Assessing Progress

After a period of dazedly looking around as he found himself back on the familiar yet barren 1st level, Yaan sat down.

He sat down alone, in the middle of this desolate region, not caring about the poor environment or the dust accumulating on his robe.

"In the end, I was sent back to the 1st level and given no reward…" Yaan mused to himself.

"There are three possible reasons for this. Firstly, there might not be any reward. To begin with, I didn't take on the True-False Illusion Trial for a monetary reward, the trial spirits also never promised any sort of reward, the reward was only mentioned by Rui. That said, the other trials in this inheritance gave out rewards…"

"The second possibility, is that I actually received the reward already; my title as an inheritor candidate. This position has its downsides, but the perks are undeniable. Others can't reject my challenge, I don't need to wait to challenge them, and I can issue as many challenges as I want every day. It's possible that this is the Apex Grade reward."

"Lastly, and most likely, is that I don't qualify to receive the reward, since I'm not actually a resident of the 9th level yet. If that's the case, then I might get the actual reward when I return to the 9th level."

As Yaan thought of these things, he eventually shook his head. There was no use thinking about this now, since there was nothing he could do about it. Instead, it was time to focus on his next course of action.

Yaan had no intention of seeking out others right now, nor of challenging anyone to battle immediately.

He was now an inheritor candidate, meaning that if he was challenged, he would be forced to battle immediately. If he rose up to a higher floor, then he would be completely unable to cultivate in peace. At least, it would be impossible to undertake any sort of cultivation that required his utmost attention if there was a chance of being challenged by a relatively strong opponent.

Yaan also considered the possibility that others might deliberately lose battles in order to descend layers and challenge him, but he quickly ruled this out. Such a thing was very much against the rules, anyone found guilty of doing this would be executed without mercy. It was unlikely that anyone would take this risk just to eliminate him.

Even those fellows on the 9th layer wouldn't dare, after all, they were certainly being watched more carefully by the trial spirits compared to others.

But still, there was a small chance that they might challenge one another now, with the idea that they would either win and strike it rich, or they could surrender at the last second, being demoted to the 1st level…at that point, they could challenge Yaan and potentially take his armour and stone ring.

"The old man hinted at something just now though. He stated aloud that he left me with my ring and armour. This was likely to tell those four that even if they defeat me, they won't be able to take my best treasures. Even so, I need to be careful. If one of those four really does challenge me, I can only give up, I'm not their match…yet."

Yaan's eyes shone. He decided to spend his time doing something that he really should have done the moment he entered the 4th Trial Realm; he wanted to spend a period of time assessing his current strength.

From his absorption of the vitality from the bloody vortex, to his crazed progression as he tempered his body with various expensive resources, to his completion of the True-False Illusion Trial…Yaan's strength had improved substantially compared to when he first entered the 4th Trial Realm.

"I spent nine years in an illusion…even though my body and vital cultivation didn't change much in that time, my gains still weren't small. My understanding of illusions has reached a whole new level, not to mention all the matters which I discussed with the Spirit Plane Lord. And of course, there's also my psyche cultivation!"

Yaan successfully stepped onto the path of psyche cultivation. Right now, he was unable to restrain himself from thoroughly investigating just what this meant!

He sat there silently for a long period of time, unmoved and unperturbed by any external matters.

Eventually, Yaan opened his eyes. An excited glint could be seen within the depths of his gaze.

"The Sea of Consciousness is really quite incredible. All paths of cultivation will lead to a steady improvement in intelligence, but the cultivation of psyche path actually takes intelligence as its core. More-so than intelligence itself though, the crux of psyche path is the ability of the Sea of Consciousness to use intelligence as a means to generate Psyche Power!"

The Sea of Consciousness was the result of transforming the regular mortal consciousness into a more concrete form. The Sea of Consciousness was not physical, in fact, it was even less corporeal than the soul, which was a spiritual entity. Despite this, the power contained within the sea was very real.

The walls of the sea were thick and solid, holding together the entire sea within. The background of the contained space was pitch black, but it was vast and filled with understanding. An ocean of white light swelled across the small realm, formed from countless white fragments of light.

Sentience, wisdom, knowledge. Between these three separated components, a connection existed. This connection was not stationary, but moving - this flow itself could be thought of as the mind's 'intelligence'. The flow of intelligence gradually produced a grey gas, which continually exuded from the flow, forming and filling the Sea of Consciousness.

As Yaan focussed on this grey power, he slowly and cautiously tried to urge its movement. Surprisingly, he found that he was able to master its control almost instantly!

Within seconds, Yaan's expression changed. He showed a joyous look as the grey mist rapidly converged towards a point within the sea, forming the faint outline of a blurred figure.

Forming the vague figure was simple, but it took Yaan over an hour to complete his objective.

"Incredible…" He muttered to himself.

He did not mutter this in the outside world, but within the sea itself!

The grey figure was no longer grey and blurred, it now resembled Yaan himself almost perfectly! The only discrepancy was that the Yaan within the Sea of Consciousness looked a bit like a ghost, his form was partially transparent and not entirely stable.

Still, by forming this projection of himself within his Sea of Consciousness, Yaan was able to observe the inner workings within the sea more clearly.

"The Four Paths Cultivation Technique in my mind contains many adjustments to suit my current needs…clearly, the Spirit Plane Lord actually tailored this entire method specifically for me. This technique requires separate methods to be used to cultivate each of the four paths, but since I have no solid understanding of psyche cultivation and soul cultivation, she included specialised methods so that I could actually cultivate the technique. As for my Qi and body, I can continue using the Fiend Transformation Technique."

The original Four Paths Cultivation Technique was supposed to be cultivated alongside multiple other cultivation techniques, each corresponding to their respective paths. He already possessed the Fiend Transformation Technique for his Qi and body, but he lacked a proper understanding of mind and soul methods.

As such, the Spirit Plane Lord provided him with suitable methods for these paths. She included an explanation of various ways to cultivate the mind, one of which was to keep this projection of oneself called a 'psyche avatar' within the Sea of Consciousness at all times. This way, Yaan would always be controlling his mind, without exerting too much effort.

Now, as for the use of Psyche Power, it was a bit different from the other paths of cultivation, in that it was actually quite weak in combat on its own. This was why the psyche path had never truly flourished, it was only treated as a complementary path for all other paths.

However, it was indeed very complementary, only, the results were very broad and not extremely obvious at first.

For example, possessing a Sea of Consciousness had increased Yaan's mental processing speed by multiple fold, this alone was a very noteworthy advantage. His reaction time, his ability to deduce various matters, and so on, had all improved by leaps and bounds.

His mental willpower, resilience and endurance improved too. By using Psyche Power, it became many times easier to forcefully resist and endure intense pains. Of course, once his Psyche Power was completely depleted, this advantage would vanish.

Interestingly, it seemed that possessing a Sea of Consciousness could improve the cultivator's ability to comprehend certain daos to an extent, but this varied heavily depending on the individual.

In terms of more tangible uses of Psyche Power, Yaan immediately found one that made him feel overjoyed.

Swoosh…

His Vital Energy surged through his body. By utilising a portion of his Psyche Power, Yaan was able to gain better control over the inner workings of his body.

As he remembered another aspect that he should have improved in, Yaan's psyche avatar pointed towards a swarm of black lights within the sea of white.

Whoosh!

Instantly, 100 of the 101 astral spirits were forced out from the Sea of Consciousness and reappeared in his physical body!

Yaan had never heard of people storing astral spirits within the Sea of Consciousness, but then again, how many people cultivated both Astral Power and Psyche Power?

Nobody dared to bring astral spirits into the mind, because this was simply too dangerous. Generally, this could only result in being possessed by the astral spirit and completely losing yourself as the parasitic creature took control.

"It seems that the Sea of Consciousness can be used to subdue astral spirits. Bringing them into the sea directly is not smart, but I can use my Psyche Power to subdue them within my body!" Yaan's gaze flashed as he realised this.

He had been wondering how he should go about increasing his power so that he could return to the 9th level…whilst Astral Power was not compatible with the later stages of the Four Paths Cultivation Technique, it was excellent way to rapidly increase his strength!

And unlike many paths of cultivation, the astral path was actually very easy to discard. Simply expelling the astral spirits from the body was enough to remove one's astral cultivation. That said, you would need to find a way to defend yourself from the re-awakened astral spirits after they regained their instincts.

100 1-Star Astral Tattoos appeared on Yaan's body, covering him from head to toe in thick black tattoos. They took their most optimal places on his flesh and quickly settled down.

Shockingly, the moment the 100 tattoos settled down, they began to tremble. Yaan wasn't at all surprised, he had expected this to happen. He payed close attention as he urged the tattoos to move.

Bam!

The 100 tattoos moved far too quickly, rapidly converging together in the centre of Yaan's chest. He remained calm throughout, but used his Psyche Power to closely observe the situation within.

As the 100 1-Star Astral Tattoos fused together, forming a single 2-Star Astral Tattoo, Yaan watched with rapt attention. Gradually, the tattoo emerged from his body, solidifying itself on the right side of his chest.

After this, Yaan brought out the subdued 2-Star astral spirit from his Sea of Consciousness, before forming a second 2-Star Astral Tattoo on the back of his left hand.

This was the astral path. At each stage of progression, upon forming 100 Astral Tattoos of the same rank, they could be fused together into a single tattoo of the rank above!

Yaan realised in this moment that not only was Psyche Power extremely useful for enhancing his fine control over his body and energies, but it also allowed him to observe his internal condition in extremely fine detail. This level of clarity far surpassed his usual method of roughly feeling the flow of his Vital Energy and Astral Power.

"For now, I definitely need to properly assess my body so that I can understand all of my strengths. I have two 2-Star Astral Tattoos, this means that my Astral Power alone is at the level of Rank 2 battle power. But what about my Vital Energy, and more interestingly, my physical body?"

Yaan spent the following few hours examining his internal condition as meticulously as possible. When he first entered the 4th Trial Realm, he neglected to do this, instead finding himself engrossed in battles and training using the myriad of new materials which he had access too.

But now, perhaps because he was a poor person with no funds to cultivate with, he finally paid attention to analysing his actual progress.

"My Vital Energy unknowingly reached 89%, I'm actually at the Late 3-Star Realm and making solid progress towards the peak!"

"As expected, my Iron Rank bones improved to Bronze Rank bones!"

"I was correct before, I also developed the Progressive Flesh Constitution, but to think it also reached Bronze Rank…"

"This…I directly developed Silver Rank organs? It must be because I used the Trio of Accelerated Agony Pills alongside various poisons."

"Iron Rank tendons too! With this, I'm only missing the Progressive Blood Constitution! That's natural though, the Progressive Blood Constitution can only be developed by burning away blood essence, which I have never tried."

Yaan knew that his physical body should have improved, but this level of advancement was far beyond his estimations!

Back in the Heavenly Path Sect, Yaan developed the 'Progressive Bones Constitution' at the lowest rank, Iron Rank. Back then, Rui merely mentioned that it would be a decent boost to his strength…she did not explain the true importance of the Progressive Body Constitutions.

When Rui fell into a deep sleep moments before Yaan left Heavenly Path Mountain, she urged him to pursue the tempering of his physical body.

In North Ghu City, Yaan did exactly this. He even developed the Progressive Flesh Constitution and advanced his bones to Bronze Rank.

It was only after entering the 4th Trial Realm and received the complete Fiend Transformation Technique that he came to understand the true relevance and importance of the Progressive Body Constitutions.

Humans who lacking a certain constitution, which was almost all of them, were not suited to any form of body tempering, but the Fiend Transformation allowed an ordinary human to become a fiend with the Fiend Foundation. The 'Fiend Foundation' served multiple purposes, one of which being the alteration of the body, making it better adapted to the body tempering path.

However, truly stepping onto the body tempering path was a slightly strange matter, it required the fusion of all five Progressive Body Constitutions, which would result in the formation of the 'Progressive Physique Constitution'.

The Progressive Physique Constitution was the foundation of the earlier stages of the body tempering path.

In fact, a human born with this physique could actually cultivate the body tempering path directly, but such a thing was extraordinarily rare. Usually, someone with the Progressive Physique Constitution would actually possess no Qi Channels, meridians or dantian, but their blood would be filled with a powerful innate vitality!

However, Yaan planned to cultivate the Four Paths Cultivation Technique, so nothing about his progress would be 'usual'.

If he developed the Progressive Physique Constitution normally, he would never be able to return to Qi refining, unless he somehow found a way to restore his internal Qi system. This matter had bothered him for a while. Along with the issue of restoring his crippled dantian, it really seemed like there wasn't much hope, other than awakening Rui and listening to her supposed method.

To develop the Progressive Physique Constitution, it was necessary for all five of the component body constitutions to be at the same rank when fused together. Since it was many times easier to accomplish this with all five constitutions at the Iron Rank, this was the natural way to step onto this path. At this point, the body temperer would be classed as an 'Iron Rank body temperer', this was the first realm, the Iron Rank!

Iron Rank, Bronze Rank, Silver Rank, Gold Rank, Mythril Rank, Obsidian Rank, these were the first stages of the body tempering path. Iron Rank to Bronze Rank corresponded to Rank 1 strength, Silver to Gold as Rank 2, Mythril to Obsidian as Rank 3.

From there, body temperers would encounter a serious issue - the complete inability to progress further!

For humans and demons to reach the next stage in the body tempering path, they actually needed Vital Energy. For this, they needed to form their Vital Core.

When the Vital Core was formed within an Obsidian Rank body, the Vital Core would integrate with and make alterations to the physical flesh, completely fusing the two powers together…the practitioner of the two paths, Vital Energy and physical body, would now be cultivating just one path, the true body tempering path!

Originally, these two paths were developed to converge in this way, as a means to allow humans to properly cultivate the body.

At this point, the body temperer would be at the 4-Star Realm, but they were clearly superior to 4-Star Realm beings who only cultivated their Vital Energy and never bothered with their physical body.

For a human to become a body temperer was clearly an arduous and overly complex affair, it was something that should have originally been impossible, but this convoluted route was deduced over the ages.

But Yaan's path would be even more extreme.

Unlike others, he would not fuse together the Iron Rank constitutions, but instead, he would combine the five Obsidian Rank Progressive Body Constitutions, directly developing the Obsidian Rank body!

But that was not all.

In order to form a Vital Qi Core, a Vital Core within the dantian, the Vital Core needed to be formed during the fusion of the five constitutions. Like this, the body could be massively reformed, fusing the Qi Channels and blood vessels together whilst the body was undergoing the various drastic alterations simultaneously.

Yaan rubbed his head and sighed.

"This technique is really absurd. Honestly, the body tempering path itself is crazy enough, how was something like this even discovered? Transforming into a demonic race, cultivating Vital Energy whilst simultaneously developing five separate constitutions, fusing these constitutions to develop a physique, then taking this physique as a form of cultivation, before fusing your Vital Energy and your physique together…"

"But the Four Paths Cultivation technique takes this even further…I actually need to develop and then fuse five separate Obsidian Rank constitutions. This will be much more difficult than fusing them at Iron Rank…"

Despite the difficulties, Yaan smiled and shook his head. He wouldn't let the difficult road ahead discourage him. After all, wasn't it this sort of ridiculous, fate defying path, that he had been seeking?

Even though this technique had never been cultivated to the Immortal Step, so what? It had been cultivated to the peak of the Foundation Step, it was only that nobody had managed to successfully take that final step!

"Immortal…when will I reach that stage…?" Yaan mused allowed. In the end, he shook his head. He was thinking way too far ahead. It was more important for him to focus on what was in front of him right now…with this technique in hand, it was time to begin training properly!

"Oh, wait, all of my resources were taken…"

It seemed that before cultivating, he would need to issue some challenges.