As they walked out of the house, they headed towards the portal arch, and as usual, Elder Byron decided to have a conversation with Rand at that moment, explaining to him the wisdom of life and cultivation.
"Oberin, as I've already mentioned, our sect specializes in the Transformation Path. In fact, there are many paths through which cultivators can achieve power. I can list several for you: the Body Path, through which cultivators transform their bodies into true semblances of treasure-like artifacts, brimming with primal power; the Weapon Path, where they concentrate much of their energy into external objects, making them extremely strong in attack with weapons, but almost helpless without them; the Elemental Path, where cultivators synchronize their bodies with one or several elements, for example, practitioners of the fire element gain immense control over their element and can use fire techniques in ways other cultivators cannot.
Each of the paths I've listed is vast, with many variations and branches. Speaking of smaller paths, the Dark Moon Path immediately comes to mind, which is a branch of the Light Path. It's practiced by the imperial family. But just because it's a branch of the main path doesn't mean it's weaker or stronger than the main path or any other. It just has a slightly greater specialization than its parent, and whether that's good or bad depends on the situation and the practitioners of these paths.
This doesn't mean that one person can only practice one path, although some paths do conflict with each other. What truly hinders a cultivator from practicing several paths at once is time. Because a cultivator's time is always limited, and someone who tries to practice several paths at once usually isn't very good at any of them and is unlikely to be stronger than others, more likely the opposite. Although there are exceptions to this rule.
As for the path of our sect, it differs slightly from the typical Transformation Path. The main difference is that it intertwines to a large extent with the Body and Blood Paths. In a sense, we are that exception. We are cultivators who practice several paths.
To obtain the power of a spiritual beast, we transfuse its blood into ourselves and essentially become half-humans, half-beasts. Human minds, but beastly bodies and strength. But this path has its problems, otherwise every hunter would transfuse beast blood and surpass their limits.
The main problem is that the human body is not adapted for this. It's too weak to accept the strength of beasts, which are born with stronger bodies. To solve this problem, we also cultivate the Body Path to some extent, so that our bodies become strong enough to accept foreign blood without being destroyed by its overwhelming power.
But solving this problem creates another. Even if our bodies are strong enough, beast blood doesn't want to settle in a foreign organism and rejects it. If an ordinary cultivator of the Body Path tries to infuse themselves with spiritual beast blood, they will not only gain nothing useful from it, but also harm themselves. Therefore, to solve this problem, we practice the Blood Path. Remember when I told you about the Mythical Blood cultivation method? So, with its help, we first strengthen our blood, and then transform it so that it can not only coexist with alien beast blood but also absorb its power. Truly a miraculous method."
Here, in the midst of his endless monologue, Rand interjected with a question, to which he partially knew the answer, but thought that perhaps this old man could add something interesting, and it was necessary to throw him off rhythm, or else he would talk until evening about things known to every passerby.
"Master, so this technique allows us not only to combine our blood with that of dragons, but also with other creatures, right? For example, with a phoenix or a legendary white tiger..."
"With a phoenix or a white tiger, hm. Your choice is certainly impressive. Even the great elder would hesitate to deal with them. But yes, any animal with blood can be used, as long as it doesn't exceed the practitioner's capabilities. For instance, if a disciple at the Foundation Establishment stage tries to infuse themselves with the blood of a Core Formation stage creature, it will end badly for the person. At best, they won't succeed, and at worst, they'll die. Another difficulty is that if the same Foundation Establishment stage disciple finds a cub of an animal that easily reaches the Nascent Soul stage when mature and tries to infuse themselves with its blood, in most cases they'll meet a similar tragic fate. In the offspring of animals, their blood may be somewhat 'asleep,' but it doesn't become weaker because of it.
"That's why it's very important for the sect to have various animals for each stage of its disciple's cultivation. Small wyverns for the Foundation Establishment stage, true wyverns for the Core Formation stage, hornless dragons for the Nascent Soul stage.
"Also, dragon-like creatures have many advantages compared to most others. They are relatively easy to feed, as they don't require special food. The lower their rank, the faster they reproduce, and many other small and big advantages. But for cultivators, the most important of them are only two. First, animals from the dragon lineage, even the weakest among them, generally surpass other animals at the same cultivation stage in strength. A wyvern will always be stronger than a wolf or a bear when they're at the same cultivation stage. Second, if a practitioner at the Foundation Establishment stage infused themselves with the blood of a small wyvern, then when they enter the Core Formation stage, it will be much easier for them to transition to the blood of true wyvern than, say, a thunderbird." With these last words, the elder finally paused, but after a few seconds, he continued speaking.
"I understand that I've given you a huge amount of information, and it's very difficult to grasp it all at once, but you don't need to understand everything right away. In time, you'll figure it all out. Right now, you just need to know that you'll have to train your body and strengthen your blood. And for that, you'll need techniques, for which we're heading there now."