After looking at his surroundings with his new Spirit Sense for a while, Shang sat down again and closed his right eye.
It was time to reach the True Path Stage.
It had been so long.
He had worked so much.
50 years of training tirelessly with unending discipline and enthusiasm.
How long would a normal talented person have taken, someone that didn't dedicate 100% of their life to their own power?
Probably over 150 years.
Maybe even over 200.
The danger of dying of old age would have been a real possibility.
But now, it was time.
Shang concentrated on his Path and willed it to become a reality.
It took several hours, but eventually, his Path began to manifest.
Shang felt a certain feeling of order enter his body, and he felt how it strengthened him.
It enveloped his entire being, and Shang felt how his connection with the world deepened.
Shang pulled this certain feeling deep into his chest and gathered it in one place. This was how the warriors reached the True Path Stage.
All the Mana in the surroundings entered Shang's body. Even the unknown kinds of Mana.
When someone elevated in power at this level, they absorbed all kinds of Mana of the surroundings to strengthen their being.
The Mana in the surrounding kilometers began to gather at Shang's place, but new Mana simply flooded the empty spaces again.
Mana was unending, and it filled the entire world.
As Shang absorbed more and more Mana, the connections of Mana he had established when he reached the Commander Stage began to strengthen even more.
The circulation of Mana inside Shang's body intensified severalfold, and he felt like he was ascending.
It was such a mysterious but empowering feeling.
It was like he was leaving his old body behind and inhabiting a new one.
As the connection strengthened even more, the different strands of Mana started to connect with each other. They didn't connect the different parts of Shang's body with each other anymore but directly connected with each other.
Shang willed them to become even more powerful, and at that moment, a change happened.
Shang felt the strands of Mana dissipate at the same level as they were being built. It was like there wasn't enough power to tie them together.
It was like someone needed to hold so many things that they would need three arms. Shang simply couldn't concentrate on everything at once.
However, Shang had already expected that.
This issue was the very reason why a warrior needed to have created their Path. Every warrior without a Path could have also reached that step, but this would be the very step that made them fail.
Shang visualized his Path and willed it to take control of his entire being.
As soon as that happened, the different strands of Mana slowed down, but they also stopped dissipating.
The streams of Mana began to move and extend to different locations than before, and this time, they stayed stable.
They crisscrossed over his entire body and slowly created something that looked like a network.
It took several minutes for all the strands to completely connect to each other, and when they were done, something changed again.
Even more Mana entered Shang's body.
The strands of Mana pulled at the surrounding Mana like they were a bottomless hole.
More and more Mana entered Shang's body for several more minutes.
As more time passed, Shang's body began to shine in a blue light.
To Shang, the Mana inside his body felt like a steady wind. It was circulating inside it in a rapid stream, strengthening his entire body.
At some point, Shang felt like he was at his limit, but he had already learned how to advance to the True Path Stage.
He suppressed the feeling and began to absorb more Mana. This was necessary since the body didn't naturally absorb enough Mana to make the breakthrough.
It was like Shang was forcing himself to eat more and more, even though he felt full.
The instinct of spitting out the Mana screamed at Shang.
However, Shang's expression didn't even change.
He had gone through so much pain in his life that this little bit of discomfort barely counted as a mere annoyance.
Shang shoved more and more Mana inside his body until he felt that it became impossible to absorb more.
His body had reached Mana saturation.
Then, Shang took a deep breath.
And willed all of the strings of Mana inside his body to compress.
They had become far wider in the past minutes, and Shang would need to compress them.
If he didn't do that, he basically wouldn't be able to move the Mana around. It was simply far too pressurized and massive.
Shang remained sitting on the floor for several minutes, his eye closed.
He felt like his soul and body were cramping, but this was an expected effect that every warrior had to go through.
If a warrior couldn't even deal with this bit of discomfort, they didn't deserve to reach the True Path Stage anyway.
All the strands of Mana became thinner and more compressed.
Shang felt the pressure inside his body climb to new heights.
It was like he was compressing air between his two hands.
Yet, Shang only continued in a methodical manner.
In the next hour, the Mana compressed to only half of its initial volume.
Another hour later, it halved its volume again.
At that point, Shang felt like he had hit a limit.
It was like he couldn't compress it anymore.
'This is the moment,' he thought with a bit of excitement. Who wouldn't be excited after finally achieving their goal after 50 years of hard work?
Shang gathered all his power and willpower.
BANG!
And unleashed everything in one final compression.
It was difficult, and Shang only made tiny progress.
However, just five seconds later, something happened.
Shang felt like he had suddenly lost his grip on his Mana.
He felt like the air he was trying to compress with so much force had suddenly vanished.
Shang knew what that meant.
Shang looked at the strands of Mana inside his body and saw that they had reduced their volume by another 90%.
This was it.
Earlier, Shang had felt like the Mana inside his body was a wind blowing through his body in a loop.
Now, it was like it was a river.
Yes, the Mana had transformed from gaseous to liquid.
He had done it!
There was now a network of veins filled with liquid Mana inside his veins, and the Mana was moving rapidly through his body.
And the very engine that made something this condensed and powerful move was Shang's comprehension of his Path.
Every network of veins was unique, and no human had the same network. Their Path and Concepts decided what kind of network their Mana would build.
The networks didn't have different strengths or weaknesses. They looked different, but they were all equally good.
They were only aligned differently to make it easier to interact with one's Path.
After looking at his body for several minutes, Shang finally opened his right eye and activated his Spirit Sense.
When he saw what he could see with his Spirit Sense, a smile appeared on his face.
He could see the surrounding 20 kilometers!
High Mages could only see the surrounding five kilometers!
At that moment, Shang was certain that he had created something incredible.
