It was only known that even the current Human Emperor would find it difficult to ascend to the eighth or ninth heaven and see the stars, moon, and great sun with their bloodline abilities.
Quan had already cultivated to the Yin Sha realm.
According to the customs of Mount Taihang, Quan could cultivate for another ten years within Mount Taihang. If he could condense seven Yin Sha innate divine abilities within this short period, he could remain in the core area of Mount Taihang.
However, if he could not condense seven Yin Sha divine abilities within these ten years, he would be sent out as a preacher to spread the immortal path far and wide.
Thus, Quan began to cultivate within Mount Taihang.
The Mount Taihang cultivation group, at the very beginning of the origin of the immortal path, adhered to the master-disciple distinction, where a master would take in a disciple and pass down the immortal path.
Later, however, the master-disciple and sect divisions ceased to be popular. Instead, they adopted a school-based approach to widely accept disciples.
Each of these schools conducted research on the future development of the immortal path.
Some schools believed that after the Core Condensation realm, the path forward was to continuously temper the condensed primordial core, drawing upon the alchemy methods of "Nine Grades of Core Formation" to treat the cultivator's primordial core as a type of tempering elixir.
One turn, one tempering; two turns, two tempering. With each tempering, the primordial core would become increasingly indestructible, and the divine power within the primordial core would grow.
After undergoing nine temperings, referred to as "Nine Turns, Nine Returns," the primordial core dao would have condensed one's essence, qi, and spirit into a unified whole, reaching a state of "perfection."
With the nine turns of the primordial core and the completion of the formless state, one could be called an immortal.
This was the research of the Nine Turns, Nine Returns Primordial Core school on the path of cultivation.
As far as Quan knew, the strongest cultivator of this school, Jing Geng Shangren, the founder of the Nine Turns, Nine Returns path, had already completed five turns and five returns, forging a "Five-Turn Primordial Core" within his body.
Compared to ordinary cultivators in the Core Condensation realm, Jing Geng Shangren's mana was significantly more potent, his divine sense range was vaster, and his physical body was even more indestructible. He could defeat an ordinary Core Condensation realm cultivator in a head-on confrontation within a few exchanges.
This fully demonstrated the reliability of the Nine Turns of the Primordial Core, proving it to be a potentially successful path for cultivators in the future.
With each turn of the Nine Turns of the Primordial Core, one's essence, qi, and spirit were strengthened compared to cultivators who had not undergone the core tempering.
Therefore, to distinguish themselves from ordinary Core Condensation realm cultivators, the Core Tempering school referred to Core Condensation realm cultivators who had not undergone even one tempering and return as Core Condensation realm cultivators, while those who had undergone at least one tempering and return were called Core Tempering realm cultivators.
Thus, the Core Condensation realm and the Core Tempering realm were differentiated.
Within the Core Tempering school, even a Core Tempering realm cultivator who had only undergone one turn and one return was far superior to a Core Condensation realm cultivator. From this perspective, they indeed had some justification for distinguishing themselves from ordinary Core Condensation realm cultivators.
However, other schools did not agree with the internal divisions of the Core Tempering school.
They insisted that the so-called Core Tempering realm was merely an internal classification of the Core Tempering school, not a true division of cultivators. In a broad sense, so-called Core Tempering realm cultivators could still only be considered Core Condensation realm cultivators.
Furthermore, the so-called core tempering was not a name for a realm but rather resembled a secret immortal technique, where Core Condensation realm cultivators used a secret immortal technique to temper their primordial cores.
It was merely a secret immortal technique, not a division of realms. This was the attack launched by other schools against the Core Tempering school, and they claimed to have obtained crucial evidence from Jing Geng Shangren, a cultivator who had completed five turns and five returns and condensed a five-turn primordial core.
Jing Geng Shangren spent ten years on the first turn and first return, and twenty years on the second turn and second return.
He spent forty years on the third turn and third return, and eighty years on the fourth turn and fourth return.
Currently, Jing Geng Shangren had only condensed a five-turn primordial core. The transition from the fourth to the fifth turn took one hundred and sixty years, and the entire process from ordinary Core Condensation realm to condensing a five-turn primordial core took almost three hundred years.
However, his lifespan had not increased by even a single year.
One had to wonder, how many years of lifespan would it take to truly complete the nine turns and nine returns? Three to four thousand years? Yet, Core Condensation realm cultivators only had a lifespan of five hundred years. Where would they find so much time to undergo core tempering?
This was sufficient proof that core tempering was a dead end, fundamentally impossible to succeed, and a misguided path of cultivation—this was the internal view of other schools.
In the Nascent Soul school, the cultivation path of the Core Condensation realm, which involved the so-called nine turns and nine returns, was not recognized.
The Nascent Soul school believed that the cultivation path after the Core Condensation realm was to shatter the primordial core, with the golden core shattering and the Nascent Soul emerging. This was the initial concept of the Nascent Soul school for the future path of cultivation.
However, after several Core Condensation realm cultivators died consecutively during the step of shattering the core to form an infant, the cultivators of the Nascent Soul school changed their minds—the concept of shattering the core to form an infant was too dangerous and should not be pursued. Instead, they should consider other directions.
It made sense. The fundamental essence of Core Condensation realm cultivators lay within their primordial cores. The primordial core, a product of the convergence of essence, qi, and spirit, was the fundamental reliance of Core Condensation realm cultivators.
Losing the primordial core meant the complete loss of a Core Condensation realm cultivator's essence, qi, and spirit.
To actively shatter the primordial core was to abandon one's physical body, abandon one's mana, abandon essence and qi, and then convert them into spirit, sacrificing the former two to strengthen the latter.
If this operation succeeded, one could condense the Nascent Soul, thereby breaking free from the constraints of lifespan, the constraints of the physical body, and even the constraints of mana.
One would no longer need mana, no longer be confined to a physical body, and even if the physical body was damaged, one could switch to another.
The outcome of success was highly attractive to cultivators, but the outcome of failure was equally chilling to the cultivators of the Nascent Soul school.
Failure meant that the Nascent Soul, a fully realized entity, had not emerged, and at the same time, the primordial core had shattered, equivalent to the shattering of essence, qi, and spirit.
A person's ability to live depended on essence, qi, and spirit. The same applied to cultivators. Lacking one element might be manageable, but lacking all three, how could one possibly live? It was an immediate path to death.
Precisely because failure meant death, and also because no successful examples had been witnessed, the Nascent Soul school, after losing several Core Condensation realm cultivators, no longer mentioned the concept of shattering the core to form an infant, an endeavor with a one hundred percent failure rate.
The cultivators of the Nascent Soul school proposed a gentler method with a lower mortality rate: instead of shattering the primordial core, they would simply condense "spirit" and nurture an Yin Spirit within the primordial core.
Then, the Yin Spirit would transform into a Yang Spirit, and finally, just like the primordial core, the Yin and Yang spirits would converge, achieving the Nascent Soul fruition and becoming an immortal.
What is Yin Spirit?
The Yin Spirit is formless and intangible, cannot be touched, and is invisible to the naked eye.