aerating the dirt and breaking up hard clods.
Lin Mo directed the spell slowly, sweeping his hands back and forth. It was a massive drain on his dantian. Within twenty minutes, his spiritual reserves were entirely empty. He dropped to one knee, gasping, the spell breaking. The churning earth settled, leaving a perfectly tilled, soft expanse of soil behind.
The Lotus pulsed, flooding his body with physical stamina, though it couldn't instantly refill his spiritual qi. That required meditation.
**[Earth Turning Technique proficiency +2]**
**[Earth Turning Technique: Novice (85/100)]**
"Almost competent," he panted, pulling himself up. "Much better than using a hoe for three days."
With the field prepped, he needed seeds. And to carve his defensive array, he needed a tool that wouldn't shatter under the pressure of channeling his qi. The small skinning knife had barely survived the first array node.
He hitched his small cart to his own waist using a thick leather strap. With Baozi indisposed, Lin Mo was the draft animal today. It was a humbling experience, dragging the wooden wheels over the uneven dirt path, but it served as excellent resistance training for his core and legs.
The walk to Clear Water Town took a little longer than usual, but he arrived as the morning market was hitting its peak. He avoided the central district where the cultivators traded their high-end goods and headed straight for the agricultural sector.
He parked his cart outside a large, open-front shop filled with massive woven bins of seeds. The air here smelled intensely of dried herbs, dust, and raw, latent vitality.
"Elder Ma," Lin Mo called out respectfully, stepping into the shop.
An old man, his face a map of deep wrinkles and his back bent from a lifetime of leaning over ledgers, looked up from behind a wooden counter. He wore the simple robes of a mortal, but his eyes were sharp. Ma was a mortal who had spent seventy years dealing with low-level cultivators; he knew more about spiritual soil than most Qi Condensation masters.
"Ah, the immortal gardener," Ma chuckled, his voice raspy. "I heard from Uncle Wang that your vegetable yield was excellent again. To what do I owe the pleasure? It's too early for you to plant rice."
"Your ears are too sharp, Elder Ma," Lin Mo smiled. "You are correct. The soil needs a rotation. I'm looking for something that will replenish the yin-balance and perhaps provide a bit of physical nourishment."
Ma nodded approvingly. "Most of the loose cultivators around here just plant the same low-grade Blood-Wheat year after year until the dirt turns to sand, then they complain to the heavens when their crops wither. Rotation is the true dao of the earth."
The old man hobbled out from behind the counter, gesturing for Lin Mo to follow him down a row of bins.
"If you want to replenish the yin and fix the soil structure, you should plant Moonlight Beans on one acre," Ma suggested, plunging his wrinkled hand into a bin of pale, silvery beans that seemed to absorb the light around them. "They draw ambient yin-qi from the moonlight and lock it into the roots. The beans themselves are excellent for brewing low-grade qi-recovery tea. They mature in three months."
"I'll take enough for one acre," Lin Mo agreed instantly. The beans would be perfect for his own consumption, reducing the time he needed to spend meditating to refill his dantian.
"And for the second acre?" Ma asked. "If you want physical nourishment, I recommend Azure-Vein Wheat. It's notoriously hard to process—the husks are like iron—but the flour is dense with earth and wood qi. Excellent for body refinement, and spirit beasts love the leftover chaff."
Lin Mo thought of Baozi's bottomless stomach and the heavy physical toll of his saber practice. "Perfect. I'll take an acre's worth of the wheat as well."
Ma weighed out the seeds, packing them into sturdy canvas sacks. "That will be two silver spirit coins for the beans, and three for the wheat. Five silver total."
Lin Mo handed over the coins, a tiny fraction of his newly acquired wealth. "Thank you, Elder Ma. By the way, I am in need of a good carving knife. Something capable of handling a slight channeling of qi without snapping. Do you know a blacksmith who won't charge me a sect-level premium?"
Ma stroked his wispy beard. "For array carving? Or just woodworking?"
"Just woodworking," Lin Mo lied smoothly. "I'm making some repairs to my cabin, want to engrave some simple good-luck wards."
"Go to Iron-Arm Chen three streets over," Ma advised. "He's a mortal, but his grandfather was an outer sect forge-slave. He knows how to fold a tiny bit of star-iron into his steel. It'll cost you a few silver, but it'll hold an edge and a bit of qi."
Lin Mo thanked the old merchant, loaded his heavy sacks of seeds into his cart, and headed toward the blacksmith's street.
The heat radiating from Chen's forge was palpable from a block away. The rhythmic ringing of hammers on anvils was deafening. Lin Mo found Iron-Arm Chen exactly as described—a massive mortal man whose right arm was thick with burn scars and corded muscle.
After a brief negotiation that involved Lin Mo paying four silver coins, he walked away with a small, beautifully balanced carving knife. The blade was only three inches long, dark gray, and held a subtle, shimmering pattern from the folded steel. It felt perfect in his hand.
His errands complete, Lin Mo began the long haul back to his farm. The cart was heavy, the sun was hot, and his muscles ached, but his mood was serene. He was laying the foundation for his future, one brick at a time.
He was about half a mile from his property, walking along the quiet, tree-lined dirt path, when the hairs on the back of his neck suddenly stood up.
It was an instinct born not from his past life as an accountant, but from the residual combat instincts the system was slowly building within him. He stopped, lowering the handles of his cart to the ground, and rested his hand casually near the hilt of his iron saber.
A moment later, a sharp, whistling sound tore through the air above him.
Lin Mo looked up. Descending from the clouds was a young man standing atop a glowing, pale-blue flying sword. The cultivator wore the pristine white and azure robes of an inner sect disciple of the Azure Mist Sect. His aura was terrifying—dense, sharp, and suffocating. Foundation Establishment realm. At least.
The cultivator didn't land gently. He dropped from the sky like a stone, his flying sword snapping up into his hand at the last second, and slammed into the dirt path twenty yards in front of Lin Mo, kicking up a massive cloud of dust.
Lin Mo immediately bowed deeply, keeping his eyes on the ground, adopting the universal posture of a weak, subservient loose cultivator.
"Senior," Lin Mo greeted respectfully, his voice steady.
The young cultivator waved his hand, using a gust of wind-qi to clear the dust. He was handsome, with sharp, aristocratic features and eyes that looked at Lin Mo as if he were an insect that had crawled onto a dining table.
"You," the cultivator snapped, his voice echoing with infused qi that made Lin Mo's eardrums ache. "You live on the farm just down this road?"
"Yes, Senior. I rent two acres from the town magistrate," Lin Mo replied, keeping his head bowed.
"A few nights ago, a Rank 1 Peak mutant Shadow Cat entered this area. I was tracking its blood trail from the weeping willow basin, but the trail ends abruptly near the boundary of your miserable little plot. Did you see it?"
Lin Mo's heart skipped a beat, but his face remained a mask of placid confusion. So this was the disciple who had originally wounded the beast or was tasked with cleaning up the mess it made of the mercenaries. If Lin Mo admitted to killing it, he would invite a mountain of questions. How did a Level 2 farmer kill a mutant? What artifact did he use? What secrets was he hiding?
In the cultivation world, the nail that sticks out gets hammered down. And usually, the hammer was a flying sword to the throat.
"A mutant Shadow Cat, Senior?" Lin Mo let his voice tremble just a fraction, injecting a believable amount of fear. "Heavens, no. I haven't seen anything like that. If a beast of that rank came to my farm, I would be dead. I only have a few chickens, Senior. Perhaps it passed through the woods to the south, toward the river?"
The inner sect disciple narrowed his eyes, his terrifying divine sense washing over Lin Mo. Lin Mo felt a cold, invasive pressure scan his body. It probed his dantian, feeling the pitiful, shallow pool of chaotic wood and earth qi. It scanned his body, noting the calluses and the lack of magical artifacts.
The disciple scoffed, the pressure vanishing instantly.
"Trash," the young man muttered, turning his back on Lin Mo. "Level 2 garbage with mixed roots. A Shadow Cat would have eaten you and your chickens without breaking a sweat. The beast must have used a shadow-step technique to cross the river and mask its scent."
The disciple didn't offer an apology or a farewell. He simply tossed his sword into the air, leaped onto it, and shot into the sky like a blue comet, vanishing over the treeline in seconds.
Lin Mo slowly straightened his back, letting out a long, silent exhale. His palms were slightly sweaty. That was the reality of this world. His life, his entire existence, hung on the whims of people who could kill him with a thought and feel no more remorse than a man swatting a mosquito.
He gripped the handles of his cart, his knuckles turning white.
"I need to finish that array," he whispered to himself, his serene mood replaced by a cold, burning determination. "Tonight."
He spent the remainder of the afternoon planting the seeds. He used a simple wooden dibber to punch holes in the soft, tilled earth, dropping a Moonlight Bean or an Azure-Vein Wheat seed into each one, then covering it gently. It was backbreaking work, entirely manual, but he moved with mechanical efficiency.
When the sun finally set, casting long shadows across the valley, both acres were fully planted. He dragged himself to the edge of the field, utterly drained of spiritual energy, and cast a weak, desperate *Spring Breeze Drizzle Art* just to settle the soil and give the seeds their first drink of infused water.
*[Spring Breeze Drizzle Art proficiency +1]*
He didn't bother making a hot meal. He ate a cold bowl of leftover rice, drank a cup of well water, and sat down at his wooden table, lighting the oil lamp.
He pulled out the *Fundamentals of Earth and Wood Formations*, the new star-iron carving knife, and the remaining three polished wooden stakes.
The encounter with the sect disciple had lit a fire under him. The illusion of his safety had been shattered. His fence was just wood; his saber was just iron. He needed a barrier of heaven and earth.
He picked up the second stake, closed his eyes, and channeled his meager wood-qi into the new blade.
The difference was immediate. The star-iron knife accepted the qi smoothly, acting as a perfect conduit rather than a dam. When he pressed the blade into the wood, it carved like butter, leaving a flawless, deep groove filled with a faint, glowing energy.
He began to carve the *Solidify Node*.
It was significantly more complex than the *Qi-Gathering Node*. The lines had to overlap perfectly, forming a three-dimensional cage of energy within the two-dimensional surface of the wood. The mental strain was immense. It felt as if he were trying to thread a needle in a pitch-black room while standing on one leg.
Twenty minutes in, his focus wavered for a fraction of a second. The qi flow stuttered.
*Crack.*
A small burst of chaotic energy shot up the handle of the knife, shocking his hand and sending a spike of agonizing pain directly into his brain. He gasped, dropping the knife as a severe headache bloomed behind his eyes.
But instantly, the Immortal Lotus spun. The pearlescent light washed over his mind, erasing the pain, repairing the frayed nerves, and flooding his brain with fresh oxygen and vitality.
Lin Mo shook his head, clearing away the residual phantom ache, and picked the knife right back up.
**[Array Formations proficiency +1]**
**[Array Formations: Novice (17/100)]**
"Again," he commanded himself.
He carved. He failed. The Lotus healed him. He learned from the failure, his proficiency ticking upward, locking the muscle memory and spiritual flow into his very being.
It was a cycle of agonizing torture and instant, divine relief. To any other cultivator, this method of brute-forcing an array formation would result in permanent brain damage or complete cultivation crippling within an hour. But Lin Mo had an infinite well of health and an absolute guarantee of progress.
He didn't sleep. The moon crawled across the sky, painting the cabin in silver light, and still, he carved.
By dawn, the *Solidify Node* was complete, glowing with a steady, pulsing green light.
**[Array Formations proficiency +12]**
**[Array Formations: Novice (29/100)]**
He didn't stop to celebrate. He walked outside, swung his saber a thousand times, shot his bow five hundred times, fed the chickens, cast the drizzle art over his fields, and went right back to the table.
For the next five days, Lin Mo lived in a state of hyper-focused trance.
His routine became mechanical, stripping away all unnecessary actions. He survived on cold spirit rice and water. He spoke to no one. He barely registered the passage of time. His entire universe shrank down to the tip of his carving knife and the flow of his qi.
On the third night, he finished the *Reflect Node*.
On the fourth night, he finished the *Alert Node*.
On the fifth day, he began the most difficult piece: the *Central Array Disc*. This required him to carve a thick, circular slab of hardened spirit-wood he had purchased alongside the stakes. The central disc was the brain of the ward; it had to synchronize the four external nodes, draw upon the ambient qi of his farm, and weave it into a cohesive dome of protection.
The complexity of the runes on the disc was staggering. They looked less like writing and more like a chaotic, dense thicket of thorns.
He failed fifty times. He suffered fifty localized qi-explosions that charred his fingers and rattled his teeth. He experienced fifty migraines that would have sent a mortal into a coma.
And fifty times, the Immortal Lotus brought him back, fresh and clear-headed.
**[Array Formations proficiency +30]**
**[Array Formations: Novice (59/100)]**
As the sun sank below the horizon on the evening of the sixth day, casting long, fiery shadows into the cabin, Lin Mo made the final cut.
He drew his knife away from the central disc. He held his breath.
The dense thicket of carved runes flared with a blinding, emerald-green light. The light pulsed outward, a tangible wave of pure wood-qi that swept through the small cabin, rattling the teacups and making the pages of his manual flutter wildly.
Then, the light settled, sinking into the wood. The entire disc hummed with a low, vibrating frequency, feeling warm to the touch.
It was complete.
Lin Mo slumped back in his chair, a profound, bone-deep exhaustion settling over him that even the Lotus couldn't immediately banish. It wasn't physical fatigue; it was the sheer mental weight of focusing for six days straight.
He let out a ragged, triumphant laugh.
"I did it," he whispered, staring at the glowing disk.
He didn't wait until morning to install it. He gathered the four node stakes and the central disc and stepped out into the night. The moon was a crescent, providing just enough light to see by.
He walked to the far northeast corner of his two-acre plot, directly on the boundary line, and drove the *Qi-Gathering Node* deep into the earth using the flat of his iron saber. He moved to the southeast corner and buried the *Solidify Node*. Northwest for the *Reflect Node*. Southwest for the *Alert Node*.
Finally, he returned to the center of his property, right beneath the floorboards of his porch, near where Baozi was still sleeping. He dug a hole three feet deep, placed the *Central Array Disc* inside, and covered it with dirt.
He stood up, dusted off his hands, and stepped back.
He formed a specific hand seal detailed in the manual, pointing two fingers at the ground where the disc was buried, and channeled a sharp burst of his own qi downward to act as a starter spark.
"Activate."
For a second, nothing happened. Lin Mo's heart hammered in his chest. Had he made a mistake in the calculations? Had the stakes been placed too far apart?
Then, he felt it.
The ground beneath him shivered. The ambient wood-qi generated by his newly planted seeds and the surrounding forest rushed toward the four corners of his property.
Four pillars of faint, green light shot up from the buried stakes, rising twenty feet into the air. The pillars suddenly bent inward, arching over the farm to meet perfectly in the center, directly above Lin Mo's cabin.
The moment they connected, a translucent, shimmering dome of emerald energy cascaded downward, enveloping the entire two acres in a perfect hemisphere.
The air inside the dome instantly felt different. It was thicker, richer, and perfectly still. The sounds of the nocturnal insects in the forest outside were suddenly muffled, as if a thick pane of glass had been placed over the world.
The green shimmer held for five seconds, and then, as the array synchronized perfectly with the environment, it faded into absolute invisibility.
The *Minor Wood-Spirit Ward* was active.
Lin Mo walked to the edge of his property. He picked up a heavy rock from the dirt road outside and tossed it toward his fence.
The moment the rock crossed the invisible boundary, a web of green energy flashed into existence. The rock struck the energy barrier with a dull *thump* and bounced harmlessly away. Inside Lin Mo's mind, a soft, chiming sound echoed—the *Alert Node* doing its job, letting him know exactly where the perimeter had been struck.
It worked. It perfectly repelled kinetic force and alerted him to the breach. According to the manual, this ward could easily withstand the full-force charge of a Rank 1 Peak beast, and it would take a Foundation Establishment cultivator a significant amount of time to batter it down.
For the first time since he had awoken in this terrifying, magical world three years ago, Lin Mo felt truly, completely safe.
He closed his eyes, leaning his back against his wooden fence, and let out a long sigh of relief. He didn't have to sleep with one eye open anymore. He didn't have to fear the shadows. His garden had walls.
"Ahem."
A low, rumbling sound, resembling a throat clearing, came from the porch.
Lin Mo opened his eyes and turned around.
Standing on the porch steps was Baozi. But it wasn't the same fat, lazy hound that had gone to sleep six days ago.
The dog was now the size of a small pony. His earthy-brown fur had darkened into a rich, deep mahogany, and it looked thick enough to turn a mortal blade. The floppy ears were slightly more pointed, and his soulful brown eyes now carried a faint, golden glow.
Baozi shook his massive head, a cloud of residual earth-qi dust flying off his coat. He looked down at his massive paws, let out a confused whine, and then looked up at Lin Mo.
"Well, well," Lin Mo smiled broadly, walking over to the massive beast. "Look who finally decided to wake up."
He reached out and scratched Baozi behind the ears. The hound leaned into the touch, his tail thumping against the wooden porch with enough force to rattle the boards.
"You grew up, buddy," Lin Mo laughed, feeling the dense, powerful muscles beneath the dog's thick coat. Baozi was no longer a useless, fat pet. He radiated the aura of a true Rank 1 mid-tier spirit beast.
Baozi let out a happy bark, a sound that resonated deep in Lin Mo's chest, and promptly trotted over to his empty food trough, turning back to give Lin Mo a pointed, demanding look.
"Alright, alright. I'm cooking," Lin Mo chuckled.
He walked into his cabin, the heavy weight of the world lifted from his shoulders. His array was active, his crops were planted, his martial arts were progressing, and his dog was now capable of holding his own in a fight.
He summoned his status panel as he lit the stove to boil some water.
**[Name: Lin Mo]**
**[Lifespan: Endless]**
**[Cultivation Realm: Qi Condensation, Level 2 (160/1000)]**
**[Cultivation Method]**
* **Azure Wood Breathing Art:** Novice (98/100)
**[Spells & Skills]**
* **Spring Breeze Drizzle Art:** Competent (18/500)
* **Earth Turning Technique:** Novice (85/100)
* **Array Formations:** Novice (59/100)
* **Carpentry:** Beginner (45/100)
**[Martial Arts]**
* **Mountain Cleaving Saber:** Beginner (56/100)
* **Falling Leaf Archery:** Beginner (35/100)
The numbers were small, the progress was slow, and to a genius of a great sect, his entire existence would be considered a joke.
But Lin Mo poured his hot water over a pinch of mortal tea leaves, completely unbothered. He didn't need to be a genius. He didn't need to rush. The great sects would rise and fall, the geniuses would slaughter each other for ancient inheritances, and the heavens would weep blood.
Lin Mo would just be here, behind his invisible walls, tending his fields, and living forever.