No matter how he studied the various methods of the primordial spirit, he remained stuck at the peak of Foundation Establishment—and that was, in the end, a serious problem.

Duanmu Yu seemed to hesitate, words rising to her lips and dying there. But on second thought, Wei Zhao had been so trusting and frank with her that it hardly seemed right to keep secrets. Yet this concerned a confidential matter, the sort of thing that could not be casually divulged to outsiders. Even fellow disciples of the same sect had to guard against one another—how much more so with an outsider like Wei Zhao?

"What is it? Is there something you want to say?" Wei Zhao asked, watching her with a measure of surprise.

"You..." Duanmu Yu gritted her teeth. Anyone else would never have spoken of it so readily, but just as Wei Zhao had said, she was, at heart, a person who prized loyalty above all. Not only had Wei Zhao braved danger to save her, but more importantly, he trusted her so completely—it would be unconscionable not to repay him in kind. At last the words escaped her: "Have you ever heard of the Spirit-Consciousness Grass?"

"Spirit-Consciousness Grass?" Wei Zhao was taken aback, then shook his head. "What is that?"

"A most unusual spiritual herb. It is said to grow only near the River of Consciousness, and it is the finest spiritual medicine for tempering one's consciousness. Once ingested, one can use it to refine one's consciousness and be reborn, as it were—it can even temper the strongest of Golden Core cultivators!" Excitement and yearning were written plainly across Duanmu Yu's face.

"The strongest Golden Core?" Wei Zhao was rather astonished, and could not help saying, "Are you telling me that the strongest Golden Core cultivators of the Little World of Antiquity are all forged through acquired tempering?"

"That's right." Duanmu Yu answered as though it were the most natural thing in the world. Seeing Wei Zhao's odd expression, she asked, "Is there some problem with that?"

"No problem, exactly—but it is not quite the same on Cloud Terrace Island. There, whether one can become the strongest Golden Core is decided entirely by the process of breakthrough, and chiefly by tempering the physical body rather than the consciousness. It seems the two are entirely separate branches," Wei Zhao said thoughtfully.

One cultivated the body, the other the consciousness. Though their paths differed, in some measure they arrived at the same destination by different roads—both produced the strongest Golden Core cultivators.

"Temper the body? And what of the consciousness?" Duanmu Yu looked positively baffled.

"On Cloud Terrace Island, consciousness cultivation was not valued at the outset. By and large, no one below the Nascent Soul stage would devote themselves to it. Only after reaching a sufficiently high level does it command attention—though of course, special heart methods or fortunate encounters are another matter entirely," Wei Zhao explained.

"Cultivating consciousness only above the Nascent Soul stage? How could there possibly be time for that?" Duanmu Yu was struck dumb. In her understanding, Nascent Soul old monsters were already the highest existence; by Wei Zhao's account, did that not mean the vast majority of cultivators never cultivated their consciousness at all?

"Not at all. Above the Nascent Soul stage there are still any number of realms waiting to be broken through, and on Cloud Terrace Island cultivators above Nascent Soul are as common as hairs on an ox—it is perfectly normal." Wei Zhao saw nothing amiss in his own words; rather, it was her reaction that surprised him. "Is it truly so much earlier in the Little World of Antiquity?"

Duanmu Yu was utterly dumbfounded by his words. Above the Nascent Soul stage there were still any number of realms, and cultivators of that caliber were as common as hairs on an ox—this all but overturned everything she knew!

She was choked into silence for a good while before she recovered herself and said faintly, "Earlier? Far earlier than you imagine. In our Little World of Antiquity, systematic consciousness cultivation begins as early as the Foundation Establishment stage. Has Leng Leng truly never mentioned it to you?"

"She truly has not." Wei Zhao shook his head. No doubt Leng Leng had assumed he already knew such things, and so had never brought them up at all.

But looking back now, no wonder his master Leng Leng had given him that piece of Star-Ink Charcoal. At the time, judging by the conventional wisdom of Cloud Terrace Island, Wei Zhao had thought such a thing would only harm a cultivator in the early Foundation Establishment stage, with no benefit at all—but he had been entirely mistaken. Once one reached the Foundation Establishment stage, one was meant to begin systematic consciousness cultivation. So long as one grasped the method and the knack, one would not suffer the Star-Ink Charcoal's backlash in the least.

This, too, showed how deeply Leng Leng cared for him. A treasure like the Star-Ink Charcoal—and a treasure she needed for her own cultivation at that—was something others would break their skulls fighting over and still never obtain, yet when she did not even know whether Wei Zhao would survive, she had not hesitated to leave it to him. That was proof enough of the depth of her feeling.

"..." Duanmu Yu was speechless for a moment, then returned to the point. "The Spirit-Consciousness Grass ought to be the very finest spiritual medicine where consciousness is concerned. Since you are a primordial spirit body, perhaps it could help you break through the barrier."

"It could! It very well could!" Wei Zhao was beginning to grow excited. This was different from the Sacred Water Pearl—the Sacred Water Pearl was meant solely for healing wounds, whereas the Spirit-Consciousness Grass was itself meant for tempering and elevating the consciousness. The two had utterly different effects.

And in the very moment he had been listening to Duanmu Yu speak, it had suddenly occurred to him that the reason he had fallen into a bottleneck and made no progress for so long was very likely that he had gone astray from the very beginning!

Out of habitual thinking, ever since Wei Zhao had projected into the secular world, he had consistently relied on his prior experience on Cloud Terrace Island to restore and elevate his strength. And in some measure, his primordial spirit body was no different from his true body—it lacked none of the organs and structures it ought to have—so there was nothing improper in his approach. At least, the initial stage had gone quite smoothly.

And yet a primordial spirit body was, after all, a primordial spirit body, fundamentally distinct from the true body. The cultivation philosophy of the true body might just barely serve at the outset, but afterward it became utterly unworkable.

It was even quite possible that the initial smooth sailing had not been due to cultivation at all, but rather to an inherent process of adaptation and recovery that followed the projection of the primordial spirit. Once that process ran its course, no amount of conventional cultivation would avail.

Following this line of thought, it was not hard to understand why he had still been able to advance all the way to his present peak of Foundation Establishment: Wei Zhao had been using that piece of Star-Ink Charcoal Leng Leng gave him all along. His continued advancement had not come from proper cultivation, but from ceaselessly absorbing the vast consciousness energy within the Star-Ink Charcoal.

By the time the Star-Ink Charcoal's consciousness energy was nearly spent and Wei Zhao began consciously to restrain himself, he happened to run headlong into the bottleneck he could not surmount no matter what—and that was powerful corroboration.