Veronica eagerly looked up at her mother's face. The cyborg cat became more excited as Cynthia was about to explain the fundamental framework of cultivation! "The first and arguably the most original method of attaining immortality is a category which I call Natural Cultivation." The Oblivion Empress spoke to her child. "This is a state of growth and cultivation where the mortal in question does not have to deliberately do anything special to live longer and attain greater strength. It is the easiest and most foolproof method to cultivate, though it imposes harsh demands on the talent and the inherent possibilities of the individual itself. The vast majority of natural cultivators are able to attain greater strength simply by living, but they will ultimately come across a bottleneck that they cannot overcome because they have never learned to solve such problems in the first place." That... sounded awfully familiar to Veronica. She thought about her own creations. "Mother?" "Yes, my child?" "Are my design spirits and companion spirits natural cultivators? They kind of fit your definition." Cynthia smiled. "That is a clever guess. The full answer is more complicated. I suggest you wait before you form your own conclusions." She explained a little more about natural cultivation. There were essentially lucky' life forms that were just born awesome. "Similar to how the children of the rich and wealthy families of first-rate states are born in lives of luxury, there are a small number of exceedingly fortunate life forms that can aptly be described as born gods. These humans or creatures enjoy divine constitutions or other special conditions that allow them to grow powerful... to an extent." "This is not an option for the vast majority of people." Ves said. "I guess this is why other cultivation methods emerged, right?" "Exactly. Mortals cannot help but desire what they are not permitted to obtain through normal means. The first artificial cultivation methods that emerged in history are likely modeled after natural cultivators. The weak sought to imitate these inborn gods, and managed to succeed in part or in whole over time." "Really?" "Yes." Cynthia smiled. "The success rates are always low, but even if I in a trillion individuals can use a method to become a True God, then the cultivation method can be considered valid." "So deliberate cultivation started out as a way to imitate the super powerful beings that everyone saw as gods." It reminded Ves of how a lot of indigenous alien races of the Red Ocean sought to become existences similar to the phase whales! "Yes, but this approach has a major flaw." The mother continued. "What if the god that people are imitating is not as powerful as they thought? What if their methods have reached a limit? DO you think that cultivators will be satisfied if they stop at the level of a high pre-divinity state or a weak True God?" Veronica shook her head. "Hell no. I bet they will do anything to exceed the hardware of natural cultivators." "That is exactly what happened. Cultivators experimented with different energies and discovered new reactions and interactions. They eventually found out that natural cultivators are mostly able to grow stronger by deriving strength from the power of heaven and earth. As such, instead of trying to copy the cultivation approach of an alien life form that is never fully compatible with their own physiques, the ambitious cultivators cut off the middlemen and sought to attain power from more direct sources. This has led to the birth of qi cultivation." Qi cultivation sounded like a big deal. Ves guessed that this may be the most orthodox and mainstream form of cultivation! "What distinguishes qi cultivation from other forms of cultivation?" Veronica asked. "As I have mentioned earlier, qi cultivation methods try to foster growth by absorbing certain elements of the power of heaven and earth. I am sure that you have discovered that the spiritual energy that you have always been playing around with is not uniform. It is split up into a potentially infinite variety of elements or attributes. Qi cultivators have sought to fuel themselves with the types of spiritual energy that they have access to, desire the most or feel compatible with. These can encompass fundamental forces of the universe such as Hre, gravity and electromagnetism. They can also encompass abstract concepts such as justice, love and civilization. They can even be more specific such as belief in the New Rubarth Empire or the affection for your own family. This is because all of them are fundamentally derived from the power of earth or the power of heaven. As long as the elemental qi for it exists, it can be used to power one's ascension to godhood.' Veronica looked impressed. What her mother told her explained so much and matched with many of her previous observations! "So this is the most orthodox form of cultivation?" Veronica guessed. "Yes. Anyone can engage in qi cultivation. Spiritual energy is everywhere, and even a barren location such as the Milky Way can still produce limited quantities of it by relying on the power of earth. However, many qi cuitivators soon find out that there are many shortcomings and limitations to their methods. It is not so easy to attain immortality. The low life states of many humans and aliens restrict them in every step of the way. The further they grow beyond their original states, the harder it becomes to defy their fate. It is like stretching an elastic band. The further you pull it apart, the stronger it desires to snap back into its most compact form. Death is the usual result of cultivators who have failed to stretch their elastic band any further." That was an easy analogy to understand. An ordinary ant that tried to become as powerful as a god had to go through an unimaginable struggle to become a bajillion times stronger than if it lived an ordinary life! "So what happened next?" Ves asked. "Qi cultivators came up with two general solutions." Cynthia answered. "The first is to refine their cultivation methods. It is not enough to simply absorb energy and rely on quantity to force their subsequent evolution. They must upgrade their inherently low qualities step by step, and that requires more finesse. Qi cultivators have invented many different assisting techniques, of which one of them is artistic conception." "What is that?" "Very simply put, artistic conception is an attempt to become a higher existence by visualizing and thinking hard about it. Early cultivators consciously and unconsciously did so by imagining themselves becoming the natural gods they have witnessed themselves. Over time, cultivation methods have put more emphasis on this by utilizing mantras, exquisite artworks, incense or any other form of stimulation to put cultivators in a special state of mind. Their mental activity will take on a specific form that allows them to attain further progress by absorbing and expending the power of heaven and earth in a specific manner." From the perspective of spiritual engineering, it was like turning oneself into a temporary spiritual construct. The more elaborate and well-designed this construct had become, the greater the yield! Veronica blinked her artificial purple eyes. "In other words, the main means for qi cultivators to become stronger is to embrace their superstitions?" "Correct, in a sense." Cynthia smirked as if she knew that word made her child uncomfortable. "Is it truly superstition when it is a valid vehicle of empowerment? If a seemingly silly assumption such as "stars are evil" has successfully enabled a cultivator to rise to become a True God, then is it still a baseless form of superstition?" "...Did that actually happen?" Cynthia chuckled. "You would be surprised, Ves. You see, the power of heaven and earth is psychoactive. It can influence one's state of mind, possibly to an extreme degree. It is also psychoreactive. It responds and reacts to the thinking of sentient beings. Since living individuals can come up with an endless variety of thoughts, it is possible for any of them to become the basis of a valid cultivation method. It just depends on whether it allows an individual to derive power from spiritual energy." "I see. I understand... I think. There has to be limits, though. Otherwise, pretty much anyone can become a True God as long as they are delusional enough." "You are correct. The difficulty of qi cultivation is not trivial even in an environment that is rich with the power of heaven and earth such as Messier 87. As I have mentioned before, restrictions such as talent and resource shortages can prevent many ambitious mortals from attaining their goals. Aside from trying to develop the model of qi cultivation further, cultivators have also tried to think laterally and discovered other valid approaches that can help them attain greater power and longevity." "Other approaches?" "Three-thousand Daos lead to the same destination." Cynthia spoke. "That is an ancient and outdated saying that roughly expresses that there is a large variety of roads that cultivators can follow in order to ascend to heaven. Some of them can be quite convoluted and clever. Take swordmasters for example. You have interacted with them often enough to gain an understanding of how they cultivate. What is their defining property?" "Willpower." Veronica immediately replied. "They transform and elevate their willpower so that it can become more extraordinary and powerful." "That is roughly correct. Compared to qi cultivation, the cultivation of swordmasters does not have such a high demand for talent. As long as other conditions are satisfied, any human can theoretically become a True God through willpower cultivation. The human only needs to demonstrate increasingly greater persistence, courage, discipline and other related traits. As you can already deduce, willpower cultivation is much more suitable for soldiers and warriors as a result." This already fit with the theoretical framework that Ves had constructed through his own research! "What are the flaws of willpower cultivation?" The cat cutely asked. "You should already know them. No one can maintain a balanced state of mind by pursuing this torturous approach of cultivation. A willpower cultivator must also constantly push themselves and take on real risks. Willpower is a quality that can only grow under genuine pressure. In most times, willpower cultivators have the highest chance of suffering a violent death. Peace is antithetical to their existence." Ves fully agreed with that. The Age of Mechs was a time where high-ranking mech pilots popped up like mushrooms, but they only had room to emerge due to all of the internal wars that took place in human space! Without all of the different states competing and provoking each other, it would have been a lot harder for expert pilots, ace pilots and god pilots to come into existence! "What else is there aside from willpower cultivation?" The cyborg cat asked. "There has to be more approaches." Cynthia scratches Veronica below her chin. "There are. From my extensive experiences and learning, I have identified at least five broad categories of cultivation methods. I call them body cultivation, creation cultivation, artifact cultivation, deity cultivation and... let us call it contract cultivation." The cat resting on her lap squirmed in a restless manner when her mother mentioned deity cultivation. Ves could roughly guess what all of those broad approaches represented. He could even tie them to the people and methods that he had encountered throughout his eventful career! Thus spoke of the validity of his mother's explanation. Her classification lifted much of the mystique surrounding this difficult phenomenon and granted him a clear way to distinguish between different cultivation methods! "Each of them can enable a person to become a True God?" "That is technically the case. Each approach imposes different conditions, requirements and circumstances. Some cultivation methods are more suited in an energy-poor environment such as the current Milky Way whereas other approaches will produce better results in a more energy-rich environment such as Messier 87. If you wish to learn how to properly leverage the latter's exotic radiation to your advantage, then you must clearly understand the fundamental properties of each of the aforementioned categories."