Chapter 1357 Divine Fire

Strictly speaking, she was still a Divine Sea Realm cultivator. The only difference between herself and ordinary Divine Sea cultivators was that she had gained access to a tiny portion of the Greater Laws. This distinction was far more significant than it sounded.

Starting from the Nascent Soul Realm, a cultivator could finally be considered a genuine powerhouse. This was because advancing to the Nascent Soul Realm required successfully fusing one's soul with a Law Seed.

A Law Seed was essentially a tiny fragment of the greater truths governing the universe. By successfully fusing with one, cultivators gained their first genuine connection to the Laws, allowing them to wield powers that had previously been beyond their reach.

Of course, possessing a Law Seed was merely the beginning.

To advance further, the cultivator needed to nurture and develop that seed until it formed a Law Domain. Once the domain was successfully established, the cultivator could officially enter the Soul Transformation Realm.

Within their domain, the cultivator's understanding of their Law could influence the surrounding environment, allowing them to exercise far greater authority over their surroundings than an ordinary Nascent Soul cultivator.

However, the path didn't end there. To advance beyond Soul Transformation, the cultivator needed to develop their domain even further. They had to transform it into an actual world.

Only when this transformation succeeded could they enter the Divine Sea Realm.

At that stage, the cultivator would possess an internal world born from their understanding of the Laws.

It was an extraordinary achievement that countless cultivators could only dream of accomplishing.

Yet even this wasn't the end.

The so-called Immortal Ascension Realm existed because a small number of Divine Sea cultivators managed to surpass the ordinary limits of their realm without actually reaching the next cultivation stage.

They obtained a slight understanding of the Greater Laws. Unlike ordinary Laws, Greater Laws belonged to a much higher level of the universe's fundamental truths.

Even the smallest amount of authority over them could produce extraordinary changes and grant abilities far beyond those of ordinary cultivators.

It was similar to how certain exceptionally talented Golden Core cultivators could obtain a Law Seed before reaching the Nascent Soul Realm. Such individuals were still Golden Core cultivators, but their combat strength and abilities could already exceed the normal limitations of their realm.

The same principle applied to Immortal Ascension cultivators.

They were still fundamentally within the Divine Sea Realm. However, their limited access to the Greater Laws allowed them to wield powers that ordinary Divine Sea cultivators couldn't hope to match. Their lifespans also increased tremendously, giving rise to the belief that they were already approaching immortality.

Thus, the title of Immortal Ascension had gradually become accepted and recognized as a distinct stage by many cultivators.

But Yū Meng knew better.

No matter how impressive her current power appeared, she had yet to take the final step. She wasn't a True Immortal. And unless she could find a means to advance beyond her current limitations, that would remain the case.

This was precisely why Earth was so important to her. It represented an opportunity she couldn't afford to lose.

After all, she had struggled against two other individuals whose strength was no weaker than hers for control of this realm, eventually agreeing to share it with them temporarily.

To understand the true value of this opportunity, one first needed to understand what it actually took to become a True Immortal.

Advancing beyond the Divine Sea Realm traditionally required two things.

The first was comprehending a significant portion of a Greater Law.

The second was igniting one's Divine Fire.

Only after accomplishing both and surviving the universe's test could a cultivator successfully ascend and become a True Immortal.

However, according to certain ancient records known to only a handful of individuals, the actual difficulty of this advancement had never been igniting the Divine Fire.

It was comprehending a Greater Law.

As long as a cultivator possessed sufficient comprehension of a Greater Law and had established a strong enough foundation, the ignition of their Divine Fire would follow naturally.

After successfully surviving the universe's test, they would ascend and truly enter the realm of immortality.

Unfortunately, that was how things had worked in the distant past. The situation was completely different now.

For countless years, the original path to becoming a True Immortal had been severed. The reason was related to several taboos whose existence even someone at Yū Meng's level didn't dare contemplate too deeply.

After all, certain existences were capable of sensing when someone directed their attention toward them, even from an unimaginable distance.

And Yū Meng had absolutely no intention of attracting such attention.

Those matters are better left alone.

Fortunately, although the original path had been severed, another method of becoming a True Immortal still existed.

It involved Origin Energy.

Unlike the conventional method, which relied on comprehending a Greater Law to ignite one's Divine Fire naturally, this alternative method bypassed the need for such extensive comprehension by forcibly igniting the Divine Fire through burning an enormous quantity of Origin Energy.

Once the Divine Fire was successfully ignited and the cultivator survived the universe's test, they could ascend.

At that point, their existence would undergo a fundamental transformation. The Greater Laws that had once been extraordinarily difficult to touch would become as natural to them as breathing, allowing them to wield powers they had previously only possessed a limited understanding of.

That was the realm of a True Immortal.

However, obtaining the Origin Energy required for such an advancement was no simple matter. In fact, this was where the greatest difficulty of the alternative method lay.

Currently, the only known reliable source capable of providing sufficient Origin Energy was a Major Realm.

Realms could generally be divided into two categories.

Minor Realms and Major Realms.

Minor Realms varied greatly in size, although the overwhelming majority were relatively small. However, regardless of their physical dimensions, they shared one fundamental limitation: they couldn't naturally support the growth of truly powerful supernatural beings beyond a certain point.

Major Realms were different.

Such realms possessed considerably stronger foundations and could support the development of powerful existences like Divine Sea cultivators, who were equivalent to Demigods from other supernatural power system.

Generally speaking, the stronger a Major Realm was, the greater its size and the higher the level of beings it could naturally nurture and accommodate.

However, what most people didn't know was that Major Realms possessed another extraordinary characteristic.

They could support the birth of a limited number of beings at a level beyond what their ordinary developmental limits would normally permit.

The price was their foundation.

More specifically, their Origin Energy.