Ten Years of Cultivation, and I’ve Only Just Reached the First Qi Refining Stage

Why? Is it talent? Someone gazes across the vast ocean in despair. Then comes a turning point: the Spirit-Insight Pearl. An inner world formed when a powerful figure makes a pact with the laws of heaven and earth. Legend has it that those whose strength has stagnated for years can risk their lives and give it a try. A path to the heavens stretches through an age crawling with the uncanny and ravaged by demonic calamities. Beyond the Fifteen Continents lie four commanderies and an Imperial Lake. That's right, this is a vast cultivation dynasty that spans the world. Evil spirits keep appearing and plague every region, but cultivators are as numerous as oxen. There is despair, but also hope. For prodigies and young talents, the younger, the better. An older sister from the direct line of the family has already leapt through the Dragon Gate. Her cultivation seems to be at the fifth stage of Qi Refining, and she's only twenty. As for someone else, at sixteen years old, after ten years of diligent study and hard training, they're only at the first stage of Qi Refining. Four years behind at sixteen, can they still catch up? And if they can, what about all the other young talents: those of the city, the continents, the feudal lords, and the royal capital?