Xiao had a strange and slightly excited expression on his face as he had guessed something. He began to ponder deeply.
'This world. After a person reaches the pinnacle cultivation of the Endless Haven, they ascend into the Upper World or Upper Dimension. And that upper world is the Heavenly Realms, and the cultivation realm after a Great Emperor is Immortal. I think I am much closer to the truth. Also, from what I know, all of our Founding Emperors have disappeared after proving the Dao, bearing the Heaven's Will, and becoming Great Emperors. It is said that they disappeared somewhere. And some say that they ascended into a higher world.'
He squinted his eyes.
'If this so called higher world exists, then it must be this, the Heavenly Realms. And also, if my guess about the realm after Great Emperor is true, then what kind of Immortal is this? What was it called? Is it the legendary True Immortal, Mystic Immortal, Golden Immortal? Or is it even cooler, like Zenith Heaven Immortal? Dammit, if Immortals exist in the Heavenly Realms, then it's cool and terrifying at the same time.'
From what Xiao knew about the Great Emperors, their power was already terrible enough. So he could not even fathom or imagine someone even more terrifying and dreadful than Great Emperors existing.
'As if Great Emperors are not already terrible enough! Well, it's not my problem anyway. I am just a mortal after all. What comes after Great Emperor is not my business to know or learn anyway. But at least I am not clueless like before.'
Feeling that he shouldn't worry about this information for now and not waste his time on it, Xiao decided to leave it alone. Anyway, he would find plenty of opportunities to verify whether this information was true or not.
But for now, he would just ignore it, as this information was related to higher dimensional beings. If he tried to dig deeper into it right now with his weak and meager strength, then he would just be courting death.
Anyway, when he was strong enough and had a higher cultivation where his existence could bear such knowledge, he would investigate this information. But for now, Xiao would just put it in the back of his mind so that when the time came, he wouldn't forget about it.
Thinking so, he looked at his surroundings. His gaze scanned everything on this floor, be it the bookshelves, books, information talismans, cloud-like mist, or even that strange but mysterious signboard.
At the same time, a sudden thought struck his mind.
'This place, mainly the fifth floor, contains information about the Heavenly Realms and Immortals. Ah, I am such an idiot. To think that I needed this much time to figure this out. Also, who would have known that a mortal like me would enter such a place to access such information? If my cultivation were high enough, then I might be able to pry into that information. But it is not, and thankfully I was protected by the defense mechanism of this library from accessing such dangerous information.'
Curiosity kills the cat, and today Xiao practically learned the true meaning of it, as he felt that he was lucky to avoid a great disaster.
'No, I might really be the luckiest person in this world!'
Shaking his head, he walked for a few seconds and sat down at the table in the corner of this library floor.
Placing the two books he had taken with him onto the table, he picked up the book called [Path of Cultivation and Mortal Boundary] and thought.
'Alright, now I can finally read in peace. I hope that no damned thing will disturb me, at least for now.'
After that, Xiao began to read the book, which contained information about cultivation.
"Cultivation is a process of transcendence. To achieve absolute detachment. From this world, from pain, suffering, chaos, fate, death, time, emotions, indifference, from the Heaven and Earth itself. Cultivation is divided into two boundaries. One is the Mortal Boundary, and another is #@##$ Boundary."
Reading this, Xiao thought.
'Cultivation is a process of transcendence, huh. Just like the description of the Void Record had mentioned before. To achieve transcendence, they looked at something they shouldn't have and learned something they should not have.'
He pondered deeply.
'This illusory realm is my ultimate goal, and cultivation is the process toward it. Well, it does make sense. Even though I don't know if cultivation actually leads to that realm or not, since no one has actually achieved it. But if it does, then it makes sense for cultivation to be a process of transcendence. Also, transcendence means transcending everything, be it the world or anything else.'
Xiao's eyes shone brightly, as from this information he had a rough idea of what transcendence actually meant. As for how hard it was to achieve it, he didn't know. Well, from the information in the Void Record, no one had successfully achieved it. And as for those who had tried to attain it, all of them had suffered a miserable fate instead.
So from this alone, one could just imagine how terrifyingly hard and dreadful it was to attain that realm. Then Xiao focused on the last piece of information.
'Cultivation is divided into two boundaries, huh? So that's what the Mortal Boundary stands for? And what about the other boundary? I guess it must be related to Immortals. So what might this boundary be called?'
Xiao thought as he tried to guess the name of this higher boundary.
'Immortal Boundary? True Immortality? Or Great Boundary? Well, it might be something like that. If not, then it should have a completely different name altogether. Also, as for the Mortal Boundary.'
He squinted his eyes.
'Does Mortal Boundary mean that all cultivation realms considered within this boundary, no matter how high that realm is, are ultimately still considered mortal? If so, then what about Great Emperors? Are they also considered mortals in the end?'
Xiao frowned, as from what he knew, Great Emperors lived as long as the Heaven and Earth and ruled the Endless Haven and the Myriad Races. There had never been a case in history of a Great Emperor dying because of old age.
...
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