The Golden Tablet

Gaofeng started walking in the direction of the slight pull he felt. Because of the size of the temple, however, this walk wasn't simple at all. There were long corridors, large and many floors, and formations and other forms of magical protection over many places. Gaofeng didn't have a frail body, but even he got tired after walking around for a good while. Finally, he arrived at his destination, a seemingly simple black door without a doorhandle. Curious to how this door was supposed to be opened, Gaofeng put his hand on it. Nothing happened initially, but when Gaofeng again consciously sensed the connection he had to the prayer beads and what he believed to be the golden tablet on the other side of this door, a ripple of energy appeared from his own hand and the door soundlessly slid to the side at once. Gaofeng relaxed after this turn of events, as it would be truly painful if he had come all this way for naught. It seemed like the connection he had to the prayer bead was the key to unlock this door, and thus anyone that wasn't accepted by the beads would never be able to even see this unique tablet.

Once Gaofeng had stepped into the room, the door closed behind him. He wasn't worried however, because he had confidence that the prayer beads wouldn't just lock him in here forever. The room he now entered was filled with a gentle light from the furthest wall away from him, and no other light sources could be found. With rising anticipation, Gaofeng calmed his breath while walking towards the light. The light source wasn't exactly clear at first, but when he arrived closer to it, he understood that he had truly found what he was looking for. Even Gaofeng didn't know the name of this tablet, so he could only call it the golden tablet, but he knew what this tablet represented. It represented a divine cultivation technique beyond perfection. A normal mortal who got the opportunity to cultivate would likely not care about what kind of cultivation technique they would use, but cultivators definitely understood this significance. Once cultivators started cultivating a cultivation technique, they could never change it again, and if they did so then they had to start cultivating again from scratch, but cultivating again was incomparably more difficult that cultivating for the first time as they would have to destroy their own cultivation, essentially destroying their own foundation for cultivation. There were some exceptions, naturally, but even cultivation techniques that could be cultivated after already having cultivated another technique would undoubtedly create flaws in their cultivation, and thus one could only achieve the true peak of cultivation if one stuck with their method of cultivation for the rest of their lives. If this method of cultivation was too low in level, however, they would eventually reach a point at which they could never advance again in their lives, except if they themselves were able to further develop this cultivation technique. Even this could only work up to a certain level, because if the initial level of a cultivation technique didn't create a sturdy enough foundation, the cultivator would eventually not be able to continue progressing. Also, the difficulty of enhancing and evolving a technique refined for eons was an unimaginably difficult task. Because Gaofeng's ambitions were unimaginably high, however, he refused to settle for even the highest quality cultivation techniques of the Shangsheng clan, and instead he wanted to use this golden tablet to get a cultivation technique beyond even perfection, a technique that would be talked about with reverence throughout the universe. Gaofeng's deep study on this subject matter on how to get a perfect and personalized cultivation technique led to him reading the notes in the diary of one of the previous Holy Monks of the Holy Temple in which he found some information regarding the golden tablet. Even this glorious Holy Monk, however, hadn't been able to gain his own divine cultivation technique by utilizing the tablet, as he didn't meet its requirements. He had noted down the three requirements as stated by the founder of the Holy Temple, and these were that the person in question had to be mortal and thus without cultivation, had to have a Holy physique, and had to achieve the level of One-With-Nature heart realm. Even the Holy Monk didn't have more information than that, but he had written down his suspicions about the reason for these requirements. The most obvious would be the first point, as the person receiving the cultivation technique would need to have no prior cultivation foundation, as that would conflict with the goal of a perfect cultivation technique. Secondly, the Holy Monk suspected that to cultivate such a divine technique, it required both immense talent and an incredibly sturdy body, and a person with a Holy physique would have both of these. Another suggestion he made was that the Golden Tablet had certain pre-configured cultivation techniques that were tailored for Holy physiques, and thus that it couldn't actually create cultivation techniques. As for the third point, the Holy Monk thought this requirement might be because one would need a high ability for understanding and mental strength to be imbued with, and being able to utilize, such a complex and perfect technique while still remaining mortal. Gaofeng had agreed with the Holy Monk's suspicions after considering this matter for a while, but now was the time to truly put these theories to the test. When Gaofeng neared the light, he realized that it didn't come from the golden tablet, so his heart dropped in his stomach. However, after getting closer he realized that what he saw was instead a golden barrier that hid something within. His heart calmed again, but this was unexpected, as the diary of the Holy Monk he had read had no mention of such a barrier. Perhaps he couldn't be bothered to describe the exact details because his diary would never be read by anyone who wasn't similarly of the 10th peak of the Holy Temple. Unfortunately for him, however, that text and many others had been leaked by a Shangsheng family member who became a monk of the 10th peak for so to send valuable information and texts back to the Shangsheng family. This matter had never been discovered by the Holy Temple, however, as Gaofeng's ancestor never actually stole the scrolls or jade tablets these techniques were recorded on, but instead created his own copies that he sent back to the family. Such information was highly confidential even in the Shangsheng family, so only a small few individuals ever got to see the information he brought back. In relation to Gaofeng the infiltrator was his great-great-great grandfather, and thus Gaofeng naturally had access to this information. This ancestor of his had never been able to enter the room that had the golden tablet in it, however, so Gaofeng had never gotten any updated information through that channel.

The golden barrier in front of Gaofeng flickered with dancing gold flowing and making beautiful patterns, continuing to shift until Gaofeng laid his hand on it. At that point the flowing gold gathered at his hand and the golden light completely concentrated on his small frame. After about a minute of Gaofeng feeling the gold move about like an excited cat in the palm of his hand, the gold retracted and formed a passage which he could enter through. The passage was sealed completely behind him, and the outside world could neither be heard or seen. What was in front of Gaofeng, however, was so unimaginable that he nearly fell backwards, but consciously utilizing his powerful heart-realm he steadied himself and grew solemn. This sight was truly beyond his every expectation, to the level of Gaofeng nearly not believing what he was seeing. The small space he believed to be behind the golden barrier in the hall on top of the 10th Holy Peak, turned out to contain a towering golden tablet standing tall despite being surrounded by ruins decayed by the tides of time. These ruins were enormous, as they needed to be to be able to contain the golden tablet, but the odd thing was that they were far larger than even the Holy Temple, which made Gaofeng realize that the golden light not only acted as a test to see if he was qualified to see the golden tablet, but also as a teleportation device. Naturally Gaofeng had read some notes about teleportation devices, but even the Shangsheng family only had a single teleportation device for each branch, and these teleportation devices could only transport them to one of the closer Shangsheng branches before they had to step out and utilize this other branch's teleportation device. The place Gaofeng now found himself in, however, he realized was so far from the 10th peak that he would never be able to return even before his death, as beyond the gigantic ruins he could see the distant stars, and he realized that he didn't recognize even a single star from the one's he was used to spot in the night sky. Thus, the only conclusion Gaofeng could come to was that he was teleported to a different plane of existence, a different planet and likely an altogether different galaxy. The most breathtaking thing of them all, however, was naturally the majestic golden tablet which in itself seemed capable of challenging and destroying even heaven itself by simply releasing its majestic aura.