The second floor of the Nine Orders Pavilion differed little from the first, with three steles containing the Nine-Order Dao standing at its center.
However, more than one person was studying the Nine-Order Dao steles. Several disciples sat before them, eyes closed as they contemplated the Dao.
Chen Xuan walked over to the stele inscribed with the word "Time," sat down before it, and extended his divine sense into it.
The cultivation method for the second layer of the time Dao was a full order of magnitude more complex than the first. It no longer involved merely sensing differences in the flow of time; he had to begin actively slicing off segments of time, treating its flowing current as a piece of cloth that could be cut.
The key to this step lay in precision. Cutting too much would interrupt the flow of time and provoke a backlash from its laws, while cutting too little would yield no meaningful cultivation gains. He had to find exactly the right measure.
Chen Xuan sat down before the stele once more and closed his eyes.
The time power within his Zhaoxi Bizheng fate pattern seemed to sense the call of a higher-level method and began flowing along the new circulation routes on its own.
His perception underwent repeated trial and error as he practiced those precise cuts. For the first twenty days, he made almost no progress. Every attempt felt like cutting silk thread with a blunt knife: either he failed to sever it or cut too far.
But starting on the twenty-first day, he gradually found that subtle rhythm.
Time power condensed at his fingertips into a thread of exceedingly thin silver light, as transparent and sharp as a cicada's wing.
With a gentle flick, that thread of silver light swept across