Terrifying Indeed! (Seeking Recommendations! Collections!)

Had Huang Shang obtained the Bright Jade Art before reading the Dao Scripture in its entirety, he might not have bothered to look at it.

The reason was exactly as Xu Yue feared: for a genius who had mastered everything without a teacher to study a divine art from a low-martial world would provide a short-term boost, but prove a hindrance in the long run.

However, with the foundation of the Dao Scripture and having embarked on the path of cultivating Literary Qi, looking back at such martial arts manuals was no longer an issue.

His perspective had changed.

He would not be prejudiced or influenced; instead, he could benefit from them and broaden his horizons.

The Bright Jade Art consisted of nine levels and was profound and vast; it was not a martial art intended solely for women.

Just as the Nine Yin Manual did not imply it was a feminine martial art.

Bright Jade, Bright Jade—"Bright" represented the sun and moon, while "Jade" represented the essence of heaven and earth.

To seize the fortune of heaven and earth and harvest the essence of the sun and moon—that was the essence of the Bright Jade.

Even so, the first few levels of the Bright Jade Art could not avoid the standard routine of clearing meridians and strengthening internal energy.

Huang Shang flipped through the pages unhurriedly, browsing the thin volume of the Bright Jade Art.

He closed the manual, shut his eyes to ponder, and when he opened it again, he began reading from the seventh level.

The nine levels of the Bright Jade Art contained fewer words the higher one went; by the ninth level, there were only a few sparse sentences, totaling less than a hundred characters.

"The Ancestral Aperture is not within the body, nor is it outside; it cannot be grasped, only silently preserved..."

"Subtly move it with intent, like polishing a mirror, like a divine sea; the sun and moon gather at the brow, the light of the heart appears like jade before one..."

There were many Daoist terms within, and Huang Shang understood them only vaguely.

But he did not intend to play a cryptic guessing game with the creator; instead, he recalled the relevant plot in his mind.

In Handsome Siblings, the description of the Bright Jade Art appeared quite late. In the early stages, the two palace masters, Yao Yue and Lian Xing, shook the world with their Moving Flower Grafting Jade, while the cultivation method they practiced was only revealed in Wei Wuya's underground palace.

It was precisely during that desperate situation that Yao Yue mastered the ninth level of the Bright Jade Art, pitting her against Yan Nantian, who had also perfected the Wedding Dress Art.

As these two supreme experts stood in a distant standoff, they revealed the characteristics of their divine arts through their respective phenomena.

Under normal circumstances, a standoff between two supreme experts would at least cause the ground beneath their feet to sink deep with footprints, if not change the color of the sky and dim the sun and moon.

But the Wedding Dress Art could be retracted or released at will, without a trace of leakage; the ground where Yan Nantian stood remained as flat as before, while the ground where Yao Yue stood rose into a high mound of earth.

This was the characteristic of the Bright Jade Art. It was said that when practiced to the peak of the ninth level, the power would no longer radiate outward but instead converge inward, forming a vortex of suction within the body. Anything that touched it would be drawn in like iron to a magnet.

This was somewhat like the Heavenly Demon Force Field of Wan Wan in the Twin Dragons of the Tang Dynasty world, and somewhat like the concept of absorbing the primordial energy of heaven and earth in the Legend of the Emperor world.

In any case, it extended one's influence to the surrounding space, not just limiting it to within the body.

With the practical combat effects in mind and comparing them to the manual, Huang Shang's eyes flickered; he began to understand what the ninth level of the Bright Jade Art was truly about.

"Cultivation of the Ancestral Aperture! The Upper Dantian of the Daoists!"

Dantian was originally a term used by the Daoist Internal Alchemy school to cultivate essence, energy, and spirit, later widely adopted by various schools.

Martial artists believed the Dantian to be the most important location because internal energy was born from it.

But the Dantian spoken of by martial artists actually referred to the Lower Dantian.

The human body possesses three Dantians.

The brain is the Sea of Marrow, the Upper Dantian; the heart is the Crimson Fire, the Middle Dantian; three inches below the navel is the Lower Dantian.

The Lower Dantian is the storehouse of essence; the Middle Dantian is the storehouse of energy; the Upper Dantian is the storehouse of spirit.

Essence, Energy, and Spirit!

They corresponded exactly to the three basic attributes of a Reincarnator!

Following this line of thought, the martial arts of low-martial worlds focused on the diligent cultivation of the Lower Dantian, which was the essence of the human body.

Thus, while strength increased, speed grew, and physique improved, one remained a mortal, with no fundamental change to their lifespan.

But once one began to cultivate the Upper Dantian, internal energy would take on incredible, miraculous effects, and the person would begin to shed their mortal shell, advancing toward another level of existence.

However, there was a condition: one required dense primordial energy of heaven and earth.

Without sufficient primordial energy, the soul would perish upon leaving the body, and one could not perform internal observation to view the soul; it was like crossing a river by feeling for stones, and the achievements would be very limited.

Even so, it could not stop the imagination and speculation.

When the Bright Jade Art was practiced to the eighth level, the Lower Dantian could no longer be improved, so its creator turned their gaze to the mysterious and profound Upper Dantian, naming it the Ancestral Aperture.

"The martial talent of Yao Yue and Lian Xing was no less than Huang Shang's; they reached the eighth level at a young age."

"But they were stuck for a full twenty years and could not break through to the ninth level precisely because of the appearance of the 'Jade Lad' Jiang Feng. Falling into love, their minds were no longer pure, contradicting the Daoist requirement of a heart as still as water reflecting the light."

"It was not until the underground palace of Wei Wuya that Yao Yue, under the crisis of death, experienced a great upheaval of emotion, which instead allowed her to break through the obstacles and perfect the divine art."

"But this perfection was, in fact, only the starting point of another realm."

Huang Shang flipped through the Bright Jade Art, simulating the situation at that time.

This line of thought was undoubtedly stunning.

The masters of a low-martial world were limited by their world; if they were given a broader heaven and earth, their future would be vastly different.

"Then what about Huang Shang?"

"The real Huang Shang read through the entire Daoist Canon and realized a divine art on his own; could it be that his approach was based on the Upper Dantian?"

The more Huang Shang thought about it, the more likely it seemed.

The Nine Yin Manual is a supreme Daoist art, fundamentally based on the path of Yin and Yang.

But the path of Yin and Yang is too vast; where exactly did it manifest?

Why did Huang Shang make such a massive leap to become a supreme master of the martial arts world?

"The three Dantians of the human body are a Daoist concept; the Upper Dantian is even known as the Primordial Spirit Mansion and the Palace of Nature."

"Huang Shang realized the secret of returning essence to nourish the brain and refining Qi into spirit from this. Without a teacher, he naturally leaped from an ordinary scholar to a martial arts master, which also explains why he lived to be over a hundred years old."

The Upper Dantian is the "Palace of Nature," while the Lower Dantian is the "Palace of Life."

When the two are combined, one cultivates both nature and life!

At this moment, Huang Shang fully understood why the Reincarnators valued Huang Shang so highly.

It was truly impressive!

Grandmasters already possess advanced thinking; once they are brought into higher worlds of the Heavens Consciousness, they are bound to advance by leaps and bounds, becoming unstoppable.

By then, it would be equivalent to having a private cheat code.

The Character Card is indeed the greatest weapon the Main God Temple grants to Reincarnators.

Huang Shang was very glad that the Main God Temple was so greedy; plunder was not enough, so it had decided to cultivate slaves instead.

If not for this, where would he have gotten the Dao Scripture and the Bright Jade Art?

As for the Bright Jade Art, he still did not intend to practice it step by step, but rather to develop the Ancestral Aperture directly according to his own line of thought.

He had the qualifications to do so.

The Dao Scripture provided visualization methods to strengthen the soul, and Huang Shang had even forged his own path of Literary Qi based on his own circumstances.

He used the insights gained from the Dao Scripture to strengthen his soul with Literary Qi.

Then, he used his strengthened soul to develop the Ancestral Aperture.

Once the Ancestral Aperture was formed, he would effectively possess the ninth level of the Bright Jade Art, using it to conversely open up all the meridians in his body.

Surpassing the master!

Having set his cultivation plan, Huang Shang felt as if the clouds had parted to reveal the blue sky.

His cultivation path in this world had finally been determined, thanks to the selfless contributions of the Reincarnators.

Wu Que stood guard for Huang Shang.

His expression gradually turned blank.

His own heritage was from the Moving Flower Palace, and he was practicing the Bright Jade Art, having already reached the sixth level of cultivation.

Therefore, he could see that Huang Shang was not practicing the Bright Jade Art at all.

Yet, his aura was growing stronger.

Could it be self-realization?

No way, in just one night!

Is this what a grandmaster is? Is this what a big shot is?

After holding it in for a long while, Wu Que finally managed to squeeze out a phrase: "Terrifying to this extent!"

Thanks to book friends "Heaven Crystal Hun Tian Treasure Mirror," "Feng Yu Wu Fei," "Jiu Xiao Shu," "Flammable and Explosive C," and "delgnze" for their tips.