I Cheated While Cultivating

Chapter 316: Chapter 36: Ten Steps to the Immortal Gate

“Your Divine Soul is very powerful, and your cultivation profound. You have a knack for understanding related techniques, deepening your comprehension of the Puppetry Technique [Eighth Rank], proficiency +0.8.”

“Congratulations! Your proficiency in the Puppetry Technique [Eighth Rank] has reached 1, and you have officially learned this technique.”

“Congratulations! Your realm is profound, looking down from a high place, you have completely mastered the Puppetry Technique [Eighth Rank], proficiency +21000.”

…

[Eighth Rank] Puppetry Technique: Perfection (21000/21000)

You can use powerful mental force to destroy a living person’s Divine Soul and refine their body into a puppet for yourself. The more noble the person’s identity before death, the stronger the refined puppet will be.

At most, three puppets can be controlled simultaneously.

…

Almost the moment Zhou Heng was attacked by the Puppetry Technique, he learned the technique, grasped all its principles, and its many applications, far surpassing the Immortal Master “Han Lin” before him.

While Han Lin was casting the Puppetry Technique on “Ye Long,” he felt as though his spiritual power had come into contact with a golden sea, incredibly vast in comparison to his own, utterly insignificant.

“How is this possible, a mere mortal, how could he possess such a powerful Divine Soul??” Han Lin couldn’t believe it, his expression one of sheer terror. These were his last thoughts.

Zhou Heng barely had to think about it, his supremely powerful Divine Sense instantly overwhelmed Han Lin’s spirit, breaking it down as easily as crushing dry weeds and sweeping away dust. At the same time, he also used the Puppetry Technique, turning Han Lin into his own puppet.

“So it turns out this Han Lin was driven to such madness in refining puppets in order to deal with his enemy,” Zhou Heng thought, as he let the puppet untie him while reading the memory fragments obtained from Han Lin.

Besides refining a living person into a puppet, the Puppetry Technique also allows one to obtain some fragments of memory. Although it is not as comprehensive as a Memory Drop Card and has a strong element of randomness, it is still quite useful.

Beyond the information about Han Lin’s enemy, Zhou Heng learned about some of the cultivation philosophies of this world.

Although Cheng Jianjian had previously mentioned that this world mainly practices cultivation through techniques and doesn’t pay much attention to the tempering of the physical body, she hadn’t studied it deeply and only knew some superficial information, which wasn’t comprehensive.

From Han Lin’s memory fragments, Zhou Heng learned that the practitioners of this world call themselves “Cultivators,” and those who achieve a certain level of success are honored as “Great Real Persons.” Those who are even higher are referred to as “Immortals.”

They advocate using the “visualization method” to temper the Divine Soul, solidify the Divine Soul into an entity symbolizing certain laws, thereby interact with reality, mobilize the natural energies of heaven and earth, and cast various techniques.

This process involves ten stages: Concentrating the Heart, Stabilizing the Divine Soul, Releasing the Spirit, Night Roaming, Subjugating Matter, Sun Roaming, True Form, Revealing the Sacred, Heavenly Heart, and Path of Divinity.

This is known as the “Ten Steps of the Immortal Path.”

It is rumored that once you have traversed these ten steps, you will completely transcend the mundane, ascend to the heavens in broad daylight, and enter the Immortal World.

From then on, you will live eternally, undying and everlasting.

This Han Lin had reached the Subjugating Matter stage and could cast minor techniques such as fireballs, ice arrows, and bolts of lightning. Their power is not insignificant, and in the mortal realms, he could be revered as an Immortal Master.

“Han Lin’s Divine Soul is only equivalent to the level of an Eighth Rank Martial Artist, but if purely speaking of offensive power and range, a Cultivator at the Subjugating Matter stage has far surpassed all Eighth Rank Martial Artists,” Zhou Heng marveled, but he also understood the drawback of such Divine Soul Cultivators, “However, these Cultivators have very weak physical bodies. If a Subjugating Matter Cultivator like Han Lin were to be approached by an Eighth Rank Martial Artist, they would be killed by a single punch.”

In short, based on the information from Han Lin’s memory fragments, it seems that until the True Form Realm, Cultivators have extremely frail physical bodies. As for the True Form Realm and even higher levels, that remains unknown.

It’s not that there’s no relevant information in these fragments of Han Lin’s memories; rather, as a Loose Cultivator, his knowledge of the higher realms is very limited.

Being able to know the specific names of the ten steps to Immortal Sect actually already surpasses many loose cultivators.

“According to Jiang Jian’s previous estimates, the strongest people outwardly in this world are roughly equivalent to the level of Sect Fifth Rank, and the control of objects is only equivalent to Eighth Rank. If that’s the case, then the Heavenly Heart Realm must be equivalent to Sect Fifth Rank, and the Realm of Dao Gods is probably similar to Absolute Fourth Rank,” Zhou Heng secretly guessed and compared the realm classifications, which suddenly made him feel somewhat amused, “If that’s really the case, then stepping beyond the ten steps to Immortal Sect should lead to the realm of the Celestial Man. Since when could Celestial Men be immortally indestructible, eternally unperishable?”

Rumors are, after all, just rumors.

The decay calamity of the Celestial Men that occurs every five hundred years has been stepped on a bit.

Afterward, Zhou Heng tidied up the cave a bit, but didn’t find anything of value, so he could only leave the cave with the puppet.

It was then that he discovered a spiritual dwelling not far from there.

The spiritual dwelling was nothing miraculous, simply a place carved out of a cave as a residence, equipped with pots and bowls, a table and stools, and a stone bed, upon which a grass mat was spread.

Zhou Heng planned on recuperating here for a few days.

After all, he had just taken possession of a body and descended. Ye Long’s body had been revived from death, with depleted vitality and major organ damage, and without any cultivation to speak of, he wasn’t suited for long-distance trekking.

It would be wise to recuperate and get the body into good condition here.

So, in the following days, Zhou Heng lived in this cave, sending the puppet out to hunt, bringing back meat to roast and eat, while he practiced standing postures and warmed his body with punches.

— Although the laws of this world are different and suppress most martial arts, especially those above Middle Third Rank, there are no such restrictions on basic martial arts based on the physical body.

After more than ten days, Zhou Heng had finally conditioned this “corpse” back into a healthy ordinary person.

At the same time, his physical strength had also recovered to Ninth Grade level, but it couldn’t go any higher. It seemed as though the physical bodies of this world were different and incapable of cultivating inner qi.

Zhou Heng’s strongest means of self-protection at present was actually Han Lin, the puppet.

Zhou Heng had also tried practicing techniques such as fireballs, ice arrows, and lightning bolts. Logically, with his Divine Soul realm, casting these techniques should have been easy, but in reality none had been successful.

Although he had descended with just a thread of his divine soul’s awareness, if he wanted to transform it into Divine Soul Power on the level of controlling objects, it would be at least equivalent to fifty Han Lins, which more than met the mental power requirements of these techniques, yet he couldn’t cast them.

Zhou Heng now was like having a warehouse full of high-quality metals with no clue how to forge these metals into weapons; he could only stare helplessly.

“It must be related to the visualization technique. The cultivators of this world manipulate the forces of nature, probably not just through their divine souls. The visualization technique must also play an important role,” Zhou Heng realized in his heart.

His memories from Han Lin were fragmented and incomplete. He only knew that cultivators in this place primarily used visualization techniques, but he didn’t know how to practice these visualization methods or what kind of changes they could bring about.

He could only guess.

“If I were to guess based on some information I learned from my previous life, so-called visualization should be sitting in meditation, imagining the image of certain things in the mind, in order to achieve peace and focus, and restrain wandering thoughts,” Zhou Heng mused.

Zhou Heng fell into contemplation, thinking to himself: “However, such mere imagination cannot be considered cultivation, let alone bring about extraordinary power. It seems that if I want to gain the power of this world, I still need to get my hands on real visualization techniques.”

But in this world, visualization techniques are mostly sect secrets, and loose cultivators also treat their own visualization techniques as extremely valuable, reluctant to disclose them easily. Getting a hold of visualization techniques is extremely difficult.

Moreover, the status of cultivators themselves is above that of nations and in order to maintain this superior position, it is even more difficult for royals and nobles to obtain visualization techniques.

This means that with Zhou Heng’s current identity as “Ye Long,” it is almost impossible to acquire visualization techniques through normal channels.

“If I can’t get it through normal channels, then I have to take unconventional paths, either secretly buying it from someone or directly resorting to murder and robbery,” Zhou Heng thought of two methods, but neither was easy.

“However, no matter which path one takes, one can never acquire the visualization method by just staying in a cave dwelling; one still needs to go out to gather information, starting with finding a town.”

As someone who preferred action, with a thought, he immediately left the cave with the puppet Han Lin in tow.

Before leaving, Zhou Heng erased all signs of his having lived there, as well as any traces along the way.

He hadn’t forgotten that Han Lin still had an enemy.

That was a peak Sun Roaming Realm expert, close to the level of a Great Celestial Man.

—Cultivators of the True Form Realm are revered as Great Celestial Men.

He had not recovered much strength yet and did not want to attract a formidable enemy.

…

Three days after Zhou Heng left the cave, a middle-aged man dressed in a large red robe arrived there.

He searched around, first visiting the cave where Zhou Heng had resided, only to find it empty, which made him frown. Then he went to the cave Han Lin had used for puppetry crafting, but still found nothing.

“Heh, interesting. When did Han Lin learn to erase his tracks and counter-track?” the man in the red robe sneered.

He then drew a yellow talisman from his chest, blew gently on it, and the talisman immediately ignited without fire, revealing red lines on the ground that spread in one direction.

“Han Lin, I’d like to see where you can run to now!” the man in the red robe narrowed his eyes with murderous intent and ran in the direction the red lines spread.

Simultaneously, illusory flames appeared behind him, within which an angry Vajra figure was vaguely visible, engulfed in fire. Soon, the fire enveloped his entire body, speeding up his pace.

This was the “Wrathful Flames Vajra” that the red-robed man visualized as his divine Buddha.

By using it, he could channel spiritual power to leverage the fire element qi between heaven and earth, performing many fire-related techniques with often devastatingly powerful results, a considerable combat force even among the Sun Roaming Realm.

However, it could gradually affect the cultivator’s temperament, making them more irritable and short-tempered.

…

Qingxiang Town is a small town in the southwestern region of Liang Country, known for its abundant flowers and named after them.

This was also the first town Zhou Heng found after leaving the cave.

Now, through a few disguise techniques, he had made himself look in his forties and came here as a wandering medicinal doctor, planning to set up a medical clinic.

Han Lin was completely wrapped up, carrying luggage on his back for Zhou Heng, looking every bit the part of a servant.

For a medicinal doctor, no matter where one goes, they are welcomed.

Thus, without much effort, Zhou Heng rented a small courtyard for setting up the medical clinic, which also served as his residence.

He had chosen this identity after careful consideration.

Firstly, given his cultivation level of the Divine Soul Realm, he could effortlessly diagnose both major and minor illnesses. Secondly, as a doctor, he interacted with many different people, which made it easier to gather information.

More than ten days passed, and Zhou Heng’s clinic was running successfully, attracting many people who wanted to apprentice and learn medicine. Yet, he still heard no news about the visualization method.

After all, to the ordinary folk, cultivators were like elusive dragons—exalted beings about whose affairs mortals were unworthy of inquiring.

As a result, there were hardly any leads.

In the meantime, Zhou Heng had also tried visualizing with the “Supreme Ox-Riding Diagram” from the Gold Fortune Bag, but to no avail, as he had not cracked the method, finding it useless.

Indeed, mere imagination in one’s mind was not sufficient.

While there wasn’t much progress with the visualization method, there was an unexpected gain with martial arts. Zhou Heng had managed to refine a wisp of extremely faint Innate True Qi by modifying The Eternal Life Chant.

However, this strand of Innate True Qi was so weak that it was incredibly difficult even to attract the elemental qi of heaven and earth, let alone use it to execute martial arts or techniques.

Even so, the successful cultivation of True Qi still filled Zhou Heng with excitement.

He had taken the first step of a long journey.

But as his research deepened, Zhou Heng discovered that the Innate True Qi refined in this world still relied on the Divine Soul’s attraction to the external qi of heaven and earth. Even the nature of Innate True Qi itself was dominated by the Divine Soul Power, meaning even if one’s Innate True Qi grew strong enough to leverage the elemental qi of heaven and earth, its essence still depended on the power of the Divine Soul, not much different from the visualization method, and perhaps even more complicated.

“Divine Soul Power is dominant, which is probably a fundamental rule of this world,” Zhou Heng thought. “I still need to keep searching for the visualization method, and explore other ways to strengthen Innate True Qi in this world.

“I must prepare on both fronts.”

…

One evening, as the clinic was closing.

Zhou Heng sat in the small courtyard, contemplating other methods to strengthen Innate True Qi in this world.

Suddenly, the sound of knocking on the door came.

Moreover, it was urgent, and the force behind the knocking grew stronger and stronger.

Boom! Boom! Boom!

It nearly seemed as if the person would break down the door if it wasn’t opened soon.

Zhou Heng’s eyebrows slightly furrowed.

Under his Divine Sense’s detection, he could clearly “see” that the person knocking was a burly middle-aged man in a large red robe, with a beard framing his face, who appeared somewhat agitated.

Facing this sudden encounter, Zhou Heng slightly raised his eyebrows, stood up, and opened the courtyard door, meeting the middle-aged man in the large red robe.

“Have you seen Han Lin?” the man in the red robe looked into Zhou Heng’s eyes and said, “You’d better answer truthfully. I don’t like being lied to.”

“I haven’t seen him,” Zhou Heng replied impassively.

“…” The man in the red robe paused briefly, then cracked a smile, shaking his head and said, “No, I don’t believe you!

“Step aside, let me have a look inside.”