Ziqi Sect

Biodata

Feature	Details
Name	Ziqi Sect (子器派)
Type	Ancient Immortal Sect specializing in Artifact Cultivation and artifact refinement 25
Affiliation	Governed by the Mother Crucible for most of its later history; merged with the Heart Beast Sect to form the Fortune Sect 143 493
Location	The underground small worlds surrounding the Outer Heavenly Meteorite Crater; its port connected the sect to rogue cultivators and subsidiary forces 144 147
Status	Merged into the Fortune Sect; its Artifact Cultivator and Beast Cultivator inheritances were subsequently integrated into the Great Immortal Creation Method 493
First Appearance	25

History

Ancient sect and the Outer Heavenly Meteorite Crater

The Ziqi Sect was already a major Artifact Cultivator force seven thousand years ago, with a scale the Heart Beast Sect could not compare to. It was known for artifact refinement and the Armor Spell, an ancient spell later encountered in corrupted form in the Heart Beast Realm 25.

Its prosperity became tied to the Outer Heavenly Meteorite Crater. The sect excavated the crater for roughly a thousand years, reaching a depth of ten thousand meters while continuously obtaining increasingly valuable metal ore, including High-grade Spirit Materials. The crater's metal pollution and disease risk led the sect to develop safeguards such as puppets 147.

The original mountain gate stood on the surface beside the crater. Sect Master Chen Tiangang later led more than a thousand Artifact Cultivators in artifact refinement at Doushuai Palace, before the sect was dragged beneath the crater by the catastrophe that created the Mother Crucible 221 239.

Birth of the Mother Crucible

Seven thousand years before the present, Chen Tiangang attempted a forbidden ascension method. He sacrificed and merged more than three thousand Dao Bodies in pursuit of immortality, but the attempt failed and drove him into qi deviation 239.

Jiang Tianche, the sole spiritually aware Dao Body within the merged mass, attempted to stop Chen Tiangang. Chen Tiangang's memories overwhelmed him, and a part-human, part-insect, part-immortal entity ultimately ascended, leaving Jiang Tianche's remains behind 239.

Those remains became the Mother Crucible. Phosphorescent flesh engulfed the Ziqi Sect, assimilated its disciples, and dragged the entire mountain gate into the Outer Heavenly Meteorite Crater. The Mother Crucible then preserved an illusion of the former sect while controlling its disciples and holding an Ascension Assembly every thousand years 239.

Control of the Heart Beast Realm

The Ziqi Sect treated the Heart Beast Sect and similar smaller forces as subsidiaries that supplied flesh limbs. Multi-Limb Mountain functioned as a cultivation site and harvesting ground, where rogue cultivators and Puppet Cultivators were raised as “Medicine Humans” for Ziqi Sect disciples 132 133.

Ziqi Sect disciples harvested limbs from Medicine Humans to create and replace Flesh-Limb Artifacts. Their corrosive spiritual power rapidly degraded these limbs, ensuring a continuous demand for new material 133.

The sect also held the Iron Cauldron Trial approximately once every fifty years, originally inviting talented rogue artifact refiners to become disciples. By the present era, the associated Iron Cauldron secret realm had become linked to Polymelia and spreading metal toxin 34.

Li Mo's infiltration

Li Mo entered the Ziqi Sect by impersonating an Artifact Cultivator and using his Primordial Dao Body, Crucible, and limb-transplantation ability to pass as one of its disciples. He entered the Mother Crucible after the sect ordered its Heart Beast Sect affiliates to return 141 143.

Within the Mother Crucible, Li Mo learned the Ziqi Life-Protecting Heart Sutra and acquired a legitimate identity as an Artifact Person. His five Dao Bodies caused a major disturbance on the Path of Heart's Inquiry, leading Nascent Soul cultivators to compete over his recruitment 143 146.

He was ultimately taken into the Graveyard Incineration Furnace lineage under Qiongshan, later becoming known publicly as Azure Sky Daoist and rising to the Ziqi Sect's Inner Sect through the Golden Cauldron Gate 147 162 199.

Thousand-Year Calamity and collapse

The sect's Ascension Assembly and repeated reforging cycles destabilized its cultivators. Great Mothers, phosphorescent flesh, and the Mother Crucible's control threatened both the Inner Sect and the port 237 239.

The Mastermind later infiltrated the Ziqi Sect's port, converting Artifact Cultivators into Buddhist monks and gradually eroding their consciousness. The sect lacked a Void Refining Stage cultivator capable of resisting this takeover 480.

Li Mo returned to defend the sect, using the Mother Crucible to suppress and defeat the Karma Seal Mother. The Heart Beast Sect entered the Outer Heavenly Meteorite Crater in support of the Ziqi Sect 484.

After Li Mo reached the Void Refining Stage, True Lord Jiutu and the surviving Artifact Cultivators proposed merging the Ziqi Sect with the Heart Beast Sect. Li Mo accepted, establishing the Fortune Sect and retaining both former sects as branches 493.

Organization

Mother Crucible

The Mother Crucible stood above all Ziqi Sect disciples and determined the division of its territories. Artifact Cultivators regarded it with reverence and avoided openly discussing the sect itself 143.

• It controlled the birth of every Artifact Person; the Ziqi Sect had no mortal population 143.
• It nurtured Artifact People in amber containers and eliminated those that failed to survive the Death Sickness 143.
• It instilled memories into newborn Artifact People to create shared identity and knowledge of sect customs 144.
• It could assimilate disciples and repeatedly reforge them, allowing Golden Core cultivators to retain past-life memories at a severe long-term cost 235 237.
• After the sect's liberation, Artifact Cultivators were no longer dependent on it for birth, though those dying within the crater could still be drawn into the Supreme Furnace for reforging 493.

Outer Sect and Inner Sect

The Ziqi Sect occupied fifteen underground small worlds. Environments closer to the surface were less suitable for cultivation 144.

Area	Function and inhabitants
First three layers	Home to Low-grade inheritance lineages, generally including Artifact People without Dao Bodies or with incompatible Acquired Dao Bodies 144
Middle three layers	Home to Mid-grade inheritance lineages, largely composed of Artifact People with Acquired Dao Bodies; many flesh-limb harvesters originated here 144
Inner Sect	Divided into three layers and accessible through the Golden Cauldron Gate. It contained rare resources and Nascent Soul techniques, but even Nascent Soul cultivators had to obey the Mother Crucible's rules 144 209
District Ten	Included Doushuai Palace, Collection Hall, Artifact Workshop, and Supreme Furnace, among other specialized buildings 211

The Golden Cauldron Gate was held roughly once every hundred years. Outer Sect disciples at the Establishment or Core Formation stages competed for places in the Inner Sect's Blessed Land Cave Heavens 144.

Dao lineages

The sect was divided into Dao lineages whose standing could rise or fall through the Golden Cauldron Gate. Inner Sect promotions could elevate a lineage's district and access to resources 199.

Known lineages include:

• Graveyard Incineration Furnace — Li Mo's Outer Sect lineage under Qiongshan and later True Lord Jiutu; based on a metal hill covered in tombstones and Human Pig ornaments 147 200.
• White Bone Thousand Feet — A ninth-layer Dao lineage associated with Thousand-Foot True Person 199.
• Taiping Green Wood — A seventh-district lineage whose Daoist Disciple, Wood Daoist, possessed a wooden body and regenerating branch-like limbs 184.
• Fensha Land — A prominent artifact-refining lineage active in the port's cricket fights 162.

Cultivation System

Artifact Cultivation

Ziqi Sect disciples cultivated through Crucibles, Artifact Beads, body modification, and Flesh-Limb Artifacts rather than relying solely on conventional spiritual roots.

• All disciples cultivated the Ziqi Life-Protecting Heart Sutra during the Childhood Stage before changing to a Primary Cultivation Method after Foundation Establishment 143.
• Artifact Cultivators condensed three Artifact Beads within their Crucibles at the Coming-of-Age Stage; once formed, the head was no longer a vital weakness 150.
• Their Golden Cores were formed by recreating the Three Beads, in contrast to Beast Cultivators, who subdued the Three Souls 150.
• The Core Formation stages were Pseudo-Core, Core Condensation, Core Transformation, and Infant Cry 150.
• The sect's spells overwhelmingly focused on surgical body modification to improve or adapt a cultivator's Dao Body 150.

Dao Bodies and Flesh-Limb Artifacts

Dao Bodies determined an Artifact Person's prospects and placement within the sect. Innate Dao Bodies and multiple Dao Bodies were especially prized, while lower-status disciples typically possessed only Acquired Dao Bodies 143 146.

• Ziqi Sect disciples commonly used limbs as Magic Tool Blanks and replaced them when their spiritual power corroded the material 133.
• Flesh-Limb Artifacts could parasitize a body seamlessly, but required Artifact Cultivator spiritual power to display their full strength 158.
• Artifact Cultivators could absorb metallic dust through transplanted limbs, gradually transforming flesh into magic-tool-like material 131.
• The sect's cultivation methods were designed around compatibility between a disciple's Dao Body and their inherited techniques 135.

Death Sickness

The Death Sickness was a pervasive danger among Artifact Cultivators and a central flaw in the sect's system.

• The Mother Crucible used the Death Sickness to eliminate defective Artifact People during their nurturing process 143.
• Qing Jingzi's deteriorating condition showed that even Core Formation Artifact Cultivators could suffer severe mutation and mental instability 136 141.
• Repeated reforging and reincarnation inflicted irreversible damage on bodies and souls, worsening the condition of many Nascent Soul cultivators 237.
• In Doushuai Palace, Artifact Cultivators continued refining despite visible decay and Death Sickness erosion, often unaware of their own deterioration 221.

Facilities and Territories

• Outer Heavenly Meteorite Crater — The sect's core resource site, excavated to a depth of ten thousand meters and rich in metal ore and High-grade Spirit Materials 147.
• Artificial Sun / Metal Sun — A pseudo-Magic Treasure within the crater that simulated day and night and was later used to contain phosphorescence during the Thousand-Year Calamity 147 237.
• Mother Crucible — The living entity that birthed, nurtured, sorted, and controlled Artifact People 143.
• Path of Heart's Inquiry — Originally an entrance test of nature and disposition; in the later sect, it was used to assign Artifact Embryos to Dao lineages 145 146.
• Doushuai Palace — An Inner Sect artifact-refining building where cultivators refined puppets as offerings to obtain a refining room 221.
• Supreme Furnace — A secluded cultivation facility connected to the sect's reforging system 211 493.
• Port — A trade center where Dao lineages operated artifact-refining shops and rogue cultivators exchanged resources, flesh limbs, and Magic Tools 159 480.
• Multi-Limb Mountain — A Heart Beast Realm outpost and flesh-limb harvesting ground connected to the sect through its Gateway 132 143.

Relationships

• Mother Crucible — Former supreme authority and source of every Artifact Person; born from Jiang Tianche's remains after Chen Tiangang's failed ascension 143 239.
• Heart Beast Sect — Former vassal and source of Medicine Humans and flesh limbs; later allied with the Ziqi Sect against the Mastermind and merged with it into the Fortune Sect 133 484 493.
• Li Mo / Azure Sky Daoist — Infiltrated the sect, became a Daoist Disciple of the Graveyard Incineration Furnace, entered the Inner Sect, defended the crater, and approved the eventual merger 143 199 484 493.
• Chen Tiangang — Former sect master whose forbidden ascension experiment produced the Mother Crucible and caused the sect's assimilation 239.
• Jiang Tianche — Chen Tiangang's senior disciple and the spiritually aware Dao Body whose remains became the Mother Crucible 235 239.
• Graveyard Incineration Furnace — One of the sect's Dao lineages; Li Mo's principal affiliation within the Ziqi Sect 147 200.
• Mastermind — Hostile force that infiltrated the port, altered Artifact Cultivators into Buddhist monks, and sought the sect's destruction 480.
• Karma Seal Mother — A Mastermind-associated threat defeated by Li Mo through the Mother Crucible 484.

Trivia

• The sect's ancient founder was represented by the limbless golden statue known as the Golden Light Hermit in the Fortune Furnace temple 50.
• The Ziqi Sect's Daoist Canon stored techniques on hollowed human skins and corpses rather than conventional jade slips 150.
• The Heart Beast Sect was so insignificant to most Ziqi Sect members that its name was eventually forgotten, remembered only as a flesh-limb breeding ground 174.