Spiritual Pulses fall into four categories and four grades:
Beast, Elemental, War and Mysterious for the categories. Low, mid, high, and peerless for the grades.
With Beast Pulses being the most accessible of all four, most human cultivators settled for them, using their Beast Pulses to reinforce their fleshly bodies and enhance their battle prowess. Spirits on the other hand had an easier time condensing Elemental Pulses, using them to magnify their bloodline abilities and become the most dominant forces of their respective elements. This made Beast and Elemental Pulses the most common Spiritual Pulses in the cultivation world.
War Pulses encompassed swords, spears, drums, zithers—all the weapons and instruments that one could think of. As a reference, the Peerless Sword Embryo hidden in Chun Xu's Nameless Sword contained the method used by the Nameless Sword Emperor to condense his Peerless Sword Pulse.
At the peerless grade, cultivators acquired quasi-invulnerability towards the aspect that their pulse stemmed from. Only someone with a Peerless Sword Pulse or some form of equivalent ability could injure a Peerless Sword Pulse owner with swords.
As for Mysterious Pulses, they were both the rarest and most varied. Zi Zuixian's Eccentric Wine Pulse, for example, was a peerless-grade Mysterious Pulse that, not only enabled him to create spiritual alcoholic beverages of various properties out of thin air but also control the water particles in a limited radius and induce drunkenness with one glance. At the same time, no amount of alcohol could damage his body, and water too barely had any effect on him.
With that said, there wasn't a genuine hierarchy between the categories. Some Beast Pulses were stronger than Elemental and War Pulses, while some Mysterious Pulses could be worth less than a toothpick. Still, in general, Mysterious Pulses came out on top—with some having such broken abilities that they instantly made their foes despair.
In a sense, Xinzi's Hell Suppressing Immortal Tree was a one-of-a-kind Peerless Demon Pulse, possible only due to the combination of his Five Elements Transmutative Technique and Diabolic Shards.
With it to rely on, Xinzi could control or suppress all demonic powers, erase the infernal signature in his Evil Qi and mask it as Immortal Qi. The Swallowing Skill also became tremendously more effective on demonkind—enabling Xinzi to outright devour stronger demons.
Xinzi had yet to take one step in Hell but had already positioned himself as its Overlord—well, Overlord in the making, of course. And with the Pulse now set in stone, the type and quality of the Golden Core and Nascent Soul had been decided as well.
Xinzi's lips curled up, and our monk arched his head back. In Burning Spear Supercity, the White-Winged Demon Brigade's conversion work ended. From cultivator children to decrepit elders, all accepted the mnemonics, becoming a doomstack of eight million White-Winged Demons. Together, they spread their wings, flying in raptured delight throughout Burning Spear Supercity.
The ancestral animosity between humans, beasts and demons died here, and in tandem they sang tunes that all started with: "Oh, Reverend Ecstasy!"
Diabolic Shards upon Diabolic Shards piled up by Xinzi's side. A tempest of sky-blue light formed around him, soaring through the broken ceiling as 79,922 Diabolic Shards assembled at his feet. Large black wings grew from Xinzi's back, unfolding with an explosion of formless energies. Now able to utilize all his skills without fear of exposing his demonic abilities, Xinzi dared say that, even without the Thousand Soul Immolation Flag, under Dao Revelation, he had nothing to fear.
Alas, as always, all this came with a little catch. The souls stored in Xinzi's heart flew out, his mouth opened wide, devouring thousands of souls in one gulp. At the same time, the Hell Suppressing Immortal Tree's branches grew restless, dangling over the White-Winged Demons and Xue Yuanshao as if considering whether to devour them or not.
Xinzi flicked his tongue over his lips, his eyes sweeping the demonic troops. The 100 Corpse Demon Coffins nourishing the Self-Reinforcing Evil Tide didn't escape our monk's attention. Xue Yuanshao sensed Xinzi's hunger, and terror-struck, he reeled back.
"Master, I am not comestible! My old sack of bones would give you an indigestion!" Alarmed, Xue Yuanshao kowtowed at Xinzi. And if not for our monk having sovereign control of the old Xue's soul, he'd have bolted by now.
"Hungry...I'm...hungry." At this time, the 1,600 Poisonfeather Birds returned from their scouting job, flying into the gorge. Confused by the dreamlike changes, they wondered if they'd not gotten into the wrong place. Xinzi's Klesha Haze assured them that they didn't, guiding their flight through the vast expanse of land that this mini cavernous world now occupied.
"Hello, scouts. Sorry, scouts," Xinzi said, and the Poisonfeather Birds' eyes turned blank. The Klesha Haze took over, keeping the flock of birds in suspension. One tree branch swiped at them, its length increasing to an impossible 60 meters as it aimed for the beasts' necks. Too fast for anyone under Dao Revelation to follow, the elongated tree branch lopped off 300 Poisonfeather Birds' heads, capturing their souls before their bisected bodies started plummeting towards the ground.
"I can't say that I didn't have a future in store for you...but I'm really...HUNGRY!" Xinzi's eyes turned red, and his mouth opened wide, sucking all 300 souls in. Still, he wanted more. 1,300 tree branches thrust out, aiming to end the lives of all Poisonfeather Birds.
However, one inch away from the necks, the branches stopped. Xinzi's head tilting left and right while his right hand clenched at his left arm.
"Nooo...this is not how we do things here. We don't harm our own! You're giving me a bad look. The fuck is wrong is you?"
"But I'm hungry? HUNGRY!" To the onlookers, Xinzi was talking to himself, spinning, throwing hands and salivating like a demented incarnation of gluttony.
"The Shards..." Without delay, Xinzi jumped on the pile of shards, grabbing six in one swipe, and tossing them into his mouth. His Evil Qi—now shaped like Immortal Qi, rose at an alarming speed. But in this behavior, none could see an immortal.
Fortunately, the shards did the trick, sating the ravenous hunger pulsing in Xinzi's dantian. Clarity returned to Xinzi's eyes, but concern now twisted his face.
For those equipped with the Swallowing Skill, hunger was the norm. Hunger for all possible sources of immediate growth. The better of a match the food was to the demon's heart, the hungrier they were for it. At the same time, the more powerful a demon, the greater their hunger. However, demons could always keep their hunger in check, never letting it become the master of their infernal hearts.
In the Infernal Paradise, there was nothing more shameful than letting the hunger take over, and the Lords of Hell had a unique prison meant specifically for demons, nobles and even devils that failed to keep their hunger in check: the Pit of Doom.
So far, Xinzi didn't have any issue controlling his hunger. But the condensation of the Hell Suppressing Immortal Tree added to his cravings, making him look at all demons, bloodlines and souls as food he could use to further empower the tree.
Now, as his hearts multiplied, his Reincarnation of Mahasura reached higher levels, and his Evil Qi grew, so would the hunger.
'If the tree was perfect, this shouldn't happen. There must be a defect. That, or I've seized powers that don't belong to the cultivation world, and I'm now paying the price for it.'
