Shen wasn't surprised that the general cultivation knowledge touched the Guardian System.

According to the information in the antidron, the Initiate, Meridian Clearing, and Foundation Establishment realms were the equivalent of G-rank. There were many realms for a single rank, but it made sense. They were considered the preliminary steps to break the barrier between mortality and what came next. One didn't break out of the natural limits imposed on oneself by Reality without building a solid foundation. Only then could one use it to step further and reach beyond one's natural station.

Then, Core Formation was the equivalent of the F-rank, a single realm for a single rank. A core was needed to cultivate further, and having one made you much stronger than a mortal. Therefore, those in the Core Formation realm were more than mortals yet hadn't established a Path. It was considered the intermediary realm between mortality and a true cultivator.

Then Fate Origin went from E to D-rank, and Ethereal Harmonization from C to B. Touch and master a Concept, then touch and master a Law. Everything up to that point fit the Drow Maiden's explanation like a glove.

Finally, Destiny Realization was the equivalent of the A-rank. The antidron also contained a general overview of each realm, but even without that, it would be impossible not to link an A-rank's Realization with the realm name. The issue was that the information in the antidron said nothing about the S-rank or the cultivation realm equivalent to it.

The Maiden had taught Shen that S-ranks were those who Realized their Paths. Yet, the antidron suggested that was A-rank level power. Was she wrong? Or did it mean a Destiny Realization cultivator was as strong as both A and S-ranks depending on how far in the realm they were? Or was a cultivator's Path ultimately shorter and weaker than a Guardian's? Or even was that information being purposefully kept hidden from him?

He didn't waste too much time thinking about that. He would find out eventually. He was D-rank; those things were way above him. He had plenty of time to figure it all out.

Two things mattered in the short-term: first, he would have to deal with the Ethereal Tribulation when he broke through to the next level. Second, and more importantly, there was a recommended way to reach the next realm, an alternative to what the Drow Maiden had taught him.

Guardians didn't deal with tribulations. The antidron explained it had to do with using mana to progress. Therefore, the Drow Maiden knew nothing about the difficulties that Shen's Path would bring him or why touching four, then two, then one Law, as she had suggested, was a bad idea.

The Ethereal Tribulation was the crucial component Shen had been missing, the reason Yinhu Lanfen had felt like a Law incarnate. As soon as Shen touched any Law, he would undergo the tribulation, and he either became one with that Law—and then learned to harmonize all Laws of his Path with each other and himself, hence the realm's name—or he would die.

The big catch here was that while he could touch only four of his seven Laws first, then two, then one, he would have to undergo the Ethereal Tribulation each time. It might sound like a better idea than touching all Laws at once anyway, except that the tribulation's difficulty was based on how many Concepts his Path could have, not how many he was "upgrading" at once. And what really helped one survive was using their Laws; Concepts were useless in that tribulation.

Therefore, having seven Concepts or Laws in a Path was considered a very bad idea. Not only would he set up a record if he survived—the current record was for six Laws in what the antidron called a Pre-Harmonized Path, three foundation Concepts, three secondary—but it also would require him a lot of luck to find the perfect moment when he could touch seven Laws at once.

Contrary to what he had expected, almost touching on a Law once didn't make it easier to touch it again later. In fact, Shen recalled nothing of the experience; he only knew he had almost done it but couldn't even remember which Concept he had used.

Even touching four Laws at once might be a challenge, much less seven.

Rupturing a Concept was mentioned, but only for those who decided not to progress the entire Path at once. Shen was glad he had done it regardless. It had made him stronger in his current level, which gave him some leeway in deciding which Path to tread: the multiple tribulations one or the recommended method.

That was a lot to digest already, and Shen once more chose not to waste time thinking about matters too far in the future, like the Culmination Tribulation. It came when one mastered a Law and was even harder to survive. He would cross that bridge when he came to it. The next one, the Realization Tribulation, was so beyond him that he almost didn't even read what it was about.

That wasn't to say the Harmonization Tribulation was already coming. It was also in the future.

Right now, what mattered was his lacking cultivation.

A Fate Origin cultivator was physically incapable of surviving the Harmonization Tribulation without reaching the Qi Saturation level. They had to be able to use all their qi all the time forever without ever running out of it or hurting their bodies.

Shen was very, very far from it.

The Drow Maiden had let him constantly cultivate in the past year, but it hadn't been enough. Shen only had enough qi reserves to last for about ten minutes of full qi utilization, not counting techniques that bit deeply into his reserves. It was obvious to him that just continuing cultivating wouldn't let him reach the Qi Saturation level, not unless the process was supposed to take centuries to complete. It required some trick or enlightenment that he hadn't come across yet, and the antidron didn't explicitly mention it.

All it said was that there was a breaking point, a kind of switch. Shen had known about that but thought it would come naturally. Now, he was sure he had been wrong.

In fact, he highly suspected that it had to do with another tribulation. Maybe Qi Saturation was actually its name.

That was his greatest gain in all that: overhauling his views on tribulations.

His father had said the heavens were envious but too proud to curb the worthy. The antidron said tribulations were both a defense mechanism and trials with rewards.

Shen had been taught Reality was sentient. The Drow Maiden had also said she suspected tribulations came from that sentience. The antidron all but confirmed it. Not explicitly, but Shen could read well enough between the lines thanks to the drow's explanation.

Reality feared what numerous strong people could do to it. If a bundle of energy had grown strong enough to turn into Laws, it stood to reason that one day, someone might push themselves to the highest level and interfere with the Aspects directly. So, tribulations were a protection against that.

And yet, Reality was also besieged by the Void on all fronts.

It was vast enough, spanning who knows how many universes, that it didn't need to worry about getting completely annihilated—probably. But it also wanted to have strong warriors around just in case, and even having people fight here and there to protect one universe or another wasn't all that bad. So it also used its defenses as trials to prevent too many people from becoming strong. It then rewarded the ones who passed with a little extra power.

Fewer strong beings meant a lower probability of them becoming absolutely powerful, but a few of them were a boon, and it was better if they could even kill other weaklings by themselves. Reality even improved their lifespans on each tribulation, further aiding their desire to stay alive and prevent competition from arising.

The Drow Maiden had claimed Reality wasn't sapient. Shen believed her. It was certainly insidious, though.

After that, Shen turned to the information about the Cultivator Association.

The easiest way to describe it was as a mix of the chaotic era before the Eternal Empire and Russian roulette.

His clan's message had been around for a very long time and showcased what the Eternal Empire had been: a place of justice and fairness, reason and peace, but also a period of transition between chaos and order. No one could be beholden for mistakes from another, yet his clan—

No, not his clan anymore.

Imperial law stated one could be held accountable for the errors committed by someone else, but the Feng Clan had disrespected it. They declared Shen was not a cultivator of the clan, failed to produce a legal document signed by him stating he accepted being responsibilized for his father's treason, yet determined he was to take a lashing.

Shen accepted it regardless. His was a culture of honor. He understood the dangers of leaving behind people thirsting for revenge, and so did the clan elders. They sacrificed themselves and their children for the clan.

But that was an ideology they had inherited from the age of chaos when the Empire wasn't around to dispense justice fairly. Culture wasn't so easily changed when people lived tens of thousands of years, the minimum lifespan of an Ethereal Harmonization cultivator. From that perspective, the Eternal Empire had been in its infancy when Shen was around, only twenty thousand years old if he wasn't mistaken.

The Cultivator Association resembled the time before the Eternal Empire. The strong ruled, and the weak obeyed. It was like the Alliance, really, except it ignored most Alliance laws.

Although C-ranks could get the system for free and gain advantages, only B-ranks were allowed to. Anyone below was forbidden to enter one of the system's trials unless they had special dispensation because any who accepted the system also acted as a potential spy node. They claimed that mana not only shared a Guardian's willpower with the surroundings to strengthen Reality but also stole part of that willpower to be used as a micro-processing unit to keep the Guardian System running.

The antidron claimed that was stupidly false. Mana's greatest blessing and issue was preventing one from getting tribulations.

In its inception, the Alliance had needed numbers to fight the Void and a way to strengthen Reality. Mana was originally the answer to gain numbers and nothing else. The Mana Emperor had appeared in the first years and helped mana assist against the Void. But mana was still energy and couldn't take from one's willpower or use it passively. Only a Guardian's will to exist was shared with its surroundings, and it was almost the whole of what the Mana Emperor had managed to accomplish, besides establishing some rules that made the energy easier to use.

So, the real reasons they forbid people from taking from accepting the Guardian System were threefold. First, to establish a shared enemy in the Alliance, and thus a stronger identity for members of the Association. Second, to prevent people from being able to use the system to report a crime in areas where the system was cut off from—or even reporting those areas, which might not be detected by the system. Third, to keep all advantages the system might give, especially to C-ranks, monopolized in the hands of B-ranks.

In the Association, the strong who conquered an area decided the rules for those below them, and some places were ruthlessly brutal. Others were a heavenly utopia. Most places were in between, closer to brutality than safety. Neither of the three S-ranks the cultivators had—out of fifteen for the entire Alliance, if the Emperor was correct—cared for a peaceful territory. Conflict was encouraged as a way to promote martial growth.

Thus, the Russian roulette part came in the form of lucking out in your birth. Ten percent of the territories had something that passed as written rules enforced more often than not. Everywhere else, things were much more fluid and depended on power—politics, influence, and resources. You had a one-in-a-million chance of being born a non-slave if one of your parents were a cultivator. Nowhere in the Association were mortals treated as more than indentured servants.

If Earth was absorbed by the Association, it had around a 0.001% chance of not being turned into a living nightmare.

Shen then checked the Republic's laws. They were clearly an evolution of Imperial law, close to what Shen had learned about the beginning of the US, mixed with some Ancient Roman rules and the ideals of a monarchy.

Or, in other words, they were complex as hell.