Ludwig concentrated on the seed in his dantian, and it just took a second before his vision changed. There was no need for him to close and open his eyes, and sleeping intentionally for that was not needed either.
When he looked around, it was the same feeling of being in a glass house that was see through and only spiritual power was actually hard matter. And similarly to the times before, he couldn't move no matter what.
Building a foundation is actually more literal than one might think. The qi-refining realm is where one gathers qi into their body and compresses it into their dantian, to fit as much qi as possible and make the dantian fuller. One could say the same is true for the foundation establishment realm, but the focus here lays in the fact that the qi is compressed into a pillar.
At least that is the description given to Ludwig in all the books he read, but when he looked through the memories he gained, he understood it vastly different. This actually was very similar to the Vectors in his past life.
'The first is to create a horizontal pillar that supports the dantian, the cultivators in this world call it the heaven and earth pillar. The second is the vertical pillar, once again they have a fancy name for it – the eastern dragon and western tiger pillar, although it is confusing where the other two mythological beasts remain. Because the third pillar, the one giving the whole diagram depth, the diagonal pillar, is called the time and space pillar.'
In the most basic terms, this is just a diagram that can determine the coordinate the location of a point in a three-dimensional graphic. They are also the three stages of Low, Middle and High Foundation establishment.
As Ludwig was contemplating the way of cultivation and how it was pretty basic math, he absorbed crazy amounts of qi. He didn't even realise this because he went deeper into the thought of cultivation.
'The peak stage of foundation establishment is not very different, somewhat easy one could say. That is because one has to compress their dantian from its original oval form to a circular one, until all pillars have the exact same length.
But, instead of having a crystal at that point, the difficulty here is to make a bow between the length from pillar to another pillar, making it more round in shape. This is why this step is the most difficult for most, but it should actually be the easiest.
One should do it like this…' he thought of it and the spiritual power around him came flooding into his dantian, he didn't reject any of it and everything poured into it, in an instant, the dantian that was about to crack apart, had three ethereal pillars that didn't seem real.
'When one creates their first pillar, the heaven and earth come closer, making the east dragon and western tiger fall apart, when the second pillar is formed, the dantian is closer to a quadrat than a circle, making it difficult to have a deeper depth, and when the final third pillar is formed, the shape is very stable and the inner structure is difficult to change, unlike a sphere, which is just as stable but has a very elastic way of inner construction.'
The three pillars in Ludwig's dantian pulled more and more qi from the surroundings, and all at the same time also pulled the dantian closer. The dantian that hasn't been disturbed by one pillar forming before the other, kept it's oval shape, but the oval shape became more circular.
'When all pillars are formed together…'
He thought as he waited for a moment before continuing. This time, unlike the unconscious pull of spiritual power he did prior, he put his whole energy into pulling the spiritual power of the whole surroundings, as he pulled, he suddenly felt a great stream of spiritual power gush into his building while he couldn't sense anything beyond that.
Ludwig smiled but paid no heed. 'When the heaven and earth, the dragon and tiger and time space pillars pull the dantian at the same time, then a perfect shape is formed of three pillars supporting a whole circle. No matter what, three pillars are three and the dantian was born oval, so the dantian is closer to the shape of a sphere than it is to a quadrat.'
If those rules weren't in place, then someone who had less mathematical knowledge would never manage to complete the foundation establishment stage. Since the world didn't have deeper general science, then the average cultivator had to have a way of advancing. As for other fields being scientific, the formation creation art is probably the most scientific, but all other creation arts are also scientific. Botany for planting, medical for alchemists, math and physics for formation, and so on.
And Ludwig's guess was true. In that fateful moment when the pillars absorbed enough qi and were in full balance, his dantian was fully pulled and looked circular from every direction, it is now the prototype of a real sphere and is in all aspects expect one a sphere.
Ludwig thought about it and suddenly took a step. Yes, he took a step in the ethereal world. Although he wasn't able to move a lot, he was able to move! This meant a whole different thing for him, because he understood his dantian that was more stable enabled it to travel out of his body – it's physical appearance was still in his body, but the ethereal pull of spiritual power was elsewhere.
If one looked from the outside, they would see the dantian absorbing spiritual power constantly, but the fluctuations of spiritual power wouldn't be exactly where the dantian was, instead it would be a step away.
As Ludwig looked back, he also saw a bright point right where his dantian was and he felt a thin line spreading from his ethereal self to the position of his dantian, which led all the way to the physical body. It was as if his dantian was his checkpoint and he could return directly if he wished to, but he didn't need to do that, because although the ethereal world is a world that mirrors the physical world, the laws for time and space are totally different.
Any spiritual power Ludwig used would be taken from his dantian no matter where he was, while any spiritual power he absorbed, no matter how far away it was from his dantian, would still be delivered to his dantian as if he only absorbed the surrounding spiritual power.
Ludwig didn't wait any longer and used all his power to step forward. With each step, the pillars in his dantian seemed to be tested, but each step also made them more resilient. In theory, Ludwig was actually already a High Foundation Establishment cultivator, but he knew it was different.
With each formation of pillar, the compressed qi within would become a lot more, this heightened the difficulty of forming later pillars, but it also strengthened the existing ones.
In an example, it's as if people build a house by building room by room, while Ludwig built a house by firstly building the outer construct of the house, then slowly filling the ground, walls and ceiling. Naturally since modern people use the way of firstly building the structure of the house, then filling it, it is better in various ways.
So, with each step Ludwig took, he absorbed more spiritual power and was able to slowly fill the ground of his house. When he reached the end of his own yard, the ground was fully filled. 'This is much faster than I expected. In the remaining years, walls and ceiling should follow, the ground is only the easiest because technically it has no pressure on it just yet and is like a floating piece of wood on a calm river.
Only when I build the walls, will the ground be reinforced step by step while the walls will be reinforced as I build the ceiling. The ceiling… will be reinforced by enduring outside forces, in the final result, I will have a true sphere instead of the circular dantian I have currently.'
In the final analysis, Ludwig knew his cultivation better than anyone else. He passed the door of the yard, a slight rejection was felt, it wasn't the pressure of his own dantian but a pressure coming from outside, but this pressure quickly subsided.
When Ludwig was fully outside, he was able to actually see someone. Yes, it wasn't only spiritual power gathered together, he was actually able to see someone. This shouldn't have been too surprising, he expected that anyone who reached the golden core stage would be able to do the same he did in the qi refining stage, a cultivation stage further and they would be able to do the same thing he does currently.
One shouldn't think he's very special because he can do things people two stages above him should only start doing – his focus is the soul, the ethereal world is easier to enter for soul cultivators, but if you put him and a physical cultivator in a room of heightened greatly gravity, his body would be smashed to meat paste and his soul would escape the room, while the physical body cultivator would only feel like he was only doing light exercises.