Chapter 900 - Maya's Reward
Leon didn't expect his father to have the patience to observe a patient for more than three years. However, he quickly retracted the idea after seeing a few cases eclipsing the same period.
'Father probably didn't observe these people in person,' Leon concluded.
Being the Divine King of the Divine Pill Kingdom, his father didn't have the free time to observe a single individual for so long.
'Father must have assigned subordinates to observe these individuals.'
Nevertheless, patient Zhang Tianlong's case didn't end after three years but continued to the day he was killed along with his father.
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'About thirteen years to reach the Divine Origin Realm, huh?' Leon mused.
'Compared to Aria's talent to become Divine King by 30 years of age, this person's cultivation speed is not worth mentioning. However, this isn't the important point here.'
Patient Zhang Tianlong was originally someone deemed unable to cultivate for a lifetime and could only live an ordinary life as an Alchemist Servant.
However, without relying on any outside help, he fixed his cultivation talent problem and reached the Divine Origin Realm in a dozen years.
Such a feat was praiseworthy.
'Unfortunately, the report ends here…' Leon sighed.
However, the book on patient Zhang Tianlong didn't end there.
There were many blank pages afterward, but Leon eventually found his father's notes at the back of the book, listing his father's thoughts and doubts on the patient.
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…
Leon read through all of his father's recorded cases on patients with out-of-body experiences.
By the fifth case, his father had already concluded that there was something special about the out-of-body experiences that allowed mortals to break away from the mundane life.
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…
While reading through his father's notes, his father lamented that he never found the solution to induce out-of-body experience intentionally.
Nevertheless, his father's records were so detailed he made a discovery.
"Hm… although some of these cases were incomplete, there's one thing they all have in common with the completed cases. The patients only experience the out-of-body experience once," Leon mused thoughtfully.
All of the patients didn't manage to become cultivators after experiencing their out-of-body experiences. Some of them became great rulers, governors, scholars, and artists of their time.
When Leon perused over their information, he realized they died the quickest to the guardian in the Astral Soul Realm.
The longer they lasted, the better their talents.
"Hm?" Leon suddenly made another discovery.
While comparing the cases, he realized none of the patients were laborers. Their professions only required great mental faculty and imagination.
If there were one exception, patient Zhang Tianlong, the Alchemist Servant who gathers and cultivates herbs, would be it.
However, the person seemed to have exhausted his mental faculties while memorizing the Ten-Thousand Herbs of Yuan the night prior to his out-of-body experience.
"Sleeping after one's spiritual strength is depleted will induce an out-of-body experience? No, it shouldn't be that simple," Leon quickly shook his head.
If that was the only condition, there should have been many cases of cultivators experiencing the out-of-body phenomena already.
"Hm… But cultivators don't need to sleep. If their spiritual strength is exhausted, they can just meditate to recover it," Leon mused.
Nevertheless, he was certain the condition for entry into the Astral Soul Realm wasn't as simple as spiritual strength exhaustion.
'Reading mortals' out-of-body experiences alone won't give me insights into my own out-of-body experience. I need to recall the details of my own experience,' Leon figured.
Shortly after, he frowned in thought.
Before he fell asleep, his spiritual strength wasn't fully exhausted; it had recovered a fair bit by that time.
However, he did remember feeling incredible comfort and relaxation.
'The other condition is a relaxed body?' Leon's eyes flickered.
Suddenly, he drew some conclusions and came up with a wild assumption that didn't have any precedents or evidence to back it up.
'What causes a soul to leave the body? Would a body in its relaxed state loosen its binding on the soul? Would that allow the soul to drift out of the body? A soul doesn't have any weight, but if spiritual strength is also exhausted, it won't be able to hold onto the body?'
'In other words, spiritual strength exhaustion and body relaxation are both needed to induce an out-of-body experience? I don't know if it'll work, but it's worth a shot if I perfectly replicate the condition…'
After Leon settled on the idea, his frown relaxed, and his eyes brightened.
At the same time, Maya had been carefully observing Leon's expression to avoid interrupting his deep thoughts.
But after she spotted her cue to speak, she immediately acted upon it.
"Hey, do I get a reward for translating all the primordial techniques?" Maya asked.
"Oh?" Leon glanced at Maya carefully with growing curiosity before he asked, "What kind of reward do you want?"
"Since your spiritual strength recovered, we can do it again, right? You know, spiritual dual cultivation. Who knows, maybe you'll get to enter the Astral Soul Realm again, so it's a win-win situation for the both of us," Maya mentioned.
After Maya seemed nonchalant, Leon suspected she was actually looking forward to their dual cultivation again.
"Sure, why don't we start right away?" Leon beamed.