Cultivation: Pretty much self-explanatory, but I will explain this term for those who are reading a Wuxia/Xuanhuan/Xianxia (all 3 different variations of Eastern Fantasy that use this) for the first time so you can understand. Cultivation is basically how people in an eastern fantasy gain power. They absorb the power of the world around them and take it for their own or use it depending on the way they are cultivating. It is a much more level based power system compared to the western fantasy's soft-magic system. A more detailed definition is in italics below:

Cultivation (修煉 xiūliàn) (修真 xiūzhēn) (修行 xiūxíng) (修仙 xiūxiān) – the process of improving health, increasing longevity and growing powerful. This is accomplished by cultivating Qi and training in martial & mystical arts. In many of these novels, the ultimate goal of cultivation is to become an Immortal or attain godhood.

Levels: My cultivation system has 3 paths and each path has 3 Evolution has 3 Realms within them with each realm again having 3 stages. Each stage has 5 levels called | Early | Intermediate | Late | Peak | Master; with the Master level being a special level that is not required if you wish to break through to the next stage. The Master level simply strengthens your foundations, so it is best if you can achieve this level at every stage possible. Using maths, this means that the maximum levels of cultivation for each path is 135. This means that there is a total of 405 levels of cultivation.

The Three Paths: This is a modified version of the typical three paths of cultivation ( Essence/Body | Energy/Qi | Divine/Soul ) as is commonly used in books like Martial World.

The Path of Essence/Body Cultivation: The cultivation of the physical body. This path has NO form of external energy like qi used. External energy is only used for cultivating the physical body/your essence and will not allow you to suddenly use qi because it is for tempering purposes. Each Evolution in this Path will purify your body to link it to one of 3 states. The names for the realms of Essence Cultivation are:

Foundational:

Mortal: | 1. Marrow Refinement | 2. Bone Refinement | 3. Blood Refinement |

Houtian: | 4. Tendon Refinement | 5. Muscle Refinement | 6. Organ Refinement |

Xiantian: | 7. Sense Refinement | 8. Physique Refinement | 9. Purification |

Immortal:

Ancestor:

Lord:

King:

Deity:

Emperor:

Monarch:

Sovereign:

--------------------------------------------------------------------------

The Path of Energy/Qi Cultivation: The cultivation of your internal energy. In this Path of Cultivation, instead of using the Natural Essence of the world to temper your body, you absorb it and take it as your own. The 3 Evolutions in this Path of Cultivation are each related to unlocking and linking your Lower, Middle, and Upper Dantians.

Foundational: The Earth Dantian

Mortal: | 1. Qi Gathering | 2. Qi Infusion | 3. Qi Refinement |

Houtian: | 4. Essence Formation | 5. Essence Infusion | 6. Essence Refinement |

Xiantian: | 7. Meridian Refinement | 8. Dantian Refinement | 9. Purification |

Immortal: The Sky Dantian

Ancestor: | 1. Qi-Gathering | 2. Qi Infusion | 3. Qi Refinement |

Lord: | 4. Essence Formation | 5. Essence Infusion | 6. Essence Refinement |

King: | 7. Meridian Refinement | 8. Dantian Refinement | 9. Purification |

Diety: The Heaven Dantian

Emperor: | 1. Qi-Gathering | 2. Qi Infusion | 3. Qi Refinement |

Monarch: | 4. Essence Formation | 5. Essence Infusion | 6. Essence Refinement |

Sovereign: | 7. Meridian Refinement | 8. Dantian Refinement | 9. Purification |

---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

The Path of Divine/Soul Cultivation: The cultivation of your soul. This path tempers your Spirit, your Soul, and their mysterious powers. The 3 Evolutions will bring your Soul and Spirit closer to the Dao. The 3 Evolutions and their realms are:

Foundational:

Mortal: | 1. Spirit Sensing | 2. Spirit Gathering | 3. Spirit Refinement |

Houtian: | 4. Spirit Well | 5. Spirit Spring | 6. Spirit Lake |

Xiantian: | 7. Spirit Sea | 8. Spirit Ocean | 9. Purification |

Immortal:

Ancestor: | 1. Soul sensing | 2. Soul Strengthening | 3. Soul Refinement |

Lord: | 4. Soul Cleansing | 5. Soul Covergement | 6. Soul Shaping |

King: | 7. Soul Formation | 8. Soul Avatar | 9. Purification |

Diety:

Emperor:

Monarch:

Sovereign:

_______________________________________________________________________________________

Energy:

Natural Essence: The natural power of the world. When absorbed and made into someones own internal energy, the natural essence becomes qi.

Qi: Qi is simply the natural essence of the world being absorbed and made into your own energy.

Qi-Essence: A higher, more refined version of Qi, is made by absorbing higher purity natural essence and undergoing the same process used for qi.

Prime Essence: The highest grade of natural essence possible, is incredibly hard to sense, absorb and refine due to its incomparable purity. Often called the Essence of the Dao due to the fact that it is impossible to get the prime essence that does not have an attribute.

Spirit Energy: The Power of your spirit. This powers everything related to your spirit and soul.

Attributes: Attributes are what happens when you absorb a particular kind of natural essence that corresponds to a particular Dao. Prime essence is always attributed. When you use techniques, laws, concepts or weapon concept (of any of the 3 levels) that are of the same Dao as attributed essence you refined into attributed qi/qi-essence then it will greatly enhance every aspect of the move.

_______________________________________________________________________________________

Techniques and Arts:

So this section of the glossary will cover all the basic descriptions for techniques and the various types I will have.

Cultivation Art: I know that this is common knowledge for those who have read any cultivation based eastern fantasy, but I should still include this. A cultivation art is a way to absorb the Natural Essence of the world and take it as your own. Different levels of cultivation arts have different requirements and different effects. For the Path of Energy and Essence Cultivation.

Martial Art: This is also common knowledge, but I still want to clarify what this means for my book because it may be different to other books. In this book, a martial art is an art that teaches you the martial way. The martial way is of combat. Cultivation is different from martial arts. Cultivation is for ascending and increasing in power, while martial arts are ways to utilize the power you have.

Divine Art: Divine arts are different from martial arts and cultivation arts. Unlike the two types of arts above, divine arts cover everything needed for the soul's cultivation and how to utilize that power. So in a way, divine arts are like a complete combination of cultivation and martial arts for the soul.

Meditation Art: An art that allows you to meditate while cultivating and when you are musing upon the Dao. Meditation is beneficial for breaking through bottlenecks, comprehending laws and improving your laws.

Attunement Art: A very rare type of art which is entirely for the comprehension of laws. These arts attune you to a specific Dao. This allows you to have an easier time comprehending laws from that Dao and sensing things related to that Dao. Almost every attunement art has adverse effects, such as restricting your ability to sense other Dao.

Combat Art: Combat arts are a form of martial art that is entirely focused on the path of essence cultivation. They have no use of qi and usually are for armed or unarmed combat.

_____________________________________________________________

Levels of Progress:

For all the various kinds of arts, they have certain benchmarks of completion. These benchmarks are seperated into a certain amount of Realms, Layers and the 5 stages of progression of a layer (in order from biggest to smallest). An example would be an art that contains 2 realms, each with 4 layers. This means that the total amount of bechmarks (including the 5 stages per layer) is 20. Layers are named in order from earliest to latest progression as: | Initial | Minor | Intermediate | Major | Perfection |

___________________________________________________________

Grades/Ranks of arts:

Scroll: A scroll is the lowest form of arts.

Book: A book is the lower-middle tier of arts.

Manual: A manual is the upper-middle level of arts

Scripture: The highest form of art. Extremely rare to find. This type of art is required to be able to guide an entire path of cultivation from the lowest level to the highest level to be classified under this name. There are also different grades of Scriptures. They are called 1st, 2nd and True grade scriptures for how many paths of cultivation they cover (it is 1, 2 and 3 paths respectively for the 3 grades btw).

________________________________________________________________________________

The Dao and Laws:

This section is entirely dedicated to all things related to the Dao and personal enlightenment.

Dao: The Dao are the forces behind the working of the world. The Dao is different from laws because Laws are simply understandings of what you can sense of the Dao.

Laws: Laws are comprehensions of the Dao. They can be either Conceptual Laws or Natural Laws.

Concepts: Concepts are aspects of Laws that you gained through meditation on the Dao. The strength of these concepts when compared to the laws can vary based on the strength of the law/laws the concept was made of. When a concept reaches a strong enough level, it becomes a Conceptual Law.

Conceptual Law: A conceptual Law, unlike the natural laws, has no strict ranking based on the strength of the law. However, unlike with natural laws, conceptual laws depend entirely on your own comprehensions.

Natural Laws: Natural Laws are governed by a very strict system of the strong laws suppress the weak ones. The natural laws follow the Dao, therefore the Dao supports your comprehension of the natural laws with the ability to comprehend the next level of that law. (for example, the Law of Life is descended from the Law of Creation, therefore someone who has comprehended the Law of Life to the peak can begin to comprehend the Law of Creation with less trouble than others who haven't)

Weapon Heart: Essentially your own Conceptual Law specific to a certain weapon. You are in charge of making this Weapon Heart, but it all depends on your own comprehension of your chosen weapon/weapons.

Weapon Dao: The name of your weapon heart's conceptual law when has evolved to become its own mortal Dao.

Weapon Soul: The next level after a weapon Dao, the weapon soul is when you give your weapon Dao life, or it gains sentience on its own. A weapon soul is capable of cultivating its own unique path of cultivation, able of growing stronger with you. It also infuses every weapon of its type that you use, giving them great power.

_____________________________________________________________________________________

General Terms:

This will be terms like Dantian and Meridians.

Dantian (丹田 dāntián) – literally translates as “Cinnabar Field” or “Elixir Field”. Refers to the region in the body where a person’s Qi is concentrated. There are technically three dantians, but these novels simplify the concept and only use the lower dantian (located three finger widths below and two finger widths behind the navel). In my book, there are going to be the 3 Dantians because it conveniently allows a simple way to do the Energy/Qi path of cultivation. The 3 dantians are named the | Earth (Lower) | Sky (Middle) | Heaven (Upper) | dantians. Their locations are, | The navel | The heart | The forehead (in the brain) | respectively. Do note that they are not visible and are within the body.

Meridians (經脈 jīngmài) – the network of vessels/channels in the body through which Qi flows. Like blood vessels, but for Qi instead of blood. The meridians link the 3 dantians and the acupoints together.

Qi Circulation (行氣 xíngqì) – the act of controlling Qi to flow from the dantians, through the meridians, and back into the dantians in a cycle. The purpose of this varies between novels, but usually, it helps replenish stamina, purify the Qi, or strengthen the meridians.

Insight (參悟 cānwù) (頓悟 dùnwù) – related to enlightenment. Cultivators usually gain insights by meditating, engaging in life-or-death battles, or going out into the world to experience new things. These insights are often needed in order to master techniques or advance to higher stages of cultivation.

Internal Demons (心魔 xīnmó) – literally translates as “Heart Devils”. Rather than standard demons or devils, these are a practitioner’s negative emotions and other mental barriers which hinder their training/cultivation. Internal Demons, in some cases, can even attack the practitioner from the inside, and failure to adequately resist them may result in Qi Deviation.

Qi Deviation (走火入魔 zǒuhuǒ rùmó) – also known as Qigong Deviation. Literally translates as “to catch fire and be entered [possessed] by devils”. A state wherein the cultivation base becomes dangerously unstable, causing internal damage to the body and symptoms of psychosis. People who succumb to their Internal Demons, who practice cultivation/martial arts incorrectly, or who rashly use forbidden arts are all at risk of falling into this state.

Bottleneck (瓶頸 píngjǐng) – the term for when cultivators figuratively hit a wall in their training and it suddenly becomes incredibly difficult to proceed. When they reach a bottleneck, cultivators may require new Insights, the aid of medicinal pills, or even harsher training in order to make a Breakthrough (突破 tūpò) and successfully bypass the bottleneck.

Impurities (雜質 zázhì) – usually described as a smelly, black substance which is secreted from a cultivator’s skin when they reach new cultivation stages or consume special medicinal pills. The result of the body purifying itself and expelling the waste.

Spiritual Sense (靈識 língshí) – also known as “Consciousness” or Divine Sense (神識 shénshí). An ability possessed by cultivators to scan their surroundings (far beyond the limits of their ordinary 5 senses) with their spirit. The distance/total area they can scan corresponds to the strength of their spirit. Also used in some novels to remotely control magical items such as Flying Swords.

Killing Intent (煞氣 shàqì) – a murderous aura which emits from a person when they desire to harm someone. People who have experienced bloody battles and/or have already killed others tend to have much stronger Killing Intent than an ordinary person. Experts may be able to disguise their Killing Intent, as well as intentionally release it as a form of mental attack.

Weapon Intent: This is similar to killing intent, except that it is separate from killing intent and will depend on the level of their weapon heart/Dao/soul. It will give a different feeling for different weapons. For example, sword intent makes people feel as if they are could to be cut swiftly. Bow intent, on the other hand, makes the target of the intent feel as if they are in the sights of an archer. Like killing intent, this intent once it reaches a certain level of strength, can be used to directly kill people.

Of course, it cannot be a good W/Xx/Xh without an interspatial ring or some form of storage. So, I gave the book what is below and also 2 different methods which I won't spoil.

Interspatial Ring (空間戒指 kōngjiān jièzhi) – a magic ring with a pocket dimension inside it. With a mere thought, the owner can store items inside it and retrieve them at will. Depending on the novel, there may be some restrictions – for example, the size of the storage space might be limited or the ring might only be capable of storing certain types of items.

_________________________________________________________________________________________

Links:

Pretty self explanatory, has links i used in the making of this glossary. these links also have more details. Do note however, that unless it is in the book, i doubt there will be anything about more in-depth information like the Eight Extraordinary Meridians since I am just making them clear from birth for convenience.

General W/Xx/Xh terms and info:

https://immortalmountain.wordpress.com/glossary/wuxia-xianxia-xuanhuan-terms/

About the 3 dantian:

http://taichibasics.com/three-dantians/