At the core of the Infernal Sulfur plane, within the central array of the Incense Fire Divine Dao, ti seed to lose all aning.
Jie Ming’s consciousness did not fully imrse itself in polishing his cultivation; instead, it frequently drifted into his mind-space, lingering before the towering jade-like edifice of the Great Dao Book Pavilion.
At this mont, his consciousness-body sat cross-legged before the pavilion, cradling a simple cyan notebook warm to the touch.
Unlike most of the pavilion’s tos that recorded divine abilities and cultivation thods, this notebook was unadorned.
Its cover bore no title—only a faint line of ink that seed ready to fade at any mont: Miscellaneous Records of Seeking the Dao · On Realms.
It was not a cultivation technique, nor a heaven-defying secret art; it felt more like the idle reflections of an unknown senior tracing the origins of their path.
Yet Jie Ming read with rapt fascination, for the notebook explored the essential origins of each major realm in the immortal cultivation system.
Combining the text with his own experiences, his thoughts rose and fell like waves.
“The desire for immortality is the beginning of the Dao.”
So began the notebook, stating its thesis plainly.
It held that the creation and division of every major realm on the path of immortality stemd not from the pursuit of world-shattering power, but from living beings’ most primal, most fervent longing for eternal life.
The earliest stage, Qi Refinent—or in even more ancient terms, “Refining Qi”—arose when the ancients discovered a substance in heaven and earth called “Qi” (Spiritual Qi) that could nourish life, delay aging, and bestow extraordinary strength.
Thus they devised thods to absorb and refine it, thereby transcending mortal lifespan.
Yet re Qi refinent progressed slowly and had a high barrier to entry.
Countless people spent their entire lives without achievent, wasting their years in vain.
Thus, peerless geniuses proposed uniting the three treasures of the human body—essence, qi, and spirit—to build a foundation, allowing the three to support one another.
This made the path of cultivation steadier and more efficient, giving far more people the chance to touch immortality.
Thus was born the Foundation Establishnt stage.
Yet even Foundation Establishnt cultivators, though granted longer lives, still faced inevitable limits.
Seeing their end approaching and the immortal path still distant, predecessors blazed new trails: since the mortal flesh would eventually age and decay, why not refine all one’s essence to its utmost, condensing it into an indestructible, eternally enduring Golden Core?
With this Golden Core as the center, one could break free from the shackles of bodily decay.
Thus the Golden Core stage ca into being.
With an undying body, immortality seed achieved.
Yet cultivators soon discovered that bodily eternity did not guarantee eternal soul or self; the soul that represented “I” would still decay with ti.
The goal of immortality remained unfulfilled.
Thus the pursuit continued.
How to make the “self” harder to destroy?
The ancients fused “spirit”—representing soul and consciousness—with the immortal “essence” (the Golden Core), giving birth to the Nascent Soul.
The Nascent Soul was the condensed essence of a cultivator’s life and consciousness. From this point onward, cultivators completely transcended the constraint of lifespan.
At the Nascent Soul stage, the simple desire for longevity seed provisionally satisfied.
But… people die when they are killed.
Even the wondrous Nascent Soul was not invincible.
To truly safeguard this hard-won fruit of immortality in a world full of danger, to prevent others from easily taking their lives, the primary aim of cultivation after Nascent Soul quietly shifted—from pursuing longevity to seeking the power to protect the Dao.
The Spirit Transformation stage was born from this need.
The core of “Spirit Transformation” lay in using every available internal and external force to dramatically enhance recovery, survivability, and combat power—making oneself far harder to kill.
To achieve Spirit Transformation, one had to take the three treasures—essence, qi, and spirit—that were initially united in Foundation Establishnt but later skewed toward Golden Core and Nascent Soul, and perform a complete, perfect reunification and sublimation at a higher level of existence.
Moreover, since Spirit Transformation cultivators already possessed near-infinite lifespan, they had ample ti to delve deeply into arts of combat and protection, and to explore the deeper “principles” of heaven and earth.
In wizard terms, they began systematically and profoundly researching “laws.”
“Thus, the Spirit Transformation stage is fundantally a realm dedicated to enhancing combat and survival capabilities while laying a solid life foundation for deeper exploration of the Great Dao (laws),” Jie Ming concluded, closing the notebook. Cyan light flowed back into the pavilion as his consciousness-body revealed a look of deep emotion.
Indeed, every mature power system bore the deep imprint of the culture and core desires of the civilization that birthed it.
The immortal cultivation civilization arose from the ultimate pursuit of individual “longevity and vision of eternity,” “freedom between heaven and earth.” Each realm’s evolution revolved tightly around extending lifespan and protecting that longevity.
Every step brimd with exploration of life’s essence and obsession with continued existence.
In contrast, the wizard civilization originated from an infinite thirst for knowledge and truth.
To acquire more knowledge and understand the world’s essence, they needed stronger perception, computational power, and the ability to interfere with reality.
Thus, wizard rank advancent focused more on qualitative leaps in ntal strength, upgrades to computational architecture, and efficiency in analyzing and applying specific laws.
That was why third-ring wizards already possessed the basic perception needed to study laws.
Yet in terms of lifespan, even sixth-ring wizards—if they did not regularly take longevity potions or undergo bio-modifications—had quite “limited” lives.
Different starting points, different paths, vastly different ways of wielding power.
Wizards and cultivators of the sa tier might possess similar total energy or destructive force, yet their internal logic and expressions differed like night and day.
Yet fascinatingly, when these two paths reached their extres—whether immortal cultivators becoming true immortals or wizards reaching eighth- or ninth-ring—they faintly pointed toward similar endpoints.
“Truly… different roads leading to the sa goal, yet each with its own splendor.” Jie Ming’s consciousness-body slowly dissipated, returning to reality.
Within the central array, Jie Ming, seated cross-legged, slowly opened his eyes.
Starlight seed to swirl within his pupils before settling into serene clarity.
The earlier reading and reflection had been like a clear spring, washing away the slight tension accumulated from long research and breakthrough preparation.
It gave him a clearer, more essential understanding of the Spirit Transformation realm he was about to enter.
At this mont, he clearly felt his internal state had reached perfect harmony and completion; essence, qi, and spirit resonated in exquisite balance at a delicate critical point.
The Nascent Soul in his dantian glowed softly, eager and ready.
The Ring of Truth spun steadily in his sea of consciousness, providing powerful spiritual backing.
The body tempered by the Body Forging Art was like a drawn bowstring, brimming with surging power.
The mont had co; everything was ready.
“The ti is right. Then… let us begin.”
Jie Ming murmured to himself, closed his eyes, and sank his mind into his dantian, beginning to circulate the profound thod recorded in the Qi Refinent Art specifically for breaking through from Nascent Soul to Spirit Transformation.
There were no heaven-shaking phenona, no painful struggle.
Under the command of a fourth-ring wizard’s imnse spiritual force, the entire process was unimaginably smooth—like gently pushing open a door that had long been ajar.
Within his dantian, the Nascent Soul that looked identical to him began to slowly “grow.”
Yet this growth was not re increase in size, but an essential “diffusion” and “fusion.”
The Nascent Soul’s radiance grew ever brighter while its form beca increasingly translucent, gradually transforming into a chaotic yet brilliant mass of spiritual light.
This light did not leave the dantian. Instead, like rcury spilling across the ground or spring sun lting snow, it flowed in reverse along predetermined ridians and vessels, spreading upward.
It re-fused, at the deepest level, with every inch of Jie Ming’s flesh, every bone, every cell.
Not the Nascent Soul leaving the body, but spirit and form achieving perfect unity on a higher dinsion.
An indescribable sense of “wholeness” filled Jie Ming’s entire being.
It was as though the invisible, microscopic barrier that had always existed between Nascent Soul and body had been utterly shattered.
Before, though he could command his Nascent Soul as easily as his own limbs, it still required conscious effort.
Now, he was the Nascent Soul, and the Nascent Soul was he.
Essence, qi, and spirit reached an unprecedented harmony and unity—circulating endlessly, generating life without cease.
The already ocean-vast spiritual power within him seed infused with new vitality and spirituality, flowing with even greater smoothness and freedom.
Recovery speed beca astonishing: with a re thought, depleted spiritual power could be replenished by madly absorbing ambient energy through every pore or instantly regenerated from internal circulation.
An illusion of “near-infinite spiritual power” arose spontaneously.
The raw quantity of ntal strength, fixed by his wizard rank, did not explode due to the cultivation breakthrough.
Yet Jie Ming keenly sensed that his precision of control and efficiency of application had leaped several tiers.
Operations that once required utmost caution now felt as natural as moving a finger.
The breadth, depth, and speed of his thinking had all markedly improved.
Direct physical enhancent was not particularly pronounced—after all, the Body Forging Art had long forged his body far beyond peers.
But that feeling of “perfect roundness,” “inner and outer unity,” seed to raise his body’s defense, recovery, and adaptive evolution against all forms of damage to new heights.
The change that delighted Jie Ming most, however, occurred on the level of cognition.
His mind beca extraordinarily clear and calm. Difficult problems from past research now yielded insights from new angles with just a little thought—sotis even direct answers.
His perception of the surroundings reached an entirely new realm.
He no longer needed to actively cast spells; through re sight, hearing, touch, even the most basic sense of “presence,” he could vaguely “see” the flow of elents in the air, the paths of energy veins, the minute vibrations of material structures…
It was as though all things in existence were “speaking” to him of the principles governing their operation.
With a thought, his gaze fell upon a cup of ordinary water he had prepared beside the array.
No incantation, no spellcasting, not even an obvious energy fluctuation.
He simply “thought” of making the water disappear.
The next instant, in Jie Ming’s perception, the most fundantal material particles composing the water—the primal “earth” elental base state in wizard theory—had their activity “dialed down” by an invisible force.
Not alchemical decomposition and conversion, but sothing closer to… temporarily shifting from an active state of existence toward stillness or dissipation.
The cup remained in his hand, yet the water within had been erased as though by the most masterful eraser—silently vanishing.
No steam, no residue, as if it had never existed.
“The threshold for manipulable elental activity has dropped dramatically… So this is the preliminary application of ‘Dao’ when fourth-ring wizardry combines with Spirit Transformation? It shares the sa wonder as wizard law manipulation, yet approaches from the essence of ‘existence’ and ‘change’…” Marvelous light flashed in Jie Ming’s eyes.
He imdiately tested his commonly used observation spell: All-Purpose Eye.
When activated, this spell collected every observable datum within range without omission.
Energy spectra, material composition, microscopic structures, life fluctuations, even the faintest spiritual remnants—the volu of information was staggering.
Previously, even after reaching fourth-ring and vastly increasing his ntal strength, Jie Ming could only maintain All-Purpose Eye’s effective radius at four or five ters around himself.
Beyond that, the flood of raw, unprocessed data would overwhelm his consciousness and cause “ntal crash.”
Now, All-Purpose Eye activated silently.
Hum…
The familiar torrent of information poured in.
Yet what Jie Ming felt was not burden, but effortless reception and sorting.
With a re thought, the observation range rippled outward like water.
Five ters, eight ters, ten ters… twelve ters!
Everything within a twelve-ter radius lay completely within his “eye”!
Moreover, the fineness and dinsionality of information processing far surpassed before.
He could “see” the dynamic balance of faith power and Spiritual Qi conversion within the Incense Fire Divine Dao energy network.
He could “see” the slow isotopic decay of several inert elents deep within the rocks beneath his feet due to prolonged geothermal heat.
He could “see” the extrely subtle polarization phenona of different attribute elental energies in the air caused by the plane’s characteristics…
This was no longer re observation; it approached omniscient insight.
Jie Ming had no doubt that the current precision and processing power of All-Purpose Eye alone could replace most standard laboratory instrunts for routine material and energy analysis!
“Spirit Transformation… so this is the benefit of unifying all power.” Jie Ming slowly withdrew the spell, a sincere smile lifting the corners of his mouth.
Sublimation of life, leap in cognition, the first manifestation of ability to interfere with the world’s essence.
This was not rely an increase in combat strength; it was a trendous leap in his capacity as a researcher to explore truth.
He slowly rose, feeling the new power flowing endlessly within him—perfectly unified, whole and complete—and turned his gaze toward the depths of the Incense Fire Divine Dao network.
Spirit Transformation achieved; the road ahead lay wider still.
It was ti to put all the theories and insights accumulated over the years into practice.
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