Orifice Opening, Viscera Refining

Although the opening of Introduction to Spirit Refinement mentioned the first six realms,

it merely made Li Xijun curious about just how powerful this world's Spirit-Refining System could become.

As an introductory book, however, it did not elaborate on anything else. Instead, it mainly explained the cultivation method for the first realm, Orifice Opening.

What Li Xijun had never expected was that

the first realm of this world's Spirit-Refining System was cultivated through reading!

According to Introduction to Spirit Refinement, the path of spirit refinement had stood on three pillars since ancient times: Confucianism, Buddhism, and Taoism.

The books and writings created by the ancient sages of these three schools all contained special power.

Therefore, whether they were Confucian, Taoist, or Buddhist Spirit-Refining Cultivators, their first lesson was reading.

In particular, they had to extensively read classics such as the Four Books and Five Classics, the Taoist Canon, and Buddhist Scriptures.

Taking Confucian Spirit-Refining Cultivators as an example,

to become an Orifice Opening Realm cultivator, one needed to thoroughly study the Four Books and Five Classics and constantly contemplate the classics written by Confucian sages.

Through continuous reading, memorization, and contemplation, scholars with talent in this regard would feel their spirits growing stronger by the day. The more they read, the sharper their ears and eyes became, the quicker their thoughts, the more vigorous their spirits, and the more freely their ambitions soared.

Once they sensed the Ancestral Aperture within the human heart, successfully broke through the barrier preventing their spirit from entering it, and perceived the soul dwelling high within, they would become an Orifice Opening Realm Spirit-Refining Cultivator.

From then on, they would possess photographic memory, condensed spirit, incredibly swift thoughts, and perceive external objects as moving slowly.

Most importantly, they could truly sense their souls and cultivate through a "Contemplation Method," strengthening their souls and becoming fundamentally different from ordinary people at the level of the soul.

According to Introduction to Spirit Refinement, when the Ancestral Aperture between the brows opens, everyone sees all sorts of dreamlike illusions.

The only obvious sign they share is hearing a faint, crisp sound from the deepest part of their bodies, like bubbles bursting or a pinecone shell cracking open.

Reading this, Li Xijun immediately recalled the scene of seeing the Grand Luo Mark in his Sea of Consciousness for the first time.

Having realized something, Li Xijun silently closed the book, showing no expression.

At that moment, he used his "special skill" from stock trading, separating himself from "himself" and calmly viewing things from a third-person perspective.

Then, he silently rose and left the attic. He crossed the small bridge and the crowd, headed to a secluded place, used a drone to confirm that no one was following him, and then repeated the previous process, decisively returning to his room once more.

Only after returning to his familiar home did Li Xijun let out a long breath and eagerly flip through the book, unable to suppress his excitement.

Soon, a technique for sensing one's own soul after opening the Ancestral Aperture came into view.

According to it, after opening the Ancestral Aperture between the brows, one could use meditation, incantations, hand seals, and other methods to assist in sensing the soul and initially wielding the power of the soul.

Following its instructions, Li Xijun sat cross-legged on his bed, formed hand seals with both hands, and silently recited, "The human heart is perilous, the Dao heart is subtle. Be refined and single-minded, and hold fast to the mean."

The second hand of the clock on the wall ticked away. At some unknown point, Li Xijun entered a peaceful and tranquil state of mind.

With the opportunity he had received when opening the Grand Luo Mark before,

Li Xijun encountered no obstruction as he guided his spirit into the Ancestral Aperture between his brows. Illuminated by the golden mark above his Sea of Consciousness, he easily sensed his own soul.

Unlike last time, however, Li Xijun, whose heart was now still as water, experienced the power of his soul through the technique.

In an instant,

Li Xijun, who had been sitting with his eyes closed, suddenly felt an incomparable coolness in his mind. His unconsciously opened eyes became brilliantly bright, as if light had filled an empty room. In particular, his irises shone with starlike radiance.

As Li Xijun looked again at the second hand moving across the wall clock, he clearly felt that the trajectory of its movement had slowed.

"Is this... Thought Overclocking, or rather, Bullet Time?"

Overjoyed, Li Xijun kept experimenting, but after three minutes, he felt a faint prickling pain in his brain.

This made him hurriedly withdraw from that Bullet Time state of extreme mental focus.

At the same time,

now even more convinced by Introduction to Spirit Refinement, he continued sitting on the bed and turned to its final pages.

Unfortunately, there was no introduction to the Second Realm, Spirit Condensation.

Instead, the handwriting began to change noticeably.

The style of writing also shifted from its previous lofty arrogance into a tone as gentle as a spring breeze.

This person even put forward views entirely contrary to the disdain for martial arts expressed at the beginning of Introduction to Spirit Refinement.

Although martial arts has only five realms—Skin and Flesh, Tendons and Bones, Viscera Refining, Marrow Cleansing, and Blood Exchange—the world calls it a dead-end path.

Yet today's Dasheng stands amid a great upheaval unseen in a thousand years.

The Western Seven Gods Church and Potion Practitioners each possess all manner of methods, bizarre in the extreme, capable at the slightest provocation of driving others or themselves mad and causing physical mutations.

In contrast, though Dasheng Martial Arts has its shackles, it seeks nothing externally and remains untainted by foul corruption. Through pure Blood Essence martial arts, it excavates the potential of the human body, tempering and transforming it. A Blood-Exchange Martial Sage can stand within a hundred paces and still rival an entire nation.

For thousands of years, we Eastern martial artists have sought inwardly within the physical body and long since comprehended the mysteries of human anatomy. If one spends ten thousand taels of silver, has an ample supply of great medicines, and takes medicinal baths every day, then ten months of Viscera Refining and two years of Marrow Refining are no difficult feat.

If cultivators like us possess spare wealth and resources, we should advance martial arts and spirit refinement side by side. Only then can we contend against high-sequence Potion Practitioners.

—Respectfully, Li Boyan

The following content was much like how Introduction to Spirit Refinement had detailed the Orifice Opening Realm.

This person likewise gave a rather thorough introduction to the first three realms of martial arts.

At first, Li Xijun, who cultivated Main World martial arts, had looked down on it.

It was said that Martial Saints in the Main World could shatter planets with a single strike. He had no regard for the dead-end martial arts of the Da Sheng World.

But as he continued reading, his expression grew increasingly solemn, eventually turning to amazement and wild delight.

"The Skin and Flesh Realm and Tendons and Bones Realm are indeed exquisite, but compared to foundational cultivation methods that comprehensively excavate the body's potential and stimulate the flesh, tendons, and bones, they're nothing special."

"But this Third Realm, Viscera Refining, actually dares to directly cultivate the five organs and Six Viscera?"

"An Organ Refining Martial Artist is like a ferocious tiger. Inner Breath naturally arises within him, and he possesses three thousand jin of strength. Wait, three thousand jin?!"

Li Xijun fell silent.

An Apprentice at level nine only had a punching force of one thousand kilograms, or two thousand jin.

And when the two top Martial Arts Universities of Great Yan, known as the Imperial Capital Two Heavens, recruited geniuses, they often followed an unspoken rule.

One had to break through level nine and deeply excavate one's potential, usually reaching a punching force of over two thousand jin—around twenty-three hundred jin—to be admitted.

The reason was simple.

Generally speaking, the more thoroughly one excavated one's potential in the Apprentice Realm,

the better the results would be when cultivating high-level methods and absorbing Spiritual Power in the Mortal Shedding Realm, and the more terrifying the improvement to one's physical qualities would become.

When some people reached the Mortal Shedding Realm and absorbed Spiritual Power to evolve their physical bodies, they might gain only several thousand kilograms of strength. But geniuses who had broken through level nine and deeply excavated their potential could gain two or three times as much with every absorption of Spiritual Power in the Mortal Shedding Realm.

Therefore, if one wanted to enter the Imperial Capital Two Heavens with only Blood Essence Level nine, that was basically an automatic failure.

And throughout all these years in the Federation, among the many geniuses admitted to the Imperial Capital Two Heavens, Li Xijun had never heard of anyone reaching three thousand jin of punching force. Even the Wood Sage had only reached around twenty-five hundred jin back then.

Moreover,

"Martial artists in the Da Sheng World actually developed an energy like Inner Breath by excavating inward?"

"An Organ Refining Martial Artist's explosive combat power can even double after using Inner Breath?"

Thoroughly moved, Li Xijun looked again at that sentence above.

For thousands of years, we Eastern martial artists have sought inwardly within the physical body and long since comprehended the mysteries of human anatomy. If one spends ten thousand taels of silver, has an ample supply of great medicines, and takes medicinal baths every day, then ten months of Viscera Refining and two years of Marrow Refining are no difficult feat.

"Although I'm a poor bastard in the Main World, living off Pin Hao Fan and sleeping under a tiny blanket,"

"but if you're talking ten thousand taels of silver... then I'm wide awake!"