Secular Immortal of the Nine Realms - Chapter 199:
Chapter 199: Rankings
Fang Chen chuckled. “Elder, it’s another puppet. My main body is waiting outside. It looks like you can’t leave this place?”
Another puppet? Enlightenment Heaven Supreme eyed Fang Chen from head to toe with a frown, but unfortunately, his cultivation was too low for him to discern whether Fang Chen was real or not.
“Is the sword embryo with you? You can take the Blood Ginseng and the Scarlet Fruits, but you have to return the sword embryo. Otherwise, my main body will personally come here to take it back,” Enlightenment Heaven Supreme said. “By then, you and the country you live in will have to suffer my wrath.”
“Elder, you would have long returned if you could do so. You thought that I had a Saint-tier spirit medicine on the Spirit Medicine Ranking, after all. Speaking of which, I’m curious to know what the Spirit Medicine Ranking is,” Fang Chen said with a smile.
A cold glint flashed across Enlightenment Heaven Supreme’s eyes.
Fang Chen was right. It would be difficult for his main body to come here at the moment, or at least in the short run.
“All of the grade-1 states gathered their sect ancestors together to establish a series of rankings, of which, the Emperor Ranking, the Spirit Medicine Ranking, and the Spirit Artifact Ranking are the most famous ones,” Enlightenment Heaven Supreme replied.
As he spoke, he tried to analyze whether Fang Chen was a puppet or the main body, as well as his motive for returning here. He didn’t think that Fang Chen had come here just to court death.
“Oh? I’m interested to know more,” Fang Chen clasped his fist and said.
“…This isn’t the place to speak. Come with,” Enlightenment Heaven Supreme said.
“All right.” Fang Chen nodded as he readily followed Enlightenment Heaven Supreme.
Hm? Enlightenment Heaven Supreme was perplexed. If he’s willing to follow me, he should be a puppet, right? There’s no way the main body would have been so bold as to follow me.
“This is the last puppet I have remaining. Please don’t harm it, or else you will never know the whereabouts of the Saint-tier spirit medicine,” Fang Chen casually said.
Enlightenment Heaven Supreme had been tempted to attack Fang Chen to figure out the truth, but those words compelled him to suppress his urge. He impassively said, “Cut the crap and follow me.”
Soon, they arrived at a courtyard.
Fang Chen casually grabbed a stone chair and sat down. Enlightenment Heaven Supreme took the opposite seat and quietly assessed him.
“What’s your motive for returning here?” Enlightenment Heaven Supreme asked.
“I want to strike a deal with you, but before that, I’d like you to tell me more about the world of cultivation,” Fang Chen replied with a smile.
Strike a deal? Enlightenment Heaven Supreme’s eyes lit up. He must be reluctant to give up on this fortuitous encounter. He knows that I’m a powerful cultivator, so he wants to make a trade and get something good out of it.
The thought of that calmed Enlightenment Heaven Supreme down. He nodded his head and spoke in a much gentler tone, “Very well. Let’s start with the Emperor Ranking. The Emperor Ranking was established by the sect ancestors, though the reason it was established remains unknown. Only the strongest experts are listed in the Emperor Ranking. The top twenty are all sect ancestors, whereas the following eighty are at least Ascendant cultivators.”
“So, the Emperor Ranking lists the top hundred strongest cultivators in the world?” Fang Chen nodded in realization. “What cultivation realm is the Ascendant realm? And how strong are the sect ancestors?”
“You don’t even know all of the cultivation realms? How did you even become a cultivator? Do you have a sect?” Enlightenment Heaven Supreme asked.
“Elder, you should stop probing me. I am just an unaffiliated cultivator. I only managed to become a cultivator because of the Saint-tier spirit medicine I consumed,” Fang Chen replied.
Enlightenment Heaven Supreme laughed. “Why would I need to probe you? Since you don’t know a thing at all, I shall do you a favor and enlighten you.
“Cultivation realms are broadly divided into three categories—the Four Lower Realms, the Three Mid Realms, and the Three Upper Realms.
“The Four Lower Realms are Ki Refinement, Foundation Establishment, Golden Core, and Nascent Soul. Most cultivators are in the Four Lower Realms. Nascent Soul cultivators enjoy a lifespan of eight hundred years, making them immortal in mortal eyes.”
“What about the Three Mid Realms?” Fang Chen asked.
“The Mid Three Realms? I doubt you’d ever reach that level in your life. Anyone who reaches this level is in the upper echelon of the world. The Mid Three Realms are Astral Projection, Soul Severance, and Grand Harmonization.”
“Elder, you must be an expert of that realm,” Fang Chen remarked in awe as he made sure to memorize everything he had just heard.
“Are you trying to probe me?” Enlightenment Heaven Supreme sneered. “I’ll tell you my cultivation realm if we ever get a chance to meet in the future. What do you say?”
“I wouldn’t want to meet your main body,” Fang Chen replied.
Enlightenment Heaven Supreme scoffed. “As for the Three Upper Realms, they are Dao Convergence, Great Tribulation, and Ascendant. Those are realms you can hardly fathom even if you have lived a thousand lifetimes.”
Fang Chen ignored his mockery and asked, “Is Ascendant the end of the path for cultivators? How strong are sect ancestors then?”
“Sect ancestors?” Anticipation flickered across Enlightenment Heaven Supreme’s eyes.
“Ascendant is the limit of a cultivator. Beyond that, a cultivator will ascend to the immortal realm and become a truly carefree existence. However, it’s a pity no one has ascended to the immortal realm in the past hundred thousand years. The immortal realm’s gates appear to have closed.
“Some of the Ascendant cultivators, upon nearing the limit of their lifespan, will choose to undergo Artifact Emancipation. Those who succeed will become an untitled immortal, whereas those who fail return to the cycle of reincarnation.
“The sect ancestors you speak of are those who have successfully become untitled immortals. Such existence can be otherwise termed as earth immortals. They don’t possess the means of true immortals, but their powers come very close. They are revered as sect ancestors because they dictate their respective sects’ fates.”
“Untitled immortals, sect ancestors…” Fang Chen wondered if Elder Cloudcrane was a sect ancestor too, but it seemed unlikely that he would catch the eye of an expert of such caliber.
Then, he thought about the fairy he had seen amid the blazing sun and wondered if she was a sect ancestor. That makes things difficult. This is the first time that I felt something for someone, but it turns out that she’s likely an untitled immortal. What the hell is this?
“Similarly, the Spirit Medicine Ranking is a ranking listing the top hundred spirit medicines in the world. Every spirit medicine on the ranking is a spirit-tier spirit medicine. That’s also the case in the Spirit Artifact Ranking, but this one lists the top three hundred artifacts.”
“How are spirit artifacts different from normal artifacts?” Fang Chen asked.
Enlightenment Heaven Supreme chuckled in disdain. “Artifacts are divided into tiers—Heaven, Earth, Black, and Yellow. Those in this category are the normal artifacts you speak of. Spirit artifacts are artifacts transcending Heaven artifacts. The same goes for Saint-tier spirit medicine too.”
“Ah, so there are further tiers,” Fang Chen murmured under his breath. “What tiers are the 100-year-old Scarlet Fruit and the Blood Ginseng?”
“Those two are pinnacle Yellow-tier spirit medicine. If you strike a deal with me, I’ll give them to you and bestow you with a proper legacy on top of that,” Enlightenment Heaven Supreme said.
His answer was dozens of Purple Lightning Talismans.
Amid the lightning, Fang Chen had already taken out the Moonsunk Gold Truncheon to smash the other party’s head.
“You dare!” Enlightenment Heaven Supreme was infuriated. How dare he make a move on me?!
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Starve’s Trivia:
This is a chapter with lots of information, so let me just add a bit of context to some stuff, for those who aren’t familiar with cultivation stories.
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Untitled immortals: These are people who become immortal in the mortal world. They are untitled because they aren’t proper immortals in the truest sense, but that doesn’t mean that they are weak.
They are also called earth immortals, as opposed to those who ascend to the immortal realm to become heaven immortals.
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Artifact Emancipation: It’s a process that involves being killed by a powerful weapon, in hopes that the death could trigger a metamorphosis for one to become an immortal. It is viewed as an inferior way of becoming an immortal, as compared to ascending to the immortal realm.
Imagine the body as a cocoon, and being killed is an attempt to open the cocoon to release the butterfly within.
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I’m not going to dissect each of the cultivation realms here as it will be a chunkload more of information.
