Chapter 340: Immortal Fairy's Difficult Problem

The collection of cultivation techniques housed within the Scripture Repository of the Dao Sect far surpassed even that stored in the imperial palace of the Great Xia Dynasty.

Within these walls lay manual upon manual from eras past and present, alongside the written insights left behind by generations of sect elders.

It was here that Lu Yang discovered the Pure Yang Cultivation Technique, the very method his companion Meng Jingzhou practiced.

Compared to Lu Yang's own path, Meng Jingzhou’s technique was far simpler, for generations of predecessors possessing the Single Celibate Root had already paved a glorious, thorough highway for him, ensuring that so long as he walked it, his ultimate destination would be the magnificent Tribulation Transcendence Stage.

Yet Lu Yang could not help but wonder whether the path laid down by those ancestors remained viable, now that Meng Jingzhou had shattered their baseline to pioneer the unprecedented Dual Celibate Root.

"Why is it so thin?" Lu Yang muttered to himself in bewilderment. What he held in his hands was the manual detailing the cultivation methods for the two vast realms of the Golden Core and Nascent Soul; even if the wording were refined to the utmost, conveying profound truths through minimal prose, it should not have been this meager.

He flipped the manual open, only to find a single sentence inscribed within the pages:

Keep it up, do not break your virginity, for your cultivation has only just begun!

Lu Yang: "..."

Indeed, there was no shortage of predecessors with the Single Celibate Root who had cultivated to the Body Integration Stage or even the Tribulation Transcendence Stage; compared to those titans of the two great realms, the Golden Core Stage was merely the starting line.

"So, for your lineage of the Single Celibate Root, as long as you maintain your virginity, you can just keep cultivating indefinitely, is that it?"

Lu Yang had heard tales of a certain predecessor with the Single Celibate Root who, after enduring untold hardships to reach the Tribulation Transcendence Stage, celebrated grandly by booking every single brothel in the Imperial City for an entire month, single-handedly driving up the consumption threshold of the capital's pleasure quarters.

Such was the epitome of what one might call retaliatory spending.

Yet the Single Celibate Root was fundamentally different from the Buddhist path.

Buddhism emphasized the eradication of desire, viewing beautiful women as mere skeletons draped in pink flesh—passing clouds unworthy of lingering attachment.

The Single Celibate Root, however, did not eliminate such desires; in fact, these urges only grew stronger as one's cultivation realm advanced, leaving its practitioners with no choice but to practice absolute restraint and endurance, to the point where, upon reaching their absolute limit, they might very well mistake a skeleton for a beautiful woman.

Lu Yang also came across a rather peculiar manual titled the Method of Flesh Sacrifice. True to its name, it was a technique centered on sacrificing one's own body, derived from the philosophy that all things originate from nature and must ultimately return to nature.

Since they all stemmed from nature, why not restore oneself to nature?

To cultivate this technique, one had to sacrifice a part of their body in exchange for formidable innate talent and breakthroughs in cultivation realms.

Consequently, those who practiced this method were often blind or mute, their bodies left scarred and incomplete; some had even sacrificed so much that their physical forms were reduced to near-empty husks.

While the technique was somewhat extreme, it had not yet crossed the threshold into the demonic path.

One of Lu Yang's senior brothers happened to cultivate this very method.

During the Qi Refinement Stage, he sacrificed his appendix; during the Foundation Establishment Stage, he sacrificed his body fat; during the Golden Core Stage, he sacrificed his hair; and upon reaching the Nascent Soul Stage, he sacrificed his eyesight, leaving him as a nearsighted youth who now wore spectacles.

"All things originate from nature and must ultimately return to nature... what a familiar saying. The Immortal of Time once told me something similar, remarking that all things have their period of prosperity and their period of decline, and that both are but fleeting moments to nature itself."

"Only by mimicking nature and returning to pristine simplicity can one maintain eternal, absolute power."

"The words of the Immortal of Time resolved a dilemma that had troubled me for the longest time. Moved by inspiration, I penned the Immortal Cultivation Technique of Imperishability and attained immortality."

"Fairy, with your supreme intellect, could there really be a problem capable of troubling you?"

Hearing Lu Yang praise her so, the Immortal of Imperishability beamed with joy, but she quickly caught herself, realizing she ought to maintain a dignified reserve before him rather than rejoicing at a few simple compliments. Compressing her lips into a subtle smile, she spoke:

"Even though this Immortal's talent stands unique across eternity—such that even the likes of the Immortal of Heavenly Response cannot compare to me—I still encountered a hurdle when facing the threshold of immortality."

Lu Yang nodded. Attaining immortality was the apex for any cultivator, so it was entirely understandable that even the Immortal of Imperishability would face difficulties there. "Was it regarding how to condense your Dao Fruit?"

"It was regarding which kind of Dao Fruit to condense."

Lu Yang: "..."

"At the time, this Immortal had numerous options. I could have condensed the Tribulation-Responding Dao Fruit like that of the Immortal of Heavenly Response, or the Void Dao Fruit which commands the profound mysteries of space, or even the Time Dao Fruit similar to that of the Immortal of Time. Yet I was unsatisfied with all of them, feeling they failed to reflect this Immortal's true caliber."

"According to this Immortal's original progress, I should have been the very first to attain immortality, leaving both the Immortal of Nine Heavens and the Immortal of Time trailing behind. It was only because this Immortal encountered that dilemma when choosing her Dao Fruit, unable to decide which one to condense, that I was delayed."

"Just by that one single moment, truly, just a moment," the Immortal of Imperishability emphasized, gesturing a tiny distance with her thumb and forefinger to show how brief the span had been.

Lu Yang had no way of knowing how long her "moment" actually was—whether it meant days, months, or years.

Given that the Immortal of Imperishability confidently claimed to be a mere sixteen years old, Lu Yang possessed an absolute lack of trust in her perception of time.

"And so, the Immortal of Nine Heavens, the Immortal of Time, the Immortal of Heavenly Response, and the Immortal of the Qilin attained immortality one after another, leaving me behind." At this point, the Immortal of Imperishability wrinkled her nose, deeply displeased by their actions.

"It was only when the last of them, the Immortal of the Qilin, achieved immortality that the Immortal of Time spoke those words to me. Greatly inspired, I ultimately condensed the Imperishable Dao Fruit, which left them all burning with envy!"

The Immortal of Imperishability declared triumphantly, for this was the Dao Fruit that served as her ultimate pride.

To express her gratitude for the inspiration, she had personally prepared a grand feast to entertain the Immortal of Time, which moved him so deeply that he wept bitter tears, repeatedly expressing profound regret for his past choices.

Lu Yang fell into contemplation. The words of the Immortal of Time clearly contained hidden, profound mechanics, though his current low realm prevented him from grasping their subtle mysteries.

If such hidden profundities were laid bare through the words of another, their transformative effect would be severely diminished.

Committing the saying of the Immortal of Time to memory, he continued his study of the techniques.

Aside from the common manuals found throughout the world, the Scripture Repository also contained several techniques that differed slightly from the norm, authored by Lu Yang's senior brothers and sisters.

While these seniors could not yet compose entirely original techniques from scratch, innovating upon existing foundations posed no problem for them.

Take, for instance, the Great Sun Dharma Body Technique Lu Yang was currently studying. By meditating upon the sun and channeling its latent might, a cultivator could condense a "Great Sun Dharma Body" capable of incinerating all creation. During the day, the power of this Dharma Body reached its zenith, but once the sun set and night fell, its potency would diminish.

A certain senior sister had modified this technique slightly to write the Taiyin Dharma Body Technique, which involved meditating upon the moon to condense a "Taiyin Dharma Body" that was as gentle as water and possessed immense restorative properties.

More importantly, these two techniques were entirely compatible, allowing a cultivator to switch back and forth between the Great Sun Dharma Body and the Taiyin Dharma Body—manifesting the former by day and the latter by night.

And this was merely the first layer, accessible only to those in the Golden Core and Nascent Soul Stages.

Upon cultivating to the second layer, one could summon both the Great Sun and Taiyin Dharma Bodies simultaneously, a state known as the "Simultaneous Radiance of Sun and Moon" which doubled one's power.

Upon reaching the third layer, the two forms would merge into one, condensing a new entity known as the "Taiji Dao Transformation Body," which combined the advantages of both forms to achieve a flawless balance of offense and defense.

Lu Yang found himself completely captivated by this method, struck by just how terrifyingly formidable it was.

When he had visited the first floor of the Scripture Repository, he had encountered a technique called the Sun-Gazing Method, at the end of which it was noted that upon reaching the Golden Core Stage, one could proceed to the second floor to study its sequential continuations: the Great Sun Dharma Body Technique and the Taiyin Dharma Body Technique.

At the time, he had never imagined that the sequential techniques would be this fierce.

"The senior sister who created this technique is truly incredible. Who is she?"

Lu Yang glanced down at the author's name: Yun Zhi.

Looking up, he realized that he had unconsciously wandered into the legendary "Yun Zhi Section."