Wang ng listened to "Shan Lin’s" lecture, and much of it made a lot of sense. It was completely different from what he had been taught at the Holy Hall. One could say the creators of the Cultivation Academy were operating from a very high perspective. Judging by the hidden anings in the lecture, it seed they clearly understood what ascension was all about.
This was different from his Godhood. The level of the Godhood was too high—so high that while Wang ng could sense certain things, he found them very difficult to understand. Still, it had broadened his horizons, and the way Shan Lin’s lecture confird his own insights thrilled Wang ng to no end.
What was the point of cultivation?
Whether one followed the Celestial Dao or defied it, it was all just about becoming stronger.
Therefore, the Cultivation Academy treated Elental Power as a type of power to be wielded, discarding all the pompous, grandiose claims used to fool mortals.
Cultivation was neither mysterious nor esoteric; it was simply the path of pursuing power.
The first thing the Cultivation Academy did was strip away the reverence for cultivation. The next emphasis was on application.
The level of one’s Elental Power could be left to develop naturally. The focus was not on its level, but on the fundantals. How to use Elental Power to maximum effect and how to truly understand "Elental Power"—that was the key.
Blindly increasing your Elental Power level would, at best, make you a simple-minded brute with strong limbs. When has soone like that ever been considered truly powerful?
As for those from other Small Thousand Realms, unless they were above the eightieth layer—what the Small Thousand Realms referred to as the Ancestor level—they could hardly catch the Star Alliance’s eye. In the Alliance’s view, they were just fools who didn’t know how to use their power. And since their ways were already set, they had little potential for growth. However, it was another matter entirely if they reached the Great Perfection Realm.
This was where the importance of the Cultivation Academy lay. The Academy selected elite disciples from every Small Thousand Realm and trained them from the fundantals. Those who succeeded could beco mbers of the Star Alliance.
It had to be said that "Shan Lin’s" argunts were very persuasive, revolutionary even, starting from the most basic uses of Elental Power.
A Cultivator’s power was analogous to a mortal’s physical strength. The Small Thousand Realms focused on increasing that strength, whereas the Cultivation Academy emphasized how that strength was used.
There were two fundantal factors: the application of the Five Elents and the Heart Spirit.
The Five Elents within the human body are in harmony with the Celestial Dao. So, what is best?
What is most suitable is what is best. Therefore, when choosing a Cultivation Technique, it must align with one’s Five Elents Attribute. This was why Shan Lin said previous Cultivation Techniques could be discarded.
In most Small Thousand Realms, it was common to ignore the Five Elents. So even chose the wrong ones. Of course, there was no shortage of lucky people who happened to stumble upon a suitable match.
But that was chance. At the Cultivation Academy, they didn’t want chance; they demanded certainty.
The second item, and the most important one, was the Heart Spirit.
If Elental Power was the brawn, then the Heart Spirit was the brain. The moves themselves were fixed, so why did the sa Sword Technique wielded by different people have completely different killing power?
That was the effect of the Heart Spirit. Basically, sects ranked outside the top one hundred had no idea how to use the Heart Spirit. Those ranked between fifty and one hundred were aware of it, but only the top fifty had any real mastery in this area.
Therefore, coming to the Cultivation Academy was a brand-new start for every Cultivator. They should all feel fortunate; they were the lucky ones among the masses of Cultivators.
This was no longer just ’practice.’ This was true Cultivation!
’True Cultivation, huh?’
Wang ng liked Shan Lin’s tone; it was invigorating. The man was addressing the very things that had been puzzling him. The Godhood was too advanced, so much so that he could only do certain things by instinct, unable to truly unleash its power.
The reason he could so easily imitate Sword Techniques was due to the latent power of his Heart Spirit, but that was only because the techniques were low-level. If he hadn’t co to the Great Yuan Realm, he might have been led astray by flawed thods and faded into diocrity. Of course, he might have had a miraculous encounter instead, but who could say for sure?
While "Shan Lin" taught the most fundantal theories of Cultivation, he was also eroding everyone’s sense of loyalty to their sects, instilling the subconscious belief that there was only the Star Alliance, and no sects.
But it didn’t work on everyone. Wang ng was receptive to the passion in the lecture, but his thoughts were of Zhang Xiaopang and the others, far away at the Holy Hall. ’Ranked 186th, was it?’
’With there, everything will be different.’
Master Wang was certainly full of confidence.
After listening for a while, Wang ng felt a wave of weakness. This thod of teaching via an Array Technique also consud one’s Heart Spirit. In fact, it was also a test of the students’ Heart Spirit strength, to prevent them from biting off more than they could chew.
When he erged from the instructional Array Technique, Wang ng felt he had gained imnsely. To say he was "suddenly enlightened" would not be enough to describe the joy in his heart.
Sects in the typical Small Thousand Realm would describe cultivation in mysterious terms, thereby elevating their own standing and making their disciples revere them. For the average Cultivator, this wasn’t necessarily a bad thing; after all, cultivation was fraught with risk. But for a natural-born adventurer like Wang ng, that kind of secretive, roundabout approach was just confusing.
Frankly, the Holy Hall’s teaching thods conflicted with the insights from his Godhood and would have thrown Wang ng into confusion. No matter how smart he was, constantly struggling between correct and incorrect thods would have been a form of torture.
For Wang ng, this new environnt was like a fish taking to water.
But just because it was this way for him didn’t an it was the sa for everyone else. Wang ng scanned the others’ expressions. So were shocked, so were angry, and so were frustrated. Most were calm and serious. Only a tiny few were as overjoyed and excited as he was.
Wang ng didn’t linger. Although it was just a basic theory, for him it was completely revolutionary. He needed to go back and mull it over.
Tang Wei watched the scene unfold. If he had his Horse-Cutting Saber in hand, he would have undoubtedly hacked the "Shan Lin" before him to pieces. This lecture was essentially telling him to start over from scratch, to abandon everything he had so staunchly upheld.
He knew his own strength; here, he was undoubtedly at the bottom. The only thing he had left was his pride. ’What am I supposed to do?’
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