The anomaly in the Yellow Springs was quickly noticed by the zombie cultivators. Even though they had already died once, they still felt a chill run down their spines.
Countless souls could be seen drifting up and down in the death-energy-filled waters of the Yellow Springs. Some were solid, some were ethereal, all retaining the appearance they had before death.
They had originally thought the souls would transform into zombies.
But in reality, the souls had previously been tainted by Karmic Fire, and without the bodies they had possessed in life, it was difficult even to cultivate as zombies to the Ghost Envoy realm.
Ren Qing simply allowed the souls to develop on their own. If any abnormalities appeared, he would suppress them immediately. He also stationed a portion of the ghost shadow in the Underworld.
As the number of souls continued to grow, the Yellow Springs quietly underwent changes.
The gray-black river water became increasingly viscous. Souls would occasionally try to break free for no reason, only to be dragged back into the Yellow Springs by other souls.
During this endless cycle, some souls began exhibiting the aura of the Martial Practitioner realm.
It seemed that the Yellow Springs was nurturing a unique cultivation system. According to the information stream, it was a type of strange entity known as a "Nether Soul."
Nether Souls were formed by the Rebirth Technique. They required souls that had lost their intelligence to cast themselves into death energy and regain intelligence through the erosion of yin energy.
The intelligence of Nether Souls was extremely chaotic, and they would even slaughter one another.
Ren Qing had never intended for every Nether Soul to serve Restraint Officers' Hall. Forcibly grinding away their viciousness would require enormous effort for little gain and would be completely unnecessary.
He established restrictions on the Yellow Springs, allowing only Nether Souls possessing independent thought to enter the outside world.
Among tens of thousands of Nether Souls, there would always be a few exceptions. Even if their cultivation potential was mediocre, they would still serve as a useful supplement to the Underworld.
If Nether Souls wished to cultivate techniques, they could choose the Marsh Technique, whose upper limit was the Yin Difference realm.
Amid the prolonged slaughter among the Nether Souls, the river channels of the Yellow Springs gradually lengthened, allowing the Corpse Vein to carry out another round of expansion within the Underworld.
Ren Qing found this somewhat surprising. It seemed that both the Underworld and the Heavenly Palace were not limited to advancing only alongside Heaven and Earth Genesis.
Just as he was about to continue separating souls, he noticed that Song Zongwu had awakened.
After only a brief period of dormancy, Song Zongwu's six arms and six eyes had regrown, and his cultivation had stabilized at barely the Yang Spirit realm.
On the surface, it seemed he had paid almost no price to break free from Sitting-Deer Arhat. In reality, even his soul had taken on the texture of melted wax.
Although Heavenly Dao transformation could strengthen techniques, it came hand in hand with loss of control.
Ren Qing's consciousness entered the Underworld. Song Zongwu had clearly been waiting for him. When the two met, both could not help feeling emotional.
Song Zongwu had already noticed that Ren Qing was now in the Heavenly Aberration realm the moment he returned to his body.
Even now, he found it unbelievable. At first, he had thought he had slept for several hundred years, but upon careful reflection, less than a century had actually passed.
"Ren Qing..."
Song Zongwu patted Ren Qing's shoulder. The moment his palm touched him, Karmic Fire invaded Ren Qing's flesh and bones.
He quickly withdrew his arm, afraid of affecting Ren Qing's foundation.
"Senior Song, it's fine."
Ren Qing shook his head. If they were really comparing degrees of Heavenly Dao transformation, Song Zongwu could not even come close to him.
His many techniques had raised his tolerance limit for Heavenly Dao transformation, allowing him to maintain a human form.
"It's really this serious? You have to keep Karmic Fire wrapped around yourself just to resist Buddhism?"
"I suspect all Buddhas are actually one..."
Song Zongwu revealed a bitter smile, allowing the bone-chilling yin energy to wash over him. Otherwise, the Karmic Fire within his soul would completely ignite his body.
He recounted his experiences over the past period. It truly had been a turbulent journey.
After leaving Xiangxiang, Song Zongwu was taken to Lingshan Temple by Nameless Ascetic. He stayed there and cultivated the Restraint Officer techniques.
His progress with the Restraint Officer techniques was extremely smooth. At the same time, the Immovable Scripture within the Sitting-Deer Buddhist qi stagnated, as though it had vanished from his body.
But strange things began happening. The monks in the temple became inexplicably affected and frequently displayed undisguised malice.
Even novice monks under ten years old looked at Song Zongwu with greedy eyes.
At first, Song Zongwu did not know the reason. He even considered killing the monks who threatened him. It was not until Nameless Ascetic appeared again that he learned the truth.
Buddhist qi was an extremely sinister cultivation system.
Although Arhat Buddhist qi lacked intelligence, it still operated according to specific rules and sought to devour Buddhist disciples who had achieved completion.
Song Zongwu was already in his tenth life. In the eyes of the Sitting-Deer Buddhist qi, there was no chance he would perfect the Immovable Scripture in this lifetime.
As a result, the Sitting-Deer Buddhist qi began selecting the next Buddhist disciple and stimulated the evil thoughts hidden within the monks' hearts.
At this point, Song Zongwu's tone turned somewhat helpless. Who could have imagined that Nameless Ascetic was actually one of his previous lives, spending centuries plotting a way to escape Buddhism's control?
With Nameless Ascetic's talent, he had ceased fearing the Arhat Fruit Position in his very first life.
He spent only a few decades successfully separating all Buddhist qi from his body and even sealed the Fruit Position inside a special container.
Nameless Ascetic had believed he would never again become entangled with Buddhism.
Yet the Buddhist qi remained like a disease clinging to the bone, constantly regenerating. Each time it was dispersed, its essence would gradually transform further.
"Senior Song, are you saying..."
"That's right. After dispersing the Buddhist qi of an Arhat Fruit Position, the body will become occupied by the Buddhist qi of a Bodhisattva Fruit Position, or even... a Tathagata Fruit Position."
Ren Qing's mouth fell slightly open. No wonder Nameless Ascetic had become so desperate that he willingly sought death and left the chance of survival to Song Zongwu.
The moment a cultivator mastered a Buddhist technique, their body and soul no longer truly belonged to them.
The reason Song Zongwu had ended up in such a miserable state and was willing to endure Karmic Fire Burning the Body was precisely to make Buddhism abandon him voluntarily, allowing him to break free forever.
Ren Qing's expression became conflicted. If he truly squeezed Sitting-Deer Fruit Position dry, would it attract the attention of higher-level Buddhas?
The more he thought about it, the more troublesome Buddhism seemed. Yet he could not bear to give up the Fruit Position's ability to transfer Heavenly Dao transformation. For a moment, he could not decide what to choose.
Song Zongwu seemed to guess what Ren Qing was thinking.
"You can seal a Fruit Position, but never try to destroy it."
According to Nameless Ascetic, many Fruit Positions had already been sealed away. This was because of Buddhism's habit of gathering populations. Like locusts, wherever they passed, no living beings remained.
As for destroying a Buddhist Fruit Position, Buddhas themselves could reincarnate endlessly. They could not be exterminated and would only begin a new cycle.
Ren Qing considered this silently. For now, he would maintain the current model within the Longevity Forbidden Zone and continuously steal Buddhist qi from Sitting-Deer Arhat.
If he wanted to study Buddhist techniques, Buddhist qi would indeed be highly useful.
Of course, he had no intention of cultivating Buddhist techniques himself. What truly interested him was the ability to transfer Heavenly Dao transformation and whether there might be opportunities hidden within it.
Unfortunately, the previous generations of Buddhas within Sitting-Deer Fruit Position could not yet be touched, lest unnecessary complications arise.
Ren Qing silently finalized his plans. Several cracks on the turtle shell gradually healed, proving that sometimes a single thought could bring both fortune and disaster.
"Senior Song, do you know what Fruit Positions are made of?"
Ren Qing only asked casually, but to his surprise, Song Zongwu fell silent.
After hesitating for a long time, Song Zongwu finally said,
"The memories from being devoured by Buddhist qi are very vague, but I can vaguely recall some scenes."
"It seems that hidden within the Buddhist qi..."
Before he could finish speaking, the Karmic Fire within his body and soul flared up.
Ren Qing quickly used death energy to cool the high temperatures caused by Song Zongwu's Heavenly Dao transformation. It took several hours before things barely stabilized and finally returned to calm.
Song Zongwu would need to at least reach the No-Birth Immortal stage of strange entity fusion. Otherwise, he would not even be able to leave the Underworld.
He did not particularly care. Being alive already meant he had triumphed over Buddhism. At least he would not remain trapped at the initial Yang Spirit realm forever.
Ren Qing could not help feeling regretful, but he could try approaching the problem through Buddhist techniques and then let the monks of Lingshan Temple cultivate them.
Perhaps it might give birth to new Fruit Positions or avoid the drawbacks of Buddhist cultivation methods.
While the two conversed, Ren Qing brought Song Zongwu around various parts of Stomach World, while controlling death energy to shroud Song Zongwu's entire body.
Once he forged a magical artifact capable of containing death energy, Song Zongwu would be able to leave the Underworld for short periods.
The prosperity of Restraint Officers' Hall astonished Song Zongwu. He had never expected that under Ren Qing's leadership, the population would already be approaching one million.
The existence of Body Cultivation had also made cultivation completely universal.
Song Zongwu saw a seven- or eight-year-old child in Wuwei City whose cultivation was already approaching the Half-Corpse realm and could break through at any moment.
Ren Qing would soon enter seclusion again to advance Heaven and Earth Genesis to the Heavenly Aberration realm. Taking advantage of the present moment, he simply opened the Heavenly Palace to the public.
With a wave of his hand, every cultivator of Restraint Officers' Hall received additional information in their minds. It detailed how to enter the Heavenly Dao Palace and the Restraint Officer Palace.
To enter the Heavenly Palace, one had to possess Ghost Envoy realm cultivation and could not have severe body or soul mutations, lest they suddenly lose control.
The artifact refiners finally understood why Ren Qing had ordered them to forge town-sized magical artifacts.
The prototypes of the towns already stood outside Wuwei City. Their walls had been completed, and the plaques at the gates bore the names "Heavenly Dao Palace" and "Restraint Officer Palace."
Thousands of cultivators stepped onto magical artifacts and gradually approached the blazing sun hanging in the sky, where a magnificent small world flickered in and out of sight.
Children gazed upward from the streets with longing. The scene resembled ascension to immortality.
In addition, tribes and villages spread throughout Stomach World also noticed the phenomenon. Many mortals had never even known cultivators existed.
Before long, mortals seeking immortals would begin making their way toward Wuwei City.
The Heavenly Palace contained no buildings. It remained in a primordial age and required large numbers of cultivators to develop it, eventually transforming it into a true Heaven Beyond Heaven.
Within the Heavenly Dao Palace, mountains rose in endless layers. The insect molt had become mountain ranges, while the Heavenly Dao Insect eggs had become peaks radiating dense Nether Yuan.
Within the Heavenly Palace, the Heavenly Dao Insects seemed to have transformed into a form of existence known as spiritual veins.
Compared to the normal atmosphere of the Heavenly Dao Palace, the Restraint Officer Palace was completely different.
To cultivate there, cultivators had to bury themselves in the soil. Their bodies would then become covered in mycelium and transform into towering fungus trees.
Through becoming trees, cultivators could feel the strange entities within them growing vigorously.
Thus, upon entering the Restraint Officer Palace, one would see bizarre fungus trees everywhere. Heads hung from branches, eyeballs covered the bark, and countless other grotesque forms filled the landscape...
The appearance of the Heavenly Palace would lead to a shortage of high-level cultivators within Wuwei City.
However, the increasing secularization of Wuwei City was not a bad thing. One drawback of universal cultivation was stagnating population growth, as everyone pursued immortality and enlightenment.
Once immortals and mortals were separated, the city's mortal atmosphere immediately became much richer.
Seeing the Heavenly Palace operating smoothly, Ren Qing began using hundreds of bacterial souls to deduce Buddhist techniques. His templates were naturally Great Compassion Maitreya Bodhisattva, Sitting-Deer Arhat, and Laughing Lion Arhat.
Ideally, he wanted a technique that did not require him to cultivate personally, yet still allowed him to indirectly control Fruit Positions and hand all Heavenly Dao transformation over to Dipankara Buddha...
At the same time, the Heavenly Dao Crack continued healing slowly. It would not be long before he advanced to the Heavenly Aberration realm.