"Gu Yue was clearly only average-looking."
"But why did it hurt so much when she got close to Jiang Xia?"
Tang Wulin fell silent inwardly, bewildered, and even began openly disparaging Gu Yue's appearance in his mind.
He did not discriminate against the ordinary-looking Gu Yue. He simply needed to use this to remind himself not to let her stir up such completely unreasonable emotional turmoil in him.
Yes, Gu Yue's looks were unremarkable. It was only her inexplicable confidence that gave her a distinctive presence.
But that still did not change her ordinary appearance.
Tang Wulin repeated this over and over in his mind, forcing himself to calm down.
Yet he still could not hide his hostility toward Jiang Xia.
"It's fine. However popular Jiang Xia is, he still has no strength."
Once mocked in all sorts of ways for his Blue Silver Grass Martial Soul, and now powerful thanks to his Golden Dragon King bloodline, he understood the importance of strength better than anyone.
Without strength, there was no respect.
Jiang Xia might provide everyone with boosts and serve a support role, but he simply had no combat power.
At that thought, a smile curled Tang Wulin's lips. He finally settled down and entered a meditative state.
Jiang Xia forged several times at the Blacksmith's Association, consolidating his gains from achieving first-grade thousand refinements before returning to the Spirit Pagoda.
Upon returning to the Spirit Pagoda, he connected directly to the Spirit Ascension Platform.
As before, he was not entering the Spirit Ascension Platform to ascend his spirits, so his quota was merely a matter of an entry slot.
Of course, Jiang Xia needed a quiet area, so he had to clear out a stretch of the Spirit Ascension Platform. The losses incurred during this clearing would be subsidized by Pagoda Master Chen Xin.
Neither Han Tianyi nor Jiang Xia had insisted on this.
Chen Xin himself had insisted.
He could not possibly pass up such a good chance to earn a favor.
That made it sound rather like bootlicking, but in reality, Chen Xin had merely agreed with a grand wave of his hand during their discussion.
Inside the Spirit Ascension Platform.
Jiang Xia recalled the Four-Element Vortex Gu Yue had used that day.
He tried to analyze and reconstruct it.
Yet before he could begin, he froze where he stood.
Upon entering the Spirit Ascension Platform, he sensed that something was off.
It felt completely different.
"What's going on?"
Jiang Xia blinked and repeated what he had just done.
He had not actually done much, merely released his Martial Soul and then connected it to the Spirit Ascension Platform's illusory space.
Yet at this moment, he sensed something unusual.
"My Martial Soul seems to have become completely identical to this place in essence."
A thought arose in Jiang Xia's mind.
His Broken Dream was, ultimately, a dreamscape, something born from the evolution of mental thoughts.
It was merely a thought, even less tangible than an illusory space.
An illusory space at least had an underlying framework and logic, whereas a dreamscape was like a dream, an illusion, a bubble, a shadow, shattering at a touch.
That was precisely why his Broken Dream's intrusion into the Spirit Ascension Platform's space was both smooth and difficult.
It was smooth because his Broken Dream was so mutable that, despite being somewhat inferior in essence, it could still merge into the Spirit Ascension Platform's space.
The difficulty lay in how much weaker his Broken Dream itself was compared to the illusory space; infiltrating it required skill.
This infiltration was even somewhat more troublesome than connecting to the real world.
It was possible, but once it was fully accomplished, it would naturally go deeper than connecting to reality: it would be a true fusion.
When his Broken Dream connected to the real world, it could not affect reality. It did not even count as a fusion, merely an added layer covering it.
But when Broken Dream connected to the Spirit Ascension Platform's space, the two combined organically, truly fusing together.
It had been very troublesome before.
Now, it was no longer so troublesome. His Broken Dream seemed to have gained bones, no longer just a heap of loose flesh.
"Was it that illusory space I devoured at the research institute?"
Jiang Xia quickly pinpointed the source.
After devouring the illusory space, his dreamscape had gained a trace of structure, a skeleton.
"So that's how it is!"
Realization dawned on Jiang Xia.
In his perception, the illusory space within his Broken Dream became tangible.
Previously, he had been unable to sense it clearly. Now, as the Spirit Ascension Platform's space merged in, a slight clash arose between the two illusory spaces, making Jiang Xia aware of their existence.
The clash was not intense, limited to instinctive rejection.
Under Jiang Xia's control, they would merge very smoothly.
"The fusion of the illusory space and the Spirit Ascension Platform's space seems to have made both of them more... solid?"
Jiang Xia was somewhat uncertain.
He merged Broken Dream with the Spirit Ascension Platform's space, and the overlapping portions of the illusory space within Broken Dream and the Spirit Ascension Platform's space trembled continuously.
Jiang Xia tried to sense the information conveyed by this constant trembling.
The space had indeed become more stable, and Jiang Xia's control over the entire space had diminished.
"This isn't a good thing." Jiang Xia frowned.
"But that's not right. When I merged with the illusory space, my control over Broken Dream didn't diminish. It even seemed to grow stronger. I previously thought that improvement came from my Soul Power breakthrough after absorbing the Soul Spirit, but now it seems the illusory space played a part."
"When I previously merged Broken Dream into the Spirit Ascension Platform's space to cultivate, my control over the entire dreamscape improved too."
"There's no reason it should weaken now that I'm merging with both at once."
Jiang Xia pondered it over and over, until a flash of inspiration suddenly shot through his mind.
"I understand!"
He tried moving the illusory space within Broken Dream, then extended Broken Dream into the Spirit Ascension Platform's space.
At this moment, he separated the illusory space from the Spirit Ascension Platform's space, preventing them from merging directly and instead merging each with Broken Dream.
In this state, Jiang Xia sensed that his control within both spaces remained unaffected.
"Just as I thought!"
Jiang Xia smiled.
Then, controlling the two within Broken Dream, he merged them with Broken Dream as the medium.
In his perception, the entire world seemed to appear in his mind. Even without Spirit Detection, he could clearly sense the fluctuations of heaven and earth.
Of course, it was not as precise as Spirit Detection.
But in depth, it surpassed Spirit Detection completely.
At this moment, Jiang Xia seemed to sense the rhythm of wind, the scorching heat of fire, the flow of water, the solidity of earth...
Even the spatial element faintly emerged in his perception, like dancing sprites.
"My control over this space has grown stronger!"
At that moment, Jiang Xia's emotions surged violently.
Leaving aside any other effects, this enhancement in control alone would greatly improve the efficiency with which he comprehended the transformations of all things within the Spirit Ascension Platform.
It was not merely doubled, but tripled, quadrupled, or even increased five- or sixfold!
Besides comprehension, there was also manifestation.
When he reproduced his insights through Imitation, they would also have greater depth, and he could act to excavate that depth within his Imitation, reaching deeper realms.
From a fantasy cultivation perspective, it was an upgrade from simply drawing on energy to relying on intent.
"All of this is simply unbelievable!"