Chapter 79 : Five Spiritual Roots? “Heavenly Spiritual Root”?
Chapter 79: Five Spiritual Roots? “Heavenly Spiritual Root”?
To be honest, at this moment, even True Person Zhiying herself felt a tidal wave rise within her heart.
When she had taken in this little girl, it had been because she saw that her temperament was pure and that she was fated with her.
She had never imagined, not even in her wildest dreams, that the girl could display such a cultivation speed that completely overturned common sense.
One had to know that even True Person Zhiying herself—hailed throughout the sect as a top-tier genius—had only possessed Three Spiritual Roots back then.
During the Qi Refining stage, her progress had indeed surpassed her peers, but it had been far from earth-shattering.
What had truly allowed her to surge ahead and leave cultivators of the same generation far behind was when, at Qi Refining Great Perfection, she had first begun to comprehend and grasp that incomparably profound Power of Time.
Even so, it would have been utterly impossible for her to achieve anything like what Xiao Ying before her was doing now—using Five Spiritual Roots, yet displaying an efficiency comparable to that of a Heavenly Spiritual Root!
“Xiao Ying,” True Person Zhiying suppressed the shock in her heart and tried to keep her voice gentle, “are you really as Yaxiao said—did you just ‘feel that it should be this fast’ in your heart, and then suddenly charged straight into the Second Layer?”
However, the little girl in front of her let out a soft giggle.
Those Peach-Blossom Eyes curved into crescent moons, carrying a hint of slyness.
“Master, you really know how to joke. How could there be such a cheap thing in this world? That was only because… Senior Sister He’s reaction at the time was just too interesting, and I couldn’t help wanting to tease her a little.”
As she spoke, she even tilted her head slightly toward He Yaxiao’s direction, making a playful, apologetic expression.
Seeing her junior sister’s adorable and lively demeanor, how could He Yaxiao still be angry? She could only shake her head helplessly and smile.
“Then… Xiao Ying,” the interest in True Person Zhiying’s eyes grew even stronger, “tell Master—how exactly did you do it?”
Faced with the gazes of her master and the two elders beside her—True Person Mingzhu and Senior Sister He Yaxiao—those looks filled with excitement, shock, and intense curiosity, Xiao Ying did not answer immediately.
Her eyes drifted for a brief instant, as if she had fallen into some distant memory.
Several years ago, on a certain night before the “foolish” young master of her household had left home to head for the sect, that memory quietly surfaced…
……
“Xiao Ying, do you see this candlelight?” The youthful Long Tao sat cross-legged before the table, pointing at the flickering flame.
“I see it, I see it! Young Master, are you going to start talking about some crazy nonsense like ‘speed of light’ or ‘photons’ again? Sigh… the young lady won’t listen, so you just grab me and ramble at me alone, right?”
“Hey! Today I’m saying it a different way!” The young master seemed slightly tipsy, his cheeks flushed, but his eyes were exceptionally bright.
“Do you know? When a photon goes from the candle here to your eyes over there, it doesn’t stupidly travel along just one straight line… It actually takes all the possible paths it could travel in between, all at the same moment, and walks every single one of them! Then all those possibilities stack together, and only then do you see the light! Can you believe it? All paths!”
“Sigh, I told you, Young Master, you really shouldn’t drink. You only had a little honey brew during the day, and now you’re already talking nonsense again.” Xiao Ying stood up, putting on the air of a little housekeeper.
“I’ll go make you some sobering soup. You absolutely mustn’t get arrested by the City Lord for being a cultist because of these strange theories!”
“I… I’m not drunk! Hey! Remember to bring some orange peel too!”
……
The brief memory receded like a tide, and Xiao Ying’s gaze refocused on the three curious listeners before her.
She organized her thoughts slightly in her mind before speaking.
“Actually… this method is somewhat similar to Master’s sword art.”
“My sword art?” True Person Zhiying raised her brows slightly.
“Yes,” Xiao Ying nodded firmly.
“The set of sword techniques you demonstrated on the day you accepted me as a disciple, in the City Lord’s residence of Qinglin Town. Even then, I vaguely felt that your use of the Power of Time was not merely about simply accelerating yourself or slowing down your opponent… that would be too singular. Your core lies in ‘simultaneous superposition.’”
“Simultaneous… superposition?”
This unfamiliar phrase made True Person Mingzhu and He Yaxiao unconsciously reveal confused expressions.
In their understanding, True Person Zhiying’s unfathomable Time Sword Intent ultimately boiled down to exquisitely manipulating the flow of time—fast or slow—to defeat enemies.
However, the True Person Zhiying standing between them, upon hearing those four words, had a brilliant light erupt in her eyes! She could no longer restrain the surging excitement in her heart, and a radiant smile bloomed across her face—like a child discovering an unrivaled treasure, or like finally meeting a true kindred spirit!
Seeing this, Xiao Ying paused slightly, hesitating as she glanced at True Person Mingzhu and Senior Sister He Yaxiao beside her.
What she was about to say would very likely touch upon the most core secrets of her master’s sword path.
“Speak freely,” True Person Zhiying said clearly, her voice carrying unquestionable trust.
“Martial Uncle Mingzhu and Yaxiao are not outsiders. There is no harm in them hearing this.”
With her master’s approval, Xiao Ying finally set her mind at ease and continued explaining.
“Master, the true essence of your sword art does not lie in speed or slowness, but in the fact that at that ‘instant’ when you strike, you are not striking with just one sword. At that same moment, you are simultaneously performing, allowing to exist, and stacking together ‘all possible moves that could be executed’ within those immeasurable instants. Then, in the next instant, based on the opponent’s reaction and the changes in the situation, you select the most perfect, the most appropriate sword from among those infinite possibilities, and turn it into the real attack.”
She paused, her tone filled with heartfelt admiration.
“Therefore, unless an opponent completely crushes you in absolute realm, otherwise, if one speaks only of sword techniques and divine abilities… it is fundamentally impossible for anyone to defeat you. Because you are not ‘reacting’—you are ‘choosing.’ You can always calmly choose that ‘only correct’ move from among tens of thousands of possibilities.”
This explanation not only left True Person Mingzhu and He Yaxiao utterly dumbfounded, but also made True Person Zhiying so excited that she could hardly contain herself.
Almost subconsciously, she reached out and pulled Xiao Ying into her embrace, excitedly ruffling her hair.
All these years… ever since she had comprehended this unique Time Sword Intent, no one had ever truly understood its core profundity.
Others could, at most, see that she was manipulating the flow of time, fast or slow, but no one had touched upon the true essence of “countless possibilities, stacked and selected.” When she had accepted Xiao Ying as a disciple in Qinglin Town back then, it had only been because she sensed that this child, while watching her sword dance, could vaguely perceive the flowing fluctuations of the Power of Time, and thus felt she was worth cultivating.
Yet she had never imagined that what she had picked up was far more than an uncut jade.
This was a divine treasure that already shone with its own radiance even without carving! To be able to understand the very core of her sword intent so thoroughly!
At this moment, an indescribable impulse even surged within True Person Zhiying’s heart—she truly wanted to form a Dao Partnership with this girl right now! Among the countless cultivators in the world, only the person before her was truly worthy of walking side by side with her, as a fellow traveler upon the Great Dao!
Of course, that thought only flashed by for an instant.
No matter how free-spirited she was, such a matter would at least have to wait until Xiao Ying reached Foundation Establishment.
She forcibly suppressed her churning emotions, set Xiao Ying back down, her hands still resting on her disciple’s shoulders.
Her eyes shone brightly, and her tone brimmed with unconcealed pride and excitement.
“Worthy indeed of being the disciple I took a fancy to at first sight! Truly the best! But…” Her tone shifted, her curiosity growing ever stronger.
“Quickly tell Master—how did you apply this idea to speeding up Qi Refining?”
“Mm…” Xiao Ying tilted her head and thought for a moment, organizing her words.
“I was thinking that the reason Five Spiritual Roots are inefficient is because meridians of different attributes interfere with and cancel each other out. The spiritual energy that’s drawn in runs chaotically through the meridians, clashing and conflicting, causing huge losses. If each attribute of spiritual energy could circulate only within its corresponding meridians, without interfering with one another, then the efficiency would naturally be high. But under normal circumstances, that’s definitely impossible—otherwise, predecessors would have developed it long ago.”
“Then what is your method?” True Person Zhiying pressed, not blinking an eye.
“The principle is similar to Master’s sword intent, but the method used is a bit different,” Xiao Ying explained.
“I used that tiny bit of the Power of Time that I’ve initially grasped. At the instant of drawing in spiritual energy, I placed all attribute-based energy flows into a kind of… um… ‘superposed state.’ Each strand of spiritual energy of a different attribute seems to run on its own, being absorbed by the corresponding meridians without interfering with each other. Although the total amount of spiritual energy drawn in doesn’t increase, because they’re not on the same… uh… I don’t know how to describe it—‘level,’ I guess—the final absorption efficiency… ends up being equivalent to that of a Heavenly Spiritual Root.”
This theory, like a celestial tome, once again left True Person Mingzhu and He Yaxiao frozen in a daze.
Though they heard it as if through clouds and mist, that final sentence—“equivalent to a Heavenly Spiritual Root”—they heard loud and clear!
“T-this… how is this possible?” True Person Mingzhu, after all a Golden Core True Person, managed to grasp the key point of doubt despite the chaos in her mind.
“Though I am not versed in Time Sword Intent, I do understand that as long as spiritual energy must still flow through the meridians to be absorbed, then even if at a certain instant it is in the ‘superposed’ state you describe, during the absorption process, how could spiritual energy of different attributes possibly not interfere with and affect one another at all?”
Xiao Ying seemed to have anticipated this question long ago.
She blinked those beautiful Peach-Blossom Eyes and lightly tossed out another, even more unfathomable explanation.
“They won’t,” she said.
“Before, the young—someone once told me,” she paused, thinking of a certain figure, “that as long as no observation is made, those countless paths and possibilities will all exist simultaneously… uh, in other words, as long as I don’t actively use my divine sense to internally observe the specific situation inside my body, then that ‘superposed state’ where all spiritual energy flows do not interfere with one another within the meridians will continue to be maintained.”