Mo Han crouched before the body he had killed.Not out of remorse. Not out of respect.But for analysis.
He observed how the man's muscles were distributed, the faint traces of energy in his veins, the subtle tremor that lingered even in death. He used his fingers to trace tension points, like a scientist studying the broken fragment of a machine.
— "He was cultivating…" he whispered.
It was clear. The flow of Qi still clung to a few meridians, like a scent that refused to fade.But he hadn't been a powerful cultivator.First level, maybe second at best. A failed initiate—discarded like the rest.
And yet, it had been difficult.Mo Han had nearly died.
And in that instant, realization struck him with brutal clarity:
If that was all I could do against the weakest…How will I stand against what lives outside?The real cultivators?The ones who break walls with their fists?
He looked at his own hands.Intelligence. Patterns. Calculation... all of it had worked.But it was obvious: his current method was not scalable.There was a ceiling.A biological limit that no amount of repetition alone would ever surpass.
Am I trying to imitate something I don't truly understand?
And that's when everything changed.
Mo Han recalled a detail.One of the cultivators he had once observed—before being cast aside—mentioned something about "purity levels." Most cultivated by absorbing Qi from the environment—raw, heavy, impure.But the great masters... they filtered.They refined.
And then came the epiphany:
They don't cultivate Qi.They survive it.But what if, instead of resisting raw energy...I could absorb only its essence?
Mo Han closed his eyes.He searched the residual energy left in the man's body.A minimal trace of Qi still pulsed—dense, erratic, toxic.It was like trying to drink saltwater: the body rejected it, even while dying of thirst.
That's the flaw.They force the body to accept the impure—and call it strength.But if I could isolate just the core of that energy...
It was simple.And revolutionary.
He mentally constructed a new protocol:Internal Essence Filter.
He would never again absorb energy in full.Instead, he would create a mental mesh—a structure to decode the vibration of surrounding energy, separating the impure frequency from the pure.A process almost imperceptible—but constant.
He tested it right then.
Activated a rune of absolute focus, and searched for traces of Qi in the underground air of the prison.It was minimal. But it was there.Dirty. Contaminated.
Applying the filtering pattern, he felt a faint thread of heat slide up the base of his neck.
It didn't hurt.It didn't burn.It was... clean.
Mo Han's eyes widened.
This is true Qi.This is essence.
And more:His body didn't resist.The small fraction he absorbed integrated effortlessly.As if it had been made for him.
This is it.This is what they're all missing.
They are buckets trying to swallow an ocean.I will be the needle that separates gold from mud.
With this method, he understood something deeper still:A cultivator who uses pure essence is, at equal level, five times stronger than a traditional one.Because their energy isn't polluted.Because their body doesn't fight itself.Because their mind doesn't drown.
There, in that forgotten corner of the prison,Mo Han didn't just survive.
He ascended.
Not by luck.Not by bloodline.
But because he saw what no one else dared to see:
The whole world cultivates strength.I cultivate the filter.