Villain Seduces to Rise in Status

Chapter 29: 29 - Essence Lock Syndrome

Elowen saw a ray of hope in Cale’s words, turning to him with eyes that gleamed with desperate longing for salvation.

”Do... do you know any cure? You knew what is happening, so you must know what it is, right?”

Cale stood there staring at her, watching as she meant every word, hoping not to be tied to any sort of political marriage or forced affiliation that would destroy her autonomy. She offered him anything without hesitation—money, spirit stones, potions, artifacts, whatever he needed.

She burst out in tears, drops falling down her face as she covered it with trembling hands. Her legs shook beneath her as the weight of years of suffering finally found an outlet.

”Can... can you please... help me?”

Cale knew it was a hard problem, it wasn’t some random poisoning and nor was it something which started recently. It had been planned day by day for months, maybe even a few years now, accumulating slowly.

I should first try to dissipate it, then. That’s the best way to at least stop any further multiplication of the toxin.

”By the signs of it, you’ve been poisoned with Essence Lock Syndrome. It isn’t some incurable disease given the medical advances of today.”

She looked at him in shock, hope finally breaking through the despair that had consumed her for so long.

”Is... is there a cure, then? Sob...”

”It can be called a temporary measure for now,” Cale said carefully, watching her expression shift.

Her face frowned again, the hope dampening slightly.

”But if you do all medications properly, it will be cured in a year or two. But there is a condition.”

Elowen asked with a little happiness creeping into her voice. ”What do I have to do?”

”Do not accept any food or drink from any of your servants. Rather, I’d hope if you only eat food from the academy canteen only for at least a few months to prevent further poisoning.”

She nodded in agreement.

”Other than that, first I would need to circulate your qi. Thankfully you cultivate too, so it’s easy to redirect, and you would need to perform a meditation technique I will give you daily for at least half an hour. Through this, the pores on your skin will release the toxins naturally. It’s a great technique since if you master it, poisoning will be impossible. You won’t even fall sick anymore.”

Elowen was shocked to see that the guy she thought was the last, the bum of the academy, had such advanced knowledge about medicine and cultivation.

”Does such a technique actually exist?”

”It does,” Cale confirmed.

He first asked her to sit down and use her usual technique so he could see the qi flow of her cultivation method properly. She sat down slowly, and he then placed his hands on her back, starting to feel the flow of energy moving through her meridians, assessing the speed and different attributes of her qi.

He realized her core was slowly being corrupted from the inside, thankfully only in its starting phase so it was easy to address and reverse. If it had progressed further, the damage would have been permanent or even irreversible.

What if he’s just deceiving me?

Elowen thought while cultivating. But she dropped the thought immediately, seeing that he put all his focus on helping her rather than trying to impress her like every other guy at the academy did.Since she was a shy girl who rarely talked to guys, even his single touch made her blush deeply. But seeing him not even reacting to her presence or appearance, she pouted slightly and then continued cultivating, pushing her embarrassment aside.

After another few minutes, Cale opened his eyes, processing what he’d discovered.

He had fully realized and nearly learned her entire cultivation technique through direct qi sensing. But it was bad—even his own techniques were ten times better than this crude method. The efficiency gap was staggering.

”Such a crude technique. It uses blood essence to cultivate. Isn’t it just sucking out your own strength?”

Elowen asked with worry. ”What... what did you find?”

”This technique, who taught you this?”

”My family’s assault squad used this method for generations.”

Cale shook his head - tsk, tsk, tsk. ”You shouldn’t use this.”

”Why not?”

”This is a lousy technique. Yes, it will increase your cultivation at a decent speed, but maybe since your family is also new to cultivation, they didn’t see the downsides. It deteriorates your meridians, making them slow and brittle over time.”

He kept talking for the next few minutes, naming the downsides —weakened meridian walls, accelerated core degradation, reduced lifespan of cultivation potential, susceptibility to future poisoning because of structural weakness. She was surprised, this was a technique being used since her grandfather’s time, and now he was calling it just some crude technique developed by people who didn’t understand cultivation theory.

Is he fooling me?

She thought to herself with a mix of doubt and cautious hope.Cale then took out a piece of paper from his pouch and laid it flat on the ground between them.

”Since your body has become accustomed to this technique, you shouldn’t directly change right away. I will give you an updated version—use it accordingly along with another proper one which I also use personally.”

He sat down and started scribbling on the paper, his handwriting flowing naturally as he wrote out modified cultivation patterns and new meridian pathways.

She looked at him with obvious excitement, her eyes tracking his movements as he worked.

Cale noticed her intense gaze immediately.

”Hmm... why are you staring at me like that?”

”Are you from some runic family? How can you easily alter a technique like that without even thinking?”

Cale smirked slightly. ”Well, something like that.”

Cale sat down in lotus position, preparing himself mentally.

”You sit like this too.”

Elowen was looking at him, thinking about why they had to sit in such a specific position for cultivation. But she complied, positioning herself across from him in proper lotus stance.

”Okay, I will keep guiding you as you cultivate this new technique. Pay attention to how the qi flows through your meridians—it should feel smooth, not jagged like your old method.”

She nodded, but was internally unsure if it was a good idea to learn a derivative technique refined by some teenager.

She continued cultivating, starting with the new pathway Cale had written out. Cale guided her, telling her things here and there, refining her phrasing and adding new knowledge that made her understand the technique at a theoretical level.

At first, she could understand him perfectly, following his explanations with relative ease. But at some point, she lost understanding as he moved into more complex concepts and advanced theory that required foundation knowledge she didn’t possess.

I can’t understand anything anymore. Although I know some words here and there, but the theory itself seems a bit too much for me, Elowen thought, feeling overwhelmed by the depth of his knowledge.

But her impression of Cale changed drastically that night—from thinking he was weak and pitiful to realizing he was far more capable and knowledgeable than anyone at the academy suspected.