Daily life of a cultivation judge

"At the time when they started redistributing resources, they only gave them to the younger generation," Xia Fang said. "It was mostly those around my age," she added for clarity.

"While the elderly ones, aside from the nodes, didn't get any," she continued.

"Back then, I couldn't see it. And even if I did, I thought maybe the clan was just being strategic with its distribution.

Since we were young and hadn't experienced much of the darkness, we had fewer mental plagues to deal with compared to the older generation, who had seen and endured so much. I believed we were better suited to make the most out of those resources," Xia Fang said, letting out a hollow chuckle.

"It was just my prideful thoughts guiding my reasoning," she murmured softly, shaking her head again.

"Which is why I didn't see it, even though the reality was staring me right in the face," she said, pausing briefly to take a sip of her tea.

"My clan had already decided to make one last stand against the three clans rather than drag things out and wait out for the inevitable end that would have come. That something was us," Xia Fang said, her guilt once again surfacing.

"The distribution of resources was to give us a chance to survive without the clan," she added, the somber weight of that truth seeming to drain the strength from her body.

"The Ning family?" Yang Qing asked softly.

Xia Fang weakly nodded before taking another sip.

"Other than the continuous flow of resources from the Song Kingdom that they used to whittle down our formation diagram, they later added one more thing to the equation," Xia fang said as she paused briefly. "And that was what forced us into action," she added.

"News filtered through that one of their palace realm experts was preparing to break through into the middle stage of the palace realm," Xia Fang said with a somber expression.

"Once that happened, the formation diagram—even with my grandfather operating it—would have served to be no more than a slight hindrance in the face of that figure," Xia Fang explained, her words drawing a hum of agreement from Yang Qing.

The formation the Xia clan possessed was a middle-tier one, meaning its maximum capabilities could match those of a middle-stage palace realm expert. But since it was being operated by someone in the early stages of the palace realm, even if it could theoretically reach the level of a middle-stage expert under optimal operation, it would still fall short of the true abilities displayed by an actual cultivator at that level.

There were several areas in which it would be lacking, especially given that it was a formation diagram. One of those shortcomings was endurance. Because it relied on cultivators rather than the environment as its energy source, its operational duration depended entirely on the spiritual qi reserves of those manning it. And no matter how many nodes it had, as long as Xia Fang's grandfather was the only palace realm expert among them, their combined spiritual qi pool would still fall short of what a middle-stage palace realm expert alone could sustain.

The only way they could have matched it was if they had someone like Yang Qing and his absurd spiritual qi pool density within their ranks. When Yang Qing broke through to the palace realm, his qi pool matched that of a fifth-stage palace realm expert. Even back when he was in the early stages of the core formation realm, his pool was no different from those in the late stages—and even exceeded some of them.

Of course, he was an oddity. His immense qi pool was the result of two combined factors: the nature of his peerless jade physique and the unique features of his purple-grade cultivation art.

Replicating such a combination would be difficult for most, though not impossible, given how vast the world was. But it certainly wouldn't be easy.

That said, having a large spiritual qi pool didn't automatically guarantee that Yang Qing could have fought evenly against a late-stage core formation expert when he was still in the early stages or that he could've held his own against a middle-stage palace realm cultivator at the first stage.

Even if he matched them in spiritual qi volume, the real gap came from the intricacies and qualitative improvements that came with progressing through the cultivation realms, especially changes brought from leaping across minor realm thresholds.

A blue-grade art executed by someone at the first stage of the palace realm would look different when performed by someone at the fifth stage of the same realm, even if both sides had the same level of proficiency in the art. The execution would be more potent in the hands of the fifth-stage expert because of the insights they had gained at their level, the vision through which they saw the world, and the inherent traits within themselves born out of a deeper immersion in the ocean of the Grand Dao.

This was the same handicap Xia Fang's grandfather faced. While he may have been operating a formation diagram capable of unleashing the destructive strength of a middle-stage palace realm expert, which would prove highly effective against similar early-stage palace realm experts, the moment it was used against a middle-stage expert, they could easily find flaws in it. Their advanced perception would allow them to see things within the operation of that formation diagram that Xia Fang's grandfather, with his early-stage cultivation, could not.

The only way he could bridge that gap in perception was by reaching the middle stage himself or attaining perfection in his proficiency and understanding of the formation diagram. But that would be redundant—if he had achieved such a level, his personal strength and realm would have already mirrored that of the formation diagram. He would not be in the early stages.

Of course, those rules didn't apply to everyone. There were always exceptions—and Yang Qing was one of them. With his current attainments as a third-stage palace realm expert, he was confident he could hold his own against a freshly advanced middle-stage palace realm cultivator, especially if their Dao foundation was of a weaker grade than his. In that case, his abilities, combined with the powers of the formation diagram, would allow him to overcome such an opponent.

However, if their foundations matched his own, then the best he could hope for was a pyrrhic draw—or teaming up with another early-stage palace realm expert who shared similar foundations. Yi Jie, Feng Xin, Dai Chen, or any of the others could easily fill that role.

"I wonder if Qingge or that bastard Huilang could pull it off by themselves, just using the diagram," Yang Qing mused. One had ungodly destructive capabilities, while the other possessed an unnatural, almost perverse understanding and finesse for everything combat-related.

If he had to bet on anyone being able to force a draw or even take the fight to a freshly advanced middle-stage palace realm expert with just their first-stage cultivation, personal mastery, and a mid-tier blue-grade formation diagram, it would be those two. He'd place himself as a close second. While he lacked their absurd combat aptitude, there was one area where he surpassed them both: endurance.

His vast spiritual qi reserves, terrifying regenerative capabilities, and the versatility granted by his art and physique meant he could drag out a fight for as long as needed—and that was often just as valuable as overwhelming power.

As a matter of fact, for him, the longer a fight dragged on, the better things became, thanks to his recovery speed. Still, Yang Qing quickly shook his head, clearing those dangerous thoughts from his mind. If he could help it, he'd rather not fight someone above his realm. He wasn't some battle maniac who needed a life-or-death struggle to awaken latent potential and temper his spirit, blood, soul, and qi in order to gain enlightenment or break through.

What use was talent if he always had to go through bloody near-death encounters just to advance? Sure, he hadn't forgotten that his life hanging in the balance thanks to his clan's insidious means was what had led him to gain his peerless jade physique, but when it came to the cultivation realms that followed—whether it was the qi refinement realm, foundation establishment, core formation, or now the palace realm—his breakthroughs had always been smooth. They came from random, mundane moments that sparked just the right kind of enlightenment: watching the flow of a river, sleeping in a nest, or finding better ways to sneak without an old fiend noticing.

Actually, that last one was how he ended up improving his mastery over the gold-grade art, Phantom Void Steps.

Yang Qing couldn't help but chuckle inwardly as he wondered if the reason he improved was because he embodied the very spirit behind its creation. After all, Dean Zhu Lao had invented the technique just to sneak in and out of his own abode unnoticed—and Yang Qing had used it for the exact same reason. Except in his case, he was sneaking around the Black Medallion Tower trying to avoid Old Fiend Lie.

Not that it helped—he always got caught.

Just like Dean Zhu Lao did.