"This document that only a few have ever had a chance to hear of, let alone read, was a book thousands of pages long, recording the conversation that took place in the room where Xiao Lan and Xu Ling met with the esteemed seniors. Unlike those idiots I mentioned in my earlier lessons, these guys were actual intellectuals, and contributed greatly to the Theory. As for the things discussed within, most of the content is supposed to be way too advanced for Mortal Realm cultivators like the current us to dabble on..." Cheng Hao shrugged his shoulders, as if it weren't too big of a deal. "To everything else, I may agree. But to this, I must call bullshit. Even a child would be able to pick up a concept from a conversation between adults simply by the tone of their voice or looking at their expression, let alone a sharp girl like you, especially as you have my guidance! Now, let's talk definitions!"
Hearing that, a few creases that had formed disappeared from Xiao Wu's forehead: it didn't matter whether she couldn't piece the pieces together. She had no idea why would Cheng Hao switch subjects, from her Clan's Secret Training Manuals, to showing her a memory fragment, and now even going as far as explaining theory that her ancestor had come up with. However, she had no doubt that, after this short 'lesson' would come to an end, her knowledge would have made another qualitative leap just like earlier! She had yet to forget even a single word that Cheng Hao had recited earlier in his explanations of cultivation's fifteen stages; maybe this was due to her breakthrough, but she could freely recall recent events to her liking. She had always had a good memory, especially after jotting things down; in that case, they would then be remembered even more clearly. For all the above reasons plus many more, she was looking forward to Cheng Hao's lips leaving the teacup and resuming his speech!
"Ahhh... Now, Little Wu, care to illustrate to me Qi and Spiritual Energy?" Cheng Hao asked with an enigmatic smile.
Fearing it to be a trick question, Xiao Wu took an entire two minutes to organize her answer, two minutes which Cheng Hao spent conversing with Goldy on some baboon-infested Ruin he wished to explore someday soon...
Finally, Xiao Wu felt confident of her answer, and therefore spoke up, "The definition of Qi: Qi is the most basic building block of reality. Just like there are different elements making up the objects surrounding us, different kinds of Qi exist!"
Cheng Hao did not seemed completely satisfied as he interrupted her and then added himself, "Yes. At the same time however, unlike matter, Qi is non-dimensional. It is instead a kind of Law, and can be seen as a non-material 'container' for said matter, guiding that which is material to occupy a certain region of space. Matter is governed by the countless kinds of Qi, and it follows their structure and characteristics. Basically, Qi itself has no actual mass, and instead it can be seen as the Law that reality follows as it arranges itself! Of course, it has its way to manifest itself in our world. An example of that would be the extremely dense Qi trickling down your ancestor’s - Xiao Lan’s - White Oak Shield in the memory I showed you. With that out of the way, you may proceed."
"Yes!" Xiao Wu nodded, "Next, the definition of Spiritual Energy: a mostly ever-present kind of energy, the force permeating the entire universe, which can only be interacted with through the usage of Qi! It is what we cultivators use to power our abilities and feed our cultivation bases in order to breakthrough. Hence, people can only become cultivators after sensing the Qi and growing capable of using it!"
"Yes. As a scholar used to say..." Cheng Hao smiled and casually quoted: "If the Spiritual Energy is water, the Qi is the cup with which said water can be picked up and drunk!"
Cheng Hao then sat upright and began speaking himself, "Next, there are a few more things which we need to understand before moving on. First, a Cultivator's 'Will'!”
“Our 'Will' is what we cultivators call a strand of one's consciousness once it comes out of the body. Just as our consciousness is normally capable of interacting with Qi and Spiritual Energy, a strand of it, the Will, is sensitive to both as well. It is also connected in real time with the original consciousness, allowing one to accomplish a multitude of things through its usage. An example would be inspecting other people's cultivation thanks to its sensibility to the Qi... Or even, at a higher level, create Pseudo-Life by making it permeate an object!"
Cheng Hao seemed to want to explain more in detail this last point of his as he interrupted his speech instead and delved deeper into it, "This is also the reason why Aura Manipulators are said to be able to Create Life: a Manipulator's Will would be refined through the creation of countless constructs of Aura. That is because, to sculpt Aura into various objects, one would use his or her Will. After countless repetitions, this would usually end up with the cultivator having sharpened and qualitatively improved their Will in a process completely opposite to how a blade would dull with each strike."
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"Now, with that, I introduced a new concept: Aura! As I mentioned earlier, External Aura Manipulation is the special kind of Spiritual Energy Manipulation that does not rely solely on the inference of Qi, but is instead partly carried out through the use of one's Will! Not all people have the gift of being able to Manipulate Aura, and it is in fact pretty rare..."
"Even Xu Ling was unable to use Aura! Luckily for him, through a special formula that only he and the Primordial Beast Blindlight knew, he mastered a technique known as Internal Golden Aura Manipulation Through Forceful Absorption Of Spiritual Essence' (or simply, Internal Aura Manipulation') to make up for it. The Internal Aura Manipulation had plenty of shortcomings compared to the potentials of External Aura Manipulation, but was overall a viable method to battle mid-to-large sized armies. As for how exactly the External Aura Manipulation worked..." Having said that, Cheng Hao exchanged a glance with Goldy as if to seek permission.
The reptile nodded nonchalantly.
"Well..." After receiving the golden snake's consent, he hesitated before throwing a little more information in, "To put it simply, unlike External Aura Manipulators who pulled out their OWN Spiritual Energy and then refined it OUTSIDE their bodies through their Will, an External Aura Manipulator would instead forcefully refine Spiritual Energy already present INSIDE in the target's body first. Then, when all the target's Energy had been completely condensed into a single point, the Internal Aura Manipulator would forcefully draw it out, stealing the condensed Energy in the process! The underlying process in and of itself is a secret, however, and I cannot divulge any more to you!"
After giving some time to the poor eight-year-old to sort out the barrage of completely new and unheard of stuff coming her way, Cheng Hao spoke again: "At a certain level, the Aura can be infused with a part of Will that shall, with time, become independent from the user's consciousness (although it would still share a rudimental telepathic connection)." Cheng Hao said. "Now, even though the process of Aura Manipulation has been passed down for billions of years, to record, only a few people ever got the chance to truly reach such a level! Even then, most of them had been ancient Primordial Beast geniuses from a time long past... One of those experts had been the Aura Dragon, the rumored creator of the External Aura Manipulation Technique. He achieved this level when he went ahead and created a new body for himself made completely out of Aura! After that, he proceeded to create ten sons and daughters out of Aura and of his Will."
"Shockingly, these beings built of both Aura and an Immortal Realm Primordial Beast's Will were powerful beings comparable to actual flesh-and-blood Primordial Beasts... making of the External Aura Manipulation technique an absolutely over-powered skill for those who achieved the level of Create Life Through Aura, allowing them to create armies of powerful and obedient Aura Soldiers! And it is for such reason that - for all those billions years up until that one congregation of intellectual but a thousand or so years ago - it was being thought of as the only way for Cultivators involved in Aura Manipulation to go!"
"Having introduced Aura, I’ll talk about Qi Constructs next!”
“Unlike Aura, which concerns Spiritual Energy, Constructs are objects that are created by using the cultivator's Qi to warp matter, into a stable shape or form... Well, technically speaking, by that definition anything with mass could be called a Qi Construct. Still, we cultivators tend to call Qi Constructs those objects created artificially! Also, just as with Aura, Qi Constructs can house a cultivator's Will, to the point they can even be used as replaceable clones of oneself! Many Immortal Realm cultivators used to have at least one or two clones to do their bidding,- Mm? Oh… Sorry about all this sis. I know your head must be hurting from memorizing all this stuff... Just care about the basic concepts for now! It will all be worth it!"
"Uh?" Xiao Wu, who had just been caught yawning, forced herself to shake her head, "No, no, no! Continue! This is actually quite fun!"
"Sure… Anyways, we have finally gotten to the main point! And that is... Just WHAT exactly are Martial Ways?" Cheng Hao spoke excitedly, "Theoretically speaking, they are a construct of both Qi and Spiritual Energy, arranged in a certain manner and built in accordance to the various Laws of Reality that cultivators would acquire through the process of enlightenment, a process that mainly takes place in the 13th stage, the Supreme stage. It is also for this reason that it is generally considered impossible to create a Martial Way before reaching such a stage..."
As soon as he said that, Xiao Wu eyed Cheng Hao with a bitter smile on her face: impossible? Tell that to her very own pair of eyes and aching jaw; one hurt badly from widening, the other from gaping!
Cheng Hao finished his speech. He rubbed his hands excitedly as he then spoke the umpteenth shocking news of the day: "Now, we should have all the base materials we need to reenact the stage of the Theory of Dualism! Let's write one of our own, shall we?”