The two God Kings sat down in a modest-looking tea room. The seats were simple-looking dark green cushions, the mats were a plain light tan color, and the tea was in an unadorned clay teapot sitting on a dark wood table. Nothing in this room would make you believe it belonged to a God King, at least not at first glance. In reality, every item in this room would be considered invaluable treasures even by other God Kings. As an example, the pillows were made from the wool of a star walking ram, and stuffed with the down of a burning ice duck, both of these creatures were rarely seen in the wild and their parts would typically be used to make elixirs or pills that could assist God Kings in their cultivation. But here they sat as simple cushions for Gaia and her guests. That wasn’t to say they weren’t being used, Gaia was not one to keep pointless trophies, the wool helped repair your inner universe, and the down was able to balance any disruptive chi lingering in your body after a fight. This room would be a godsend for any injured God King let alone anyone of the lower realms.
But this was all just Alex sidetracking, he had been in this room countless times before, often after battle. The room was soothing and helped calm him down, making him feel at peace and safe,
until Gaia spoke, “Are you just going to stand there staring at the pillow or are you going to sit down”
“Sorry, I was just admiring the beauty of the room”, Alex quickly spat out.
Gaia gave him a slightly annoyed look, “You have been here a thousand times, you're just stalling, I may be immortal but I don’t have all eternity to wait for you to build up the courage to sit down”
Alex quickly sat down, he knew Gaia was already at the end of her patience and really needed her to hear him out. Though as he sat there waiting for her to finish preparing some tea he did consider getting a quote from Lyrion, just to see what his other options were.
But before he could think about that any further Gaia once again spoke, “So do you finally feel like telling me why you came here or should we spend another few minutes in awkward silence”
Internally Alex took a breath, this was like any battle he had been in before, show no fear, act with confidence, and don’t get distracted. He needed to just come out and say it “You see, I was sitting on some mountain bored, we both know that it is likely nothing beyond God King, and you know that my life purpose has been to ascend the realms of cultivation, without anywhere to ascend to my life hasn’t had a purpose, Then I had a brilliant Idea, what If I put my soul into the body of a mortal, but not like an avatar, I don’t want my soul to override there dan tien with my own, I want to start over from the very beginning, a new life and a new path, and I knew that it would take a master of the soul to pull this off, and naturally you were the only person on my list, as you are the best at soul magic in all of the multiverse, so could you help me, I promise I will pay you back for the tree and also compensate you for your help with this.” Alex had said it all, it was a bit rambly but it should get the point across, he could only hope Gaia saw the genius in his plan.
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Gaia stared at Alex, they had known each other for a long time and there were few others she was closer to than Alex. He was not the brightest of God Kings, but he was not the dumbest either, far from it actually, she knew his rambling and horrible lying were because of her. If it was nearly any other God King he would have been perfectly composed and every word out of his mouth would have been thought through, you didn't become one of the strongest God Kings without a decent head on your shoulders. But that fact made Gaia even more confused, how could someone like Alex come up with such a stupid idea?
First off, separating the soul from the body is not something you should do. There is a reason that multiple cultivation realms are focused on forming the body, the body is linked to the soul, and changing that is not a painless process. And it's not like no one has tried to transplant a soul into a different body. You can’t just grab a powerful body and shove a soul inside it just doesn’t work like that. The closest things she could think of were a few cases where a duplicate body was crafted after the original was destroyed but even that was incredibly risky and often led to a permanent decrease in cultivation. But he wasn’t even asking to be put in a more powerful body, he wanted to be placed in a weaker body, a mortal body, possibly one that hadn’t even entered the original realm. When a god wanted to inhabit an avatar they would break off a piece of their soul and place it in the body of a lower realm cultivator, but this wasn’t permanent, the power would overwhelm the body and it would only last for a few years at the most, and once the god left there would only be a corpse remaining. And even when taking an avatar the god would still keep a constant connection to their real body, often only splitting off a small bit of their attention while keeping most of their focus on their main body.
But all of this really didn’t matter, just because something hadn’t been done didn’t mean it couldn’t, and even while thinking of all the issues Gaia did have some ideas. However, why did Alex want to transfer to a weaker body? As he was now Alex had to bow down to no one, if he really wanted to Alex could ignore the fact that he burnt down a priceless treasure and never repay her, no one would stop him, and she certainly couldn’t win in a fight and her faction wouldn’t be willing to go to war over a single tree, everyone knew who burnt down the tree but not a single God King ever approached Alex about the matter. So why would he want to go back to groveling at the feet of those stronger than you? It just made no sense, the world of cultivators was cruel, even in Gaia’s faction, the Nature’s Grace Sect, the fight for power was ruthless, even though the sect heavily values all life, and teaches principles of kindness and forgiveness, their were still people throughout the planes scheming for power who wouldn’t hesitate to put a knife in your back. She was sure Alex knew all this, so why, why did he want to go back to the hellscapes of the lower planes?
Gaia decided that she needed to talk him out of this, “You will be putting yourself at great risk, what happens if you die, a mortal body can be killed in so many ways, it is more likely for you to die in a freak accident or from a stray attack of someone in a higher realm, that would be a horrible way to die”
Alex responded with confidence, “I have thought about that and I believe I have a solution, I won’t be able to take my full knowledge into a mortal body like when inhabiting an avatar, most of my understanding of techniques, concepts, recipes, and other such knowledge will have to be left behind, that knowledge could be used as an anchor point so if my new body dies my soul will be pulled back to my original body”
The tale has been illicitly lifted; should you spot it on Amazon, report the violation.
That response was more like Alex's, he wasn’t an idiot and would have thought through the dangers, Gaia had been hoping he was still flustered and wouldn’t be able to form a proper response but that had failed, and she couldn’t argue about practicality either, they were both God Kings with a lot of free time, so what if it took a thousand years to work out the solution, if Gaia wanted to dissuade him she would have to go at it from a different angle, “what about repaying me for the tree you burnt down and for ignoring me for 20,000 years, why would I let you go run off into the multiverse before you pay me back” if logic wouldn’t work, go for a guilt trip.
But Alex had a response to this as well, “I doubt the spell will be ready any time soon, we will be exploring a new field of soul rituals, while I intend to help you where you need it I also plan on preparing an apology in the meantime, and if you worried about me leaving again I’m sure I can spend the next few decades in the tree of life”
Gaia was beginning to expect Alex’s initial awkwardness was all for show, he was shooting down all her arguments with ease, sure she could just say no, but Alex was stubborn, Gaia knew she was not the only one he could go to for this, one slimy merchant in particular would jump at the opportunity given how much Alex was almost certainly willing to pay. She also wanted whatever he would come up with for an apology, the last gift he had gotten her was an artificial galaxy enclosed in a ring with the core of a divine living planet at the center, this artifact would be coveted by most factions of the multiverse and many would consider it a sacred relic. She also did like Alex, and while it hadn’t exactly been a lonely 20,000 years she did miss his company. If he was going to do something stupid she might as well be there to laugh at him along the way.
Gaia looked at Alex and gave her answer, “Fine, I will help you”
“Great, I was thinking we could-” Alex began saying before he was interrupted.
“Hold on, I have a few conditions before we begin. First, and this should be obvious, you will be taking on any of the costs for this project, Second, you will not leave until I am satisfied with your apology, third, you are not allowed to go running off and leave me with all the work, and finally, you will have to let me watch your journey in the mortal planes, it will be fun to watch you squirm around”
“No problem, just don’t interfere with my new life, it would take away from the fun if a god kept saving me” Alex agreed quickly, Gaia wasn’t sure if this had been his goal all along, or if he was just desperate, either way, she was a bit excited to watch the “Infernal Titan” be bossed around by some weak mortal cultivators.
What took place next was 56 years of work, theorizing, building, testing, and starting over again and again. The idea was simple but not damaging the soul and keeping the new body intact proved difficult. About 30 years in they came across a breakthrough, before this discovery, they had been using bodies from the Origin or Body realm, while they were the two lowest realms they were still cultivators, they were working under the assumption that a stronger body would be better at withstanding the process, but frustrated with continued failures they had decided to test out a body that hadn’t yet entered the Origin Realm, and while it wasn’t a success the damage from the test was significantly less than the other test subjects. After a few more experiments they had concluded that forcing out the soul when it was linked to a dan tien would render the body useless, but if the body had not formed a dan tien then this wouldn’t be a problem.
This did however affect the final target they could choose, The two weren’t monsters, all of the bodies they had used were from people who had already died. They didn’t want to force someone out of their body, and even if they did it was easier to use someone who had just died when their body was still fine but the soul was moving on, with a bit of healing techniques mixed into the ritual any damage to the body could be repaired, and if timed correctly no one would even notice. However there was still a problem, most people of any note would enter the origin realm within days of being born, any family with wealth would have their child undergo a ritual to open a meridian, and the benefits of chi to the body were just too great to wait for the child to open one for themselves. Of course, there were still plenty of people who never opened a meridian in their life, but these were always in the lower rungs of society, while Alex didn’t need a body from a rich family if he intended to climb the ranks quickly he would need backing. While talent could get him into a sect, if he showed too much talent then the nobles and elders would push back in fear of losing their positions. Cultivation requires resources and without at least a little status Alex could find himself shunned from the more prominent sects despite his talent.
This train of thought had been running through Gaia’s head for the past few years now. Who would Alex become, and what plane would he go to, even the Zenith Plane had children and sects that took people of the mortal realms. So she finally decided to ask Alex, hopefully, he had come up with an idea,
“So do you know where you want to be put? What plane will you choose from?”
Alex responded quickly, “I kinda figured it would be random, picking feels a bit wrong don’t you think”
Gaia should have guessed he wouldn’t have thought it through, it was like his mind only worked half the time. Sometimes he will have thought out a plan with dozens of contingencies that take into account thousands of data points, other times he would charge in head first simply relying on brute force to come out victorious.
Gaia sighed, “You need to think this through if you take over someone and their personality changes drastically people may think you are possessed by a demon, and if you take the body of some street urchin then you will likely be kicked out of any sect you get with a hundred feet of, you will need to at least be the child of some wealthy commoner family if you want to not live a life of misery”
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Alex thought about Gaia’s words, he had considered a few of her points already but he was doing this for fun and it didn’t feel right to choose some ideal family to be born to. He was looking for a challenge, something that would require him to put in all his effort like he used to. But he couldn’t ignore Gaia’s points, there was a line between difficult and impossible, given that this was his first attempt he might as well give himself a few handicaps, he could always start again if this life was “too easy”. Yeah, even as the scion of a God King reaching the peak would be far from easy, but he still didn’t want to have it too easy.
Alex decided, “I think I have a solution, we should go with someone young, to the point where any changes in personality could be written off, we should aim for either a wealthy family or one of nobility, But I also think we should stick to the mortal planes, as it will greatly reduce the chance of anyone noticing something as well as providing some difficulty, as for selecting, we can make it random but you can reject the choices until one that meets the minimum requirements”
Gaia once again sighed, “So your solution is to add in more work for me, well whatever, I heard from Amara that you have been gathering a lot of nature and water chi-related treasures over the past few decades, whatever you have better be worth it and it better be ready before you leave”
Alex grinned, “Don’t worry the preparations for that are already complete, it will take a bit for it to be ready though, so let's focus on this, I’m starting to get restless”
With that, the two God Kings began the final push on what would be considered by most, “a stupid ritual”