Qi Gathering (단수/丹修)
Qi Gathering is the first stage of Immortal cultivation. It used to be called first stage of Qi Refining. It is followed by Qi Refining.
Boundary
Lifespan
Description
One requires a spiritual root to practice these methods. It is completely impossible to cultivate heaven methods without a root. Those with spiritual nature must form a Law-Transforming Dantian (법화단전/法化丹田) to receive the spiritual energy of heaven and earth before they can officially enter the Qi Refining stage. This period of forming the Law Transforming Dantian is called the Qi Gathering stage.
A person with a Heavenly Spiritual Roots can completely form the Law Transforming Dantian in a day or two, those who have the True Spiritual Roots take a month, and those with Mixed Spiritual Roots who understand the cultivation methods well can do it in a year. The slow ones take three to five years. The more elements one possesses, the exponentially longer it takes to create a Law-Transforming Dantian.
Method of Progression
Heaven Path
The process of creating a Law-Transforming Dantian is as follows:
- First, one must activate their inherent spiritual quality, transforming their dantian to be optimized for that quality.
- Afterward, by gathering Yin and Yang energies and circulating them within the dantian, it becomes imbued with primordial chaos energy, making it suitable to absorb the heaven and earth energy. Thereby, achieving the transformation into a Law-Transforming Dantian.
One must perfectly balance the concentrations of five different energies, and during the evolution of the dantian with primordial chaos energy, these concentrations must not change at all.
Earth Path
The Demon Core is a spiritual essence formed by beings called Enlightened Demon Beasts. At the same time, it's the catalyst for regular demons and mystical beasts to start cultivating upon gaining intellect.
Unlike the Heaven Tribe, which passes down and progressively develops methods for future generations, most demon races were once wild beasts roaming the fields, unable to inherit methods from their ancestors.
Inner Cores of demon beasts concentrate spiritual energy within their Demon Cores before causing an explosion. By repeating these explosions, they gradually expand their Demon Core's capacity, absorbing more Qi as their "vessel" grows. This is the foundation of all demon beast methods.
Vitality
Lifespan is mortal. A cultivator gains no additional lifespan at this stage.
Trivia
- It used to be the first star of Qi Refining before it was separated.