The Eight Extraordinary Skills excelled in their strangeness, but in Perfect World, stranger things were countless.
Once he obtained the Ten Fiends Precious Arts or Immortal King methods, most of them would fall out of relevance.
If they could not be elevated into divine abilities and their power remained merely on par with first-generation prodigies, their prospects were bleaker still. Supreme Arts alone could suppress quite a few of them.
This was also why Chen Yao did not attach much importance to sharing some of the essences of the Eight Extraordinary Skills.
The visual observation portion of Grand Luo Insight he had taught Aman was less useful than the Martial Dao Heavenly Eye;
Six Treasury Immortal Thief was a longevity method that stole the vitality of heaven and earth, but it was meaningless against Heaven's Will Blade, and its combat power fell short of Qi-State Origin-Flow;
Qi-State Origin-Flow, which transformed myriad arts into a single Qi and a single Qi into myriad arts, was not without equivalent methods. Methods whose core essences revolved around primordial powers similar to primordial Qi, such as chaos and primordial origin Qi, could accomplish the same thing. Willow Deity could easily incorporate the Kunpeng Method into her own moves. She rarely used primordial origin Qi to transform myriad arts only because few moves suited her better than her own withering and flourishing essence. And when it came to nullifying myriad arts, how could any of these be as outrageous as magic immunity?
As for Twin Hands cultivating the soul and flesh, even setting aside the Indestructible Scripture and other advanced soul arts, there were plenty of Supreme Level Nirvana Methods, Healing Arts, and Transformation Arts that surpassed it in altering the body, regeneration, and healing. For rewriting perceptions and reading memories, there were Conversion Arts, Soul-Searching Arts, and so on;
The truly outrageous ones were still Feng Hou's Mystic Gate and the complete Grand Luo Insight.
The former's Time-Stopping Golden Shutter was a devastating weapon. Coupled with its Inner Landscape, which pointed straight to the source of the Great Dao, its strangeness was absolutely on the level of immortal methods when it came to support and even divining heaven's secrets, though its combat power was stuck at the first-generation level like several of the others. That clearly set it apart from the other Eight Extraordinary Skills.
Grand Luo Insight was equally uncanny, unaffected by interference from space and time and even possessing a measure of power over fate. It, too, stood distinctly apart from the other Eight Extraordinary Skills.
This might have had something to do with the eight people who made wishes in the corresponding story.
"To see through all changes in the world" and "to control all changes in the world"-those two wishes carried considerable weight.
Wishes like "to live long," "to save anyone with a breath left," and "to make artifact refinement easier" were a notch below.
As for the wish behind Qi-State Origin-Flow, that remained a mystery, but its function was obvious: the ultimate end of arts.
In terms of uncanniness, Qi-State Origin-Flow fell roughly between Feng Hou's Mystic Gate and Grand Luo Insight on one side, and the other Eight Extraordinary Skills on the other.
In other words, although the Eight Extraordinary Skills were spoken of together, their degrees of uncanniness varied because of the people who had originally made those wishes.
Within their own world's framework, the Eight Extraordinary Skills held overwhelming advantages in their respective fields. Even in cross-disciplinary battles where they could not counter their opponents, their uncanniness still gave them a considerable edge. But on a higher plane, the influence of the original wish-makers would become apparent.
At least in terms of their upper limits of uncanniness, some of the Eight Extraordinary Skills were falling behind.
At his current stage of cultivation, the strangest were still Grand Luo Insight and Feng Hou's Mystic Gate. Replacement Precious Techniques for all the other Eight Extraordinary Skills could be found in Perfect World. The best way to escape this situation would actually be to create a new set himself in the future.
That was why he had so casually taught others Twin Hands, Six Treasury Immortal Thief, Qi-State Origin-Flow, and the visual observation portion of Grand Luo Insight. Feng Hou's Mystic Gate and the core of Grand Luo Insight, however, he had never shared. Even if their offensive output before transcendence was only that of an ordinary first-generation prodigy, their advantages in certain specialties were no less than those of Supreme Arts.
The difference had also become obvious when he previously completed Grand Luo Insight's elevation into a divine ability.
The transcendence of the Extreme Realm driven by Twin Hands had provided only a modest enhancement. Its continued improvement had relied on the Heavenly Demon Tribulation divine ability derived from it.
Qi-State Origin-Flow, cultivated in the Cave Heaven Realm, had received tremendous enhancements to its ability to transform myriad arts and transform them into a single Qi, a clearly greater improvement than Twin Hands had enjoyed.
Grand Luo Insight, elevated into a divine ability through transcendence of the Spirit Transformation Realm's Extreme Realm, had directly bestowed a tremendously powerful divine ability, not the slightest bit weaker than Shi Hao's Reincarnation Treasure Technique.
"So I should cultivate the suitable ones first and combine them with my own Dao fruit, leaving the unsuitable ones for later. After I used my own Dao to achieve Qi-State Origin-Flow and Grand Luo Insight, Six Treasury Immortal Thief's longevity, youth-preserving properties, and ability to digest all things became redundant and were replaced." Chen Yao considered which of the Eight Extraordinary Skills had already fallen out of relevance.
There was nothing he could do about that.
Six Treasury Immortal Thief steals the vitality of heaven and earth, digests all things, prolongs life, and preserves youth. All those functions have been completely replaced by Qi-State Origin-Flow's Transform Myriad Arts and Grand Luo Insight's Yang God body. I haven't even had time to use Spirit Summoning and Commanding, but Perfect World has far too many Precious Techniques for controlling souls. That one actually became obsolete first. As for Divine Machine Hundred Refinements, half of it is obsolete. Its ability to reverse-refine an opponent's weapons and even refine artifacts on the spot is still pretty good, Chen Yao tallied.
Heaven Communicating Talisman Art and Feng Hou's Mystic Gate happen to have room for Extreme Realm transcendence, so they won't become obsolete so quickly.
I'll keep tinkering with Heavenly Demon Tribulation using the Pu Demon Method. Qi-State Origin-Flow can draw on Precious Techniques from Kun Peng, Phoenix, True Dragon, and others to evolve and strengthen its combat power. Grand Luo Insight is sufficient on its own; I can add some space-time Precious Techniques later.
Wait, there's also the Eight-Nine Heavenly Art. It's a method of transformation, and also a method for wielding Precious Techniques. It'll be useful for Qi-State Origin-Flow.
Chen Yao turned his attention to the Eight-Nine Heavenly Art and began studying it closely.
"Fuck, Seventy-Two Transformations! Perfect World's own Immortal King-level Seventy-Two Transformations! Mastery of myriad arts, endless transformations, evasion of calamities. I just finished taking stock, and an upgrade to Qi-State Origin-Flow already appeared!"
"Forget it. I'll keep Qi-State Origin-Flow as the foundation, fuse in the essences, and continue down the path I've chosen. To hell with it."
After spending half a month taking stock of what he had learned and clarifying his direction, Chen Yao turned to Heaven Communicating Talisman Art.
This was his path for the Inscription Realm.
Heaven Communicating Talisman Art was the pinnacle of the talismanic register tradition: no altar, no ritual procedures, talismans formed in empty space.
It was also something for which replacement Precious Techniques existed in Perfect World.
But that did not matter. Deconstructing Heaven Communicating Talisman Art mattered more.
Why was this art named for a heaven-communicating register, rather than heaven-communicating talismanic registers or a heaven-communicating talisman?
That touched upon talismanic registers: talismans and registers were two different things.
In the talismanic register tradition, using a talisman was not simply a matter of taking one out. Those things that could be tossed out and used immediately were closer to Spell Scrolls than talismans.
First, one needed to set up an altar, arrange the ritual procedures, and perform a Register-Investiture ceremony. One would then receive a Register Office and possess a Mystic Register.
A Register Office was equivalent to a rank, registering one's name with the Heavenly Court.
Only then could one use talismans condensed from the power of the immortals and gods listed on the corresponding Mystic Register.
Without a Register Office, one had no authorization to wield that power. Without a Mystic Register, no immortal or god would give a damn about you.
Then, no matter how many talismans one had on hand, one could not borrow the power of heaven, earth, immortals, and gods.
Of course, there was no Heavenly Court in the world. The Heavenly Court was within oneself!
I am the Heavenly Court.
Burning incense, bathing, setting up an altar to pray, and performing ritual procedures were all meant to adjust one's condition, bringing oneself into a special state. Register-Investiture would then allow the immortals and gods on the Mystic Register to take up residence in the human heavenly court. This process nurtured a deity of the human body and fixed a particular state in place.
Drawing talismans and setting up altars also served to adjust one's condition. Through ritual, one employed the power of the deity of the human body to establish a connection between talisman and register. Only then could a talisman possess the corresponding supernatural properties and be used by someone holding a Register Office.
Thus, Register-Investiture had cultivation requirements. Without the ability to adjust one's condition and form the corresponding immortals and gods, one could not undergo Register-Investiture. It was impossible to obtain the highest Register Office all at once. Drawing talismans was likewise difficult to accomplish at will; the harder the talisman, the more ritual was needed to regulate the power of the deity of the human body.
Heaven Communicating Talisman Art was named for a heaven-communicating register precisely because it broke that restriction.
No Register-Investiture was needed, nor any ritual procedures. This Mystic Register communicated with heaven.
Cultivating Heaven Communicating Talisman Art allowed one to directly establish a complete human heavenly court, immediately granting the ability to easily have Mystic Registers condense the power of heaven and earth into talismans.
Once one attained mastery, one could possess every Mystic Register and wield every talisman under heaven without relying on any ritual.
Heaven Communicating Talisman Art: the supreme Mystic Register, the Ancestor of Ten Thousand Talismans, connecting directly to the Heavenly Court and reaching straight to Soaring Firmament.
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