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"Do you know what is the one thing that humans have been trying to achieve since times immemorial?"

I squinted my eyes a bit. New releases from NovelFirempy _r.

"Power? Richess?" I quickly guessed, only for Claire to shake her head with a small, faint smile.

"You need to think... bigger," she advised, only to string her eyebrows together before shaking her head a little and backtracking on her words. "No, not bigger. Greater."

This time, I actually gave Claire's question a little more thought, searching beyond what appeared like a random, obvious answer.

"Eternal youth? The power of undying?"

Claire's lips trembled as her smile grew slightly bigger.

"Now, try something simpler, but along the lines, you are already thinking."

I closed my mouth as I shut up for a moment, only to quickly arrive at the answer that both fit Claire's instructions and also made sense in my own understanding of what life, ambition, and cultivation all were for humans.

"Could it be, immortality?"

Rather than answering, Clarie confirmed my educated guess with a nod of her head.

"Immortality to cultivators is like... maybe not air and food, but like money and women to the mortals," she said, her lips trembling a little into a semblance of a smile as she mentioned her own sex. "The difference is, what mortals can achieve is temporary, but immortality?" she posed her words into a question, only to then shake her head.

"Immortality is quite the self-explanatory concept for those who never dabble in cultivation. But even though I've yet to reach beyond the mortal realm, I'm aware that in reality," Claire sighed heavily, "things are not as great, easy or simple."

Taking a short pause, Claire used it to figure out the pattern for the next part of her explanation while taking her time to calm down the pace of her breaths.

"This isn't exactly a topic I'm well-versed with, so take everything I say not with a grain but a handful of salt, but... Merely by breaking free from the constraints of the mortal realm, you can extend your lifespan by around twenty, twenty-five years," Claire explained only for a sour smile to decorate her lips. "And that's just by breaking beyond the mortal stage!"

For a moment, Claire kept the agitated look on her face, only to then let the air out of her lungs as she breathed out and relaxed a bit.

"I can't really tell how much you can extend your life by breaking through the consecutive stages within the cultivator's realm, but if we were to trust the rumors, by the time you break into the immortality stage..."

This time, Claire didn't pause. She outright finished the topic, making it known with all of herself that it was the limit of what she was willing... Or rather, what she could talk about.

"Then, if it's all about just extending your lifespan, why is your father in such a hurry to break through to the tenth stage of mortal cultivation?" I asked, happy to know more yet failing to connect what Claire said to anything that I was actually asking about.

"He's breaking through to the tenth rank, not beyond the mortal realm," Claire pointed out with a small smile, as if pointing out this small detail I'd missed somehow was enough to greatly entertain her. "But it related to how breaking beyond the mortal realm increases your lifespan.

On that point, I can't help but wonder, though," she added as she crossed her hands on her chest and gave me a mischievous side-eye, "can you figure it out yourself?"

"So it has something to do with increasing one's lifespan... but also their age?" I muttered in a questioning tone, even though I didn't really expect any sort of answer to it.

And in the end, I didn't even need a hint to notice the potential problem.

"Is it about how the increase to one's lifespan can affect their own age?" I tried my best to guess, going along with the potential inconsistency Claire's hints helped me notice.

For what does it mean to increase one's lifespan?

Was the mechanic behind it about changing how one's body operated to artificially slow down the aging process? Or maybe the consecutive breakthroughs came with a mutation that reversed the effects of aging that were already present within a cultivator's body?

"You are right on the money," Claire smiled a little... Only to then put away the device she just finished assembling only to then grab the components for another one and push the cable in before picking up her explanations again.

"While the way in which one's lifespan increases isn't well researched due to the rift between the spiritual and the scientific worlds. But, according to what I've heard, once you are past a certain age, the effects won't be as great as they should be."

'And that alone gives us some clues over the way in which this prolongation of lifespan happens,' I thought, taking a mental note of this observation...

Before stuffing it into the back of my head as I did with most of the other things I was fully aware of not be ready to properly digest, research, or analyze.

"As for why my dad is in a hurry, it's simple. Unless he gets to the tenth rank before turning forty-five, he will be deemed talentless. And while that doesn't mean he won't be able to ever enter it..."

Claire pursed her lips, cutting her explanation in the middle of her sentence while putting on a grim look on her face.

"Wait, this is one thing no one bothered to explain to me yet," I protested slightly... while actually doing my very best to change the topic after sensing how Claire wasn't comfortable talking about the one we just finished. "What does it take for one to enter the spiritual world to begin with?"

Up until now, I thought that unless Chihiro broke through to the tenth stage of mortal cultivation, he wouldn't even be able to enter the spiritual world. But now that I've listened to Claire, it turned out that failing to reach that stage before his time ran out... wouldn't really change a thing in that regard.

Sure, this kind of failure would reflect on his chances to grow in the future... But all on its own, it apparently wouldn't block him from entering the spiritual world in the first place.

'Wait, now that I think about it... Unless it's about their family matters, is there an actual reason why he wants to gain the right to enter that place to begin with?' I thought, only for my eyes to turn slightly wider when the realization struck me.

'Or maybe, the reason why he's so desperate not to go beyond his deadline has something to do with Claire's mother? Maybe his failure would directly translate into his wife's family banning him from visiting my mother-in-law-to-be?'

"You see, the spiritual world is filled with Qi..." Claire hesitated for a while. Judging by the look on her face, she searched for the right words to pass on the meaning in her head. "The Qi in the spiritual world is different.

Even though the difference is small..." Claire shook her head, "it changes the situation to the point that one's attempt to reach beyond the tenth stage of cultivation in the mortal realm is a running joke for those in the spiritual world."

I squinted my eyes a bit, intrigued by this unexpected piece of information. Yet, regardless of how intriguing it was, my hands continued to move, gradually putting together the components and assembling yet another device.

"Do you happen to know what kind of a difference it is?" I asked, eager to learn more about it so that, if possible, I could try to artificially change the Qi in this world into the Qi that was present in the spiritual realm.

"If I did, I wouldn't be stuck in this realm, would I?" Claire grinned as she answered, only to then shake her head as she put away another finished device... And then leaned back on her hands, once again raising her head up to the ceiling.

"Keep this between the two of us, but this is the actual reason why my father is in such a rush. You need to be at least at the ninth stage of cultivation to safely enter the spiritual world, but you need to reach the peak of the mortal realm if you want to go there while protecting others from the pressure of the spiritual Qi over there."

Claire took in a deep breath before lowering her chin and looking me straight in the eyes.

"In the end, it isn't for himself that my father wants to go to the spiritual world.

It was always his goal to bring me over there while I'm still in the lower stages of the mortal realm so that I could break free from the chains of mortality not with the help of the inferior spiritual Qi of this part of the world, but by cultivating the superior spiritual Qi exclusive to the spiritual world instead."