"Greetings, senior Ruan!" Fu Xian bowed to the majestic figure of Ruan Yelong once he entered the courtyard.
"Come, sit here." Yelong said, pointing towards the futon in front of him. He had no airs of a superior, only acting like a kind senior who guided his juniors.
Fu Xian stepped forward and sat down, his eyes full of expectations. A one-on-one teaching session by a fifth-stage expert! How could he not be excited? His whole life he had basically been without a master, even though this was just some guidance, he had never truly experienced it before!
Yelong smiled and said "No need to be so anxious, I will be teaching you slowly. It's good that you arrived early, this way you can enjoy a full extra hour of the Spiritual Inspiration Hall.
Alright, let's begin." As he said so, he became solemn and the aura around him changed somewhat, dao sounds slightly sounding around. He was using a special technique to better impart knowledge.
"The Origin Light stage, the first of the Dao Entering stage, has a very unique ability: the Innate Aspect. This aspect was formed from your inspirations at the first and second stage, and your experience of your whole life. Once it takes shape, we call it 'Spark'. This is the spark that will one day lighten up your whole middle dantian!"
As he spoke, inexplicable knowledge flowed into Fu Xian's mind, combining with what he heard, he gained a more complete understanding.
"We separate the Origin Light into three stages, starting with "Forming the Innate Light". In this stage, you transform the Spark that is your innate light and slowly grow it from a spark to a blinding light!
This first stage has five minor stages: Spark, Glow, Radiance, Brilliance and finally True Light.
To transform the light, you have to continuously use your cultivation art to feed your innate light and further comprehend and use your own innate aspect.
The innate aspect is deeply connected with your true light – the more you understand it, the further and faster you advance.
Every aspect is unique, but there are a few common examples:
Elemental aspects, such as fire, water, wood, earth and wind can be comprehended by understanding the elements deeper and using their own aspect more innately. For example, a spell master with a fire aspect could further comprehend their aspect by learning and creating various spells.
You, as a talisman cultivator, also have a clear path. You may consult the library for teaching materials, but I suggest first trying to advance to the stage of Radiance on your own.
The second stage of Origin Light is called "Illuminating the Cave", also known as "Illuminating the Middle Dantian". At this stage, you focus on expanding your own true light. A single light can't light up the whole cave, at least it needs to be strengthened before it may do so.
The third stage is called "Creating the Illusory Core".
I will not explain to you the deeper intricacies of the second and third stage, for they will not aid you in your cultivation. They might even hinder you.
In ancient times, people have attempted to built a supreme foundation, using their knowledge of higher stages to improve their strength.
But this path is ultimately foolish.
Even a brickle foundation is better if it has managed to built a three-story pagoda. A strong foundation can't content with even a slightly better two-story pagoda.
Anyways, once you are at a higher point, it's easy to mend your own foundation, as long as you have the minimum requirements for a proper foundation.
With your transcendent art, as long as you follow the normal procedures and attain the true light, you will quickly advance to the second stage. After finishing all three stages and advancing to the Spiritual Core stage, you will understand that the previous foundation is stable and you can built well upon it.
Just as you may see now that your time spent in the late foundation building stage was mainly focused on preparing to advance to the next stage, the same will be the case in the next stages.
It's said that the immortals above don't need to consider these things – once you are immortal, each stage can be infinitely expanded and a lower immortal stage might contend with a higher immortal stage. But ultimately, we are not immortals, so it's best to follow the orthodox path and slowly refine your foundation later."
Fu Xian, upon hearing this, nodded in understanding. He knew the saying about a strong foundation, but he also knew that staying in a certain stage longer just to have a better foundation, was utterly stupid.
As long as you can advance, you can simply look back and change things.
Those people often referencing pagodas are simply stupid. You are cultivating, you aren't building a pagoda! Anyways, would a higher cultivator care about a foundation? Simply raise the pagoda into the air. From then on, it doesn't matter how weak the foundation is.
There are many ways to refine your weaknesses when you're stronger, but few ways to fill gaps when you're weaker.
Fortunately, he had always felt that advancing was the most important, so he didn't impart any stupid logic into his clones.
As long as his clones had a stable foundation, he wouldn't tell them to force it.
Just as he had said once – rather than having a thousand qi refining clones, he'd be more than happy to sacrifice them all for a single origin light clone!
Seeing him comply so well, Yelong was happy and explained another detail "For us cultivators of the immortal city, we basically have no restriction on spiritual power. Just breathing in and out will enable us to grow our innate light. Because of this, at your stage, people focus less on cultivating and more on comprehending their own path.
I recommend you focus on drawing talisman and other activities that conform with the spiritual inspirations that form your innate light.
Don't worry, although it might sound difficult to comprehend, in fact, because of our inheritance, there is no deep difficulty. It's just that comprehending things on your own will improve your talent, while learning from books will slightly neglect your own talent.
Short-cuts, in the end, are just that. They might enable you to advance a minor stage, but this little improvement in strength isn't as important as nourishing your talent to breakthrough to the next major stage."
"Thank you, senior, for imparting the knowledge upon me!" Fu Xian stood up and bowed deeply to Yelong, truly thankful.
He knew that these small notes, such as not to read books before at least improving your own light to the stage of Radiance, were things no one would say in a public session. They would likely only say the minimum and then even tell the cultivators to read the books and learn the knowledge on their own.
In the end, it can be seen that although people are kind to give you lectures, they aren't your parents and won't consider every matter for you.
Only when people see you are talented and worthy of investment will they say a few more words, changing your whole perception.
Fortunately, his own clones had him, so he didn't have to worry about his clones who didn't have a good foundation behind them. He already had an idea on how to "comprehend" his own innate aspect better.