"What the hell?!"
At Edwin's answer, Roselle's eyes nearly popped out of their sockets.
"Primordial Spirit—you mean the Primordial Spirit from cultivation novels?"
It took Roselle several seconds to find his voice again.
Back in his previous life, when he had been holed up in a rented apartment eating instant noodles, he had read plenty of those novels.
Golden Core, Nascent Soul, Spirit Transformation—he could explain all of them inside out.
But this wasn't a cultivation world! This was the Victorian era! Steampunk! Cthulhu!
And you were talking to him about cultivation and the Primordial Spirit?!
This was way too absurd, wasn't it?
"That's right. But before I explain that, let's talk about psychology first.
You know Freud, right? The structural model of the psyche."
Edwin smiled at his reaction, then asked in return.
"Uh—you mean the id, ego, and superego?"
Roselle answered instinctively upon hearing the question.
He did know a little about that. After all, back when he argued with people online, tossing around a few psychology terms was the only way not to look uncultured.
"That's right."
Edwin's fingertips traced across the tabletop. "The id is the most primitive, animalistic part of a person's psyche.
Your instincts, desires, impulses, and fears.
When you're hungry, you want to eat. When you're sleepy, you want to sleep. When you see a beautiful woman, you want to—well, reproduce.
Those are all components of the id.
Using the concepts from cultivation novels, this would be the acquired spirit—the various stray thoughts acquired after birth, arising from the body and the outside world."
Roselle nodded. He had indeed seen that explanation in his previous life.
In classical xianxia novels, so-called cultivation meant casting off the influence brought by the acquired spirit before one could attain the Dao.
It was just that this