Peak of Nascent Soul Realm

"In progress…" The system displayed this message for a few seconds, and then Jack felt a mighty wave of energy welling out of his heart. An ordinary person might have gotten scared; after all, such massive force within the body, especially in the heart, if left uncontrolled, can be dangerous, but Jack was generally familiar with the system. The system is a product of Rachel, so dealing with this energy level is nothing for it.

The energy quietly left his heart, entered his meridians, and reached his Dantian, slowly nourishing his nascent soul.

The second stage of the nascent soul realm!

Third stage!

Fourth stage!

Fifth stage!

Sixth stage!

After reaching the peak of the sixth stage, it finally stopped. Just 100 years of cultivation helped him reach the sixth stage; that is because Jack is a peak talent; 100 years of proper cultivation for someone as talented as him is enough to propel him to the sixth stage. Feeling the strength of his nascent soul, he smiled; even though this level was nothing for him, someone who had already experienced true immortality, it was still a pleasant feeling.

After checking his internal situation for a moment, he turned his attention to the outside. The sky was calm, and fortunately, no tribulation seemed to be coming. Usually, there would be no tribulation when breaking through nascent soul stages, but after all, Jack is a special case, so he was just a bit worried about it.

Then, he looked far away, to the place where he thought the agent of the Brown dynasty might be; it's a pity Jack had no way to see him.

Putting these matters aside, he tapped "claim reward" for the success of his previous task, which was calculating the nascent soul chapter of Heaven's Way.

"Congratulations! Cultivation practice reserves +100 years."

"Next side mission: None," Jack sighed; like last time, it takes a while until the next task appears.

"Use 99 years of cultivation practice reserves and improve my cultivation using the Heaven's Way technique," Jack ordered. There is no reason to stop here; in any case, if the agent of the Brown dynasty was here, he already knew, so Jack may as well use his practice reserves. Maybe he can reach the peak of his nascent soul.

The seventh stage of the nascent soul stage!

Eighth stage!

Ninth stage!

After reaching midway through the ninth stage, it stopped; as expected, the further one goes, the harder it gets.

Jack sighed and ordered, "Use 50 years of reserves to improve my cultivation with the Heaven's Way technique."

This time, the energy was not as intense as the last two times; it came and barely helped him reach the final stage of the nascent soul, the tenth stage. After this, he only has to cultivate a bit every day to reach the peak of the tenth level; Jack wants to keep the last 50 years reserved for some emergency. In any case, even if he spends it all, it would most likely be enough to reach the peak of the tenth stage.

"Now, it's time to calculate the divine soul stage!" Jack closed his eyes, meditating for a while to feel his nascent soul, looking for any flaws; after finding none, he stood up, released the aura of a 2nd stage nascent soul cultivator, and exited the room; it was time to check what happened during the last decades. Also, he has to give the Heaven's Way technique to his loyal supporters; after all, Faith, Lucy, Amber, and Mike all have been waiting for the more complete version of Heaven's Way.

The version Jack gives them is nearly complete; still, Jack has added some flaws. If the technique gets into the wrong hands, Jack can use the flaws he added to kill the practitioner. His extra parts are intentional flaws; anyone knowing their details can use them and kill the practitioner.

Letting his subordinates practice such a flawed technique is dangerous, but again, it only works if opponents know the exact details about the flaws; in this world, only Jack has complete info regarding that. It couldn't be helped; even adding this much was already at his limit; of course, he preferred to design a backdoor solely for himself, which nobody else could gain access to, or he liked to use a memory seal to prevent theft, or many other things, but he didn't have the ability to do those, so this was the best he could do.

...

In the last 80 years, the work of building the sect headquarters has progressed by leaps and bounds; the sect now has over 20 nascent soul cultivators, including Faith, Amber, Lucy, and Mike, who are stuck in the first stage. Aside from Jack's most loyal subordinates, Five disciples managed to reach the 4th stage, two reached the 3rd stage, five are in the 2nd stage, and three others are still in the 1st stage.

Even though many disciples have surpassed Faith, the sect master, they still don't challenge her leadership. However, it is indisputable that the leadership no longer has absolute power. If it makes unpopular decisions, the nascent soul disciples will become dissatisfied. Even if they obey, they do it unwillingly and maybe even drag their feet, only obeying in name. After all, cultivation levels are important; most sects cannot survive without one strong leader.

There are two ways to rule a sect. One is to have a powerful supreme elder who is a big realm or at least five stages stronger than everyone else. In such sects, the supreme elder can use his strength to maintain the sect's unity and cohesion.

Another way is to use a council; the council acts as a collective leader; whatever is voted by the council will be enforced by all elders; such sects are far less united, but they still work; the council works as a balancing force between powerful cultivators, deterring powerful and strong and keeping them in line.

Any sect that does not have a strong supreme elder or a united council will fall into chaos. If there is no strong leader and the elders are disunited, the sect will gradually break apart and may fall into civil war or split altogether.

The four great sects have one supreme elder in the realm of soul transformation, which is one realm higher than anyone else in their sect; they are obviously the first type.

The Brown dynasty is an empire, but as cultivators, they can be bunched together with sects; they are of the second type, where there is a council of supreme elders; the 5 soul transformation cultivators all act as one; it have been millions of years, yet they never fought among each other; they know any fight among themselves would spell their doom; these people are old, they are not hotblooded youth who look to earn sex and money, they only care about one thing, which is reaching the perfection realm; all they do is to serve that purpose.

The Brown empire may change, though, their Patriarch, who is not technically senior to other supreme elders, and is only first among equals, is now trying to break through perfection; if he succeeds, the Brown family's ruling system would change, making him absolute leader.

None of the four supreme elders tried to pull schemes to stop him; as one blood, it's extremely good for them if their patriarch can break through perfection; sure, that would mean they lose a lot of their say in the dynasty, they will have a far smaller share of the cake; but, by having a perfection cultivator, they can completely conquer the four great sects, and even start attacking surrounding continents; they get a smaller share, of the cake, but the cake would at that time be far larger; even with a smaller share, their total would be far larger.

These people did not stay loyal to the dynasty because of blood or kindness; it was their own interest that compelled them to do so.

The four great sects were, of course, not happy; they never would like for one of the Brown dynasty to reach perfection, but again, as rational cultivators, they knew there was no way to stop him; if they went all out, they may actually be able to disrupt the patriarch's breakthrough, but it would not be enough to kill him; if they do so, they would be left with a raging, peak soul transformation enemy which would chase them no matter where they run to. Therefore, the four supreme elders of the four great sects just sent gifts and well wishes.

If the patriarch fails, that would be the best-case scenario, which means everything is back to normal; even better, the patriarch may be injured after his failure, strengthening the great sect's hand.

If the patriarch succeeds, then the four great sects would immediately surrender and would join the Brown family's luck; the luck backlash would be huge, but at that time, there would be no other choice at all; not surrendering means death; maybe the patriarch who reached perfection has a way to lighten the backlash of luck. This is the best play Four Great Sects has; there are some rash opinions, such as colluding with outsiders to destroy the Brown family or running away and relocating, but those opinions are very unwise.

First, even if they unite with outsiders, there still would be a fight, which would damage them the most, as their sect's headquarters and belongings are in the North Apple continent, while outsider's belonging is safe in another continent; in a battle between soul transformation cultivators, the whole continent would be in danger of destruction; in fact, it would be weird if it isn't destroyed; of course, if their sects have protection formations, they might survive, but it's doubtful that their protective formation can tolerate such intense battle.

The second opinion, relocating is also not good because all rich continents nearby already have soul transformation cultivators; only barren continents are empty; if they leave here, they would be left with no choice but to simply downgrade and occupy a less fertile and energetic continent.

The four supreme elders already spoke to the other side. The Brown dynasty also wanted more soul-transformation cultivators, so it loved accepting and integrating the four great sects. They are not narrow-minded enough to think of revenge or purity of blood.

...

Heaven's Way sect remained stable even though it didn't have an elders' council or a strong sect leader; however, conflicts would eventually start if it went on like this.

At this time, a powerful force came from the tent in the far south of the headquarters; it was as strong as the second stage of the nascent soul realm.

Feeling the pressure, Faith immediately teleported to Jack's tent and kneeled on the ground; as time passed, more and more people arrived, all bowing.

Step by step, someone came out of the tent and looked at everyone; he was Jack.