Severing Time & Space

Solitary Confinement, Part I

The days passed quickly for Wu Jian, who had followed Wu Meiying and his mother’s advice and done nothing but train. Since he was still a child and could not cultivate, he trained his body. Push-ups. Sit-ups. Pull-ups. Squats. Lunges. Dips. Planches. He did every exercise he could think of, working his body for the first half of the day before spending the evenings in meditation.

Unlike with cultivators, meditation did not offer any qualitative benefits, but it was good to understand how to properly meditate for when he became a cultivator.

At the moment, he was doing something called Archer Chinups. He was hanging a pair of ropes from the support beam running the length of his room. Attached to the ends were simple metal circles twice the size of his fist, which he was currently hanging from. Slowly, ever so slowly, Wu Jian pulled his body up with just his right arm while keeping his left arm completely straight. The muscles in his arm strained hard as he pulled himself up until his chin was higher than the metal bar. He held it, feeling his arm shake from the exertion, the muscles burning, then slowly lowered himself back down and pulled himself up with his other arm.

Sweat dripped from his arms, back, legs, and feet. Droplets splashed against the ground, forming a puddle underneath him, but he kept going through his exercises. After he finished doing Archer Chinups, he flipped his body around so he was hanging upside down, slipped his feet through the circles, and let go. Blood rushed to his head as he hung upside down. His feet felt the pressure of his weight on them. He took a deep breath, placed his hands on either side of his head, and moved up, doing a sit-up while hanging upside down. Wu Jian held this position for eight seconds after reaching the maximum height he could achieve, then slowly lowered his body and repeated the process.

There were a large number of exercises that he was able to do simply with these bars, and he went through each one, until it felt like his body was drenched in sweat, until his arms felt like they were going to fall off and his back muscles burned like fire was inside of them. Finally, he finished. He lowered himself to the ground and prepared to let go of the bars.

“Haaaaaa—aah?!”

Unfortunately, he had completely forgotten about the puddle of sweat now staining the floor and slipped. He crashed to the ground with a yelp. Pain shot through his tailbone. With a grimace, he slowly clambered to his feet and rubbed his now sore behind.

“Oooh. That smarts.”

Hissing, he limped his way over to the bed. He didn’t sit down since he didn’t want to get his sheets covered in sweat. Instead, he grabbed the towel, wiped the sweat from his face, then cleaned up the puddle.

A pair of servants came in not long after he finished cleaning. One of them was carrying a tray containing a bowl of congee filled with various fruits and nuts. The other carried several large buckets hanging from a metal pole. While the second one went over to the tub and filled it with water, the first one set the tray of food on his bed.

“Thank you very much,” Wu Jian said with a smile.

The servant eyed him for a second, then nodded. Wu Jian’s smile became a little fixed, but he said nothing. The servants had been warned against talking to him. This was apparently part of his punishment too. He was not allowed to talk to anyone. They were also not allowed to talk to him.

The servants left him alone. Wu Jian sighed, but then slapped his cheeks to pep himself up and went over to his food. He was starving.

Wu Jian gobbled up the congee within seconds, then spent another half a minute just staring longingly at his empty bowl. He was still hungry. Very hungry. It was probably because he was training so hard, but he found himself getting a lot hungrier than he used to. It was just too bad the servants didn’t bring him more food.

The final part of his training came after he finished breakfast. Wu Jian stripped off his clothes, grabbed the Silver Lotus, and walked over to the tub. He first sliced off a bit of the stem and tossed it into the water. The stem hissed as it dissolved into the water, and though nothing looked different, he knew better. After the stem dissolved, he plucked two seeds from the inside and tossed them into the water as well. They, too, dissolved, then Wu Jian placed one stamen and one silver petal into his mouth and lowered himself into the water.

It was not a hot bath like what he normally took, but that worked fine for him. The lukewarm water felt nice against his hot skin. As he crossed his legs and closed his eyes, he focused inward. His breathing slowed, body stilled, and his awareness of the world around him evaporated.

That was when he felt it.

Felt his body absorbing the nutrients from the Silver Lotus.

The Silver Lotus had several uses. The first use was strengthening the body, increasing the strength, hardness, density, and flexibility of his muscles. Its second use was purifying his body. Removing impurities from the body didn’t help him right now, but it would supposedly be useful once he began cultivating.

Wu Jian didn’t know how long he remained in the bath, but the water had grown cold, and when he opened his eyes, the bathwater was black. All of the impurities within his body had been released from his pores, turning the water a turgid, disgusting color.

He quickly stepped out of the bath and wiped himself down. Then he dried himself off and got dressed in his under robes. He didn’t wear anything else since he was not allowed to leave his room.

With a sigh, he flopped onto the bed and closed his eyes.

“I wonder how Meiying is doing?” he said out loud.