The first thing Dante did before starting his Soul Cultivation journey was travel to the best spot that he's found so far for cultivating one's soul. This place also happens to be one of the most dangerous spots he's found in the entire Immortal Realm so far.
The beasts here are far stronger than most other places and almost all of them can use some form of soul attack.
It's by far the best place to train one's soul!
To advance one's Soul Cultivation is actually fairly unique compared to the other two cultivation systems, but Dante was already suspecting it to be something like this even before he transmigrated.
There are only two things to keep in mind to progress one's soul: Quantity and quality.
Every step in Soul Cultivation does essentially the same thing. It increases the purity of one's soul while also increasing the amount of Soul Energy one can hold.
The only difference between the layers is just how much these two increase.
For example, each Minor Realm (Layers) will bring about subtle changes to one's soul. While each Major Realm will bring about significant changes to one's soul, almost to the point where after breaking through a Major Realm, it'll almost feel like you are starting from the very beginning. Only, this time you'll start out with much more soul energy and the purity will be incomparable to what it was before.
Cultivating one's soul also brings more benefits than just being useful in attacking and defending, but Dante is unaware of that right now.
Not only can Dante cultivate his soul faster, but he can also use it in battle against experienced beasts.
The only problem with this place is it's rather annoying to get into… Well, that's not entirely accurate.
It's fairly easy to get into, but most people are instantly killed by the ruler of this place for trespassing in its territory.
The annoying part is getting in unnoticed which is nearly impossible since the ruler of this place is either an 8th Realm Empyrean Soul-Beast or a 9th Realm Divine Soul beast. Both of which would be incredibly annoying for Dante to fight in his current state.
He wouldn't necessarily die, but with his pitiful Soul Cultivation, he might injure his soul which is a big no-no!
Dante also doesn't want to kill this beast, at least not until he becomes strong enough to fight it with his soul.
Luckily for Dante, sneaking in isn't much of a problem. Not only does he have zero Soul Cultivation, but his aura is more beast-like than human-like. This is mainly because he spends most of his time in the wilderness with beasts and when he's not killing beasts then he's killing humans.
So all he has to do is kill a beast near the outskirts of this place and slightly alter his aura to match the beast he just killed then he's good to go…
Which is exactly what he did.
With the hard part out of the way, all Dante has to do is cultivate, fight, study, and repeat.
So that's exactly what he did!
For the next 20,000 years!
During these 20,000 years, the population of this Soul Cultivation paradise dropped to around 40% of what it was before Dante came. He even killed the ruler of this place which happened to be something really fucking annoying. It was some hybrid mutated bat-like beast.
Not only was it incredibly fast, but its attacks were annoying as hell to deal with! Every time it screeched, his body, mind, soul, and especially his ears were hurt or disoriented in some way.
The two fought for who knows how many years as Dante used the bat to temper his soul and his techniques and when Dante finally reached the 9th Layer of the Divine Soul Realm (9th Realm), and his 'Heaven's Ruler Soul Attack Arts', 'Heaven's Ruler Soul Defense Arts', and a 'Heaven's Ruler Soul Auxiliary Arts' reached Peak-Divine-Tier did Dante finally kill it.
After all of these years, Dante realized why nobody cultivated their soul! Because it was basically fucking impossible!
One could say that Dante has some of the best conditions for cultivating his soul in the entire Immortal Realm!
That may be a bit of an exaggeration as there are most likely better places than the one he stayed in for cultivating one's soul, but Dante didn't feel like searching for a needle in an almost infinitely large haystack!
Not only does Dante have a Cultivation Manual with 100% compatibility with his soul, but he's also in a place that can speed up his Soul Cultivation by several times.
It'd be a fucking miracle if anyone was able to cultivate their soul to the peak without these two things.
In fact, Dante is positive that even if someone did manage to reach the peak while relying on a half-decent cultivation manual and a shit load of resources, they'd never be able to break past that barrier. They also wouldn't even be able to put up a fight against Dante's Soul since he was able to bring out 100% potential in his soul and he didn't even need to rely on herbs or pills for that to happen.
But one thing is for sure, Dante is glad to be done with cultivating his soul for now.
With that being said, there were a few unexpected benefits that came from cultivating his soul.
He is able to reach enlightenment much faster and will stay in it much longer. He's able to retain, study, and calculate things at a speed comparable to advanced artificial intelligence. It also seems like having a high Soul Cultivation will help tremendously with smithing, alchemy, inscriptions, formations, arrays, studying the elements, and various other things as well.
Dante can also tell that his understanding of his own body increased to an insane degree. He can even notice the differences in each cell of his body which will help immensely when he tempers his body. That way he can make sure he brings out 100% potential from his body.
Dante has also already mapped out the best places to go to temper his body and with his Peak Divine Soul Realm cultivation, he was easily able to finish his Body Tempering Cultivation Manual.
While Dante is tempering his body during this time, he figured that he might as well come up with his 'Heaven's Ruler Sword Arts', 'Heaven's Ruler Spear Arts', 'Heaven's Ruler Dagger Arts', 'Heaven's Ruler Hammer Arts', and so on. It shouldn't take him too long to finish each one considering he's already done it before with his 'Heaven's Ruler Martial Arts'.
Finishing his schedule, Dante set out to temper his body.
Honestly, Dante didn't think that it would take him very long to reach the peak. Maybe 1,000 years? It may seem short compared to the other Cultivation systems, but one must remember that he's already at the peak of the Immortal Realm in terms of Essence Gathering and Soul Cultivation. Who can possibly stand a chance against him? Not to mention his cultivation manual is 100% compatible with his body making it so he won't face any bottlenecks. Therefore as long as he brings out 100% of his potential in each minor and major Realm, his foundation will remain perfect.
The thing that will take time is the weapon arts he plans on creating. As it won't just be 1 or two weapons, but probably around a dozen, he'll be doing this for.
Even with his Soul Cultivation, this will take a long time to complete, but all he's got is time!
It's time to get started with Body Tempering!
***
10,000 years later
Dante had finally finished tempering his body and was now an ultimate peak level existence in the entire Immortal Realm.
Right now, even if someone wanted to kill him, they would find such an achievement near impossible.
Just his body alone is probably stronger than any metal and if one were to attack his soul, they'd be lucky if they didn't instantly die from the backlash.
The amount of destruction that he could cause right now is nothing short of godly. If he were back on Earth right now, if he didn't control his strength properly just simply walking might obliterate the planet.
Not only that, but even if someone could fight him head-on and not die instantly, he can perfectly wield just about any weapon and can even fight bare-handed. During these last 10,000 years, he's studied and perfected the Sword, Saber, Spear, Staff, Daggers, Great Sword, Dual Swords, Dual Daggers, Hammer, Warhammer, Scythe, Axe, and the Whip.
What the hell is someone supposed to do if they ever fight him?! They might as well just commit suicide to save themselves the humiliation!
Yet, Dante wasn't satisfied with this! No! He wanted more! Being a Peak level existence didn't just mean being able to fight well! It meant having no weaknesses!
Now he needed to study smithing, alchemy, inscriptions, formations, arrays, and any other professions!
He needed to comprehend the elements! Fire, Water, Air, Earth, Wood, Lightning, Ice, Dark, Light, Space, and Time!
He needed the perfect bloodline!
He needed the perfect Physique!
He needed to become perfect before attempting to ascend to True Immortality!
"Hahaha! Let's fucking go! Now that I'm done with all of that boring shit, it's finally time to start having a bit of fun! Hahaha!"
As Dante was laughing like a madman, for some reason unknown to others, the entire Immortal Realm trembled a bit.
Nobody knew exactly what this meant, but one thing was clear… It wasn't a good thing.
And, it sure as hell wasn't! At least not for the parties that were a victim of Dante! Hahaha!