Daring to elevate one's bloodline grade was an act only undertaken by ignorant commoners. Those with true insight understood the impossibility of such a feat and thus avoided such futile efforts.
This was the initial mindset of the human race whose bloodlines were considered noble.
Their attitude towards the pioneers was one of utter disdain.
Then, when the pioneers genuinely discovered extraordinary abilities, such as breathing fire and spitting water, without relying on bloodline powers.
Many tribal chiefs, elders, and matriarchs in the south, though they heard whispers, showed only mild surprise and did not attach much importance to these matters. After all, in the early days of immortal cultivation, bloodline abilities that could rival the twenty-first grade human bloodline were considered the highest tier. Such strength was commonplace within the tribes, and individuals of this caliber might not even qualify to be a servant to a noble.
The nobles naturally paid no heed to this extremely weak, reportedly dangerous, path of cultivation. Most who pursued it either died or went mad, with only a select few achieving success in immortal cultivation.
No noble recognized the threat that immortal cultivation posed to the rule of the various human tribes.
Thus, cultivation groups spread their teachings far and wide, quickly transitioning from dozens of pioneers to disseminating their knowledge among numerous small and large tribes.
The initial stages of immortal cultivation were even inferior to those who later entered the Yin Sha realm, yet they could barely be compared to the twenty-first grade human bloodline.
Humans with this bloodline possessed resistance to most diseases, typically lived up to a hundred years, moved with the agility of the wind, and were generally free from illness.
In some smaller tribes, they had managed to escape the lowest stratum of commoner status, rising to a position near the middle tier, capable of overseeing a few commoners.
Such a status was considered too weak and lowly by the various tribal chiefs and elders, and therefore, not worth their attention.
However, for the commoners of the major tribes, the situation was entirely different.
Compared to the lowest stratum of commoners in the rigidly stratified major tribes, who possessed no bloodline power, even possessing the twenty-first grade bloodline was an excellent opportunity for them to rise and change their destiny.
To possess strength comparable to this bloodline, they were willing to pay a great price to gamble.
To gamble on their chance of successfully cultivating immortal arts.
Therefore, a large number of commoner humans, under the indifferent gaze of the tribal elders and chiefs whose bloodlines were so rich they could be called noble, began to cultivate immortal arts.
Due to the nascent stage of immortal cultivation and its current weakness compared to bloodline power, the pioneers were eager to unlock stronger powers in immortal cultivation and establish a complete system. At the very least, they aimed to reduce the mortality rate, the rate of crippling, and the rate of madness upon entering the threshold of immortal cultivation, thereby increasing the success rate. For the growth of the entire immortal cultivation collective, they naturally could not hoard their research results for personal cultivation.
The pioneers understood clearly that a few dozen cultivators comparable to the twenty-first grade bloodline, hoarding their research results, would never achieve significant breakthroughs even until death, nor would they attain higher status.
Therefore, not only could they not hide their achievements in immortal cultivation, but they also had to continuously and selflessly spread the cultivation methods, the wider the better. By drawing more commoner humans onto the chariot of the immortal cultivation collective, they could gain higher status and explore various paths in immortal cultivation.
For more complete immortal cultivation methods and higher realms of cultivation, the pioneers wished they could personally teach every commoner human the art of immortal cultivation. How could they possibly treat these methods as heirlooms, secretly passing them down to their descendants?
They understood that people were everything. Only with more people would it be possible to construct a complete cultivation system.
For one person to attempt to build a complete cultivation system was arrogance and delusion. But for millions to unite and create a cultivation system, the probability of success would be greatly amplified.
Thus, with the widespread dissemination of the immortal cultivation system and the joint efforts of over a hundred thousand cultivators, the first cultivation realm, the Yin Sha realm, was fundamentally perfected. Cultivators began to condense divine ability seeds and wield the innate divine abilities of exotic beasts, becoming comparable to those with the twentieth and nineteenth grade bloodlines.
Simultaneously, they meticulously analyzed the properties of various exotic beast miasma and studied the steps for harmonizing the miasma within elixirs, reducing the fatality and madness rates.
All these measures were aimed at increasing the strength of cultivators and lowering the threshold for entering immortal cultivation.
Consequently, more and more commoners intended to join the immortal cultivator collective. Many who were once commoners and later became immortal cultivators had risen from the bottom tier to the middle tier within their original tribes.
This change, while not enough to shake the rule of the chiefs and elders, had already caused a stir among the servants and subordinates of the elders and chiefs.
Many humans with the twenty-first and twentieth grade bloodlines actively sought to learn immortal arts.
However, in the eyes of those with higher bloodlines, the path of bloodline was the true way. For a human who was born with the power of the nineteenth grade, and one who, through arduous cultivation, luck, perseverance, and talent, might possibly possess strength comparable to the nineteenth grade bloodline, the difference in difficulty was obvious.
Although the higher bloodline humans felt the wonder of immortal cultivation and believed it could elevate some low-tier humans to the middle tier of the tribe, they still looked upon immortal cultivation with a sense of disdain, even as they acknowledged its utility for the lower strata.
A common saying among them was: "Only those whose bloodline power is extremely shallow will practice immortal arts, and only through acquired effort will they obtain power."
"True strength lies in being born with power, in possessing great strength from birth, not in pursuing power through acquired means."
The nobles divided power into innate and acquired.
Bloodline abilities provided power from birth, while immortal arts required cultivation to gain power.
Furthermore, bloodline abilities could be passed down to the next generation, whereas immortal cultivation did not alter bloodline grades. This meant that a child born to an immortal cultivator would still be a mortal, a commoner, not a human born with innate strength.
This led the nobles to believe that immortal arts were only for lowly commoners and low-grade bloodline humans.
Bloodline, in this world, was everything.
The origin of the Human Emperor's bloodline, the Human King, and high-ranking nobles inherited bloodlines. Ordinary nobles inherited the bloodlines of high-ranking nobles, who in turn gave rise to low-grade bloodline humans, ultimately reaching commoners with no bloodline abilities.
This was a strict, intricate, and anciently established system.