Chapter 396

At the core of the Purgatory Sulfur Plane, inside the hub magic array of the Incense God Dao, time seemed to have lost its meaning.

Jie Ming's consciousness was not completely immersed in the polishing of his cultivation, but often sank into his own consciousness space, lingering in that 【Great Dao Book Pavilion】 that was as towering as white jade carving.

At this moment, his consciousness body was sitting cross-legged in front of the Great Dao Book Pavilion, holding a cyan notebook that felt warm to the touch.

The material of the notebook was different from most of the classics recording magical powers and cultivation methods in the book pavilion, appearing more simple.

There was no name on the cover, only a line of faint ink marks that seemed to dissipate at any time: "Miscellaneous Records of Asking the Dao · Realm Interpretation".

This was not a cultivation method, nor a shocking secret technique, but more like an unknown predecessor who had nothing to do, tracing and thinking about the path he had taken.

Jie Ming read it with great interest, because what this notebook discussed was precisely the essence of every realm of a cultivator.

Combined with the content of the book and his own knowledge, Jie Ming's thoughts rose and fell with it.

"The desire for longevity is the beginning of the Dao path."

The notebook started with the meaning.

It believed that the creation and division of every major realm on the path of cultivation, its most primitive driving force, was not for the power to destroy heaven and earth, but originated from the simplest and strongest desire of living beings for "immortality".

The earliest "Qi Refining", or more anciently called "Refining Qi", was that the sages discovered that there was a kind of "Qi" (spiritual energy) between heaven and earth that could nourish life, delay aging, and bring extraordinary power.

So they groped for the method of absorbing and refining, thereby transcending the mortal lifespan.

However, simply refining Qi, progress was slow, and the threshold was also high.

Countless people struggled all their lives, but it was difficult to achieve anything, wasting time in vain.

So, there were brilliant people who proposed to integrate the three treasures of the human body "essence, energy, and spirit" to "build a foundation" as a platform, and the three treasures helped each other.

Making the path of cultivation become more stable and efficient, allowing more people to have the possibility of touching longevity.

This was the Foundation Establishment Stage.

But although the lifespan of Foundation Establishment cultivators increased, it was ultimately limited.

Seeing that the deadline was approaching and the immortal path was slim, there were predecessors who took another path: since the mortal body would eventually age and decay, why not refine and compress the "essence" of the body to the extreme, and cast a "Jin Dan" that is "indestructible through ten thousand calamities and eternal"?

With this Jin Dan as the core, one could get rid of the shackles of physical aging.

The Jin Dan Realm came into being.

The body is immortal, it seems that longevity has been achieved.

However, cultivators soon discovered that physical eternity does not represent spiritual infinity, and the soul representing "self" will also decay with time.

The goal of longevity has not been fully achieved.

So, the pursuit continued.

How to make "self" less likely to be destroyed?

The sages combined the "spirit" representing soul and consciousness with the immortal "essence" (Jin Dan) to conceive the "Nascent Soul".

The Nascent Soul is the essence of the cultivator's life and consciousness. It can be said that from this moment on, the cultivator has completely got rid of the restrictions of "lifespan".

At the Nascent Soul Realm, the simple desire for "longevity" seems to have been satisfied in stages.

But... if a person is killed, they will die.

Although the Nascent Soul is wonderful, it is not invincible.

In order to truly "protect" this hard-won longevity fruit in this dangerous world, and in order not to be easily taken away by others, the main purpose of cultivators' practice quietly changed after the Nascent Soul—shifting more from pursuing "longevity" to pursuing the power of "protecting the Dao".

The Soul Transformation Realm was born under this demand.

The core of so-called "Soul Transformation" lies in using all available internal and external forces to greatly improve the cultivator's recovery ability, survival ability, and combat ability, making themselves more "difficult to kill".

To this end, promotion to Soul Transformation requires a thorough and perfect reintegration and sublimation of the three treasures of "essence, energy, and spirit" that were initially integrated during Foundation Establishment and later had different focuses due to Jin Dan and Nascent Soul, at a higher life level.

Also because Soul Transformation cultivators already possess near-infinite lifespan, they have sufficient time to delve into the techniques of fighting and protecting the Dao, and to explore the deeper "principles" between heaven and earth.

In wizard terms, it is to start systematically and deeply studying "laws".

"So, the Soul Transformation Realm is essentially a realm specialized in improving combat power, survival power, and laying a solid life foundation for deeply exploring the Great Dao (laws)." Jie Ming closed the notebook, the cyan light sank into the book pavilion, and his consciousness body showed a look of emotion.

Sure enough, any mature power system is deeply imprinted with the cultural heritage and core demands of the civilization that gave birth to it.

The cultivation civilization originates from the ultimate pursuit of individual "longevity and vision" and "wandering in heaven and earth", and its realm evolution revolves tightly around how to extend lifespan and how to protect this longevity fruit.

Every step is full of exploration of the essence of life and persistence in "survival".

In contrast, the wizard civilization originates from the infinite thirst for "knowledge" and "truth".

In order to obtain more knowledge and understand the essence of the world, they need stronger perception ability, computing power, and the ability to interfere with reality.

Therefore, the improvement of wizard level is often more focused on the qualitative change of spiritual power, the upgrade of computing architecture, and the efficiency of analyzing and applying specific laws.

So Tier 3 wizards begin to possess the basic perception to study laws.

But in terms of lifespan, even for Tier 6 wizards, if they don't take longevity medicine or undergo biochemical transformation to continue, their lifespan is quite "limited".

The two have different starting points, different paths, and the ways of using power are also very different.

Wizards and cultivators of the same level may have similar total energy or destructive power, but the internal logic and performance forms are worlds apart.

However, interestingly, when these two paths reach a very high level—whether it is an immortal of cultivation or a Tier 8 or Tier 9 wizard—they vaguely point to a similar end point.

"Really... different paths lead to the same destination, but each has its own merits." Jie Ming's consciousness body dissipated slowly and returned to reality.

Inside the hub magic array, Jie Ming, who was sitting cross-legged, opened his eyes slowly.

There seemed to be stars flowing in his eyes, and then returned to clarity and calmness.

The reading and thinking just now were like a clear spring, washing away the tension in his mind caused by long-term research and preparation for the breakthrough.

Allowing him to have a clearer and more essential cognition of the "Soul Transformation" realm he was about to step into.

At this moment, he clearly felt that his internal state was perfect, essence, energy, and spirit resonated harmoniously, reaching a subtle critical point.

The Nascent Soul was shining in the dantian, eager to try.

The Ring of Truth was rotating stably in the spiritual sea, providing a powerful spiritual power backing.

The body tempered by the "Body Forging Method" was like a bowstring ready to go, full of surging power.

The opportunity has arrived, and water flows to form a canal.

"The time has come, then... let's start."

Jie Ming whispered, closed his eyes, sank his mind into the dantian, and began to run the mysterious method recorded in the "Qi Refining Method" specifically used for breaking through from Nascent Soul to Soul Transformation.

There was no earth-shattering vision, no difficult and painful barrier breaking.

Under the leadership of the powerful spiritual power of a Tier 4 wizard, the whole process was smoother than imaginable, as if just pushing open a door that had been left ajar.

In the dantian, that Nascent Soul that looked exactly like him began to "grow" slowly with the operation of the formula.

But this "growing" was not a simple expansion of volume, but a kind of essential "diffusion" and "fusion".

The light of the Nascent Soul became brighter and brighter, but its form became more and more transparent, gradually turning into a chaotic and bright spiritual light.

This spiritual light did not leave the dantian, but like mercury pouring to the ground, and like spring sun melting snow, flowed upward along the predetermined meridians and blood vessels, spreading upward.

Re-fusing with every inch of skin, every bone, every cell of Jie Ming's body... at the deepest level.

It was not the Nascent Soul leaving the body, but the perfect unification of "spirit" and "form" at a higher dimension.

A kind of indescribable sense of "completeness" filled Jie Ming's entire body and mind.

As if the thin invisible membrane between the Nascent Soul and the body before was completely broken.

Before this, Jie Ming's manipulation of his Nascent Soul, although as easy as moving his arm, ultimately consumed his mind.

But now, he is the Nascent Soul, and the Nascent Soul is him.

The three treasures of essence, energy, and spirit reached an unprecedented harmonious unification at this moment, circulating back and forth, endless.

The spiritual power that was originally vast like the sea in his body seemed to be injected with new vitality and spirituality, running more smoothly and freely.

The recovery speed was even amazingly fast, almost as soon as a thought moved, the consumed spiritual power could be madly absorbed from the surrounding pores to supplement, or instantly regenerated from the internal circulation.

A kind of illusion that "spiritual power is almost infinite" arose spontaneously.

The "quantity" of spiritual power was fixed due to the wizard level, and did not surge due to the cultivation breakthrough.

But Jie Ming keenly noticed that his "control precision" and "application efficiency" of spiritual power jumped several levels.

The fine mental operations that required carefulness in the past could now be achieved almost as easily as moving his arm, with just a slight movement of his mind.

The breadth, depth, and speed of thinking were all significantly improved.

The direct strengthening of the body was not obvious, after all, the "Body Forging Method" had long tempered his physique far beyond his peers.

But that kind of "round and flawless", "internal and external integration" feeling made the body's defense, recovery, and "self-adaptive" evolution ability to various injuries seem to rise with the tide.

And the change that made Jie Ming most happy came from the "cognitive" level.

His head became unusually clear and calm, and some difficult problems in research in the past could now be inspired from different angles with just a little thought, or even directly get the answer.

His perception of the surrounding environment also reached a brand new realm.

He didn't need to deliberately use witchcraft, just through vision, hearing, touch, and even the most basic "sense of existence", he could vaguely "see" the flow of elements in the air, the direction of energy veins, the subtle vibration of material structure...

As if everything in the world was "telling" him the "principles" of their own operation.

His mind moved slightly, and his gaze fell on a cup of ordinary clear water prepared beside the magic array.

No chanting, no casting, not even obvious energy fluctuations.

He just "thought" about letting this cup of water "disappear".

The next moment, in Jie Ming's "perception", the most basic "material particles" constituting this cup of water—understood in wizard theory, can correspond to the most primitive "earth" elemental ground state—their activity was "lowered" by an invisible force.

It was not the decomposition and transformation of alchemy, but closer to... from the active state of "existence", temporarily tending to "stillness" or "dissipation".

The cup was still in his hand, but the water in the cup, like being erased by the most brilliant eraser, disappeared silently.

No steam, no residue, as if it had never existed.

"The threshold of controllable elemental activity has been significantly lowered... is this the preliminary application of Tier 4 wizard combined with Soul Transformation stage to 'Dao'? Sure enough, it has the same effect as the law manipulation of wizards, but the angle of entry is more biased toward the essence of 'existence' and 'change'..." Jie Ming's eyes were full of brilliance.

He immediately tried his commonly used observation witchcraft: 【Eye of All-Use】.

Once this witchcraft is activated, it will collect all observable information within the casting range in great detail.

Energy spectrum, material composition, microscopic structure, life fluctuations, and even extremely weak mental residues... the amount of information is terrifying.

In the past, even after Jie Ming advanced to a Tier 4 wizard, his spiritual power increased greatly, he could only barely maintain the effective range of 【Eye of All-Use】 within a radius of four or five meters around him.

Beyond this range, massive amounts of unprocessed original information would overwhelm his consciousness processing ability, leading to "brain crash".

At this moment, 【Eye of All-Use】 activated silently.

Hum...

Familiar massive information flow poured into his consciousness.

But what Jie Ming felt was not a burden, but a kind of "receiving" and "combing" that was more than enough.

His mind moved slightly, and the observation range expanded rapidly like water waves.

Five meters, eight meters, ten meters... twelve meters!

Everything within a radius of twelve meters was in the "eye"!

And the precision and dimension of information processing far exceeded the past.

He could even "see" the dynamic balance process of the subtle faith power and spiritual energy conversion in the Incense God Dao energy network.

He could "see" the isotope decay slowly occurring in the rocks under his feet during long-term geothermal heat.

He could "see" the extremely subtle polarization phenomenon produced by elemental energy of different attributes in the air due to plane characteristics...

This was no longer just "observation", but closer to a kind of "omniscience"-like insight.

Jie Ming had no doubt that the observation precision and information processing ability of 【Eye of All-Use】 at this moment alone were enough to replace most of the precision instruments used for conventional material and energy analysis in the laboratory!

"Soul Transformation... this is the benefit of integrating all power brought by Soul Transformation." Jie Ming retracted the witchcraft slowly, a sincere smile hooking on the corners of his mouth.

The sublimation of life, the leap of cognition, the preliminary manifestation of the ability to interfere with the essence of the world.

This is not just an improvement in combat power, but a huge leap in his ability as a "researcher" to explore truth.

He stood up slowly, feeling the brand-new power flowing endlessly and perfectly in his body, and his gaze cast toward the depths of the Incense God Dao network.

Soul Transformation is achieved, and the road ahead is wider.

It is time to put the theories and insights accumulated over these years into practice.

(Only this chapter today, I need to organize the new plane plot behind.)

(End of chapter)