Jingxuan kept the Iron Nail Mingji inside his aperture again after suppressing it. Then he began the refinement of the Mingji.
The refinement process was:
Connecting the threads to the Mingji, though the number of threads required varied. For example the Iron Nail Mingji required four threads and the Space Ring Mingji required only one.
Then, sending his own will and primordial essence until the Mingji was fully refined.
The process was simple only in theory, not in practice.
A Mingji was a living being, and erasing its will was, in a sense, killing or harming it. Which living being in this world would willingly allow another to harm it? The answer was none.
Mingji struggled desperately. The moment they felt the threads binding them, they resisted fiercely—sometimes even to the point of destroying themselves.
That was why it was necessary to weaken a Mingji with primordial essence first. Refining a Mingji required a constant stream of primordial essence, and the cost was enormous.
Here, it was worth emphasizing the moment a Mingji felt the threads. That single instant explained the difference between suppressing and refining.
So, what was Suppressing? And how did it differ from Refining, since both involved the use of primordial essence?
A wild Mingji could only feed on the primordial essence found in nature. If one wrapped it with their own essence, cutting off that natural supply and storing it within the aperture, the Mingji would fall into silence. In that state, it could not absorb the cultivator's primordial essence. Of course, each time the Mingji was taken out, it had to be wrapped again.
In this state, the Mingji did not sense the threat of death and thus struggled very little. But the instant it detected the binding threads, the true battle would erupt.
Jingxuan, however, had only been suppressing the Mingji when he took it out just now.
Moreover, the Mingji from his inheritance was not a wild one but his father's Mingji. It didn't need to be suppressed at all.
But of course, being cautious by nature, he still chose to suppress it. Even after wrapping his primordial essence around two Mingji, suppressing required only a minimal amount of essence, and the Mingji did not struggle.
As a result, Jingxuan still had most of his true red primordial essence preserved within his aperture.
A Mingji born from a wielder usually possessed far more resistance than an ordinary wild Mingji. Especially when it originated from a powerful wielder, refining such a Mingji was no easy task.
However, his father had deliberately left this Mingji for inheritance purposes. Because of that, the resistance it offered was very little.
Jingxuan closed his eyes and focused on the four rings surrounding his aperture. He selected a random Rank One ring. It produced a thread that attached itself to the Space Ring Mingji. This Mingji did not struggle—it accepted the thread.
Carefully, Jingxuan guided his primordial essence and will into it. The Mingji remained still, offering no defiance. Gradually, he washed away the remnants of his father's will, layer by layer, until his own essence completely enveloped it.
The once-faint colorful glow of the flower turned deep red.
It was worth telling that this flower's center small ring, which was red, was glowing extremely beautifully, radiating a stronger crimson light.
The center of the space ring flower represented the rank of the space Mingji. The primordial essence of Rank One is red, and the core small ring also had red color, while the other nine large rings were colorful.
As he refined it, a wave of familiarity welled up in him. The Mingji still carried traces of his father's presence, and through that resonance, Jingxuan felt as though he was meeting his father's will once again.
After only a few moments, the refinement was successful. The moment he succeeded, all six talent rings released unique threads, different from the Rank One threads, and bound themselves to the Mingji.
This was what made the first Mingji a core Mingji. No matter whether a cultivator had ten, two, or four talent rings, all of them would automatically form threads and bind to their first Mingji without the wielder's involvement. As the talent rings connected, a brief mysterious glow spread across the Mingji.
Jingxuan opened his eyes, bright with joy from refining the Mingji. "As expected, refining a Mingji from inheritance was easy and smooth." The Space Ring Mingji had returned to normal. It had many colorful large rings, and its center was red in color.
He looked at it for a while before sending the Space Ring Mingji into his aperture. His aperture still held around half of its original quantity of primordial essence. As the Mingji entered the aperture, the flower sprouted mysterious roots and settled at the bottom, immersed in the true red primordial essence of Rank One.
[ > Jingxuan's aperture can only hold 50% of primordial essence, but for narrative purposes, whenever we describe his perspective, that 50% will be treated as his "100% capacity."
> Example: If his aperture decreases by 15% of total capacity, we'll record it as 30% decrease from his perspective. ]
Yet the moment he drew out the Iron Nail Mingji, his expression darkened. This one was different. Unlike the inheritance Mingji, which had yielded so gently that it hardly needed any primordial essence, this would be a true battle. What had been precaution before now became necessity—refining the Iron Nail Mingji was bound to be a trial that tested his endurance.
He had already sensed it when choosing Mingji—that this Iron Nail Mingji possessed an extraordinary will, even among the wild ones. The stronger a Mingji's will, the more difficult it was to refine. It required the user's continuous willpower to battle against it, which would eventually drain their mental energy. At the same time, it demanded even more primordial essence, since the wielder needed to suppress and weaken it for a long period until the wild Mingji's will was erased and replaced with their own.
Refining a Mingji could be described as a battle of seizure and attrition.
The cultivator seized the Mingji by cutting off its supply of primordial essence, and from there it became a battle of endurance—whether the cultivator could maintain the suppression long enough to conquer it, or whether the Mingji would break free from this seizure and potentially attack the wielder attempting to refine it.
Refining a Mingji always carried risk. An attack could not only destroy the rings, causing cultivation to regress, but also assault the cultivator's will. Such a clash could result in memory loss, or in the worst case, shatter the mind entirely.
Jingxuan now had twelve threads. He used the four threads of the flower to attach to the Iron Nail Mingji. He had already suppressed it, and now he poured primordial essence and will into it through the threads, further suppressing the Mingji and battling against its will.The entire Mingji, shaped like a human finger and nail, began to glow faintly red. It looked as if blood were flowing through the finger, colored by Jingxuan's red primordial essence.
It had been an hour, and his face remained calm.
Refining the Mingji was obviously a mentally exhausting and energy-draining task. If it had been a newbie, their fatigue would have been written all over their face. But to this demon, he could handle it with ease. He checked his primordial essence—there was about a five percent left.
He turned his attention to the Mingji before him. It was fiercely stubborn. Though only patches on its outer surface showed progress, probing deeper revealed that it was barely three percent refined, even after an hour of intense effort. Now, with his supply of will and primordial essence paused, the Mingji had grown even more aggressive, tearing at his will and forcing his primordial essence out at an accelerated pace.
Jingxuan studied it and let out a quiet sigh. "At this rate, it will drain my primordial essence and obliterate my will within three hours."
This was why it was called a battle of attrition—it drained both a person's mental energy and their primordial essence.
As a three-hundred-year-old demon, Jingxuan had no problem with mental energy; he could easily withstand that level of strain. But primordial essence was a different matter. His essence would be completely depleted before he could fully refine the Mingji.
In fact, even if he drained his entire aperture, he could only refine at most seven percent of the Mingji. His aperture would then take four hours to refill. During that time, the Mingji could drain three to four percent, leaving him with only three percent if luck was on his side—or just one percent if not.
If he didn't use any Genesis Stones, refining a Rank One Mingji alone would take more than six to eight days. Even with a vast amount of Genesis Stones, it would still take more than a day.
Currently, Jingxuan had quite a number of Genesis Stones—far more than the academy normally provided. How did he get them? To understand, we need to go back a few hours, to when the academy had just dismissed classes.
As soon as class was dismissed, Jingxuan grabbed Bo Wen and headed to the same deserted road as before.
Jingxuan said with a smile, "Bo Wen, as a good friend, you'll surely lend me some Primordial Stones, right? I am in urgent need."
Bo Wen's eyes trembled with fear, and sweat ran continuously down his face. "Jingxuan… it's like this—I don't have any Primordial Stones other than the ones the academy gave me."
Jingxuan replied shamelessly, "No problem. Bo Wen, lend me seven stones now. You can give me more later." As he said this, he held out his hand, signaling Bo Wen to hand them over.
Bo Wen was extremely reluctant. He had been stealing money from home using various techniques, but his father, a merchant, was not a fool. Bo Wen knew he was bound to be caught if he continued to steal , so he naturally wanted to stop . But how could he, when Jingxuan kept extorting him like this? Not to mention, he still had to refine the Mingji, which required a huge amount of Genesis Stones. He still had to look out for his own cultivation and also feed his Mingji.
Summoning his courage, he said, "Jingxuan, you know how I'll feed my Mingji and continue cultivating if you take all seven stones."
Jingxuan said, "Why are you so worried about feeding your Mingji? You can surely use your pocket money from your father, right?"
Then he shot Bo Wen a blackmailing look. "Or… are you stealing Genesis Stones from your house?"
Hearing the word steal, Bo Wen felt as if the sky had fallen on him. He quickly said nervously, "No, no! It's just that my pocket money was reduced, since my father knew the academy would provide Genesis Stones."
"I can surely lend a friend some help." With that, Bo Wen reluctantly parted with the pouch.
Before leaving, Jingxuan said shamelessly, "Bo Wen, I urgently need a hundred Genesis Stones in two weeks. You'll be able to gather them from your pocket money, right?"
Bo Wen was about to protest that he couldn't. Jingxuan gave him a hard, friendly pat on the back. "I know you'll do it for me."
The pat was more than friendly—it was strong enough to leave marks on Bo Wen's back. He gritted his teeth and nodded.