Chapter 1030: Dialogue with the Phoenix

The door slowly opened. Phoenix Daojun slowly walked in.

She still held considerable respect for this ancestor of her own bloodline. After all, back when she was on the verge of death in the Barren Ancient World, facing a crisis, it was Moon God Ji who exchanged a certain contract with the unseen Creator God, who then descended to rescue her and bring her into the Four Element Planes. Reflecting now, she understood why she, among countless beings, was the sole recipient of the 'Grand Dao's' grace just before death. The grace of saving her life, bringing her, who had been stranded, back home, and the connection of their bloodline—these things no longer needed to be stated.

"How are things? Are you getting used to it?" Moon God Ji, sitting on a crystal lounge chair by the window, slowly closed her book. To Xu Zhi, it was a casual conversation. "You must have benefited greatly from coming here, right? After all, their civilization doesn't have the lineage of our native elemental system; your talents couldn't be fully utilized there."

"Yes," Phoenix replied earnestly. "Indeed, my talents weren't fully utilized before." Previously, she had pioneered the Sea of Consciousness system, with her true body residing within it as the 'primordial spirit,' but in combat, she always relied on her external body. Her external human body fought using the Nine Revolutions Mysterious Art, focusing on physical cultivation and various spells. All these systems originated from the Barren Ancient World. Her Phoenix true form had indeed almost never engaged in combat. It wasn't until she nearly died of old age once, and her detached Phoenix true form was taken away by the Creator God, that she began to study her various gene systems in the Four Element Planes, without her external human shell. For thousands of years, she had been diligently dedicated to this research. However, it was ultimately an isolated endeavor. Although her talent and knowledge were profound, they were also one-sided. The cultivation methods she researched inevitably had various minor flaws she couldn't perceive. Now, having absorbed the ancient systems of countless elemental civilizations and observed their diverse wisdom, she truly stood on the shoulders of giants, fully developing and perfecting her own path!

"How is your combat power now?" Moon God Ji smiled, "You should know that the enemy's civilizations start from scratch, not inheriting the wisdom of their predecessors but forging their own new paths... Their Buddhist and Daoist sects have changed significantly, vibrant and powerfully intimidating. That feeling, like the morning sun, is what's truly formidable... I hope the same for you. Don't just emulate my semi-elemental transcendent cultivation system; forge your own semi-elemental path. Personally pioneering a world's power transcendence system is always the best approach."

Phoenix said with a serious expression, "You are right." Back then, she laid the foundation and pioneered the Sea of Consciousness system for Barren Ancient humanity, effectively creating a new civilization. Since the enemy does so, they should too; otherwise, it would be difficult to surpass them! Decayed and vanished ancient civilizations, no matter how glorious, do not belong to this era. What they must do is to make the next generation of fresh flowers and tender buds blossom anew from this past, fertile soil of decay and death. The golden spirit of a civilization's era must be to forge its own path, with the entire race imbued with an impetuous and vigorous spirit!

Phoenix Daojun said, "According to your description, the Buddhist sect's 'Aspects of All Beings' and the Daoist sect's 'Nine Revolutions Mysterious Art' are both terrifying cultivation methods that ignore physique and can raise one's energy level... And we, being able to fight them back then, can naturally still match them."

"Why? Why can we match them?" Moon God Ji smiled.

"Just like me," Phoenix said softly. "Although I've lost the Nine Revolutions Mysterious Art, I can still rely on the infinite power of the elemental system to absorb external stored energy and replenish myself..."

"Can semi-elemental beings also absorb infinite energy, like pure elemental beings?" Moon God Ji smiled and said, "Can we also have infinite stamina, like those practicing the Nine Revolutions Mysterious Art, to fight them?"

Phoenix nodded. "We have three intermediary processes: absorbing energy, passing it through the flesh-and-blood true body, and then converting it to the elemental outer layer... We are like flesh-and-blood beings, like ordinary people, who eat, digest, and then convert it into physical strength...."

"Aren't we?" Moon God Ji retorted. "We are already flesh-and-blood beings; we don't possess perfect energy conversion."

"Yes, normally that is true... We are essentially no different from flesh-and-blood beings... But in reality, it's not quite so. What if we don't pass the energy through the flesh-and-blood body, but instead directly use the elemental outer layer to absorb energy for replenishment?" Daojun said.

Moon God Ji adopted a thoughtful expression. "So that's it. We can directly use the elemental outer layer to absorb energy... Wouldn't that mean we've perfectly inherited the greatest advantage of elemental life?"

"Not exactly." Phoenix knew her ancestor was testing her, as if intentionally setting up a challenge to see how deeply she understood her own race's civilization. She said, "Even with that, we still can't compare to the elemental beings' advantage in this regard, nor can we match the Nine Revolutions Mysterious Art's advantage."

"Oh? We already have infinite energy, so why are we still so much inferior to them?" Moon God Ji's eyes were clear, displaying extreme curiosity, as if genuinely eager to know. Even Phoenix secretly admired her ancestor's eyes and curiosity; they seemed perfectly genuine.

"Because if we directly use the elemental outer layer to absorb energy without it passing through the true body... there's a terrifying, fatal flaw: the true body's power isn't infinite; it can become exhausted and die," Phoenix said, speaking of something rather complex. However, Xu Zhi understood. Indeed, it couldn't compare to the Nine Revolutions Mysterious Art's infinite recovery! The Nine Revolutions Mysterious Art offers infinite output and infinite recovery from injuries. As long as the power within the body doesn't run out, and the nine super transcendent worlds and hundreds of billions of earthly beings inside can still provide energy, perfect combat can essentially be achieved. What about semi-elemental beings? They have infinite output, but cannot infinitely recover from injuries. Because the absorbed energy doesn't pass through the 'flesh-and-blood true body,' if someone attacks your flesh-and-blood body and inflicts severe damage, your body can only recover using its own strength. That part of the flesh-and-blood body can become exhausted, just like any flesh-and-blood being.

"From this perspective, the true body is indeed the greatest fatal flaw," Phoenix said softly. "Having flesh-and-blood means we fear physical attacks... Having flesh-and-blood also means our energy conversion has a fatal flaw: the flesh-and-blood body cannot absorb energy to recover from injuries at all. As long as the flesh-and-blood body is continuously attacked and heavily wounded... no matter how much external energy there is, it will be useless, and we will still die."

Xu Zhi nodded. Compared to the truly 'immortal' Nine Revolutions Mysterious Art, these semi-elemental beings indeed possessed a significant flaw! Although original pure elemental beings didn't have this flaw, the emergence of the flesh-and-blood core led to a series of vulnerabilities.

"But the Mother River system... perfectly compensates for our flaws!" Phoenix looked at Moon God Ji with reverence and admiration. "What a terrifyingly groundbreaking idea... Since our semi-elemental flesh-and-blood body cannot recover infinitely and is a fatal flaw, it can simply be placed at the source of the Mother River. Who could possibly break through to there? And our elemental outer shell body descends along the branches of the Mother River. This elemental body still possesses the first characteristic of pure elemental beings: infinite absorption of supplied power... after all, energy can be transmitted through the Mother River. At the same time, it also possesses the second characteristic of elemental life: pure physical immunity... and our third characteristic: immortality! We have already surpassed ancient pure elemental beings, which is why, back then, we could fight against the Buddhist and Daoist sects, who possessed infinite power, and against countless strong practitioners of the Nine Revolutions Mysterious Art!"

Phoenix took a deep breath. Having deduced this far, she could already envision the scene. Both sides were immortal monsters with infinite stamina and infinite combat power, peerless taboo ancient existences of their rank... The battle would ultimately come down to who had more stored energy, whose foundation was deeper! No wonder the taboo existences on both sides were so 'poor' now.