Chapter 857 Back to Basic After finishing his meal, Alex returned to his room and spent some time cultivating the Undying God's Physique while using the mask to grind down his mental power as well. At the same time, he made Pearl cultivate as well, so the entirety of his mind and body were constantly being refined to a greater degree. After cultivating until the afternoon, Alex left and returned back to the garden where he started making places in the garden where he would grow the various plants. Unfortunately, he couldn't grow any True ingredients, but growing something great wasn't his purpose here at all. His purpose was just to grow something, anything. He could garden from halfway through when the plants were already growing. He now wanted some experience in growing plants right from when they were seeds. So, Alex brought out the seeds he had prepared for this exact situation for a very long time, and started planting them based on what he found was the best arrangement. Once done, he went looking for water to water the plant, but there was none in the village. At least, not spare enough to use it on plants. But they did tell Alex what to do. So, Alex took a large bucket and walked out into the snow. After gathering a bit of snow, they told him to put it over the furnace in the kitchen, but Alex didn't need to do that. By the time he was inside the village, the snow had already melted and the water was already at normal temperature. He poured the water onto the plants and called it a day. He went to hang out with some of the guys and saw what they did. Some of the guys were in charge of handling the beasts. They had to feed them some of what grew in the gardens, and for some the sect itself provided resources. After looking around for a while, as the sun started to dip, Alex returned back to his room. Once the village grew quiet, Alex left the house and went towards the forest he was told about. In mere minutes, he arrived outside the forest and used his spiritual sense to search through it. He found quite a few beasts, but almost all of them were extraordinarily weak. He didn't know if it was due to them being continuously hunted or due to the low amount of Qi in the air. Either way, this was the perfect situation to teach Whisker how to fight. Alex found a beast very quickly and reached in front of it. He placed down and formation and immediately the barrier covered up the beast. The little Frost Hamster, with his frozen tail, looked around in terror. Alex felt a little bad for the little hamster that was just trying to survive, so he made a mental note to save him if the time came. With the hamster being in 1st Skin-Tempering realm, and weaker than Whisker, he would really have to. "Alright Whisker, time to show your power," he said. "Let's see how well you can fight." Alex grabbed him and basically threw him into the barrier where he landed on the soft snow. The Frost Hamster, even with its small intelligence knew that it was up against a rather strong enemy and had tried to run away. But seeing that it couldn't go past the barrier, the hamster was getting more and more scared. Soon, it was like a beast trapped in a corner. All it could do was fight back. "Whisker, go attack," Alex said. Whisker dashed as fast as he could… back towards Alex. "Wait, no. Attack that hamster," Alex said, but Whisker kept sending back messages that said that he was scared. "What do you mean you are scared? You are stronger than that hamster. Go fight," Alex said, but Whisker just wouldn't listen at all. Feelings of dread and terror returned back to Alex like waves through Whisker's bond with him. The little fellow really was scared of fighting. Alex frowned. As a beast that could cultivate, he expected Whisker to be able to fight, but he was still the coward that he was since long ago. Despite having the bloodline of the Undying God, he still had the attitude of a Seeking Mouse that was afraid of everything. Alex was capable of forcing Whisker to fight; their bond allowed that much to him. However, he just didn't think that it was a good thing to do, so he could only sigh. Alex himself entered the barrier and crouched down next to Whisker. "It will be alright. I'm right here, go and fight," he said. Whisker looked at Alex again as if asking, 'really?'. "Yes, I won't let that beast hurt you," Alex replied back. "Now go attack him." Whisker looked determined as he turned towards the hamster and ran in the snow. The swift movement was rather amusing to Alex's senses. The hamster used what little Qi it had to shoot icicles at Whisker, but Whisker was slightly faster and managed to dodge in time. Alex had been ready to save him, but it seemed he didn't need to. 𝚏𝗿𝗲𝐞𝐰𝚎𝕓𝐧𝚘𝘃𝗲𝐥.𝐜𝚘𝕞 Whisker ran past the icicle and arrived directly in front of the hamster. Then, he slammed into the beast. The two rodents flew into the barrier and then fell to the ground. Then, Whisker ran at the hamster again and slammed into it. "What is he…" it took a moment for Alex to realize that Whisker had no method of fighting. Alex couldn't help but slap his own forehead in frustration. He had expected the beast to be able to fight now that he was cultivating, but he had forgotten that most of the fighting power in a beast came from natural instinct that came from having lived in the wild, or from a bloodline that carried inherited memories of their ancestor. He sighed. "I will have to teach you some techniques for you to learn. I thought this was an easy way to start your journey, but we have to dive even deeper to more basic territory," Alex sighed. "Let us return home," he said and Whisker returned back to his shoulder. He was breathing a bit heavily, but aside from that, there was nothing. As for the little hamster, it was just happy that the mouse had moved away. Alex took away the barrier and the hamster ran away. Then, he returned back to the village. Inside his house, Alex placed a formation in front of him and told Whisker to pour his Qi into the formation. Whisker wasn't sure what that meant, so Alex had to show him. It took nearly 15 minutes before Whisker understood how he could release his Qi. Then, the formation flared up and different types of lights appeared on the fog that rose from it. Blue, black, and brown motes of lights floated into the air with some red hidden in them, letting Alex know what the little beast's spiritual roots were. Alex was actually quite relieved that he even had any, to begin with. Now the little beast could cultivate through Meridian Tempering realm and past that. "So, Yin is your greatest strength, huh?" he said as he looked at the information. "Given your spiritual roots, I have some ideas about what you can learn."