Grand Ancestral Bloodlines

Chapter 1942  [Ephemeral Tapestry]

[Ephemeral Tapestry] wasn't a technique, it was a mutation of Ryu's Mysteries of Heaven and Earth Pupils that he had unlocked while cultivating a Heaven Grade technique. Of course, the Heaven Grade technique was utterly useless now. It was impressive back then, but it couldn't hold any weight. In addition, it was just the trigger of the mutation, not the foundation of it.

If Ryu was correct, he was fairly certain that this mutation wasn't really a result of the Heaven Grade technique itself, but rather his Bone Structure. Or, rather, his former Bone Structure.

[Ephemeral Tapestry] painted the world in vivid color before Ryu's eyes. With it, qi was no longer some invisible entity he had to rely on his soul to sense, but was rather real and tangible.

This mutation allowed him to do two things. The first was that it allowed him to wield Atmospheric Qi even before stepping into the Immortal Ring Realm and forming his Immortal Rings, and second, it sharpened his control of qi.

This was only natural. While others could only rely on the vague sense of the qi around them, Ryu could quite literally see the movement of the qi in the air. The best comparison was like a mortal being able to see the air they breathed. But unlike a mortal who wouldn't be able to do a thing even if they could see the air, Ryu had an additional layer of control as a precise result of this.

Ryu's qi control had always been excellent, but after unlocking [Ephemeral Tapestry], he had stepped into another level entirely. He often didn't need much effort at all to master techniques and exhibit high levels of control.

If Ryu had to make a guess, he believed that the mutation truly rooted itself from his former Ice Jade Crystal Body.

Friend of Nature and Cultivation Speed were two of the four main pillars of the Ice Jade Crystal Body, one made him more in tune with the world and made beasts more likely to follow him, while the latter allowed him to absorb qi even through his very skin itself.

When these two came together with his other talents, it wasn't too hard to imagine how [Ephemeral Tapestry] might have been able to come about.

The question, then, was how this was related to his current techniques and what he meant to do with it.

For much of his cultivation journey, Ryu's Bloodlines had been a hindrance. Well, that wasn't exactly true… at the very start, he had thought they were his greatest asset.

That said, later on, he realized just how much they were hindering him. Back then, he had been a "poor man" in a figurative sense, unable to cultivate on the one hand, and born to a small world on the other. He didn't have the proper measuring stick to realize just how poor his Bloodlines were.

Now, though, he had taken several steps that allowed them to exhibit more of their power. Not only did he strengthen them, but with the help of his Inner World, he even separated them from the normal bounds of their Fate.

After coming to this world, Ryu had come to realize how great of a move this was. If not for it, every time he stepped into a stronger world, he would need to recultivate his Bloodlines and increase their strength again to the new standard of the world.

But this time, he didn't have to do such a thing because he could force his Bloodlines to act to the tune of his own making.

That said… this wasn't without its drawbacks.

Part of what made Bloodlines so powerful were those restrictions.

How could Dragon Claw be powerful if the Fire Dragons didn't represent an arrogant disregard for the Heavens?

How could his Lightning God talent be powerful if the Lightning Qilin didn't represent Judgment of the Heavens?

How could his Rebirth Flame embody Reincarnation if that was no longer what Phoenixes represented? What about his Ice flame? His Dark Flame?

Just having a powerful body wasn't enough, these were the foundational strengths of these bloodlines and ignoring them was like picking up a mountain just to drop it onto his own feet.

It felt impossible to come up with a solution to this.

On the one hand, rooting his Bloodlines in his own Inner World gave him a great deal of flexibility, but on the other, it restricted his Bloodlines in other ways, making it difficult for him to rely on the foundation that his Ancestors had laid out for him.

There were too many worries… until Ryu realized something.

A balance.

He had been so eager to run away from the restrictions of the Heavens that he had forgotten one of the most valuable lessons he had learned on his cultivation journey.

The Heavens weren't his enemy. In some cases, they were actually the best of friends.

When the shroud of his first life's hatred was shed, and he realized just how lucky he was in this life to have so much of what he did, he also realized that there were times when the Heavens could be relied upon.

Without the Heavens, his Beyond Perfect Extreme Spiritual Foundation would still be in the Cosmic Seed Realm. Without the Heavens, his greatest strength, his Heavenly Pupils, would be nothing more than a burden. Without the Heavens, he wouldn't even have any of the talents that he did right now.

Maybe in the future there would come a

 time where he could truly separate entirely, but now wasn't that time, nor was there necessarily a need.

For the Phoenix Sky God to be trying so hard, to have offended so many people and worlds, it could only be said that even they were still restricted in some way by the Heavens.

If even someone so powerful was still under the umbrella of the Heavens, who was he to ignore it completely just yet?

And that was when he realized exactly what his body needed.