Chapter 445 - 402: Path of Returning to Simplicity, an Invisible Hand’s Grand Plan, the Horror of [Yang Lei]

The gap between Cultivation Talents has always been vast. Some people might not break through to the Peeping Dao Realm for decades or even centuries, while others can blast right through it in the blink of an eye and begin sprinting toward the next Realm.

Take Shangguan Yue, for example. In the time it took to eat a meal, she had already reached the Peak of Peeping Dao Realm. Her aura gradually stabilized, and as the radiance faded, her soft clothes slipped to the floor. A young girl, as if newborn, crawled out from the pile of garments, her White Jade-like body revealed, immaculate and utterly pure.

Her delicate little lips parted slightly, and every breath from her small nose seemed sweet. She held her two small, tender hands before her eyes, turning them over and over, marveling at how exquisite they looked. "Hm?"

It finally dawned on her. Her large, glistening eyes widened even more as she snatched up the clothes scattered on the floor, covering the budding curves of her body. Although she looked to be only seven or eight, she already had a slight figure, like a thirteen or fourteen-year-old girl with the face of an infant.

"Is this what the Path of Returning to Simplicity does?"

Shangguan Yue furrowed her brow and tilted her head toward the dumbstruck maids. "C-Could you get me some clothes that fit?"

The clothes she had changed into were now far too large. While they hadn’t been huge before, the material was incredibly smooth. Due to the significant change in her size, her shoulders could no longer hold up the dress, and it had simply slipped right off. The pants were another story entirely. Now, completely bare, she couldn’t stop her cheeks from turning as red as cherries.

’I never expected this to happen,’ she thought. After all, she had only followed the most fundamental Dao deep within her heart to seek enlightenment and experience it.

Comprehending a Dao is often a matter of a single moment of insight. Of course, some Daos are simply too unique to be comprehended, like the Void Dao, which is not something an ordinary person can grasp. The pure Space-Time Dao is another that most people cannot cultivate. Other Daos, however, are often understood by a Cultivator in a sudden flash of enlightenment.

Of course, this is built upon a lifetime of accumulated experiences. The type of Dao one can perceive is primarily related to a Cultivator’s personal journey. A Cultivator who specializes in Flame would hardly comprehend the Dao of Floods.

As for Shangguan Yue, she had never delved deeply into the subject of Daos. Perhaps she once had aspirations of perceiving a certain Dao and becoming a Refining Grandmaster, but things were different now.

She had endured more than a decade of despair and emptiness. Her mind had long since stopped hoping for anything; she didn’t even think she would survive. ’How could I dare to dream about what Dao I might perceive in the future?’

For this very reason, as she enjoyed the meal, she simply followed her heart’s desire: to eat a little more, to feel full, and, most importantly, not to hold Jiang Qiu back. Filled with a sense of indebtedness, she naturally followed the Path of Returning to Simplicity deep within her Soul and thus caught a glimpse of it.

The Path of Returning to Simplicity didn’t just appear out of nowhere. She had lived for several years looking like a middle schooler and had even acted as a mentor to a few people, making her wonder if she was aging in reverse.

Unfortunately, she didn’t know back then that she had an affinity for the Path of Returning to Simplicity, so all related notions were nothing more than idle thoughts.

Now, that very line of thinking had propelled her into the Peeping Dao Realm. And with the help of the Three-Life Race’s resources, she had cultivated all the way to the Peak without a single bottleneck!

’I have a feeling that in the future, I’ll be able to cultivate smoothly to the Dao Entry Realm and even the Fusion Realm, as easily as a baby grows up. But for me, it’s the other way around. When my Realm gets higher, maybe I’ll really turn into a baby!’

Of course, this was just a vague premonition. Shangguan Yue had no idea what the future held. Her understanding of the Path of Returning to Simplicity was superficial at best. Right now, she just felt a little awkward being naked.

Still, she was overjoyed to have broken through so many Realms at once. Soon, the maids brought her a new set of clothes. Dressed in them, she looked like a young scion of an immortal family, possessing an extraordinary aura while also exuding a sense of purity.

When [Yang Lei] heard the news, he was completely stunned, his eyelid twitching. "What did you say? What Dao? The Path of Returning to Simplicity!"

The subordinate at the Peak of Fusion Realm who was delivering the report wiped the sweat from his brow, not daring to lie. "It’s absolutely true. I went to investigate personally just now. It seems... it really is the Path of Returning to Simplicity. And she herself has no idea how incredible this Dao is. She seems as pure as a... a maiden."

What was the Path of Returning to Simplicity?

It was the path of returning to one’s original, true nature—a Dao that led directly to the pinnacle of Cultivation. In other words, it was a Dao that could definitively be cultivated to the Harmonization Realm. As long as one didn’t die prematurely, suffer some cataclysmic setback, followed their heart, and had guaranteed resources, they could reach the Harmonization Realm.

It ranked among the very best of the three thousand Great Daos—one of the top ten—and could be mentioned in the same breath as the Space-Time Dao. A cultivator of this path hadn’t appeared in many, many years.

One could say that the appearance of a cultivator on the Path of Returning to Simplicity meant they had a definite chance of contending for the title of strongest in the world, or at the very least, they would be a peerless figure among their generation.

Such cultivators were not ignorant like infants. On the contrary, their Soul Strength was exceptionally high. They could be said to be immune to the vast majority of soul-based attacks, and when they reached the pinnacle of their Cultivation, they would be completely and utterly immune to all soul attacks.