Elemental Attunement II (Patreon)

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Are elements always something concrete like fire, earth, poison, etc? Or can they be more abstract? Like void, time, space, life or love?

Elements are usually something concrete. It’s easier to train with something you can interact with. However, there are some exceptions and some things that look like exceptions that aren’t.

We’ll start with emotions. It is possible for a person to color their Qi with their emotions, sometimes even without meaning to. When a strong cultivator gets angry, people can literally feel their anger. It’s hard not to. In some cases, the anger might be strong enough that it might be considered an attack, but that’s not the same as a hypothetical Anger Element.

However, there are also things like Lu Mei’s charm techniques. When Lu Mei uses a Charm technique, she’s actually using Yin Qi to produce and enforce an emotional reaction in her target. In this case, attraction. In other words, the Yin Element would be the closest to an Emotion Element.

Another case that can be talked about here is the Xiao Sect and its Void Techniques. For example, the Void Fist. When someone like Xiao Fang uses the Void Fist, he’s creating a vacuum. He’s using his Qi to force everything out of a selected space. In that sense, the technique is more of an Air one.

More advanced techniques lead to more esoteric effects, so you can say the Void Element is a subset or refinement of the Air Element.

Can all elements be refined? Say you start out with metal qi, refine it into iron qi, steel qi, and so on?

Yes.

The Earth element is a good example of this. You can start with Earth, refine it to Metal, then go to more specific types of metal.

Bei Hong’s Gold Element is that. He went Earth > Metal > Gold.

That said, it is not necessary to start with Earth. That’s just how the Bei Clan trains its members because they believe starting with a broader base is better. They are not necessarily wrong about that.

How rare is it to have more than one element? While learning any element may be possible, does learning one box you out of others, practically speaking?

It is not rare for good cultivators to pick up more than one element. That said, most people tend to favor using only one element even if they know more.

Some elements are more compatible with each other than others. Learning Fire makes it extremely difficult to ever learn Water. So yes, in that sense, learning an element may lock you out of others.

Okay, what about Dao? How does that factor into your element?

*wiggles hand*

Going back to the refinement thing, you can say there is a point where your element is refined into a You Element.

Lord Feng Gui reached a point where the Fire Element led him to Destruction Dao.

That said, your element doesn’t always influence your Dao. It’s just extremely likely to do so, but not necessarily in ways that are immediately obvious.