Meridians

Meridians in the Forge of Destiny setting are not that dissimilar to the concept of meridians in Chinese and Eastern medicine. The channels and 'gates' or exit points they represent act as the basis for much of a cultivator's spiritual anatomy and means of expressing their qi onto the world. Humans generally have many meridians to potentially open, in line with their more flexible spiritual anatomy. By contrast, spirits are born with certain meridians already locked open and carved into their bodies, with the carving of new ones being a difficult and time consuming process. Spirit-blooded hybrids can some times have more limited numbers of meridians already open at birth, which ties into the rest of their odd biology.

From an out of universe perspective meridians function as equipment slots. More meridians open may allow a cultivator to either equip more Arts at once or equip stronger, more advanced Arts, which correspondingly require more meridians to be equipped.

Although meridians cannot be closed or changed in terms of type after opening them, they can hold other Elements or be used by other Arts with a bit of time and effort on the part of the cultivator to change them.

The possible exit gates currently known about include: A form of soft cap to total meridians appears to kick in at around 54 and again at 108, where the difficulty in opening them spikes. That the White Rooms developed by Cai Shenhua grant dice based on cultivation realm to Meridian cultivation is apparently a thing of note in-universe, because of how it allows one to rather trivially overcome this limit.
 * Arms - Offensive techniques and energy projection.
 * Head - Perception techniques.
 * Heart - Techniques which create various effects in a field around the user. Usually ally supportive.
 * Legs - Movement techniques.
 * Lungs - Techniques which involve qi constructs and draining.
 * Spine - Techniques which enhanced or modified the self.