V3C53: Semblance of Eternity

Wei Yi was able to endure several minutes of fighting against herself, after which she got out of the Realm of Potential to observe whether or not this experiment had ended up benefitting her in the slightest.

As it turned out, it had done quite a lot. Her muscles had indeed remained active after she had gone into the Realm of Potential with her mind, proving that it allowed her to carry on with continuous, simple tasks even without her overseeing them personally, and it appeared sufficient to even continue at full efficiency, while her personal participation might occasionally sway from absolute perfection. Her refinement and training of spiritual will and killing intent, which she put through the Third Eye and a few training techniques, was also able to carry on at the same high level, although her current methods did little to energy of the fifth realm.

Perhaps the most noticeable was her practise of the Ascendant’s Path technique. It was easily the strongest cultivation method that she possessed, and that was made obvious by the whirlpool of planar energy that had formed while she hadn’t been outside of her body, leaving behind an entirely empty area of energy around her.

This did cause her to realise another aspect of her current step in cultivation, and that was that she would need far more planar energy to increase her stage than she had anticipated. Through several minutes of absorbing a denser energy than in the Planar Continents, she had made a slight degree of progress, but it was blatantly less than it should have been. In other words, she had encountered the famous bottleneck of a realm four stages early, and it would be very unlikely for her not to encounter another one at the proper time.

Despite the obviously increased amount of effort that she would need to invest into the following breakthrough, it also meant that the change and growth that she would receive from it, either now or in the future, would be substantial enough to warrant such a roadblock.

Given that she was already really curious what the stable shattering of a planar anchor could accomplish, this made her curiosity grow even further, and made her contemplate what to call this particular advancement, especially so that she wouldn’t need to change the name the moment that it turned out to be something entirely different to what she was expecting due to her impression of the intended path of cultivation.

Names weren’t essential, but they were one of the few things that she could consider prior to truly knowing the abilities of a shattered anchor, and it was also something that she would still need to spend quite some time on, seeing as her ideas for names were being exhausted with every stage and realm that she had to name, as well as every technique.

One of the ideas that was firmer in her mind than most was the concept of perpetuity and eternity that pervaded the names of the final realms of cultivation, and it was something that she was, technically touching upon due to the presence of the nascent rift within her anchor. If the next breakthrough had something to do with it, or perhaps made way for it to eventually be integrated into an Imperfect Rift, the eighth realm, then it would also be fitting to call it something that was related to these concept.

Naturally, while she was pondering this, she wasn’t just idly sitting around. Since the area around her was mostly devoid of planar energy now, and would be that way for a little while until it filled up once more, she quickly transported herself to the other side of the prison realm and repeated her earlier attempt with far more surety, creating slightly different opponents that would require less mental concentration but more physical force to be exerted in order to be defeated, then continued thinking.

For a while, a short while, everything was quiet save for the sounds of colliding blades and the cuts of flesh, although that was hardly off-putting to someone who lived in the prison realm for so long.

When she left the Realm of Potential for a second time, she found that an even larger quantity of planar energy had been taken from the air around her, perhaps due to the fact that everyone within the Silver Side, which it soon wouldn’t be called due to the fact that the silver and crimson from both sides was being replaced with more natural colours every day, with only a few particularly unique items of that colour being likely to remain after enough time passed, was within the four primary settlements. Since she was effectively taking in a sixth of the energy within the entire prison realm over these two planar energy intakes, her total accumulation rose significantly more quickly than a normal cultivator’s might have, but the second cultivation session appeared to achieve even less than the first.

That was only on first glance, however. When she viewed the five-sided planar anchor within her body and at the centre of the prison realm in greater detail, she saw that the black stone was slightly brighter than before, albeit without actually gaining any lightness, as odd as that might sound, and that it gained a slight crystalline texture that had been absent from it previously.

It wasn’t sufficient for anyone to notice it on first, second, or the fiftieth glance if they weren’t looking for it, as was made obvious by a brief inspection of those within the prison realm that were observing her anchor while she had been cultivating, but it was clear that it was slowly progressing towards something greater with the vast amount of energy that she had absorbed. So long as this continued in the same direction, the final state of the anchor by the next stage would be crystalline, much like her planar energy was.

With this knowledge, an image was conjured within her mind of a great monolith that bulged outwards, containing a glowing sphere of cosmic violet light within a prison of crystal strands of varying thickness, various forms of energy arcing and surging through them in an imitation of the current arrangement. It might not necessarily be the true conclusion for her anchor, but it was certainly a plausible one, causing her to think of the name of the Endless Monolith.

So long as she survived, it could last forever, and with the nascent rift within it that would grow the more effort she invested into developing it, the energy within it would also never be exhausted, no matter where she ended up or what she did. Such a thing would be deserving of such a name.

‘That is only if I’m not making things up right now, which, technically, I am, so I’ll need to wait and see what the true Endless Monolith shall be. Maybe it will resemble those silver sprites in that it will have a top and bottom that are then orbited by a number of pieces that contain the energy of different elements, or perhaps it will collapse into a whirlpool of pure energy that somehow functions like an anchor…’ Wei Yi pondered, contemplating how plausible any of those options even was, ‘Well, I don’t know, and I won’t figure it out just by thinking. I’ll need to continue observing, paying attention, and trying to make sure that I am not doing anything counterproductive…’

She glanced at the interface of the Truth of the Universe, noting the hundreds of anchor energy points that were not being used at the moment.

‘Hm… I have certain techniques that I understand well enough to be able to advance them without worrying about them being corrupted by the Truth of the Universe, which simultaneously increases the quantity of my planar energy in order to make up for the cultivation that I had skipped, so I could skip a little closer by using up some of these points…’ she thought as she looked through the list of her techniques and their current stages.

Perhaps one of the simplest techniques that she had, while also knowing the most about how to progress it, was the Heeled Balance art, and it was also the most useful for her as further developments would allow her to move at an even greater speed and precision than she could without heels.

As such, it would naturally be a good choice for the development of her cultivation, and, since it was hardly the most complex thing under her belt, nor the technique with the greatest comprehension of any Dao out there, it would not cost her all that many anchor points to advance, even if she tried to push it into several stages. In theory, any technique that was as simple a burst of planar energy being propelled through the arm’s meridians could be elevated to an immense realm before any semblance of a Dao would be unveiled, although that did carry the potential danger of uncovering a Dao of simplicity or absolute force.

Despite that potential threat, or rather due to it, she immediately composed a technique of that nature.

Deciding on the best route through the body was easy, and since she didn’t want to transform her energy in any particular way, she couldn’t make the technique complex even if she wanted to. Using it once, she immediately confirmed a number of ways in which to make this more efficient, more difficult to dodge, more useful against multiple enemies, but she had to stop herself before this became a reasonable combat technique, since that would evade the entire point of the technique, and greatly raise the cost of developing the technique.

She considered any options to make it even less complex, implemented one that did work, and then decided to name it Absolute Force, causing the text within the interface of the Truth of the Universe to change to that name.

At the moment, it was classed as Uninitiated, so she followed her understanding of the costs of advancing any one technique and willed it to advance as much as it was able to with a single point.

Since she always made use of the explicit options available on the interface, she wasn’t sure whether or not that would actually accomplish anything, but when a point disappeared from her interface, and planar energy violently surged out from her dantian, she knew that it worked. The label for Absolute Force blurred, then trembled four times, pausing after that, then trembled five more times, with each one forcing even greater quantities of energy to burst out.

Due to the nature of the technique, it demanded far more energy than anything with even a semblance of refinement, and thus the quantity of planar energy that appeared within her body matched the amount that would typically be needed for a far, far better and stronger technique than this one. It pushed her even further into the fifth stage, the planar anchor within her getting purer once more, but it was still far from being enough. She checked the interface and found that it had grown all the way to the Fifth Stage with just a single point of anchor energy, which, while impressive in its own right, as the force that it released would match a normal combat technique now, gave her another idea.

‘Due to the particularities of my planar energy, I can heal and strengthen myself through injury, hence the masochistic approach that I am so often forced to take. Then, why don’t I simultaneously damage myself, and recover it?’ she smiled, ‘Why guide planar energy at all?’

Just like that, Absolute Rupture, a technique that didn’t even bother to guide energy through the meridians, was born.

With one point, it practically flew straight into the Ninth Stage, a total of thirteen bursts of energy surging into her, making yet another minor advancement. With no guidance towards her arms, no guidance through meridians, and a method that practically begged the energy being used to tear the cultivator’s body apart, it was a technique that could be released all around her body, instantly damaging it as much as a failed talisman of the third realm would, despite the absolute inefficiency, stupidity, and outright insanity of this technique.

However, in a way, that contributed to the absolute nature of this technique.

‘Wait a minute…’ she paused, raising her hand and releasing a little bit of energy to confirm her suspicion, ‘Unburdened and unfettered, unrelenting and unceasing… The basic path of the Absolute Dao… Fuck, I did something stupid again… Means that it’s time to go even further into insanity, then. I wonder, how far can I push my first piece of the Dao?’

She decided to even out her quantity of anchor energy points in one go an expend eleven points on developing Absolute Rupture further, since it could allow her to completely ignore the necessity for high-realm failed talismans in her physique cultivation, although she would need to be careful not to raise its power too significantly if she didn’t want to bring herself to the edge of death each time that she used the technique. With the rise of a Dao, all things under it were elevated, as one’s very being slowly connected to the true nature of the world, to the Great Dao itself, so it would be far more difficult for her to hold back the power of any Absolute skill with any advancements within the Absolute Dao.

The label of Absolute Rupture faded again, and it began to rumble again and again. Each time, more and more energy was drawn into her body from seemingly nowhere, although it was obvious to her that the anchor energy, whatever it was, could easily be traded into planar energy, as well as power for the calculative abilities of the Truth of the Universe to decipher some method of progression for her techniques.

Regarding that particular otherworldly gift, she was not concerned about it affecting her progress at the moment as there was very little that could be done with the Absolute techniques, as she technically understood how they were meant to function already. All that the Truth of the Universe could do in this situation is complete the advancement for her, since it could add nor subtract nothing.

Just like that, in an unreasonably fast and efficient manner, her cultivation seemed to near the peak of the fifth stage, although the gulf between it and her next step seemed to remain just as large as before. Her anchor had clearly changed significantly, and those who looked upon it were naturally able to tell this, especially due to the short time in which these changes occurred. Whether for better or worse, most lacked sufficient knowledge regarding anchors as a whole to even begin to comprehend what they were seeing, but most eyes were still drawn towards the towering anchor in the center of the prison realm.

As for her Absolute Rupture, it reached the absolutely immense Seventy-Sixth Stage, equaling the power of a low-grade fifth realm failed talisman, although what was far more notable was the appearance of a new section of the Truth of the Universe interface labelled simply as ‘Dao’. Within it, she saw the Ascendant’s Dao, within which were contained the Cultivation Dao, Combat Dao, Movement Dao and Crafting Dao of the same names, with the overall category being classed at Full Success, then the Absolute Dao, labelled to be at the level of Minor Achievement.

The fact that she already possessed a mostly complete Dao was good, but she was aware that it mostly meant that she understood her own path, not the true depth of reality. Whether or not the Ascendant’s Dao existed prior to her, or if she outright created it, it would need to be elaborated out of herself and into the world around her before it could truly count.

Meanwhile, the Absolute Dao could bring her some benefits even at this low stage, as it began from the derivation of an external concept. It could empower all of her attacks, removing restrictions and limitations from them until they would become naught but absolute, ignoring any and all defences, obstacles, distractions, diversions and whatever else, although that would not be achieved in full until the Full Success stage at the very least, and possibly some obscenely high stage at the most, since this was a simple yet incredibly high level concept. Something like a Fire Dao would likely count as a mildly complex and medium level concept, meaning that it would give her fewer immediate benefits for any one stage, although it could have far more uses due to the greater complexity.

It should be noted that the fragments of the Great Dao within forbidden skills and the current Dao that she was able to develop were somewhat different. A single fragment could grant the user immense power, but it would be limited and restricted to a very particular usage, as it was the entirety of a small part of the Dao. Meanwhile, her usage of the Truth of the Universe brought her to the Dao themselves, which would take far longer to bring themselves to the same level of power but would be both less restrictive and more general.

If she had a Wood Dao, for instance, then she could empower all wood-type effects and innately understand them to a certain extent, with that understanding increasing the fewer elements of other Dao were incorporated into any particular method. A fragment, on the other hand, might bind her in a similar way to Chu Ling’s forbidden skill, which tied her life to her Timeless Grove.

‘Due to the way in which the Dao empowers all, much like how the Phoenix Transformation can empower all forms of fire techniques, I should probably glean some insights into a few other forms of Dao before I go. The most complex and most beneficial would probably be the Yin Dao and Yang Dao.’

Having learned her lesson with the Absolute skills, she made the next two techniques even simpler.

Yin Condensation would resonate with the yin in her body. Yang Condensation would resonate with the yang in her body. Neither of these would have much use until she reached an immensely high realm with them, but if she did, they could allow her to amplify those energies in a form of cultivation that could also be beneficial to her Yin-Yang Ascendant physique in a less destructive manner, and could even – in theory – permit her to slightly modify her body with the aid of a few other techniques.

‘That’s all for later, though. For now, five more points to both…’

The labels for both condensation skills blurred, then trembled over and over again at great speed. Very little planar energy actively appeared or moved within her body, but she did feel a certain connection with her yin and yang growing beyond what she could experience before, although it wasn’t sufficient to permit her to do more than look.

Both rose to the Twenty-Seventh Stage in one go, consuming five points each, bringing her total supply of anchor energy points to two hundred and forty.

Finally, the most important part of the process, the Yin and Yang Dao both appeared within the appropriate section of the Truth of the Universe, both labelled to be at the Initial Accomplishment stage, one step beneath the Absolute Dao.

This was along the lines of what she expected. Yin and yang as concepts were far more complicated than simple, pure absolute force, as they could apply to essentially everything and everywhere, with some things being both yin and yang in nature while technically being neither one in practise, which is also what made both of them so useful. So long as both were balanced, they would not interfere with one another, and could be used together to raise the power of anything that wasn’t absolute yin or yang.

She did have some methods of that type, mostly due to her physique, but that only prompted her to realise a method of circumventing that limitation as well.

‘At the moment, I possess only the Ascendant’s Dao at Full Success, but that could be a good thing. It is all about my own path, my own rise, so if I use it to mould the other Dao to my whims, I could both avoid any flaws of those Dao and increase my strength no matter what I do, since I could just interpret an absolute force to be the one that I am using…’ Wei Yi glanced at the Ascendant’s Dao in the interface, ‘I wonder, how expensive would it be to raise the level of that directly?’

Willing the Truth of the Universe to expend no more than fifty anchor points upon it, she waited for a moment to see whether anything would occur, but nothing did. The label didn’t blur nor tremble, and the fifty points remained within her possession. This too, was within her expectations, and it would have been rather concerning if her prized Ascendant’s Dao could be improved with just fifty anchor points, not to mention the fact that it would inevitably slip away from her if the Truth of the Universe was given enough leeway with the principles of the Dao. If she was to comprehend it sufficiently and only required the jump from the Full Success to the First Stage to be made for her, it would still undoubtedly be costly, but far less so.

Since this was the case, she closed the interface and once again moved her position, this time into the boundary peaks of the prison realm, where there were a few relatively flat areas with enough space for her to sit down comfortably, and focused on her Absolute Rupture technique, moving into the Realm of Potential the moment before her body would experience the pain.

There, she did not leap into a practise battle, but instead looked into her own imitated form, primarily at the blood that endlessly pumped through her veins. It had been able to conjure some images that were of great interest to her, but she had struggled to uncover the method to bring them out in reality, or otherwise make use of them during her own combat or cultivation. Her intuition told her that the power of the blood could be an incredibly useful one, and so she wished to obtain it as soon as possible to supplement everything else that was already within her arsenal.

It was especially vital to have another advantage if she was going to actually contend with the Greats, and not simply their servants, as they might be on greater guard than before due to her fight with the Ning and Chen families.

Due to this, she naturally needed to figure out a method of forcing resonance with her bloodline that would function within her body, but that appeared to be significantly more difficult than the device used by Long Huang, as she could not replicate the exact manner in which energy rotated and orbited within it while within the confines of her own body.

In her eyes, attempting to replicate that part fully wasn’t the most effective nor efficient method of attaining her goals. Instead, she needed to decipher the reason behind this, then apply it in a manner that was reasonable, a little like she created the dantian bone shard talismans and array network specifically to function within her body, rather than trying to copy something that couldn’t possibly work from the outside world.

Understanding the concept of bloodline resonance, however, was rather difficult. Even with the Disciple of Iron cultivation technique that appeared to rely on a similar concept, bringing it and the bloodline resonance device together to unite their powers and truly awaken her bloodline was rather difficult to the different ways in which they acted upon her body. The former purified her blood more than anything, so while it would certainly make it more straightforward to generate a greater resonance with less energy, it would not be sufficient to enable said resonance on its own.

‘Also, the question of what causes a bloodline resonance might be more complicated than the question of what that phenomenon is to begin with and requires that to be answered for the greatest effect,’ she considered, summoning a large white board and a piece of charcoal to draw with.

So far as she understood the matter, a bloodline contained the energy of something or someone with great power, which was sealed into their blood through the mysteries of planar energy. To cause resonance with it is to amplify the power of the past, rendering it tangible to one’s eyes and increasing the amount of it that was available to the cultivator.

Thus, she needed to somehow expose more of that energy while keeping the blood within herself, which was an unduly daunting task only due to the exact principles of this resonance not being known to her or most of the world, judging by the fact that only the Blood-tinged Church and the faction behind Long Huang had any success or even interest in the field. The latter’s actions did give her a single direction to follow, which was to focus energy upon it in a very particular manner.

‘I wonder whether this has any relation to the properties of time and space,’ Wei Yi asked no-one in particular, realising a moment later that Yi Shi Ming was unable to hear her within the Realm of Potential, ‘Right. One potential lead to explore has been found, time to search for more…’

She wrote that onto the board, using it for no better reason than to brighten up the void a little.

‘The rotation and particular infusion of energy within the bloodline resonance device – the name of which I came up with myself and haven’t asked Long Huang about, so I will need to do that later – clearly plays a part, but I don’t quite understand what causes it… Perhaps bloodlines have a physical component as well, as the rotation somehow assists in the uncovering of the bloodline itself…’ she pondered, conjuring an incredibly weak version of herself to provide some spare blood, ‘I don’t think that I can do this in here, but maybe it’ll be enough to figure something out…’

With one straightforward cut that unintentionally made use of the Absolute Dao, she slaughtered her replica and collected all of the resulting blood within a large sphere using some spiritual will, then replicated the arrays that made up the resonance device using it, deciding to make use of planar energy to duplicate the inscriptions, since she had far more experience in using it for that purpose.

She was about to begin, but then recalled the seeming significance of the needle used to extract her blood, and dispersed the containment of the blood.

‘I had taken a look at the needle and hadn’t found much of interest, but perhaps I simply missed something. I should use it to remove some of my blood, then compare it to what is now on the ground. Perhaps the resonance device isn’t the optimal method of achieving resonance, and it is the needle that actually permits it within a flawed system,’ Wei Yi theorised, conjuring that implement and yet another copy of herself, ignoring the panicked expression on the duplicate’s face.

With another full orb of blood, this time extracted by the needle, she allowed the existing array and inscription structure to activate, observing the entire process incredibly closely as the sphere trembled and a vague fog of various colours emerged from the large spherical pool, but it was not the same as when Long Huang had been experimenting.

‘The Realm of Potential is clearly not replicating me perfectly, but something was happening. That means that I need to continue…’