Merin sits motionless, his senses sinking deep into his body.
Slowly, carefully, he traces the flow of energy within himself.
Two distinct currents move through him. One is steady and grounded, thick with the Earth attribute—the breath of the Jade Spiritual Body. The other is untamed and strange, a Heterogenous Spiritual Energy carried by the wolf essence.
"Jade Spiritual Body is not the limit," he thinks. "It can evolve into something greater."
Yet the doubt lingers. "But no scripture, no record ever speaks of evolving a spiritual body. Does that mean it's impossible… or that those who achieved it kept it secret?"
He remembers the ancient figures whispered about in legends, cultivators whose refinement of Qi reached five thousand turns. Perhaps they too walked this hidden path.
But he knows the truth of his own limitations. With his Jade Spiritual Body and its lifespan of one hundred and forty years, he would never reach five thousand. Even with the wolf's spiritual body added, the climb remains far beyond his reach.
"Then the only path forward," he decides, "is evolution. To keep changing, to force the body to grow beyond what is written."
With that thought, he lets go of doubt, focusing on practice.
Spiritual energy flows through him ceaselessly, absorbed and refined.
His spirit sharpens, pressing toward new frontiers.
The spirit cultivation technique he forged himself has carried him to the peak of the Conscious Spirit Realm, a realm that can be reached with sheer will and without extraordinary resources.
But to step beyond requires spiritual energy.
That energy now streams into his spirit-conscious, expanding and strengthening it, until he begins to sense the vast, shadowy ocean beneath—his subconscious mind.
The next step is clear.
He must merge his conscious spirit with the subconscious, drawing them into one whole, a union that will grant him deeper control over both his body and spirit.
He sinks deeper into meditation, spirit-conscious spreading wide like ripples across still water.
The boundary between conscious and subconscious begins to blur.
Most cultivators would fight lifetimes against the chaos of the subconscious, yet Merin's spirit has already stepped into the Demigod Realm.
Barriers that would be immovable for others dissolve before him like mist in sunlight.
His spirit-conscious dives, fusing into the subconscious, and in that instant, his awareness expands—every nerve, every muscle, every flicker of Qi within his body comes under his absolute command.
Thought and action become one.
Breath and spirit align seamlessly.
He opens his eyes, jade light flashing across them, knowing he has taken another step toward a realm no one in this world has ever reached.
He sits still, but within, the world has changed.
The rhythm of his heartbeat, the minute tremor of blood flowing through his veins, even the hidden tension of marrow shifting inside bone—all of it falls beneath his command.
He can silence his heartbeat to nothingness or let it thunder like a war drum.
His spirit-conscious flows into every corner of his being, meeting no resistance, no unknowns.
The subconscious, once a shadowed sea, now lies open to him, calm and transparent.
Thought, instinct, and will have fused.
For the first time, Merin feels not merely alive, but complete.
Yet cultivation reminds him—spirit rank seven is far from enough. His goal is half-step rank twenty-one, a path no one has walked, a path he must forge.
He ponders long into the night, mind threading through visions of ripple, jade, and wolf, until fatigue drags at his body. Closing his eyes, he slips into meditation, letting the dual streams of spiritual energy repair his exhaustion.
When dawn breaks, they gather again. The elder of Ice and Snow Palace leads them through falling snow to a narrow pass carved between jagged cliffs.
She stops, frost clinging to her robes, and says, "Take this passage. In two or three days, you will reach the other side."
They bow and thank her.
"But be careful," she adds, her gaze sharpening. "Wu City is no longer Wu City—it is now filled with demons."
The weight of her words sinks in.
They nod in silence and begin their trek into the passage, the wind at their backs, each step carrying them closer to danger.
The next day, at noon, they press deeper into the mountain passage.
Snow reflects white light off the ice walls, but Merin halts suddenly.
His eyes narrow. The flow of spiritual energy here is wrong—disrupted, twisted like water forced through a broken channel.
He lifts a hand, pressing against the frozen wall.
His fellow disciples stop, exchanging glances.
Wang Zishan steps closer. "Yu Feng, did you find anything?"
Merin nods. He releases a ripple of qi into the ice.
The wall cracks, shudders, then bursts open, revealing a hidden passage swallowed in darkness.
A ball of qi forms in Merin's hand, glowing softly, pushing back the shadows.
Without a word, he steps inside.
The others hesitate, then follow, Yu Lei just behind him.
His voice breaks the silence. "Yu Feng, where are you leading us?"
The glow of Merin's qi sphere flickers across the frozen stone, his eyes fixed ahead as though he already knows what waits.
The tunnel widens, spilling them into a vast cavern.
Walls and ceiling shimmer with veins of ice jade, casting a blue glow across the chamber.
At its heart lies a pool, spiritual energy condensed into liquid by the cold, rippling faintly with power.
But between them and the pool coils an ice snake, its scales glittering like frost, its eyes pale with killing intent.
It strikes.
They scatter, blades flashing, qi roaring against the beast's freezing breath.
Merin stands still, his spirit unfurling like an unseen net.
The snake hesitates, its senses clouded, its movements slowing as confusion takes hold.
In that opening, his companions strike together—steel and qi tearing through its body until the cavern falls silent again.
None of them notices the subtle flicker of Merin's spirit retracting, his role hidden in their victory.
They step past the corpse, breath steaming in the cold, and approach the pool.
Wang Zhen kneels, dipping his hand into the liquid.
The moment his skin touches it, he jerks back, gasping. "It's cold."
Wang Zishan says, "We should be careful in absorbing the spiritual liquid. It can freeze our Qi and blood and kill us."
The group nods and sits around the pond.
Except Merin, everyone uses an instrument to scoop out a drop of spiritual liquid and swallows it to obtain its energy.
Merin, instead, directly absorbs the spiritual energy.
He feels his spiritual energy rising steadily until it stops increasing after some time.
He refines the spiritual energy, his circulation count climbing to 618 turns.
Once his Jade Qi is consumed, he resumes the process, refining again and again, each cycle pushing his turns higher.
But at 987 turns, his Jade Qi ceases to grow.
No matter how he refines, his capacity for absorbing the energy no longer increases.
Qi energy is the essence of physical energy, so he knows he must give his body time to improve before he can continue.
He opens his eyes and finds the others already seated at a distance, having stopped long before.
Seeing him stir, Wang Zhen leans forward. "How many turns can you refine?"
Merin says, "987 turns."
Shock ripples through the group.
They are all below 500 turns, while Yu Feng has nearly reached 1000.
Wang Zishan says, "Sect Master and Elders will be pleasantly surprised—in six months' time, Yu Feng's cultivation is nearing theirs."
Yu Lei grins. "In a few days, we'll have to call Yu Feng… Elder Feng."
Wang Zhen chuckles, "Elder Feng," then bursts into laughter.
The rest follow, their laughter echoing in the cavern.
Merin doesn't pay attention to them, his eyes fixed on the Ice Jade glittering along the ceiling and walls.
He steps closer, running his Qi and spirit over their surface.
In that instant, he discovers the spirituality within the Ice Jade is strikingly similar to the Jade spiritual body.
His quiet contemplation is noticed.
Yu Qinshan asks, "Yu Feng, what did you come across again?"
Merin says, "This Ice Jade's spirituality is similar to the Jade body's spirituality."
The others exchange looks of surprise and rush to examine it for themselves.
Wang Zhen says, "What should we do with these then?"
Wang Zishan says, "By comprehending the spirituality of the Ice Jade, we can create another spiritual body technique. This will improve the heritage of our sect."
Yu Han says, "It will also help us transform our bodies into spiritual bodies, since it resonates with the Jade body."
Wang Zhen grins. "Then what are we waiting for? Let's comprehend the Ice Jade."
They settle down, each immersing themselves in the glow of the Ice Jade.
As they begin their comprehension, far away, the Jade Crow they had sent reaches their sect.