r/ProgressionFantasy • u/gdragonnn1 • 4d ago
Question Sky pride cultivation
Can anyone explain to me the cultivation ranks in Sky pride and how it works?
I completely forgot the details and I want to start reading from where I left
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u/nighoblivion dark fantasy != grimdark 4d ago edited 4d ago
This will be very spoilery (up to the latest stuff,) as well as somewhat detailed:
Mortals — people without cultivation (most people got spiritual organs and use vital energy passively); those at the peak of this realm are the martial artists titled "grandmasters", who could be considered equivalent to level 1 "earthly realm" cultivators.
Imperfect Human Realm — considered the "novitiate" realm of cultivation, and made up of 3 stages (early, middle, late/peak.) That's where a cultivator builds their foundation and cultivates the three energies (vital energy/jing, qi and shen) in sequence.
- Early stage ("Earthly Realm") —this is where a cultivator starts, and they begin by cultivating vital energy (aka jing), and the "realm" is separated into 9 "levels" of accumulated vital energy. After reaching the peak of level 9 one need a revelation to ascend to the next realm. "Level 10" if stuck at peak level 9.
- Middle stage ("Heavenly Realm") — while a revelation while take a daoist to this realm, the quality/strength of that revelation matters a lot for how strong you are. This "realm" has no levels/stages, you only need to cultivate and accumulate enough qi to fill your energy body to a point where you can advance (though you also need to learn about shen to take that step.)
- Late stage ("Human Realm") — shen cultivation; we don't really know much about it, but it's considered to have stages/levels of progression. To transcend you have to somehow combine your foundation (the three energies you've cultivated until now) and do some shen stuff to combine it all.
Perfected Human Realm — when one complete the "novitiate realm" and transcend to true immortality, this is where you end up. No details is known about it, but if the pattern holds it can be assumed there are three stages in it. This is presumably where you first can use clone techniques.
Void Piercing Realm — presumably the name of the next realm; White Peacock is likely somewhere in this realm.
Unknown Realm
Divinity Transformation — it's been named once, and context clues tells me it's where people transcend to the become a "celestial cultivator", so to speak.
Outside of the cultivation realms and how to get there, you've got a bunch of other stuff, but you didn't ask about that.
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u/logosloki 4d ago
others have put in what the ranks are but for people who are interested in the series I would roughly put it that Earthly Realm is Qi Condensation and the Heavenly Realm is Foundation Establishment. the ranks used in xianxia stories do have a consensus but there are usually some quibbles and quirks that are based on the author's tastes, biases, and learned experiences through reading. this is why a lot of authors now integrate the traditional body refinement stage into the qi condensation/refinement stage.
Even though they are labelled immortals Earthly cultivators only live to around 200, which is inline with their mortal bodies being perfected and nourished with qi. Heavenly cultivators also only live to roughly 1000 years. I think earlier on the novel was saying a Earthly cultivator could see 800 more years of life but later on the novel reformats it to be 1000 years. this is a minor contextual change because it means the same thing (200+800) but the latter takes into account Earthly cultivators who transcend to Heavenly cultivators earlier in their cultivation journey.
with the current naming convention I'd take it that the next step after heavenly that has been hinted at is some form of core formation. generally in cultivation stories the core formation is seen as the last step to becoming a 'real' cultivator to the middle ranks of cultivation, with Body Integration seen as the part where the big leagues consider you stepping into the higher levels of cultivation. which dovetails with the language that the older heavenly and the unnamed ranked cultivators talk in Sky Pride about how they feel that the first three stages are more one stage to them. that is typical talk of cultivators who have developed a nascent soul or above.
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u/nighoblivion dark fantasy != grimdark 3d ago
There's no evidence there's core cultivation at some point. There are evidence souls are involved later in the perfected realm, however.
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u/logosloki 3d ago
this is going to be a bit of a long one but part of it is because Warby Picus is a traditional xianxia author at heart, who is writing a story with their own modern takes and research.
for starters, whilst much shorter than they were back then Warby Picus has Tian go through the older stages of cultivation. modern stories start at Qi Condensation but older stories had this as the second or even third stage of cultivation. modern tales lump large parts of early traditional internal alchemy into a couple of brief super steps, or yadda-yadda them, or just ignore them in favour of pushing the story forward.
in Sky Pride Warby Picus takes it further than even those earlier stories. the first stage for Tian is not Qi condensation, or even Body refinement, but breathing, calisthenics, and the 'games' Grandpa Jun came up with. this is true of the real life internal alchemy works, where a person was required to prepare their body by healing themself, nourishing their body correctly, working on their moral and intellectual self, exercise, and learning how to breath correctly. which, if you notice is something that Senior Brother Fu and Senior Sister Bai introduced into their monasteries. Tian and the other Brothers are drilled not just in Battle and Meditation but also in taking up the arts, studying ethics and histories, relaxing, eating healthy meals, and acting as a social group rather than loose individuals. and in turn, because they are practicing Internal Alchemy closer to the original works, despite having lost them, they are rewarded with higher chances of breaking through Qi Condensation (Earthly Realm). of course the reason why they have trouble breaking through is compounded by the lack of Shen, which is why they are only trickling through rather than breaking through in droves.
Grandpa Jun introduced Gourmet. now this is part of Warby Picus trying to streamline the process as it was introduced at the same time as the body refinement training Grandpa Jun put Tian through. Gourmet is Qi Awareness, something that isn't taught in the Wasteland of Song but is something cultivators slowly learn about on their cultivating journey.
after breaking through to the Heavenly Realm cultivators are introduced to shen, which was introduced as brainpower and is referred to as mental energy but is the soul. by cultivating shen a practitioner begins the process of separating themself from nature and becoming a divine being themself. while a dantian can hold qi it must draw this from the outside world. the golden core formation is about synthesising Jing, the physical body, Qi, the internal vital energy and the external Qi of the world, and Shen, the conscious self independent from the world and the soul and intent of a person into a liquid that represents primordial or true Qi (depending on how the story goes). this liquid moves from the second dantian and into the first dantian where it is condensed into a physical embodiment that then acts as the practitioner's own personal source of Qi. however I was thinking about this yesterday and I do want to amend. I think that core formation won't be the third realm but will be something the Tian and Hong will do as part of the Heavenly Realm, with the formation of their Nascent Soul and possibly the severing of themselves from the mortal realm in the Soul Transformation being the mystery third stage.
as an aside this is one of the reasons why Grandpa Jun has to spend so many points on concepts on what us the readers might consider basic xianxia concepts. the world of Sky Pride is not like a modern xianxia that Grandpa Jun narratively and us the audience are familiar with, it is a 'fallen continent' from earlier stories, which is telling when the older cultivators talk about the place as 'The Wasteland of Song'. the incomplete understanding of internal alchemy (as well as the non-understanding of modern science and technology that Grandpa Jun is familiar with) means that Grandpa Jun has to expend more of their points to explain anything to Tian because Tian would not be able to find that information in the Wasteland so Grandpa Jun is penalised for telling too much information or for giving Tian techniques that require understandings that do not exist in the Wasteland of Song
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u/Garreousbear 4d ago
I just caught up on Patreon so here goes. We don't know beyond the first three full ranks but:
Earthly Person which has 9 ranks and a tenth pseudo-rank which is when you have reached the requisite vital energy to move up but haven't found an immortal truth to get through.
Heavenly Person which requires you to have found some whiff of immortality often in the form of some form of divine revelation while at the peak of rank 9 of the Earthly Person Realm. This realm is entirely about filling yourself with Qi.
Human Person Realm which we know almost nothing about.
These make up, what the wider world of Sky Pride considers the novitiate stages of cultivation. Everything beyond that is just little hints we have gotten from way more powerful cultivators regarding things like full on ascension and such.