Cultivating Disciples to Breakthrough

Having guided the elders at the Dao Seed Realm and returned to cultivation again, Xuan Hao found himself free from any interruptions that he had been expecting to find him after the interruption from the elders only a few days into his secluded cultivation began. In total, he found himself peacefully cultivating for the next year without any interruptions along the way and when he woke from his cultivation, it wasn’t because the sect faced some kind of problem, but instead because his cultivation had reached the limit of the Late Stage of the Sea Formation Realm. Only a single step away from the Peak of the Sea Formation Realm.

Originally, he wanted to breakthrough to the Peak of the Sea Formation Realm during this secluded cultivation session, but he had found himself hitting a bottleneck as the size of his spiritual sea reached a point where he was now only a single meter away from reaching the 1000-kilometer circumference needed to reach the Peak of the Sea Formation Realm.

The bottleneck was expected, but it was far harder to overcome than he had originally anticipated, as it became clear to him from his first few attempts to overcome the bottleneck that it wasn’t possible to do so without returning his spiritual sea to a completely calm state, something that would take some time, as he had pushed his spiritual sea beyond what it could handle to grow it to its current size.

In its current state, his spiritual sea was already close to reaching the turbulent stage. Having been pushed far more than in the past given that he had originally wanted to break through to the Peak of the Sea Formation Realm in a single step before starting to stabilize his spiritual sea for a breakthrough to the Land Creation Realm.

Now, however, it looked like he would have to first stabilize his spiritual sea and return it to a calm state before he could break through to the Peak of the Sea Formation Realm. Negatives aside, this also meant that he should be able to break through to the Land Creation Realm only a short time after he broke through to the Peak of the Sea Formation Realm or potentially even directly break through after reaching the Peak of the Sea Formation Realm.

 All that aside, he now had to figure out how to stabilize his spiritual sea… And the only reason he could think about was further increasing his comprehension of different Daos. The problem with this solution, however, was the fact that his comprehension of a Dao to the Small Success Realm or even the Large Success Realm would have little impact on his spiritual sea. Only a Dao reaching the Perfection Realm or beyond that would have any real impact on his spiritual sea.

But, out of the different Daos that he had brought to the Large Success Realm, he didn’t feel like it would be easy to raise any of them to the Perfection Realm in the short term. Not to mention, he had a feeling that just raising a single Dao to the Perfection Realm would not be enough to stabilize his spiritual sea enough for him to break through to the Peak of the Sea Formation Realm.

However, he didn’t want to spend the next five or ten years still stuck at the Late Stage of the Sea Formation Realm. So, after thinking his situation through, he ultimately ended up setting his sight of the Dao of Alchemy, a Dao he had already made some significant progress on through the years and had already reached the Large Success Realm in.

But this wasn’t what was important. Instead, it was the fact that comprehending the Dao of Alchemy to the Perfection Realm would allow him to become a Saint Realm Alchemist and in turn also give him another way to strengthen the foundation of his spiritual sea. Especially so considering that the enhancement brought by the core formed from reaching the Saint Realm was far more than even that of bringing one of his Daos to the Perfection Realm.

Essentially meaning that comprehending just the Dao of Alchemy to the Perfection Realm should be enough for him to calm his spiritual sea and break through to the Peak of the Sea Formation Realm.

To make things easier for himself, Xuan Hao didn’t lock himself away to comprehend the Dao of Alchemy on his own but instead stepped out to find Pei Yang. Knowing that working together with him would be the best way for him to rapidly increase his comprehension of the Dao of Alchemy.

Not to mention, Pei Yang himself was currently using the artifacts that he had picked up from the ancient alchemy sect ruins and should already be close to reaching the Saint Realm thanks to their assistance.

In a way, it wasn’t so much that he wanted to seek out Pei Yang for guidance and help in further deepening his own understanding of the Dao of Alchemy, but more so that he also wanted a chance to try and use those artifacts to create Saint Grade Pills and other alchemical concoctions…

Whoosh~

With this in mind, after a quick scan of the sect with his divine sense to see what had changed while he had been locked away for secluded cultivation, Xuan Hao quickly made his way towards the Alchemy Hall where the artifacts and in turn also Pei Yang was located.

As for what had changed during the past year… Xuan Hao didn’t find anything noteworthy outside of the large number of both sect elders and disciples that could be seen constantly lingering around the ascension realm tower.

Although it was clear that everyone in the sect should have gotten as high up the ascension realm tower as they could with their current strength, the combat experience and ascension coins that they could still gain from the ascension realm tower made them come back even as they had reached their limit in how far they could progress.

Not to mention, there would constantly be disciples who broke through and came back to challenge the floor that they had failed to conquer in the past. Along with that, there would also be those who tried to team up with others to try and get through a difficult floor through teamwork.

But… It was also during this time that the sect elders and disciples found out that they couldn’t join up with those far weaker than themselves and could only team up with those stuck on the same floor as themselves within the same major realm. Making it impossible for the few seniors who had originally wanted to carry their juniors to do so.

Still, sad as this outcome might have been for those who had wanted to earn some extra contribution points in this manner, it proved to be better for the sect overall, as there was no real way for the younger disciples or sect elders for that matter to get someone stronger to carry them.

In turn, this also ended up resulting in the overall combat strength of the sect’s elders and disciples having far greater combat strength than that of others, as they constantly threw themselves into deadly battles inside the ascension realm tower.

Of course, outside of the few who were unfortunate enough to meet these elders and disciples in battle, no one knew about the increase in strength that the Star Shattering Sect had undergone due to the ascension realm tower.

Out of everyone, the ones who had it the worst because of this change were none other than the demonic cultivators who had to face the elders and disciples of the sect daily.

In a way, because of the increase in strength of the sect’s elders and disciples, the demonic cultivators of the Frozen Wastelands had found themselves losing ground over the past year.

If not for the sect not wanting to invade the Frozen Wastelands, it wouldn’t have been surprising for the sect to have begun establishing new branch sects inside the Frozen Wastelands in an attempt to get some of the rare and unique spiritual herbs and other cultivation resources that could be found in the Frozen Wastelands.

Still, the demonic cultivators being pushed back over the past year because of the increased strength of the sect’s elders and disciples had resulted in a small kingdom that had already fallen to the demonic cultivators being overtaken by the Star Shattering Sect. Turning into a rather exciting event for the disciples, who now had first hand experience in takin over territory from the demonic cultivators, as Elder Song and the rest of the sect’s elders left the liberation of the small kingdom to the younger disciples. Letting the more talented disciples who had broken through to the Nascent Soul Realm and been promoted to Core Disciples be the ones in charge of the conquest of the small kingdom.

Among these Core Disciples were also a few of the far more talented ones that had already broken through to the Domain Lord Realm like Xuan Hao’s own disciples of which Chu Yang also decided to join in on the fun and help in the conquest of the small kingdom together with Bai Ning, who had somehow been dragged out of his forge thanks to the appearance of a small scale spiritual metal mine that contained a unique spiritual metal that couldn’t be found anywhere else within the sect’s territory.