The instant that they sit and start cultivating together, I can feel the ‘quality’ of the surrounding area change. And something that I don’t think about much is shown again before me.

Qi affects everything in this world.

And when these two high end cultivators, one in Late Core Formation and the other in Late Nascent Soul, begin diligently cultivating together… I can feel the difference. That a new property is coming out of this interaction, that is greater than just two people cultivating together.

Emergence.

Sister Nuan runs over and sits down perpendicular to the center of them. Waving me over, as she gets in position to cultivate as well.

Why is she having me cultivate with them?

She knows I need some time to recover and rebuild my body before the next rank.

… unless they are planning on handling that now.

Racing over, I move to join in, with my whirlpool joining the tornado that is growing in this room.

I can feel my excitement rise, as this will mean that my plans can move a little quicker and that I also have my first chance to experience something I had only discovered with my scan.

The power of group cultivation.

Cultivating qi in a certain area results in the extraction of qi from that very area. However, it is also being supplied by the qi sub-dimension that continuously feeds into this world. When done correctly, a group of people in a certain configuration can amplify the amount of qi that is getting pulled and collected by the group.

But that's not all. The quality of the qi is notably increased as well.

With each person who (correctly) cultivates in this configuration, the purity of it slightly grows. Making it easier to accept and integrate for everyone involved.

In fact, group cultivation is a major reason that disciples of all ranks decide to live on sect grounds and practice together under instruction. They get access to qi rich environments and an opportunity to cultivate in a way that would be far more beneficial than if they did it alone.

Even for cultivators of the Head Librarian and Patriarch’s realm, it still has some benefit to do so… though the challenges for them change from simply a qi-based one, at their points.

And even if you are at a bottleneck and can’t progress further, just taking part in a group activity like this can still help your fellow cultivator, so it is always encouraged to do so.

The room suddenly goes dark.

I sense that dual orbs of darkness or void envelopes the entire room, before a flash of light practically blinds me, when it fills the gap.

Right after, most of the qi in this tornado rushes towards them, before moving back to a stable equilibrium just seconds after.

Both of them just moved up in ranks. Revealing part of their cultivations, both related to void, light, and other properties.

If I’m not correct, they both must have gone into the Peak ranks of their respective realms.

For her part, Nuan seems to use the increased qi flow in this tornado to further consolidate her recent entry into Nascent Soul from when I healed her.

It doesn’t seem that she’ll progress here, but I think will help her progress her further.

Everything reaches a normal pace. Everyone coming to a state of flow with a look of peacefulness. Only constant, increased cultivation remains.

All between people we can (supposedly) trust.

Well. I better get comfortable. We might be here awhile.

…

…It’s not as long as I thought it would be.

Only a few hours later, I can sense their eyes opening to look over at me. While they’ve been cultivating, and I alongside them, I’ve been using the vast amounts of available qi to prep my body for a rapid expansion in my meridians and dantians.

My suspicions are quickly answered when my eyes meet Sister Nuan’s and she gives me a nod, with both of the other elders watching me.

Nodding back, I lower my defenses. Leaving myself vulnerable to intrusions.

As soon as I do so, I can feel three different sources of qi threads enter my body, from the surrounding three respectively.

Unlike how I expected, though, all they do is feed me qi directly.

All of what would normally be coming to them, they are sending over in a purified form. There’s something else included, though.

I can sense parts of their cultivation bases being sent over. The barest wisps, as their high realms are almost incompatible from mine, because of the caverns of difference in quality and purity.

Their intention is clear. They are giving me what I need to manually push through this rank and approach the bottleneck into Rank 3.

With the most important aspect to handle, being the extraordinarily pure cultivation base wisps. And by wisps, I mean the same size as a thread of qi. Packed dense and at such a higher purity that it is solid. Near indestructible. Hard to move.

But not impossible to move.

I send it over to every single part of my body, smoothing and grinding out the channels while using the thread as a lever to expand and fix things underneath.

An excruciating, but bearable process, mostly because of my healing abilities, qualities, and previous experience in similar things.

This takes a while.

Several more hours, in fact. With another trio of wisps being sent over every time the previous ones disappear. It soon becomes monotonous work, but in a calming way. And even with the pain, it becomes a pattern, of sorts.

Sadly, I won’t be able to use this tactic again. Especially in these early stages, doing something like this allows me to improve and speed up my cultivation by leaps and bounds. However, my body still needs time to rest and a specific way to recover as a standard. Time that would be used for long-form strengthening.

If I try to use this shortcut for every rank, then I would actually be losing my exponential advantage, rather than gaining or maintaining it.

Soon enough, it is finished and I find myself at the cusp of Rank 3. Right at the bottleneck.

After all this work, it only takes a nudge with my improved cultivation base and qi, to push me into the next rank.

Now becoming a Rank 3 Qi Condensation expert.

As before, I feel an even more massive amount of qi circulating through my dantians. 10,000 units worth of qi. 10 to the power of 4.

“So… that’s how it happened.”

My eyes shoot upward, looking straight at the Head Librarian, whose eyes are locked onto mine and can clearly see my new gains.

A glance at Nuan shows her lips pursed, but not speaking. She gives me a quick nod and a glance at the two elders.

Huh. This is one of the rare times that I don’t know what she means by that.