During the journey, Cao Yun decided to focus solely on stabilizing his soul cultivation and calming his mind. Every single second felt like an eternity, and yet a single week could pass by in a blink. The feelings of Cao Yun were all over the place. Thankfully, he could control himself with his soul and mind cultivation. Thousands upon thousands of times, he imagined the assault on Emperor Weide. Countless scenarios were floating in his mind. Even with three months of travel, he couldn't go through them all. Besides, some were just too dramatic and catastrophic to be credible.
Thankfully, Director Hua was doing everything she could to slow down the journey without being directly involved. In that endeavor, General Wei Zhenhai was extremely useful. Since he was in charge of Sun Liao's safety, it wasn't difficult to gently guide him in the right direction. Even without Director Hua and Sun Liao himself trying to slow down in order to give Cao Yun more time, General Wei Zhenhai would have already been slow. With him in charge, they might even take four months. Honestly, it would be a stretch, but they would clearly take a bit more than three months.
General Wei Zhenhai knew about the Nine-Souls Calamity Ascension Pill. As such, he was torn between getting the pill to Emperor Weide as soon as possible and not losing the pill to anything. In the end, the fear of losing the pill somehow always won. If such a thing happened, he would be the worst failure of all mankind, the worst traitor in all of history. Such a title was looming over his head. Thanks to his cultivation, he didn't need to sleep during the entire journey. Otherwise, he would have had nightmares about his failures. No amount of contrition or sacrifice would be able to wash away such an offense.
Hidden among the alchemists, Cao Yun was taking full advantage of General Wei Zhenhai's paranoia. The young man was frequently talking with his brothers and sister as well as with Feng Yingyue, Director Hua, and Xiao Xuefeng. They all knew the plans, at least parts of the plan, as Cao Yun had a few hidden cards to play, just in case. Thus, they shared information, they prepared as best as they could. Honestly, Sun Liao was the most useful of the lot. And Ren Chao felt as useless as he was.
Ren Chao explained everything he knew about the weapons and armor he had forged or helped forge. This wasn't useless, contrary to what he believed. However, one had to admit that it wasn't very useful information for Cao Yun. Thanks to Ren Chao's 1-star Spirit weapon, the 'Dark Abyss Wrathful Serpent Spear', Cao Yun had no doubt that no amount of armor could protect Emperor Weide, especially with Cao Yun's current physique. Even without using his full asura cultivation, his flesh was still extremely strong, stronger than most late Spirit Warriors, and stronger than a 9th-grade Spirit Warrior.
Although physical strength wasn't the best weapon of a cultivator at this stage, this was still an advantage Cao Yun intended to use as best as he could.
That being said, Cao Yun was interested in Emperor Weide's weapon. Indeed, Ren Chao had forged it by following Emperor Weide's instructions and, after seeing some of his martial arts being displayed, like he had done for Cao Yun. So, even if Ren Chao wasn't a martial arts expert, Cao Yun could still imagine most of Emperor Weide's style just from his brother's description. No matter what Ren Chao thought, his input was very valuable.
Like many cultivators, Emperor Weide's weapon of choice was a sword, a Jian to be precise: a straight double-edged sword. Ren Chao had been able to forge an incredible sword, almost a 1-star Spirit sword, but a bit short of actually reaching that goal. This was the 'Fate Splitting Truth'. According to Ren Chao, it could cleave almost anything in two, at least on the Piaolu planet. In the hands of Emperor Weide, this was a terrifying weapon. No matter how sturdy Cao Yun's body was, he was absolutely certain that Emperor Weide could slice him in half upon any strike. Although he could heal from most injuries, he was not immortal at all. Cutting off his head and his heart would clearly do the trick. The Dantian was a huge weakness of all cultivators. Even if Cao Yun could repair them to an extent, he couldn't heal his own soul if it was damaged.
Emperor Weide's martial art was known as 'Nuwa's Mandate of Absolute Benevolence'. The name was famous and known by all. After all, it was a technique invented by Emperor Nuwa herself. She had invented it before leaving the Piaolu planet, soon after becoming an actual Immortal. As such, it was clearly a God martial art, most likely a 1-star or 2-star God martial art. Although Cao Yun's 'Azure Dragon's Seven Piercing Stars' was far beneath it, the quality of a martial art depended much more on the martial artist. A great swordsman would be terrifying even when using the most humble of martial arts. In fact, the greatest swordsman of all would not even use any technique, his every movement would be a sword movement.
Anyway, Cao Yun learned as much as he could from Ren Chao, knowing full well that it was just a speck of Emperor Weide's actual might. Most likely, Emperor Weide had developed a form of martial state, but Cao Yun couldn't know to what extent he had developed it. Besides, he also had his pseudo-Domain, 'Domain of the Three Confluences'. No one actually knew what it did exactly, or even how he had achieved such a thing.
An actual Domain was something only a Monarch could achieve. The Monarch realm was the fifth realm of cultivation, the intermediate realm between Sage and Immortal. As a matter of fact, this realm was literally known as the Domain Realm. In this realm, a cultivator could fully manifest their sea of consciousness outside, forming a small world around them where they were the absolute ruler and de facto god. Anyone within the domain had to obey the rules of the cultivator. Only another Domain could counter such a technique. In fact, to fight a Domain, one had to either form a Domain or be so significantly stronger that they could simply negate it. The best strategy to fight a Domain was usually to simply stay away from its range. Of course, the stronger a Monarch was, the larger their Domain would be.
In a sense, a Domain was similar to spiritual senses. However, even a Sage couldn't produce one. A Sage would slowly build up their sea of consciousness while studying the Dao, but only when it was fully built up, when it actually became a Domain, could one become a Monarch. Only then could the sea of consciousness be manifested outside as a Domain. Thus, no one knew how Emperor Weide had been able to achieve such a thing. That being said, even though he wasn't arrogant enough to claim to have mastered an actual Domain, he called it a pseudo-Domain himself. A few zealots had called it a Domain, but Emperor Weide had never endorsed or claimed that name. No matter the name, this was still terrifying.
For a few days, Cao Yun hesitated while looking at the Nine-Souls Calamity Ascension Pill he had. Indeed, among the five pills, one would be given to Emperor Weide as a poisoned gift, two would go to Sect Leader Xuan and Matriarch Huang, and one would remain in the Golden Flowery Fragrance Institute as payment. The last pill was for Cao Yun. Since he had gone to all this trouble to forge the pill, he had no qualms taking the second-best pill. Director Hua herself didn't even try to bargain with him, this was the deal they had made.
Although she was happy with the unstable pill she had received, she would have been happy even without it. The sheer experience they had gained from the refinement process alone was absolutely worth it. Director Hua was absolutely convinced that they would spend centuries studying this refinement process. Cao Yun had even agreed to write everything about it. Some parts of his tale would be sealed and only shown to a select few, as they involved a lot of secrets. But most of his tale could be shared with every alchemist. Combined with the reports of all the alchemists, no matter how directly or indirectly involved they were, alchemists would have a lifetime of study to do. Director Hua was certain that mankind would soon be able to produce 1-star Spirit pills just as if they were just slightly more difficult 5-star Heaven pills. History would prove her right. In fact, history would prove her too pessimistic...
Cao Yun decided against taking the pill. Even now, his Soul Embryo was still a bit unstable because he had progressed too fast. A Soul Embryo was a very delicate and fragile thing. Although the pill might have helped Cao Yun push closer to the 8th-grade Spirit Warrior stage, or maybe push him past the boundary, it was much too risky. This time, he would certainly harm his future, there was no doubt about it. Thus, he chose not to take the pill. Besides, it could help him overcome the Greater Tribulation. So he would be more patient. Cao Yun would try to hold on to this Nine-Souls Calamity Ascension Pill until he actually became a 9th-grade Spirit Warrior and was ready to break through. With it, he had a real chance of becoming a Sage, even during the Forsaken Dao Era.
As he was meditating and calming down as much as he could, Cao Yun could feel that his soul and his Soul Embryo were slowly getting more and more intimate. Although his soul was within his Soul Embryo, they were still two separate entities. As a 7th-grade Spirit Warrior, Cao Yun's goal was to fully merge the two together. They had to become one entity. His Soul Embryo had to actually become his soul.
Cao Yun pondered it. He was still a bit confused over the nature of the soul. Although it was talked about as being one soul, it was in fact an amalgamation of ten different souls always talking and responding to one another. They were the three Hun and the seven Po. Cao Yun had a very deep understanding of the Po for a Spirit Warrior. But his knowledge of the Hun was still a bit lacking. Honestly, it was higher than most Spirit Warriors. And fully understanding the concepts of the souls wasn't necessary to become an 8th-grade Spirit Warrior. That being said, it would be very useful indeed.
This gave Cao Yun a great opportunity to relax, he simply studied his own soul. In fact, he experimented with his Po as well, turning it into Death Energy and back. He couldn't turn his Hun into Ghost Energy, though. Cao Yun could barely perceive his Hun, but the fact that he could perceive it at all was already a great victory. The Hun was related to higher purposes. Right now, Cao Yun was convinced that he had such purposes. Not only did he want to save his sister because he loved her and she was his family, but he also cared about all of mankind and the Hongchen Kingdom. No matter how much he loved Cao Huiying, he couldn't sacrifice the Hongchen Kingdom for her, so he would save both. Besides those goals, Cao Yun had more intangible aspirations. He wanted to sail through all of creation in order to understand the Dao better.
Cao Yun wasn't just looking for power or immortality. In fact, his most vibrant aspiration was to sincerely understand himself, down to his very soul. For Feng Yingyue, the ten souls were a means for the Dao to express itself through people. In fact, the souls were an emanation of the Dao trying to understand itself, to perceive itself in all its smaller parts. Honestly, Cao Yun wasn't too sure about that. At the very least, he wasn't convinced.
The Dao was a concept. He felt that giving aspirations and desires, even actions, to the Dao was too much. The Dao was a force of nature. In fact, it was nature itself and more than that. It was before and beyond everything while being unbound by time or causation. Dao was simply unexplainable, but Cao Yun didn't think that it was unknowable. In fact, cultivators were always trying to perceive the Dao in nature. Honestly, Cao Yun's ideas on the matter were a bit all over the place. One thing was certain for him, it couldn't be explained easily, so he wasn't satisfied with any answer he had already gotten from anyone, but he was willing to entertain those ideas.
Dao was seen as the absolute fabric of everything, the changeless mother of all of existence. But even this description wasn't taken by Cao Yun as an absolute truth. What Cao Yun was trying to achieve was to understand his own condition by exploring the laws of the universe, the minor Dao. Whether he would one day get to an answer or not was irrelevant. Maybe there would be no answer because the questions he was asking were simply nonsensical and based on his ignorance. However, he would never stop searching and challenging everything he thought he knew. Hopefully, he would understand himself and reality itself better. Even if he didn't get to an absolute comprehension of everything, he could still improve step by step over decades, centuries, millennia, entire eons.
As Cao Yun was slowly entering a deep state of pure contemplation, his soul and Soul Embryo were naturally melding into one another. The less he was actively trying to achieve it, the faster they were merging. All his thoughts were, in fact, pushing his Hun further and further, while his Po was already very well developed. Cao Yun's cosmic considerations were the ultimate goal of one's Hun. Family and community were two huge parts of the Hun, but they were its lesser aspects. The Hun was all about the aspirations to be linked to something bigger than oneself, either other human beings or greater philosophical principles.
At last, the group reached the Imperial City. Director Hua and the others felt their hearts skip a beat. Soon, everything would be decided.