It was painful, there was nothing but darkness.
Besides the constant excruciating pain, there was also the feeling of being fragile and small. He couldn't move no matter how hard he tried, and he couldn't feel his eyes let alone open them.
His name is Jay, he was once a top level expert who resided in the True Dao Universe, but now he feels vulnerable and lost. Jay really hates having this kind of feeling.
Nonetheless, he did not have many regrets and those who would miss him are already dead.
***
It all happened the day a black crystal covered with an ominous aura broke through the boundary separating the True Dao Universe and the boundless chaos.
Jay was one of the closest to the planet it landed on at the time, so he was one of the first to arrive.
When he got there he saw everything within five hundred million miles around the black crystal was gray, all other colors lost.
After making sure it was safe to enter the area, Jay flashed and nearly instantly arrived at a distance of five miles away from the object were he found two familiar faces had arrived before him.
Giving each other a look, they conversed with there will’s exchanging a countless number of words in mere instants.
Putting on solemn faces they slowly inched closer to the object.
When they reached five meters from the object a sudden blinding rainbow like light shot out from the crystal covering everyone in its radiance, the light bypassed all treasure and arts leaving these top level experts no way to resist.
***
Three months have passed since then.
Jay has grown used to the darkness and extreme pain to a certain extent due to his strong will, if it was a normal person they would probably have died from the pain long ago.
Once his mind cleared up to a certain extent, Jay could feel that his Will has reverted back to the most basic spirituality.
Spirituality is the most basic requirement needed to practice cultivation, it is an inherent quality that a person has since birth and is rarely ever acquired later in life. Spirituality is something that comes from a person's soul. The talent of a cultivator is determined by the quality of a person's spirituality and the suitability of their physiques
The quality of a person's physique isn't as important as the quality of a person's spirituality since it is easy to change, while changing the quality of someone's spirituality is impossible by normal means. This is because the quality of spirituality is determined by the most basic and essential part of a being… the original soul!
The stronger the original soul the better the quality of the spirituality of a person, but the original soul is not something that can be easily strengthened.
Using his spirituality Jay entered his soul space, located between his brows at the glabella, finding his soul has become as week as a mortals!
Jay expecting this to a certain extent kept a calm mind while feeling slight discomfort.
Jay’s reaction can be considered really good, considering that for any other cultivator being turned back into a mortal would be a great blow, even to those at the lowest realm, not to mention Jay who had reached a very high level, making it an even greater blow to him.
Using his knowledge and experience of the location of his original soul from his past life, Jay was barely able to sense his original soul. Finding it just as strong as before, Jay let out an inward sigh of relief, glad that the mysterious object did not affect his original soul.
It has to be know that normal cultivators can't directly raise the strength of their original soul and would have to do it in the roundabout way of increasing the power of their soul, but even than the increase in the strength of the original soul isn't too great.
His current original soul is one million times stronger than that of a normal being, putting it on the same level as lower rank divine beings, which could be considered as one of the top for humans.
Coming out of his thoughts, Jay used his spirituality to sense his body, only to find he was an embryo!
No wonder he felt so small!
From what he could get from sensing around, he was surrounded by a liquid that seemed to replicate the womb of a human mother except many times better.
From what he could sense, that was the only thing keeping his current body stable, and slowing down the aging of the body allowing it to stay stable longer.
It seemed someone was trying to give humans innate power, like the spiritual beasts who were born with powerful bodies and souls, but only managed to make unstable humans with a spirit dan.
By sensing around Jay found he wasn't the only one in the liquid, there were six others, some older than him and some the same age as him, but unlike him the only thing alive was there body.
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They didn’t have souls!
Looking back to his body, Jay sensed around for the qi in his body, which is the first step in beginning cultivation.
It did not take long for Jay to sense his qi due to his past experience.
Immediately after he sensed it, Jay took a hold of that feeling, making it permanent.
Sensing the time through the activity of spiritual essence present in the air, Jay found it was nearly morning.
Getting ready, Jay waited patently.
***
Morning arrived and Jay immediately activated a mystic art by making hand signs and condensing his meager qi into runic shapes that moved on his hands.
Jay, using the mystic art, drew a small amount of the purest purple rising sun qi present in the morning into his body than activated the potential in his cells before losing his consciousness due to exhaustion.
When Jay woke up he found it the afternoon, sensing his body he found it just the tiniest bit more stable.
If anyone saw what Jay had just done they would be shocked, for only does who have reached a high level in the dao of the sun are able to absorb the purple rising sun qi in the morning, and even than the qi they absorbed would not be as pure as what Jay absorbed.
The reason Jay could do this is because of the mystic art he made.
In his previous life Jay was extremely poor, this was due to him wanting to break through the bonds of his world and become a unique being.
And if you had taken to much fortune from the world, the tribulation set by the world would be nearly impossible to pass unless you had made great contributions to the world.
Due to this he had cultivated in daos that would maximise efficiency and minimise waste, as a result of this his battle power was sacrificed while his utility was maximized.
One of the reason he rushed toward the mysterious object, even considering the risks of it, was the chance to breakthrough.
Due to his utility, auxiliary arts such as blacksmithing and alchemy became extremely easy things to master. He became the very popular in his universe.
Leading to many cultivators coming to him to help optimise there cultivation techniques and mystic arts, and because such things don't mean much to top level cultivators Jay was able to look at a lot of them.
With this he was on good terms with most of the other top level beings and was able to gain an great knowledge, this led to him making some amazing techniques for himself.
They were so profound that the heavenly dao placed a restriction on his original soul making him unable to teach them to others, even if the heavenly dao had not put a restriction on him there would not be many who could even learn them.
Because the heavenly dao doesn't want others knowing his techniques, the restrictions also have the effect of hiding them not allowing others to see.
The one he just used was one of the top mystic arts he has created, the Three Truths scripture.
The three truths of purity, control, and potential.
Jay used the truth of control to bring the qi to him, then used the truth of purity to make it entirely pure, and lastly used the truth of potential to stimulate the potential in his cells to absorb the qi.
Using this method Jay continued to absorb the purple rising sun qi in the morning and the essence water moon qi when the moon first rises, stabilizing his body and improving its condition.
***
Seventy seven years have passed since then and Jay is now the size of a baby.
Even though Jay can now open his eyes he has chosen not to. This was due to him fearing he was being monitored.
His soul has strengthened enough for him to cover the entire tub he was in with his spirituality, and judging by the type of technology and formation he sensed on it, Jay has a pretty good idea of his current location.
Other than that Jay has managed to reach a stabilization of five percent, which should have relaxed him seeing that the stabilization was working, but about twenty years ago his life force started deteriorating making him grow anxious.
Seeing he wouldn't last much longer if his life force continued to deteriorate, Jay immediately burned the power of his original soul turning it into life force.
This was a method that is widely known, but not regularly practiced for people would rather reincarnate than burn there original soul, the most basic part of their existence.
Jay used it because original soul power did not matter to him as much as it did to everyone else.
If it wasn't because he didn't want to take to much fortune from the world his original soul would be able to endlessly grow.
However, even by using this method it will at most give him a thousand and five hundred more years, judging by the slowed aging in the liquid, which is a hundred times slower, that would last till he turned fifteen.
If he can't fully stabilize himself by than he would die.
With that in mind, Jay tried harder than he ever did before for survival. Instead of just bringing out the potential of his cells Jay started to used the truth of potential to juice out the hidden potential of his entire being, putting him under great strain.
***
Five hundred years have passed and Jay now has the body of a five year old with black hair, rosy white skin, and a cute chubby face.
His bodys stabilization has reached fifty percent, it seems at this pace he would completely stabilized in another five hundred years.
Now that his body is half stabilized and is five years old, Jay is not facing as much stress as before and he can stay awake longer.
Because of this, in the time between morning and night, Jay has started to use a special mystic art to cutivate his spirit dans into seven true selves, Jay took the six other spirit dans from those around him and made them his own. This was possible because the ones around him don't have souls and they were the same type of ‘special’ human.
Once there done they will be another him who can cultivate by themselves, gain insights on their own, and be able to share abilities with each other.
If Jay wasn't doing that, he would either be cultivating his virgin primordial yang into innate yang energy by using a special mystic art that uses the power of the sun, which is an extreme yang of nature, or extracting the virgin primordial yin from the females around him and putting it in his soul sea were he would cultivate it into innate yin using the power of the moon, Jay didn't take more than they could recover from so he could have an unlimited supply.
As one could deduce Jay was doing his all to stay busy and forget about the time, otherwise he might end up going mad, after all his mental state is currently being influenced by is new body.
***
Five hundred more years passed and Jay's body was ten years old.
In the tube Jay waved his little hand causing runes to shine on it drawing purple gas that then came and enveloped his little body pouring in through his pores.
Jay's body was now completely stabilized!!!
The pain was now entirely gone and was replaced by a comfortable sensation.
Jay opened his eyes for the first time and what met them was… darkness!
Feeling a little dejected Jay waved his hands causing runes to flash for a moment, then the rest of the purple qi rushed towards the virgin primordial yang qi in his body.
With a sizzle it immediately turned into innate yang energy, a top grade yang energy!
The energy immediately started nurshering his body making it better and stronger.
Seven purple and round spirit dans flew out of between Jay’s eyebrows and hovered in front of him.
Jay waved his hand and runes flew out onto the surface of those round purple spirit dans.
A crack sound came from the spirit dans when the last rune went into them, a few cracks later and a completely naked little Jay with big round black eyes, short silky black hair, and an adorable little faces came out.
They then flew back into between Jays eyebrows into his soul sea.
“Hehe.”
Jay let out a little laugh, unable to contain his joy now that he did not have to worry about his death anymore.
Thinking about how the virgin primordial yin still hasn't transformed into innate yin energy, Jays happy mood dampened a little, and when he thought about the massive loss of the power of his original soul his happy mood left him completely.
Putting on a cautious face Jay started to swim forward until he came upon a sold layer.
Giving a punch a crack was produced and with the pressure of the liquid waying down on it the glass completely fell apart causing a loud sound.
Jay having his body nurched by the sun and moon for one thousand years has given him an extremely strong body, enough to shatter that extremely resilient and strong glass with the help of the pressure from the fluid.
Jay was carried through the opening in the glass by the liquid landing on the ground on his bare behind.
Light started to fill his original dark surroundings, blinding his eyes for a moment. When Jay’s eyes adjusted to the light and they could focus again what he saw confirmed the guess he had previously made on his current whereabouts.