Ryu observed the changes to his Immortal Sakura. According to Eska, the true strength behind her technique was in its flexibility. The Immortal Sakura could act as a sturdy foundation to be build upon, allowing those who used it to maneuver outward along countless paths.
Thanks to Ailsa's guidance, Ryu had inadvertently stumbled along one of these paths, resulting in his Immortal Sakura becoming acquainted with the lightning element.
As things stood now, as long as Ryu meditated upon it, he could most certainly comprehend a Lightning Inheritance. However, he was hesitant to do so and ended up putting it off.
One had to remember that not every Inheritance was the same. What Ryu gained from the Tatsuya Saintly Weapons couldn't be matched by any normal glaive, spear or halberd wielding Clan. In this same way, not every lightning inheritance was the same. For example, Ryu didn't comprehend any old wind inheritance, he specifically waited until he could understand his Northern Heavenly Wind.
In truth, the matters of becoming a Wind Heir weren't completely analogous. Back then, Ryu didn't want to rely on his own comprehension to create his own Wind Inheritance, but right now, Ryu had two seemingly outstanding paths before him. One was the Inheritance of the [Tribulation Nine Clouds] and the other was within his own Lightning Qilin bloodline.
Once one sets off on a path, it isn't so easy to deviate from it, which is why Ryu had been careful to be selective. If he wanted to fuse two paths, it wasn't impossible, but he needed a greater understanding of both beforehand. One only needed to see how slowly his dual wielding path was progressing to see this.
Under Ailsa's watchful eye, Ryu greedily absorbed the rest of the lightning treasures. To the Outer Ring, its no doubt that each would be worth several million gold coins, but Ryu tore through them all as though they were nothing but cheap snacks. By the end of it all, Ryu's Thunder formation had grown to seven hundred meters and his Immortal Sakura had curiously grown along with it. Well, its roots had.
Ryu's Mental Realm had truly become a paradise. A sturdy crackling yellow formation stood as its base, with an ancient tree's roots holding it in place. Even the Immortal Sakura's transparent petals flashed with streaks of lightning occasionally.
'Is it meant to be like this Ailsa?' Ryu asked curiously after absorbing the last of the lightning qi. 'My Immortal Sakura, I mean. Is it supposed to perpetually stand within my Mental Realm?'
Ailsa nodded. 'This is actually a fairly new discipline, which is likely why Eska didn't know anything about it. Though the masters of the mind were taboo in this Realm, that doesn't mean they were taboo in others. Cultivation is constantly evolving an improving. Though many good things of the past have been forgotten, there are many new paths that have been forged as well.
'If you continually Visualize in this way, keeping the image within your mind, projecting the image will become easier and your mind will take on the characteristics of your Visualization much quicker as well. But, this is obviously something incredibly difficult to do. Luckily, you have the Origin Flame.'
As Ailsa guided Ryu, she didn't forget to prep him appropriately. Though priming his Mental Realm was important, awakening a larger portion of his Lightning Qilin bloodline from slumber would greatly aid in the next steps as well. So, not long after Ryu completely absorbed the lightning treasures, he found himself undergoing the not so painless process of absorbing Spiritual Roots. It seemed Ailsa was serious about not allowing him to rely on the Incubator for Body Realm cultivation.
Ryu quickly circulated his [Phoenix Heavenly Body] technique. Thanks to this technique, his absorption was far more efficient than it would be for others despite the burning of his blood vessels. And, despite its name, Ryu could easily use it for his non-phoenix bloodlines as well.
Ailsa turned out to be correct once again, absorbing blood that matched the affinities of his bloodline made the process even more smooth, bringing out yet another reason for the speed of Ryu's cultivation. Still, this wasn't even the most poignant point. How many in the very first Body Realm could even dream of using Fourth Order beasts to cultivate? Even if they came from prestigious families and had people who could hunt for them, could their bloodlines withstand such pressure?
What Ryu was doing was the equivalent of an Awakening Realm Expert absorbing qi from a Spiritual Severing Realm expert. Of course, with his advantages came disadvantages, namely that his blood took far more than others to satiate, but… Was that really a disadvantage? All this meant was that Ryu could grow far more powerful before worrying about gathering treasures to open his Body Vessels.
Ryu's bodily strength once more shot forward.
For someone within the Pulse Tempering Realm like Ryu, they'd usually begin around five hundred jin of strength, and peak out at around fifty thousand jin once their blood was completely satiated.
Once one reached fifty thousand jin, you could be considering a match for Lower Spiritual Severing Realm experts, but only after beginning to open your Body Vessels could you start matching higher experts. After opening them all, battling a Divine Vessel Realm expert was possible.
However, Ryu already had over two thousand jin of strength after opening his Pulses, and before he started cultivating upon Flash Mountain, he had reached ten thousand jin. Ryu had assumed that this meant that since he had four bloodlines, he received four times the strength of others, but he was greatly mistaken. He had simply underestimated his bloodlines too much.
The value of five hundred jin was for those with Common Grade blood. It was six hundred for those with Black Grade, seven hundred for those with Earth Grade, eight hundred for those with Heaven Grade, nine hundred for those of the Sovereign Grade, and finally… a thousand for those of the Ancestral Grade.
The most poignant point was that these were just averages, there were always bloodlines that were more suited toward body cultivation than others. For example, Ryu's Phoenix Bloodlines sat right at this thousand jin mark upon awakening, but his Dragon and Qilin bloodline were double that!
So why was Ryu at two thousand jin upon awakening? It was purely because he was an anomaly. Despite his bloodlines having such great individual strengths, because they were in a single body, they couldn't react in the way they wanted, making Ryu's awakening strength lower than it should have been.
Unfortunately, what Ailsa realized and what she informed Ryu of was that this didn't mean that Ryu's base strength should have been six thousand jin, a full twelve times more than someone with Common Grade blood. After all, Ryu only had one body and there was only so much blood he could have. In order to share his body, his bloodlines had to give up a little of their domineeringness. However… The number was still shocking. Ryu's base strength was five thousand jin! The reason he couldn't see the end of his strength was because he would need to reach five hundred thousand jin to get there!
This number was too astounding. Someone of Common Grade blood would only reach this after opening all six Body Vessels… Though, Ryu still had a way to go. He had only just reached sixty thousand jin.