Outskirts of the Evergreen Forest.
The next day.
Dawn.
Merin opens his eyes suddenly and frowns. "Why is this happening?"
For the past day, a restless feeling has stirred in him, as if something is about to go wrong.
"But what could happen to me?" he mutters.
With his strength, danger could only come if an ancestor-level cultivator attacked him.
But considering the current situation, he doubts the five-beast clan ancestors would target him now.
They're likely huddled somewhere, debating their future.
So what causes this unease?
It must be his family, or Asuna.
They're his only true connections in this world, and the only ones he worries about.
With that thought, he steps out of his carriage.
It's parked outside an outpost at the foot of the Evergreen Hills.
Rain falls steadily, soaking him instantly before he gathers natural energy and forms a shield.
It takes a few seconds.
Merin wants to return home as soon as possible—but not in this weather.
He sighs and glances around, noting the many unfamiliar plants.
"If I have to wait, I might as well do something useful."
He releases his mental field and locates the driver and the guide resting inside the outpost.
He sends them a mental message: he's leaving for a while and will return later.
Then he enters the Evergreen Forest surrounding the hills.
He begins recording the unique energies radiating from various trees and plants.
To break through to the True Core Realm, he needs to create a unique energy—
One that can't be formed through internal cultivation alone.
In the Spiritual Way, cultivators don't generate energy within their bodies until the True Core Realm.
Until then, they manipulate natural energy in the world.
But controlling natural energy is slow and difficult for 99.9% of people.
Not for him.
He possesses extraordinary mental and soul power—something few in the world can claim.
Merin halts in front of a strange tree.
Though one could call it a tree, it resembles a massive weave of vines more than anything else.
He studies it carefully—its trunk is formed by vines tightly knotted together, rising upward until they separate and spread out like branches.
At the base, the roots, too, are just separated vines twisting into the ground.
Anyone else might dismiss it as a large vine behaving like a tree, but Merin senses otherwise.
He releases his mental energy and probes the structure.
What he finds makes him pause.
Each vine channels energy to the others, flowing through the structure like a web of interwoven streams.
He narrows his eyes.
This isn't an ordinary plant.
The energy of any single vine is weak, almost mundane—but taken together, they pass the threshold between common and extraordinary.
It's a spiritual tree—its vitality confirms it as a rank 2.
That means he can't simply scan and move on.
He needs to understand its energy fully, and that takes time.
He remains still, quietly sensing.
As he begins to grasp the nature of the tree's energy, he frowns.
Something is missing.
"This tree shouldn't have reached this level of vitality so quickly," he mutters.
Merin's true body is itself a tree, one of rank 6.
He stops speculating.
The moment he understands the energy completely, the answer will come.
He usually needs only seconds to decipher the energy of a rank 1 tree, so a rank 2 takes a few minutes.
After a minute of deep focus, nearing the end of his analysis, he suddenly senses a shift.
Within the tree, different strands of energy react and merge violently.
Using his mental field, he watches as a vine branch lashes out and coils around a bird flying too close.
He opens his eyes in time to see the vine shimmer with the sheen of black iron as it tightens its grip, crushing the bird's bones and wings before releasing the corpse.
The lifeless body drops to the ground.
Moments later, roots rise from the soil, slither toward the bird, and wrap around it completely before dragging it underground.
He now understands the reason behind the tree's accelerated growth—it's carnivorous.
But then, why didn't it attack him?
He knows the tree isn't sentient—it lacks the wisdom to assess threats or make choices.
Before he can dive deeper into the question, the answer presents itself.
His eyes catch a single drop of rain sliding off his shoe and falling to the ground.
He remembers—his body is wrapped in a transparent energy shield, thin as skin, shielding him and his clothes from the rain.
That same shield also masks his presence.
Satisfied, he refocuses on the tree and resumes comprehending its energy.
Within minutes, he fully grasps it.
He wills the natural energy into the shape of a vine and strikes with it.
The conjured vine tears a deep gash into a nearby tree.
In the web of magnetic fields woven by the world's artistic conception, his field resonates with another.
He hasn't left yet.
Instead, he stares at the vine tree and feels a growing urge.
During the attack on the bird, the separate energies in the vines had momentarily merged.
Now, he wants to combine them permanently—and see what happens.
Letting the urge guide him, he dives into the process.
With his deep understanding of the vine tree, connecting the separate energies is simple.
The next challenge arises—once he releases control, the energies begin to separate again.
He spends time experimenting, trying to find a method to bind the energy particles permanently.
But no matter how he thinks it through, no solution comes.
It's the first time he has faced a problem like this.
To merge energies, he must temper them—but how?
His inner energy is tempered by repeatedly circulating within his body.
But the vine tree lacks any internal circulation system.
Its energy rests in individual cells, only linking together momentarily during an attack.
Each cell stores a fragment of the whole energy.
After cycling through idea after idea, he finally finds a solution.
He sends natural energy into the tree, using it as a bridge to connect the energy in each cell.
He guides the natural energy to flow from one cell to another, drawing and blending tiny amounts of energy from each.
He sustains this process with his mind, carefully maintaining the transfer.
Then he opens his eyes.
The entire vine tree has turned black.
Natural energy continues pouring into its body, drawn by the ongoing transformation.
The process is no longer passive—it is actively pulling ambient energy from the world.
Elsewhere, a teenager walks across the hills as if searching for something.
Suddenly, he stops.
His black eyes shift to blue, and the surrounding natural energy becomes visible to him.
He watches as all the natural energy in the area flows in a single direction.
"What is that?" he mutters.
It doesn't look like someone is cultivating.
That leaves only one explanation—a spiritual plant or tree is being born.
He immediately picks up his pace.
A symbol flashes beneath both feet, and his speed triples as he rushes toward the source.
Merin steps back and looks at the vine tree.
It has grown slightly taller, but the most drastic change is in its colour—the light brown and green vines have turned completely black.
More importantly, the energy within the vines has changed.
Each cell's energy is now connected by energy lines, forming a circulation loop that moves not just through individual vines but between them.
The energy is also beginning to temper itself, and the process continues even without his active control.
Suddenly, Merin feels a faint shift in his core.
Before he can inspect it, his senses pick up a disturbance—someone has entered his mental domain.
He doesn't react immediately, remaining still and watching the tree.
He wants to see what the intruder does.
The energy signature is strong, close to that of an Ascension Realm cultivator.
Then the attack comes.
Merin raises his hand, and a thick wall of vines erupts behind him, blocking the incoming strike.
He hears the blast and turns to see the defensive wall splintering.
More fireballs streak toward him.
Snakelike vines shoot from the ground, weaving together to form a second barrier.
The impact rocks the forest floor.
Within his mental domain, Merin retaliates.
Vines burst from the ground around the attacker's feet, trying to wrap around him like constrictors.
The attacker leaps back, narrowly escaping the grasp, and slips beyond Merin's mental range.
Merin conjures a wooden arrow and fires.
The attacker raises an ice shield, deflecting the shot.
But Merin continues his barrage.
The attacker is forced to retreat behind a tree for cover.
Merin steps forward, trying to lure him back into his domain.
But then the attacker releases a spreading fog.
Thick and unnatural, the fog envelops the area and blinds Merin completely.
It also interferes with his mental perception.
But just before the attacker strikes again, wind swirls violently around Merin.
He stands at its centre as the spinning wind shreds the fog.
A snake-shaped lightning bolt shoots toward him, but the wind barrier twists and scatters the strike.
Merin's eyes narrow.
The teenager launches another attack—a line of firebirds erupts from his palm, symbols flashing beneath his feet.
Merin raises both hands, and a wall of woven wood bursts from the earth.
The birds collide, and flames scatter across the barrier, scorching it but failing to break through.
Merin leaps into the air and whips his hand forward.
Wind blades shaped like crescent moons slice through the air.
Symbols pulse beneath the boy's feet as thick sheets of ice rise from the ground, forming a dome that absorbs the impact.
Splinters of ice scatter, and the moment it breaks, the boy retaliates with a wide blast of thunder.
Merin twists mid-air, a spiral of wind encasing his body, and lands soundlessly.
Roots burst from the ground, chasing the boy like snakes.
A symbol glows again, and a solid wall of stone rises, halting the roots.
Their duel rages across the forest—fire clashing with wood, wind clashing with ice, lightning breaking roots, and vines entangling stone.
Merin's mind sharpens with each exchange.
The symbols that appear before every spell—the precise elemental shifts.
This boy isn't a beast cultivator.
No beast blood flows in him.
His techniques look like techniques in the spiritual path.
Then his realm must be the True Core Realm.
Merin dodges a whip of fire and counters with a sharp gust that splits the ground.
The boy blocks with another stone shield, faster than expected.
Merin's vines lash out—another symbol appears, and a shockwave knocks them away.
Their movements mirror each other in speed.
Their attacks land with equal force.
Neither gains ground.
Merin narrows his eyes.
Symbols… elements… this isn't ordinary spiritual cultivation.
Could it be a new profession?
Some unique path built around symbolic casting?
That makes this boy too interesting to kill.
He must be captured.
But matching his speed and power won't be enough.
So Merin slows his breathing, then waves a hand.
Soft green energy drifts through the air.
Sleep spell.
The boy's steps falter.
He staggers, blinking, walking like he's drunk.
Merin stays still, watching.
The boy sways again, balance slipping.
He drops to one knee.
Merin waits for his eyes to close.
But then—
A flash.
A silver rune blazes on the boy's forehead.
His body steadies.
His gaze sharpens.
The boy stands.
His eyes meet Merin's—cold, focused, memorising.
Like he's carving Merin's face into his memory.
And before Merin can even react—
The boy vanishes.
Gone from sight, without a trace.
Merin stands still for a while, eyes lingering on the space where the boy disappeared.
He doesn't chase. Whether it's too difficult or simply impossible, he lets the boy go.
Turning back, he begins walking toward the outpost, thoughts heavy with reflection.
His speed and power match the boy's, but that isn't enough anymore.
With his mental strength, he's already faster in forming attacks and defences—but that alone won't suffice.
He needs structure.
He needs spells.
If he can convert his techniques into fixed spells, he could cast them even faster.
Faster, stronger, more efficient.
He must enhance his spells, sharpen their power and reinforce their defence, not just replication but refinement.
According to the Book of Spiritual Cultivation, spells are like musical tones.
Play a specific tone, and the spell takes shape.
A faint smile rises on Merin's lips.
It's time to compose his own symphony of destruction.
He starts with what he believes is the simplest spell: the Wooden Arrow.
Conjure a wooden arrow, lock onto a target with your mind, and fire.
He begins slowly, forming the arrow bit by bit while listening closely to the subtle music it plays.
Once he understands the tone, he channels his true energy to replicate it.
The arrow forms instantly and fires, embedding itself into a tree.
The entire process takes just under two seconds.
As he walks back, he spots scale-horses near his carriage, a few riders dismounting.
He continues toward the outpost, his mental field stretching ahead.
Sensing familiar presences, he sends a message to his driver and guide, letting them know he has returned.
Before they can respond, Bai Jun steps out, accompanied by a young girl.
The two approach him, and the girl extends her hand with a friendly smile.
Merin shakes it and hears her name for the first time: Bai Yanli.