Chapter 45: The Path of Cultivation

Jiang Xuan sat cross-legged within a magic treasure long river at this moment.

There was a great bell; once its bell rang, it possessed the might to suppress chaos, invert time and space, refine yin and yang, and had the power to turn Qian Kun around.

There was a Taiji Diagram; a scroll of painting, distinguishing clarity from turbidity, fixing earth, wind, water, and fire, encompassing all things.

There was a banner, swaying slightly, possessing the power to open heaven and split earth, the might to tear chaos apart, the might to control heaven and earth, the power to shatter time and space, and the function to govern all laws.

Cauldron, sword, tower, book...

Nearly endless magic treasures tore heaven and split earth, raising sky-high raging waves in this magic treasure long river, with countless divine powers colliding violently beyond imagination.

This was also the wonder of Jiu Kong Wu Jie; originally, all things in Jiu Kong Wu Jie were empty, heaven and earth were empty, but with Jiang Xuan and others entering, thoughts circulated, and Jiu Kong Wu Jie would undergo all kinds of changes according to what living beings thought in their hearts.

Gazing upon ancient and modern futures, reflecting the martial arts most desired in one's heart.

Like Di Shi Tian seeing Nu Feng Lei's Five Thunder Transformation Ultimate Hand, dragon origin and phoenix blood clashing; now that Di Shi Tian had obtained the dragon origin, what he most urgently wanted at this moment was to obtain the Five Thunder Transformation Ultimate Hand to dispel the phoenix blood within his body and then swallow the dragon origin, so that the two divine beast powers would not conflict with each other.

As for the Xiao family brothers, what they saw was Hun Tian Four Absolutes and Wan Dao Sen Luo; neither of their inheritances was complete, lacking the final move, and they urgently wanted to perfect their divine arts.

Shen Wu Yi Fu hoped to cultivate the Scarlet Fire Divine Art, this peerless divine art of Dong Ying; its power was indeed great, and cultivating it to the Eighth Layer would be the Martial Myth Realm, but this art was extremely dangerous to cultivate, every step requiring endurance of scorching flames, and a moment's carelessness would result in both body and spirit being destroyed; most people's Scarlet Fire Divine Art would remain at the elementary stage for their entire lives, and subsequent cultivation required not only extremely high martial arts talent but also a certain amount of luck.

To reach the final layer required even more to give up everything, using fierce flames to burn the body, ultimately reaching the highest realm of the Scarlet Fire Divine Art, Ninth Turn Rebirth.

Shen Wu Yi Fu hoped to obtain the insights of Scarlet Fire Primordial Ancestor, the founder of the Scarlet Fire Divine Art, through Jiu Kong Wu Jie, and in one leap cultivate the highest realm.

As for Jiang Xuan, what was reflected was his thoughts regarding his own path of cultivation.

After cultivating the Eight Trigrams Furnace, he then cultivated the Purple Ribbon Immortal Robe and an Immortal Trapping Sword. The Eight Trigrams Furnace refined heaven and transformed earth, could refine divine soldiers and magic treasures, could refine the essence of all things, and was the foundation for improving cultivation level.

The Purple Ribbon Immortal Robe and the Immortal Trapping Sword, one for defense, one for unmatched killing and attacking methods.

To this day, Jiang Xuan's path of cultivation had completely differed from the Zhetian Method.

Especially after cultivating the Purple Ribbon Immortal Robe to cover his entire skin, Jiang Xuan once tried to operate the profound arts recorded in the Dao Scripture, only to feel that the heaven and earth spirit qi in the Bitter Sea was like silt clogged in a river, and the speed of opening the Bitter Sea was extremely slow.

The Dao Scripture, as the supreme art of the Life Wheel Sea Mi Jing, contained profound arts that were undisputedly number one under heaven, but now operating them was extremely slow, incomparable to his previous cultivation speed.

The Dao Scripture had no problem; the problem lay with Jiang Xuan himself.

Whether magic treasures fused with the fleshly body would ultimately cause the fleshly body to change, refining magic treasures within the body was equivalent to artificially creating "gates," and this conflicted with the "gates" developed by the secret realm system of the Zhetian Method.

Jiang Xuan speculated that as the rank of the magic treasures in his body increased and their number grew, this conflict would become more intense, and ultimately he might be completely unable to cultivate the Zhetian Method.

However, regarding this situation, he was not worried; his speed of swallowing heaven and earth spirit qi with the Eight Trigrams Furnace was no slower than cultivating the Dao Scripture, and if refining heavenly materials and earthly treasures into cultivation resources, its speed surpassed the ordinary by a hundred times.

Therefore, in terms of power accumulation, Jiang Xuan had the more powerful Eight Trigrams Furnace as a substitute.

The Zhetian Method cultivated the Five Great Secret Realms: Life Wheel Sea, Dao Palace, Four Extremes, Dragon Transformation, and Immortal Platform; it emphasized constantly excavating one's own potential and developing the divine treasury within the body.

The various divine bodies, tyrant bodies, Dao bodies, and holy bodies of the Zhetian World possessed a gold mine within their bodies; with just a little development, they could achieve accomplishments ordinary people could not reach in a lifetime.

These special constitutions all had extraordinary aspects in one way or another: some had extraordinary combat power, some were innately close to the Dao with ability surpassing ordinary people, or some could leave others in the dust in cultivation speed; there were many such things, too numerous to list.

Jiang Xuan's Refining System was equivalent to autonomously transforming himself into a special constitution; the Immortal Trapping Sword fused into his right arm, and with a flick of his finger, crimson sword qi reaped all under heaven—which Zhetian person would not bestow upon him the title of "Killing Sword Body"?

With the Eight Trigrams Furnace as the foundation and divine powers manifested, which Zhetian person seeing this would not exclaim that it was an ancient phenomenon, "Heaven and Earth Furnace"?

But the problem followed: his "artificial constitution" had a serious imbalance.

The Immortal Trapping Sword was a pure sword of essence, qi, and spirit, and was also cultivated using the Sword World as resources, its sharpness fully revealed; the material of the Purple Ribbon Immortal Robe was divine stone of this world, equally miraculous; but the original form of the Eight Trigrams Furnace was merely a spiritual artifact magic treasure obtained from Great Thunder Sound Temple, and compared to the previous two magic treasures, it paled in comparison.

These days, although Jiang Xuan had swallowed the Xuanyuan Sword and magic treasures obtained from Elder Han and others, refining their essence into the Eight Trigrams Furnace, compared to the Immortal Trapping Sword and Purple Ribbon Immortal Robe, it still fell far short.

The rank of the Eight Trigrams Furnace would severely limit the rank of the magic treasures it refined. If he obtained a supreme divine material, could the fire of the Eight Trigrams Furnace refine it?

Indeed, if Jiang Xuan's realm reached a certain level, ordinary materials could transform decay into magic, breaking material limits; an ordinary firewood knife could become a Main God weapon, a blade of grass could cut down sun, moon, and stars, and an ordinary Eight Trigrams Furnace might not be unable to refine heaven, earth, and the universe, becoming a true Eight Trigrams Furnace.

But with Jiang Xuan's current realm, achieving this level was unknown how many years and months away.

And if later Jiang Xuan gained insufficient insight into the Immortal Trapping Sword, as his realm rose, he instead focused on other magic treasures, causing this magic treasure's rank to be unable to rise—would the Immortal Trapping Sword ultimately be reduced to a foil?

If he only refined one magic treasure, using this magic treasure as the foundation, cultivating only this path, then one person being one magic treasure was also no problem.

Countless magic treasures, taking only one; Jiang Xuan was naturally unwilling, and moreover, walking the path of predecessors made it impossible to reach the achievements of predecessors; this was the same in any world.

Eat rice one mouthful at a time, walk the road one step at a time. When weak, facing the road beneath one's feet, only by walking on thin ice could one reach the opposite shore.

The endless magic treasure long river flowed beside Jiang Xuan; the inexhaustible radiance of magic treasures circulated, colliding and fusing, emitting one rune after another.

At this moment, Jiang Xuan was comprehending the Dao, sitting cross-legged in the illusory magic treasure long river, his Primordial Spirit immersed in the Hongmeng Treasure Mirror, both hands forming hand seals, constantly changing—that was the manifestation of his divine power magic treasures.

Dense symbols formed a storm; this was the manifestation of his inspiration, intertwining like ripples, entwining.

Countless insights surged into his mind; with insights, Jiang Xuan's mastery of his own magic treasures became more and more perfect.

Purple qi surged around his body, behind him furnace fire soared to the sky, an immortal sword hovered above his head.

Three powers intertwined, collided, fused...

Unknown how long passed, Jiang Xuan slowly opened his eyes, countless profundities circulated in his pupils, emitting an astonishing aura, only calming down after a long time.

"Done!"

A sense of joy surged in Jiang Xuan's heart; to this day, his Refining System could be considered to have entered the hall.

Refining magic treasures from divine materials and fusing them into the fleshly body; the advancement of magic treasure rank brought Jiang Xuan more insights into the Dao, which in turn drove the advancement of other magic treasures.

Thus, as time passed, any improvement in any path of Jiang Xuan would be an all-around enhancement.

(Chapter End)