The heavenly tribulations are usually crude; basically, they are lightning that drops from tribulation clouds. Normal lightning is usually white, but as the power strengthens, the color changes. Tribulations in the divine soul realms are pure blue. The blue darkens in the soul substance realm, and once it reaches the multiple souls realm, the color changes to purple. A single purple lightning bolt can easily destroy a mortal continent.
When it hit Oliver, it should have completely disintegrated him, yet it didn’t. Somehow, a piece of him remained, though in the form of charcoal, and sank into the ocean where the battle happened. The last battle took place in the middle of the ocean; Jack intentionally arranged it that way to limit the destruction it would cause.
How did a piece of charcoal survive? Of course, because that piece of charcoal contained a treasure of a higher level; it was Oliver's system. Jack knew that it would remain, so immediately after Ted left, he went back and retrieved it. Honestly, one reason the destruction caused by the purple lightning was quite limited was because so much of its power was deflected by the piece of charcoal; otherwise, Faith would have died even from the shockwaves.
...
"The merge was successful! Congratulations!"
"Name: Jack"
"Cultivation level: First level of nascent soul"
"Main mission: Conquer the world"
"Long-term task: None"
"Short-term mission: None"
"Practice cultivation reserves: 183 Years"
Jack, who returned to his room, was happy; he succeeded without losing any of the dao collection.
One thing that will be discovered much later is that the systems actually can merge; the transmigrators can strengthen their systems by killing other transmigrators. Oliver wasn’t a true transmigrator, but as he had a system nonetheless; of course, Jack, the designer of the world, was the one who gave him the system.
"With this system, my future cultivation becomes much easier," he thought. Still, even though it gets easier, it is not easy, not even close to easy. The system looks very overpowered, but it actually isn’t; its tasks don’t pay well. At most, one may be able to get 50 years of cultivation in a year if they complete all tasks.
Reaching high levels takes many years; for example, the soul transformation cultivators are all usually millions of years old. Even with the x50 speed of the system, it can still take tens of thousands of years for Jack to reach even soul transformation. Furthermore, as the creator of the world, he knows that there are at least a few thousand perfection realm cultivators in the world, many of whom are billions of years old.
Of course, he was the one who wrote the world, so the reason there are so many perfection cultivators is that he wrote them in; but, he had no choice. Reaching rank 12 world has to be hard; otherwise, the dao collection would not advance to rank 12.
Therefore, even with the system, Jack can easily advance in early realms, but in higher realms, it doesn’t help much.
He still doesn’t have the nascent soul chapter of the Heaven's Way technique, so he didn’t start using his cultivation practice reserves.
"The Icefall sect will soon investigate everything," he thought. There is no evidence that connects Jack to the heavenly tribulations, so he wasn’t worried. But, even if the sect's higher-ups don’t target him, Oliver's father might, so Jack already planned ahead and sent Lucy to go to the Brown dynasty.
The North Apple Continent is ruled by two forces: the Brown dynasty and the four great sects. The Icefall sect is the dominant sect in the west, so joining one of the four great sects is out of the question for Jack and his forces. So, Lucy was going directly to the Brown dynasty. The local noble here is Viscount John Brown, who is from a side branch of the dynasty.
Still, even though he was only from a side branch, he was still part of the greater Brown family. Since being born, he had access to all kinds of precious cultivation resources. Now, at the young age of only 1200, he had already reached the initial stage of the multiple souls realm.
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Viscount John Brown is the leader of nearly 5% of the west of the continent. Even though the west is considered the most remote and desolate, with the worst cultivation resources, still, 5% of such a large land area is no joke. In his territory, his influence is no worse than the Icefall sect.
It just so happened that recently, John Brown fell in love with the young lady of the Icefall sect. The Icefall sect refused him and instead married her to a young master of the Firewind sect. This enraged John, but as only a small viscount and a side branch of the Brown family, he couldn’t get any revenge.
Using this division, it is probably possible for Jack's Heaven's Way sect to go under his wing. After all, even if a side branch, John is still a viscount of the Brown dynasty. As long as John recognizes the Heaven's Way sect as an extension of the Brown dynasty's forces, the Icefall sect would no longer dare to act. After all, from the perspective of the Icefall sect, they only lost a nascent soul cultivator, and even then, it was the heavenly tribulation that killed him, not the Heaven's Way sect. If the Heaven's Way sect is alone, they might be targeted, but if they are under John Brown's wing, then it would not be worth it to act for the Icefall sect.
Jack wrote the backstory, so he knows these well. Still, using so much of his knowledge from outside risks great damage to the dao collection.
To be sure, he only used his knowledge indirectly; he didn’t dare to directly use his knowledge to cultivate the nascent soul chapter of the Heaven's Way technique. But still, even indirect usage can cause damage if done wrong. Jack has to be extremely careful about it.
...
Viscount John Brown was the sole ruler of the mortal population and was the co-ruler of the immortal circles, along with the Icefall sect. Still, as a great cultivator, John really didn’t care about mortals. He just appointed the local rulers, and they took care of it. As long as there was enough supply of mortal talents flowing in, he didn’t care.
The mortal rulers were diverse, all kinds of people with different attitudes. Some were dictators, some were benevolent leaders, some were lawful, and some were chaotic. It didn’t matter which road they took; the only thing John cared about was the supply of talent. If a mortal lord didn’t provide enough mortal talents, John simply killed them with a snap and appointed another.
For this reason, the position of mortal leader was not a very popular position to hold; the risks were huge. Failing to provide enough talent even once was deadly. There were also many low-level schemes against mortal lords: wars, assassinations, political marriages, coups, etc. were prevalent. Some bolder mortal rulers even assassinated the talented youths of rival mortal leaders. Everyone knew if there was insufficient talent sent to John, that would result in the death of the mortal ruler.
Such a chaotic mortal world was extremely cruel for the poor people living there. Because of their environment, recent mortal talents sent to John were mostly orphans, who were used to fighting and killing for simple food. Still, John was too lazy to care. In any case, these struggles were not a bad thing; mortals who could survive in such environments were stronger.
When one reaches high cultivation realms, such as the multiple soul realm, they no longer consider fellow humans as the same kind. They saw humans as resources, like grass and trees. Mortal humans keep hens to lay eggs; the same principle is true for immortals. They keep mortals to give birth to immortal talents. Do mortals care about how the poor hens live? Maybe some kind and enlightened ones do, but the majority only care about the eggs and not about the miserable life the hens who produce them live.
The strong rule and exploit the weak; this principle holds true everywhere in the world. Mortal humans exploit animals, and cultivators exploit mortals. Even on a larger level, rank 10+ immortals exploit low-ranked cultivators. Rachel exploits rank 10-13 immortals. If the creation had a will, it would have exploited rank 14s. There is no end to it.
This is just how the system works. The reason is that those who refuse to act evil and are moral, kind people, simply won’t succeed. The system only allows evil people to get ahead. A cultivator who is kind and helps mortals would lose in the face of a cultivator who exploits and enslaves them and uses them for his advantage. Of course, there are exceptions, but that holds true the majority of the time in the majority of worlds.
That is a very sad thing for most people, as most mortals are not bad people; The only way to change it is if some benevolent, yet practical person somehow reaches the peak, and then uses his/her invincible power to fix the world. But, that has never happened, and wouldn’t happen, as Rachel, the current peak person in this universe, would never allow it to happen. As a result, mortals are destined to suffer for eternity.
...
Lucy arrived at Sky City a week ago. She requested an audience with John Brown, but was outright rejected. After all, Lucy is only core formation, so how can she be qualified to see him? Instead, they placed her in a guest room. One of the deputy ministers was supposed to meet them yesterday, but he didn’t come.
Just now, Lucy, who was accompanied by two other sect members, saw the long-term message spell and was made aware of the heavenly tribulation. They didn’t know the whole truth; they only knew the parts told to them.
The news of the heavenly tribulation and the death of an Icefall sect's member spread quickly. Lucy found a cultivator of Sky City and told her that she had information regarding the tribulation.
The female cultivator from Sky City immediately went to inform the deputy minister of special affairs. The deputy minister of special affairs received the news and immediately found Lucy and her party to meet with them.