By the side of the murmuring stream, the boy gripped his small wooden sword, staring fixedly at the white-haired man who had arrived on a flying sword.
"Your aptitude is excellent. Would you like to come with me?" the white-haired man asked.
Though he was young, how could he fail to see the wonder of soaring through the blue heavens? Just as he was about to open his mouth to agree, he heard a stubborn voice ring out beside him: "Take me!"
The owner of the voice was his playmate, the very person he had just defeated in a "sword fight."
The boy knew his companion’s stubbornness well. For instance, this "sword fight" today—he had lost count of how many times they had fought. But because his friend had lost once before, he was determined to win it back before he would stop.
The boy thought, *Then we can go cultivate together.*
He had forgotten many of the details, but he still remembered the white-haired man’s eyes. They were as clear as a mountain stream, and as vast and distant as the sky.
The white-haired man looked at them with those eyes, looking at the two children who had been inseparable since they were small, a smile of ambiguous meaning playing on his lips.
"I only take one disciple," the white-haired man said.
He repeated, "Both of you are good, but I will only take one."
*What should I do?* the boy thought at the time.
But he only had time to think for that one instant. The next moment, he was pushed into the stream.
*Splash!*
The sound of water bursting open.
His friend—the friend he had played with since they were both running around bare-bottomed, the friend who was still just a child—had pushed him into the water without a moment’s hesitation!
Through the rippling water, he saw his "friend’s" expressionless face, and the white-haired man’s perpetually calm gaze.
Then, a frost-white sword light shot up into the sky.
His companion and the white-haired man were enveloped in that magnificent and dazzling sword light, like a bolt of lightning from a clear sky, arriving abruptly and departing just as abruptly.
Just like the legends of countless immortals seeking the Dao, brushing past the pathetic and mediocre mortals.
Leaving behind only an inability to let go, an inability to believe, and the shock of waking up from dreams in the middle of the night, time and time again!
……
Jiang Wang opened his eyes. The pitch-black night enveloped his surroundings, and it enveloped him as well. The dormitory was exceptionally quiet; Ling He and Du Yehu’s breathing was long and steady, carrying a specific rhythm.
Jiang Wang knew they were practicing the Basic Breathing Technique. Although it was simple and fundamental, only inner-sect disciples were permitted to learn it. It was the foundational art that had remained unchanged at the Zhuang State Dao Academy for a hundred years.
There had been little suspense regarding the selection for the inner sect of the Fenglin City Dao Academy. Ling He, Du Yehu, and Zhao Rucheng had all become new inner-sect disciples, their names recorded in the Daoist jade register enshrined in the Temple of Sacrifice.
It was just that until their Dao veins manifested, they could not yet be considered formal hemp-robed Daoists.
Opening-Vein Pills were worth a thousand gold, and even though the Fenglin City Dao Academy was supported by the state, it was impossible to distribute them for free to every disciple. As the most outstanding among the outer-sect disciples selected for the inner sect, they would generally have to endure at least a year of toil, accumulating enough merit before they were eligible to obtain an Opening-Vein Pill.
Only the person with the highest outer-sect contribution each year could exchange their contribution for an Opening-Vein Pill. This was a special incentive provided by the Dao Academy for outer-sect disciples. Since this year had produced Jiang Wang, no one else could replicate his path.
Even so, Jiang Wang had only accumulated enough contribution to exchange for an Opening-Vein Pill through life-and-death, blood-soaked battles. And now, within a hundred-mile radius of Fenglin City, there were no other Xishan bandits left to be wiped out.
Joining the outer sect of the Dao Academy, practicing diligently, defeating countless competitors to enter the inner sect, continuing to cultivate while accumulating mission contributions, and finally being granted an Opening-Vein Pill to step into the extraordinary—this was the normal path for a cultivator in the Zhuang State. It could be considered a visible, broad, and smooth road.
However, compared to those whose Dao veins were naturally manifest, allowing them to enter the inner sect directly to begin practicing Daoist arts, these youths who took the outer-sect advancement route truly had to waste too much time.
On the path of cultivation, if you are slow by one step, you are slow by every step. This was the reason Jiang Wang had risked his life to complete missions while in the outer sect, and it was also the reason Fang Pengju could not curb his greed. No one wanted to wait for so many extra years!
Therefore, Jiang Wang understood Fang Pengju’s craving, but he could not forgive his methods.
Among martial artists as outstanding as them, whether it was Ling He or Du Yehu, who had less desire for the extraordinary than Fang Pengju? Yet, none of them had resorted to such base actions.
Jiang Wang’s father once said: A person is defined by his choices. Jiang Wang deeply agreed with this.
And he himself had previously been caught in a difficult choice.
As everyone knew, there were nine ranks of cultivators, with the first rank being the most esteemed, and the ninth rank being considered the beginning of the extraordinary. The hallmark of achieving the ninth rank was the formation of a Dao Whirlpool, allowing Dao essence to generate on its own.
Cultivators had already passed through a history so long it was impossible to count, and they naturally had very detailed and in-depth research into this first step of the extraordinary.
The spine was regarded as the "Great Dragon" of the human body, and the Dao vein was hidden within it. After the Dao vein manifested, a cultivator could feed the power of their blood and qi back into the Dao vein, thereby generating Dao essence. Dao essence was the root of all Daoist arts and the foundation of the extraordinary.
Taking Jiang Wang’s "Earthworm Vein" as an example, every time he mobilized the "Earthworm," he needed to expend a considerable amount of blood and qi. Only after channeling it through the entire Great Dragon of his spine could he generate one unit of Dao essence. A cultivator at Jiang Wang’s level could perform the vein-opening practice at most twice a day, accumulating two units of Dao essence. It wasn't that he wasn't working hard, but that his body wouldn't allow it. The consumption of blood and qi was too great; it damaged his source and harmed his spirit, making it entirely not worth the loss.
After accumulating Dao essence, the next step was to use the spirit to control the Dao essence, arranging the corresponding array points strictly according to the foundational array diagram. Once the array was formed, the Dao Whirlpool would be born.
As a cultivator who had already opened his veins, the Fenglin City Dao Academy naturally taught the foundational array diagram. It was the "Origin-Returning Array" commonly used in the Zhuang State, consisting of eighty-one array points in total. This meant that, assuming he made not a single mistake in laying out the foundational array, it would take him at least forty-one days—nearly a month and a half—to truly become a ninth-rank cultivator. (The two units of Dao essence Jiang Wang had previously accumulated had already been exhausted in battle.)
Before this, Jiang Wang naturally had nothing to be troubled about, but now that he had accidentally entered the Taixu Illusionary Realm and inherited Zuo Guanglie’s "Dongzhen Ruins Blessed Land," unlocking the corresponding Sword Discussion Platform and Dao Demonstration Platform, he had new worries.
Yesterday, after obtaining the Origin-Returning Array diagram, he had invested all 1,850 points of merit into the deduction of the foundational array diagram to test the effect of the Dao Demonstration Platform. In the end, he obtained the infinitely complex "Zhou Tian Star Array." The entire foundational array had three hundred and sixty-five array points!
Not to mention the difficulty of laying out the Zhou Tian Star Array, even if he could perfectly replicate the foundational array, it would take at least half a year to generate the first Dao Whirlpool.
And after that, rising from the ninth rank to the eighth rank required establishing three Dao Whirlpools; rising from the eighth rank to the seventh rank required establishing nine.
Calculated this way, the time required was far too long!
The Zhou Tian Star Array was undoubtedly stronger than the Origin-Returning Array, but the long time required for its foundation was exactly where Jiang Wang hesitated. He needed to improve his cultivation as quickly as possible to catch up with those cultivators whose Dao veins were naturally manifest; however, time waited for no one.
But after waking from his dream tonight, he had already made his choice.
Jiang Wang closed his eyes, urging the single unit of Dao essence generated from yesterday’s vein-opening practice to move slowly within his spine. In the blurred world of perception where he controlled the Dao essence, this was an infinitely vast and boundless space.
Because the Great Dragon resided here, it was also known as the "Spinal Sea."
But in the oral traditions of cultivators, it had a more resounding name—the "Heaven-Reaching Palace!"
Piercing through the Heaven-Reaching Palace and opening the Heaven-Earth Gate was the transition from a low-level cultivator to a mid-level cultivator.
In the boundless Heaven-Reaching Palace, a single unit of Dao essence was as small as a speck of dust. But it did not drift with the current; instead, it firmly and stubbornly carried out Jiang Wang’s will. It moved and moved, until finally, it hovered at the ideal location.
That was the position of the Sun Star in the Zhou Tian Star Array.
As this unit of Dao essence hovered there, Jiang Wang seemed to see the eyes of that white-haired cultivator from his youth once again.
He would never forget the moment he was pushed into the water.
Those eyes seemed to be saying to him—
"The path of cultivation is a path of contention."