Back in his soul sea, there were three different things: Two hands made of small spears, three dots of life and random spears here and there. What mattered were the hands and dots. He willed his new hands to grab a dot. He was quite happy that it did work. Now that he thought about it, he hadn't even considered the possibility that the shape of will might not be able to interact with the spiritual energy...

Condemning himself as an idiot for not trying it beforehand, and thanking the stars that it worked, he began molding the dots. Now that he could use hands, it was far easier. The process was simple. Grab the dot, pinched it at two different locations and spread the arms. Now he had a thin strand.

He faced a new problem: the strand reverted back to a ball whenever he let go of it. He pondered for a moment and in the end found a simple solution. He made the strand and picked two random spears before piercing both ends of the strand with one. Now, the strands remained as strands.

Soon, he had three strands of spiritual energy. Of the same size. It turned out that every single dot could only extend to so much. So much being exactly the same length for all of them. He recalled an elder saying that everyone had a single and unique wavelength regarding spiritual energy...This was his it seemed.

Since he had no one to compare size with, he wasn't sure if it was long or not but...eh...does it mattered? Probably not. He never heard any cultivators say that size mattered...

Anyways, he was now faced with the toughest challenge yet. He needed to make a triangle out of those strands. He wondered how he would bind the strands together... It turned out that just linking them to one another worked. Well, he had to make the triangle for things to hold. If two strands were linked, nothing happened. If there were three, nothing happened either. Unless they were in the shape of a triangle!

Why it was so? He didn't know. He didn't care either. What mattered was that he had successfully created the first side of his pyramidal core. It was a triangle with bright contours and transparent bubble-like insides. There were small ripples throughout the side and it looked mesmerizing. He quite enjoyed watching the triangle.

He was hyped right now. After so long, he had finally found a way to cultivate. A different one for sure but he found one. Now he would be able to reach the second stage of refinement within a year! Or so he believed as he exited his soul seal willingly for once.

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He was bleeding quite a lot but far less than the times he had created spears. He went to take a relaxing bath while filled in happiness. He was of age in this life and actually had money, he would probably have gone to a bar to reward himself.

If the elders knew what he had done, it wouldn't stop at a single party. They would probably send him right away to the core area or one of the oldest and strongest sect monsters would take him as his legacy disciple. In times of old, there were some people who ate the dots of spiritual energy but in the end, they would still need to will the dots inside their soul sea in order to manipulate them.

Even though the ancestors could will the dots, they still ate them at first. It was easier after all. But they never found a way out of using their will in the soul sea to shape and mold the dots. To say that Jin was a pioneer would be too much as there would without a doubt have been others who did the same throughout the eons of cultivation seen by this world. Geniuses, Fools, Lucky ones... There had been many of each and some probably did the same as Jin.

Cluelessly doing something incredible.

To be fair, the technique of shaping one's will was one that no one under the 30th stage of accumulation tried and it didn't mean they were successful at that stage. Some worked on it for years up to centuries before reaching a small success in the technique.

Using such an advanced technique to mold the spiritual energy and build one's core? Unheard of! Preposterous!

Yet that's what Jin did. And he was unaware of how big a feat he achieved. Neither was he planning to talk about it. The reaction of his two friends when he told them how he ate the energy remained fresh in his mind. No way would he embarrass himself again. To him, it wasn't a groundbreaking success but a lucky way out of a bad situation. He did feel smug about finding a way for sure. But he didn't think it was a big deal.

He believed, in fact, to lack talent and that he was forced to use this method because of that. After all, he was still incapable of forcing his will upon the spiritual energy... If he told people about this, they would make fun of him. He was sure of it. It was obvious. So, he decided to keep his mouth shut and fake it as if he was cultivating like everyone else. He wanted his image to be that of a mighty warrior not a dumb fool.

Pleased with himself, Jin relaxed in his bath. Unaware that no one he knew in this life considered him a mighty warrior. To his two inner sect friends, he was the silly and funny kid next door, a little sect brother that made them laugh. To his outer sect acquaintances, he was the lonely and shy inner sect kid. At the moment, no one but him considered himself a might warrior.

Things would change soon. He could now forge his core and then he would absorb energy into it. There was nothing left to hinder his progress!