Floating in the center of the blood-stained whirlpool, Ethan closed his eyes and accessed the deepest archives of Lord Amethyst’s legacy. The cultivation technique, The Great Amethyst Devourer of the Nine Yin Bodies, finally unspooled before his mind’s eye.

It wasn’t a series of abstract mantras or meditative poses. Instead, a vivid, three-dimensional spiritual diagram manifested. He saw a man and a woman locked in a complex, rhythmic embrace—the woman positioned over the man, her body arched in pleasure while he recited ancient scriptures that guided the flow of energy between their connected cores. The diagram shifted through dozens of hand techniques, mouth techniques, and intricate positions of penetration. It was, for all intents and purposes, a Divine Kama Sutra.

"This is magnificent," Ethan muttered, a predatory grin spreading across his face. "Crul, why didn’t you give me this sooner? I need to go find Cassandra immediately. Those curves were made for this position... Hahaha!"

[Master, stop.] Crul’s voice was like a bucket of ice water over his heated thoughts. [It is too dangerous. I am sharing this with you because it is historical record, but as your system, I must warn you against attempting to ’cultivate’ with your current harem.]

"Why? The text says it increases the power of both parties. I can pull Cassandra and the others up with me."

[You can have sex with them, Master, but you cannot cultivate with them. Use your senses. Right now, you are like a raging, flooded river. Your power is immense, and it is all converging toward the Core being forged inside you. Your women in the Body Refinement Realm? They aren’t even the size of a drinking glass.]

Crul’s tone became grim. [The moment your bodies connect for dual cultivation, you open the dam. First, you would absorb their Yin essence. Because of your power, it would be like hooking a high-pressure industrial vacuum to a thimble; you would turn them into mummified husks in seconds. And if by some miracle they survived that, when you tried to return the refined energy to them... it would be like inflating a party balloon with a jet engine. They would literally explode.]

Ethan’s grin faded. The reality of the power gap hit him harder than the spear in his gut.

[You can fuck them for pleasure all you want, but the moment you try to use them as cultivation vessels, you will accumulate a level of Karma that will crush your soul.]

"Karma," Ethan sighed. "I almost forgot that bitch existed. So what you’re saying is I either have to get off this rock or... find someone on my level. Like the Matriarch?"

[Precisely. But if I were you, I wouldn’t touch that woman.]

"Why? She’s stunning. And I can feel her eyes on me—she wants it. I know she does."

[Of course she does. She’s dying for you to impale her like a common slut. But she isn’t a common slut. While her words about recruiting you are true, her body is a trap.]

"What are you saying?"

[She uses a technique similar to yours. While yours devours Yin, hers devours Yang. She has a seal on her womb and another on her forehead. The one below was placed by her father or a high elder. Any man who enters her will feel his life force sucked through his member until he is nothing but bone. You could say that no man has ever truly ’entered’ her, despite her age.]

Ethan felt a chill that had nothing to do with the ocean water. "So she’s a black hole?"

[Exactly. Due to the difference in your cultivation, she would devour you. Your Amethyst lineage might fight back, and it would be a hell of a gamble. If you won, you’d likely bypass the dome’s restrictions and reach the Spiritual Core Realm instantly on the back of her stolen energy. But if you lose? There won’t even be a soul left to reincarnate. And even if you tried to force it, she is holding back a power that could shatter this world. I don’t believe you could dominate her... yet.]

Ethan looked up at the moon, his desire warring with his survival instinct. The "Silk Pants" young master had been a joke, but the woman watching him from the shadows was a monster of a different caliber.

"A Divine Kama Sutra I can’t use and a woman who’s a literal man-eater," Ethan growled, his eyes flashing violet. "This world is getting smaller by the second."

Ethan rose from the crimson waters, the droplets falling from his skin as he ascended like a dark god returning to the heavens.

"Crul," Ethan said, his voice cutting through the whistling wind. "How long until the portal is ready to get us out of here?"

[[ The construction is at 90%, Master. It can be activated at any moment, but it is currently highly unstable. Even at 100%, this will be a one-way trip. You lack the power to forge runes of the required rank, the Cold Steel is of poor quality, and the blood offerings are insufficient. We can only maintain the connection for a limited time. It will be like sending Noah’s Ark into the unknown—we have no arrival coordinates. ]]

Ethan narrowed his eyes, a grim smirk forming on his lips. "So it’s a Hail Mary, right?"

[[ Precisely, Master. A Hail Mary. We could emerge in a desolate wasteland where we can establish ourselves in peace, or we could land in the middle of a battlefield and be annihilated the moment we arrive. Everything will be in the hands of the heavens. ]]

"And how many people can we take with us?"

[[ Approximately 100,000. It would be safer to take fewer, but we will need significant manpower. The men and women here will be far more loyal than any locals we find out there. Raising their cultivation levels is easy once we have access to real spiritual resources, but genuine loyalty is the rarest resource in the universe. ]]

"I won’t argue with that," Ethan replied, his gaze shifting toward the distant coastline where the lights of his empire flickered. "They are our people. If I could create a stable channel, I’d take every member of Royal with me. After what they witnessed today, their loyalty isn’t just devotion—it’s blind faith. It’s time to prepare them for the exodus."

--------------------

From this moment forward, to avoid confusion regarding cultivation ranks, I will include this footer with the current established levels.

Note: These are only the ranks mentioned so far to avoid spoilers.

Body Refinement Realm

Skin Refinement / Bone Refinement / Organ Refinement

Spiritual Gathering Realm

Spiritual Perception / Spiritual Mist / Spiritual Condensation

Spiritual Core Realm

Core Solidification / Core Awakening / Spiritual Collapse (Half-step Spiritual Core)

Spiritual Soul Realm

Spiritual Soul Awakening / Soul Nourishing / Soul-Core Fusion

Golden Core Realm

Prime Fusion / Core Perfection / Core Destruction

Spiritual Sea Realm

Stage 1 ?? / Stage 2 ?? / Stage 3 ??

Dao Manifestation Realm

Stage 1 ?? / Stage 2 ?? / Stage 3 ??

Spiritual Transcendence

Stage 1 ?? / Stage 2 ?? / Stage 3 ??