Threads Of Destiny(Eastern Fantasy, Sequel to Forge of Destiny)

[JohnnieBoy123]

Assuming the person who leaves, is the person who arrived.
How much of Sun Liling will remain?
I hope she'll make it through, i don't really care for her as a person, but i think she has plenty of potential as a character, either as an antagonist or an ally.

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Liling might feel like she is no longer the same person but progression is a matter of self-actualization and you cannot force another Way on someone. If Liling cannot come to terms with this trauma her cultivation will be stunted and she will probably never reach Cyan. An outright doppelganger would be a spirit and those don't cultivate nearly as well as humans, again crippling long-term development.

This was an extremely risky play from her grandfather. He's probably hoping that she either agrees with his reasoning or hopes that she will come to hate him and integrate this into her Way in the pursuit of revenge (as he would see this as sacrificing himself for his family, the asshole).

That said, I wouldn't be surprised if the Sunflower Goddess has some kind of mind control effect over her descendants that Liling will have to leave to escape. That furthers the child abuse themes and is definitely within the Goddess's domain.

 

[Valmond]

Liling might feel like she is no longer the same person but progression is a matter of self-actualization and you cannot force another Way on someone. If Liling cannot come to terms with this trauma her cultivation will be stunted and she will probably never reach Cyan. An outright doppelganger would be a spirit and those don't cultivate nearly as well as humans, again crippling long-term development.

This was an extremely risky play from her grandfather. He's probably hoping that she either agrees with his reasoning or hopes that she will come to hate him and integrate this into her Way in the pursuit of revenge (as he would see this as sacrificing himself for his family, the asshole).

That said, I wouldn't be surprised if the Sunflower Goddess has some kind of mind control effect over her descendants that Liling will have to leave to escape. That furthers the child abuse themes and is definitely within the Goddess's domain.

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I'm not sure that you can't force a way on someone is true.
We are not talking of some random elder, this is a physical god who is pouring her essence into a green cultivator.
I would not assume that the ability to simply pull someone apart, of put the pieces back together in another way would not be possible.
Probably harder the higher the cultivator, possibly practically impossible in most cases at cyan and above, but impossible? Nah, i would not bet on it.
Also we know that it is possible to force a way on a cultivator through the way you raise/teach them.

 

[AbeoLogos]

Biggest issue for me continues to be that Ling Qi just isn't setup well to benefit from whatever she may find exploring.

Finding spirit stones or materials she can sell for spirit stones is nice, if boring, but won't be that big of a benefit. We've got our budget mostly on track, and talismans don't even cost spirit stones anymore. Same issue with finding cultivation sites: she already has what she needs there, and any improvement is likely to be a marginal increase rather than something significant.

An art would be really difficult to fit into her build at this point, given how we have it planned out. Like, I'm not against randomly stumbling across a really good art, but the problem is that meridians are so jigsaw-y and we've already planned around that with the arts we already have. There's also the fact that capabilities tend to be split across separate arts. If we find a new art that does something we want better than we currently do, we have to juggle meridians and potentially multiple other arts, which would in turn potentially require us to scrap planned or started arts and start something else in our library from scratch. It's a really big headache.

Finding a viable talisman seems unlikely and considering we're deliberately getting a new one this turn for actual targeted reasons, very silly.

Ling Qi doesn't craft or research with rare materials she might find, and her current paths for gear upgrades are from entities that are more or less arbitrarily good at what they do, so improving their work with stuff we find isn't very convincing. Tailor David Bowie and The Moon are going to provide us with good accessories and flutes regardless. Ling Qi isn't helped by finding rare materials, not at this point.

There's no room for more spirits, so that isn't an option for a reward.

So what can Ling Qi get that actually matters to her? Books of old stories, maybe? A cache of music sheets? Or another manual on formations she doesn't use. Basically, there's a problem in that most things, actually everything I can think of, Ling Qi could find is likely to go unused even if it theoretically has potential, because of time constraints.

The bigger problem is that the question of why Ling Qi is going exploring needs to be addressed, and currently there aren't very many satisfying answers. What is Ling Qi actually hoping to achieve, here? We can't know that until it actually happens, obviously. But that's actually a big problem. If we can't come up with convincing reasons Ling Qi would choose to do this in her current circumstances, that's an indication that it's a narratively poor choice to make. I do not see why Ling Qi would do this, or what she could possibly hope to gain.

 

[Valmond]

We could find nifty things our friends and family can use.
I'd be happy with finding something nice we can just hand over to someone as a gift.
Also i just want to explore the map, i'm not that fussed if we don't find anything that important or immediately useful.

 

[adaer]

I'm not sure that you can't force a way on someone is true.
We are not talking of some random elder, this is a physical god who is pouring her essence into a green cultivator.
I would not assume that the ability to simply pull someone apart, of put the pieces back together in another way would not be possible.
Probably harder the higher the cultivator, possibly practically impossible in most cases at cyan and above, but impossible? Nah, i would not bet on it.
Also we know that it is possible to force a way on a cultivator through the way you raise/teach them.

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I think that their point was that in doing that, you're unlikely to create someone able to rise to the heights that they want her too. Someone broken apart and re-molded might have a lot of trouble with their Way at higher levels of cultivation due to the trauma, or having to confront what was done to them to move forward. For instance, if Liling tries to keep going with a Way of "family loyalty is all that matters", she's going to have to come to terms with what her grandfather just did to her. Either by going "hurting family is okay if you're doing it for their own good" or "that was not okay, he was wrong to hurt his family". Either way, there's a chance for serious internal conflict there, and internal conflict can be disastrous when building your Way.

 

[Xicree]

Fun fact. Our sweet Garden of Nightmares, sunflowers and Bones was a character companion to the MC of a previous Yrsillar Quest. (Or at least an extrapolation of her)


And she's as horrifying now as she ever was ^_^ What a gal! (She was an awesome Waifu)

 

[Valmond]

I think that their point was that in doing that, you're unlikely to create someone able to rise to the heights that they want her too. Someone broken apart and re-molded might have a lot of trouble with their Way at higher levels of cultivation due to the trauma, or having to confront what was done to them to move forward. For instance, if Liling tries to keep going with a Way of "family loyalty is all that matters", she's going to have to come to terms with what her grandfather just did to her. Either by going "hurting family is okay if you're doing it for their own good" or "that was not okay, he was wrong to hurt his family". Either way, there's a chance fore serious internal conflict there, and internal conflict can be disastrous when building your Way.

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Unlikely is not the same as impossible, we don't really have much precedent for what is happening here.
That said, i could see the goddess being just fine with Liling ending up broken and unable to reach white, i have no idea what her long term goal is, or how she is intending to acchieve them.

 

[RebelYell]

Qi was warned by Zeqing that teaching her the advanced Frozen Soul Serenade would have likely corrupted her nascent Way and this was from a Cyan spirit.
Liling was didn't even get the benefit of knowing before hand she was fed to the Murder Flower Goddess's divine Qi. It's like carving a pre set path into a person before they even know where the road is.

 

[Vanguard_D]

Biggest issue for me continues to be that Ling Qi just isn't setup well to benefit from whatever she may find exploring.

Finding spirit stones or materials she can sell for spirit stones is nice, if boring, but won't be that big of a benefit. We've got our budget mostly on track, and talismans don't even cost spirit stones anymore. Same issue with finding cultivation sites: she already has what she needs there, and any improvement is likely to be a marginal increase rather than something significant.

An art would be really difficult to fit into her build at this point, given how we have it planned out. Like, I'm not against randomly stumbling across a really good art, but the problem is that meridians are so jigsaw-y and we've already planned around that with the arts we already have. There's also the fact that capabilities tend to be split across separate arts. If we find a new art that does something we want better than we currently do, we have to juggle meridians and potentially multiple other arts, which would in turn potentially require us to scrap planned or started arts and start something else in our library from scratch. It's a really big headache.

Finding a viable talisman seems unlikely and considering we're deliberately getting a new one this turn for actual targeted reasons, very silly.

Ling Qi doesn't craft or research with rare materials she might find, and her current paths for gear upgrades are from entities that are more or less arbitrarily good at what they do, so improving their work with stuff we find isn't very convincing. Tailor David Bowie and The Moon are going to provide us with good accessories and flutes regardless. Ling Qi isn't helped by finding rare materials, not at this point.

There's no room for more spirits, so that isn't an option for a reward.

So what can Ling Qi get that actually matters to her? Books of old stories, maybe? A cache of music sheets? Or another manual on formations she doesn't use. Basically, there's a problem in that most things, actually everything I can think of, Ling Qi could find is likely to go unused even if it theoretically has potential, because of time constraints.

The bigger problem is that the question of why Ling Qi is going exploring needs to be addressed, and currently there aren't very many satisfying answers. What is Ling Qi actually hoping to achieve, here? We can't know that until it actually happens, obviously. But that's actually a big problem. If we can't come up with convincing reasons Ling Qi would choose to do this in her current circumstances, that's an indication that it's a narratively poor choice to make. I do not see why Ling Qi would do this, or what she could possibly hope to gain.

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I mean, most of the same could be said about the art modding. Why do it? We dont really gain anything beside poking at a semi useless art and seeing what happens. Why she is doing this is a bit vague as it never came up before in the narrative. We have never had anyone go "you need to do this to get experience" or something like that, so there is no incentive for progress here. Nor has she had any problems communicating with her spirits for battle plans. So what, do we want to branch out for battlefield communication also? With one art? That we dont even know will work that way.

Both options involves taking a shoot in the dark. Exploration atleast have more narrative weight then the once or twice we hard that art modding was a thing but not anything about how important it was.

 

[EternalObserver]

*is slowly getting ruffled over some of the justifications on certain votes*

 

[JohnnieBoy123]

Unlikely is not the same as impossible, we don't really have much precedent for what is happening here.
That said, i could see the goddess being just fine with Liling ending up broken and unable to reach white, i have no idea what her long term goal is, or how she is intending to acchieve them.

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Shenhua did it to CRX when her daughter was a Red and that has caused significant damage to the latters' Way despite CRX being completely on board with it and shaping people and things being Shenhua's specialty.

That is basically the ideal situation to do it. This is a significantly more traumatic experience and so will have even larger consequences. Like "might not reach Cyan" consequences.

 

[Valmond]

Shenhua did it to CRX when her daughter was a Red and that has caused significant damage to the latters' Way despite CRX being completely on board with it and shaping people and things being Shenhua's specialty.

That is basically the ideal situation to do it. This is a significantly more traumatic experience and so will have even larger consequences. Like "might not reach Cyan" consequences.

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Shenhua, while totally awesome, is not an ancient jungle goddess.

 

[AbeoLogos]

And she isn't set up well to benefit from random Art Modding so it doesn't matter either way on that front, this is nothing more than a "what do we do with our free 1AP since everything else is planned out in our cultivation schedule?" question and exploration can at least produce something potentially fun or interesting in addition to just encouraging Ling Qi's curiosity (which is what Xin and the Hidden Moon wanted)

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The art already fits into her build, the meridians aren't likely to change with what we're trying to do with it, so if the art she mostly doesn't use transmutes to something she's marginally more likely to use then, boom, she's benefited. It's actually incredibly easy to benefit from modding the art, in these circumstances. Is it guaranteed? No, but that's not an objection you actually have; you've well-accepted the potential for a dud outcome.

Beyond that, tinkering with art experimentation is literally an exercise in curiosity, considering it's something we've never done before, and the outcome is something of a mystery, even to Ling Qi given her inexperience. It's also intrinsically, due to the philosophical nature of arts, and exploration of herself. Remember that Xin emphasized the importance of one's own secrets. We've seen from recent character development an acknowledgment from Ling Qi that her knowledge of self isn't perfect. Continuing that line of thought with introspection-through-action in some art modding experiments fits very well with Hidden Moon motivations.

I mean, most of the same could be said about the art modding. Why do it? We dont really gain anything beside poking at a semi useless art and seeing what happens. Why she is doing this is a bit vague as it never came up before in the narrative. We have never had anyone go "you need to do this to get experience" or something like that, so there is no incentive for progress here. Nor has she had any problems communicating with her spirits for battle plans. So what, do we want to branch out for battlefield communication also? With one art? That we dont even know will work that way.

Both options involves taking a shoot in the dark. Exploration atleast have more narrative weight then the once or twice we hard that art modding was a thing but not anything about how important it was.

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Hmm. A common thread throughout Ling Qi's sect combat experiences has been facing challenges as a consequence of communication limitations. Like that time we flew up to Shen Hu and there was that sect disciple cut off in the middling distance- being able to coordinate with him would have given more options. And more generally, Ling Qi flying blind and not knowing what she's supposed to do. We've seen more recently, with Bian Ya, that being able to coordinate eliminates a lot of uncertainty. There's sensible places to jump off of and experiment, here. Obviously hitting Bian Ya's level isn't in the cards, but a first step effort is easy to justify and weave into the threads of the story as it has existed.

Exploration doesn't have this, really. For one, there's no real thing in mind for exploration. There's no narrative weight because there's no narrative goal. Nobody has provided a reason for why Ling Qi would choose to do this, or what she'd be trying to find, and to what end.

 

[veekie]

*is slowly getting ruffled over some of the justifications on certain votes*

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Do like I do - just let it go by once you made your choices after assessing the points on your own and catching up on discussion. Less stressful that way, especially over 1 AP which no matter which happens, success or failure, isn't going to make or break anything, and was an unexpected bit of slack in an otherwise tightly aligned schedule.

Emotional arguments tend to get dragged out around the late end. Take no heed

 

[Catwings]

[X] Plan: Whispering on the Wind

 

[RebelYell]

There's going to be a rough acclimatization process for Liling either way but I don't see this as barring her past Cyan+ like what happened with Xiulan with the lighting strike it's gonna suck but the payoff is going to be insane.

 

[1986ctcel]

The art already fits into her build, the meridians aren't likely to change with what we're trying to do with it, so if the art she mostly doesn't use transmutes to something she's marginally more likely to use then, boom, she's benefited. It's actually incredibly easy to benefit from modding the art, in these circumstances. Is it guaranteed? No, but that's not an objection you actually have; you've well-accepted the potential for a dud outcome.

Beyond that, tinkering with art experimentation is literally an exercise in curiosity, considering it's something we've never done before, and the outcome is something of a mystery, even to Ling Qi given her inexperience. It's also intrinsically, due to the philosophical nature of arts, and exploration of herself. Remember that Xin emphasized the importance of one's own secrets. We've seen from recent character development an acknowledgment from Ling Qi that her knowledge of self isn't perfect. Continuing that line of thought with introspection-through-action in some art modding experiments fits very well with Hidden Moon motivations.

Click to shrink...

Ling Qi admitted she had no passion for tinkering around with Formations and only cared about the use she could get out of them which was why she ultimately dropped them and Art modding doesn't seem meaningfully different to me on that front so I don't consider it actually contributing to her curiosity much when contrasted with going outside and doing stuff with a map full of "interesting" things that was given to her by one of her mother figures.

 

[Thor's Twin]

Biggest issue for me continues to be that Ling Qi just isn't setup well to benefit from whatever she may find exploring.

Finding spirit stones or materials she can sell for spirit stones is nice, if boring, but won't be that big of a benefit. We've got our budget mostly on track, and talismans don't even cost spirit stones anymore. Same issue with finding cultivation sites: she already has what she needs there, and any improvement is likely to be a marginal increase rather than something significant.

An art would be really difficult to fit into her build at this point, given how we have it planned out. Like, I'm not against randomly stumbling across a really good art, but the problem is that meridians are so jigsaw-y and we've already planned around that with the arts we already have. There's also the fact that capabilities tend to be split across separate arts. If we find a new art that does something we want better than we currently do, we have to juggle meridians and potentially multiple other arts, which would in turn potentially require us to scrap planned or started arts and start something else in our library from scratch. It's a really big headache.

Finding a viable talisman seems unlikely and considering we're deliberately getting a new one this turn for actual targeted reasons, very silly.

Ling Qi doesn't craft or research with rare materials she might find, and her current paths for gear upgrades are from entities that are more or less arbitrarily good at what they do, so improving their work with stuff we find isn't very convincing. Tailor David Bowie and The Moon are going to provide us with good accessories and flutes regardless. Ling Qi isn't helped by finding rare materials, not at this point.

There's no room for more spirits, so that isn't an option for a reward.

So what can Ling Qi get that actually matters to her? Books of old stories, maybe? A cache of music sheets? Or another manual on formations she doesn't use. Basically, there's a problem in that most things, actually everything I can think of, Ling Qi could find is likely to go unused even if it theoretically has potential, because of time constraints.

The bigger problem is that the question of why Ling Qi is going exploring needs to be addressed, and currently there aren't very many satisfying answers. What is Ling Qi actually hoping to achieve, here? We can't know that until it actually happens, obviously. But that's actually a big problem. If we can't come up with convincing reasons Ling Qi would choose to do this in her current circumstances, that's an indication that it's a narratively poor choice to make. I do not see why Ling Qi would do this, or what she could possibly hope to gain.

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This argument seems to ignore the possibility of acquiring new sites or new pills that would help speed along our cultivation. Pills would provide an immediate temporary benefit to the speed of our cultivation, while better sites would provide longer-term rewards which may help in the long run. Especially any sites that help with base cultivation.

Additionally, finding and talking with spirits of the Sect could provide information as to the local spirit politics (which may be useful down the road) or could initialize various trials that we know are hidden around the Inner Sect, providing more experience and resources for us to use in cultivation.

Or, we could roll poorly and not really find anything, and simply gain some benefits from skill development and possibly a bit of extra money to for our spending budget.

As for the bigger problem, the "why," of exploring, it is not particularly difficult. SSC is our personalized cultivation art that rewards feats of daring, self-expression, and dealing with the spirits of the world, as well as being described as an art for those who seek the hidden powers of the world and the beauty of songs both new and old. To make the argument that exploring doesn't have the possibility of dealing with the spirits of the world, or seeking new inspiration for new songs, or even finding the hidden powers of the world, seems to be a very weak argument.

Spending a considerable amount of time cultivating SSC, it would stand to reason that Ling Qi would want to engage in activities that SSC promotes, and exploration seems to be the best option out of all the AP options in that regard.

 

[1986ctcel]

Ugh fine

[X] Plan: Working towards Goal
[X] Plan: Rainbows and Glitter

If people don't want to explore than doing sect duties that contribute to the war effort in some way is a good second choice given we haven't done it before and it should hopefully stop any grumbling about us.

 

[JohnnieBoy123]

Shenhua, while totally awesome, is not an ancient jungle goddess.

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She's a White crafter who is only one realm lower and who had a larger realm difference with the subject at the time who idolized her. Shenhua would have found it immeasurably easier. Yet even she ended up almost killing her daughter and damaged CRX's Way.

There's going to be a rough acclimatization process for Liling either way but I don't see this as barring her past Cyan+ like what happened with Xiulan with the lighting strike it's gonna suck but the payoff is going to be insane.

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I'm speaking of specifically trying to completely reshape Liling into a different person and saying that's basically impossible. Simply adopting her is less likely to break stuff. Even that could still possibly break her Way but in practice it won't. The risk Shao is actually taking is alienating Liling from him.

But, well, "this has a (fairly small) chance of breaking my favorite granddaughter and hope of the clan's Way" speaks to his desperation, even if that chance is small. "Don't mess with your children's cultivation" is a lesson that the clans of the Empire keep learning over and over again, yet here Shao is.

 

[AbeoLogos]

This argument seems to ignore the possibility of acquiring new sites or new pills that would help speed along our cultivation. Pills would provide an immediate temporary benefit to the speed of our cultivation, while better sites would provide longer-term rewards which may help in the long run. Especially any sites that help with base cultivation.

Additionally, finding and talking with spirits of the Sect could provide information as to the local spirit politics (which may be useful down the road) or could initialize various trials that we know are hidden around the Inner Sect, providing more experience and resources for us to use in cultivation.

Or, we could roll poorly and not really find anything, and simply gain some benefits from skill development and possibly a bit of extra money to for our spending budget.

As for the bigger problem, the "why," of exploring, it is not particularly difficult. SSC is our personalized cultivation art that rewards feats of daring, self-expression, and dealing with the spirits of the world, as well as being described as an art for those who seek the hidden powers of the world and the beauty of songs both new and old. To make the argument that exploring doesn't have the possibility of dealing with the spirits of the world, or seeking new inspiration for new songs, or even finding the hidden powers of the world, seems to be a very weak argument.

Spending a considerable amount of time cultivating SSC, it would stand to reason that Ling Qi would want to engage in activities that SSC promotes, and exploration seems to be the best option out of all the AP options in that regard.

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This would be a lot more convincing to me if Ling Qi had ever approached exploring anything with any of this in mind, uh, ever. For being a character so thematically driven by searching out stories and lost lore, she's never actually done it on purpose, or appreciated it when it happened, outside the single time she got kidnapped by moon aunties and stumbled into a library of frozen flame. These are not things Ling Qi actually does, and while it would be nice for her to actually start, it would be a weird place in the narrative for her to do so.

For instance, connecting with the fung-eye entity would have been a nice starter, but that flopped, but not in a way that really gives motivation for Ling Qi to go out there and try to commune with spirits. There's no narrative thread that's really active that works as a prompt to get out there and explore, at the moment. She has... a lot of other plates spinning right now.

And I didn't ignore the benefits of sites and such. I discounted them. There's a difference.

Ling Qi admitted she had no passion for tinkering around with Formations and only cared about the use she could get out of them which was why she ultimately dropped them and Art modding doesn't seem meaningfully different to me on that front so I don't consider it actually contributing to her curiosity much when contrasted with going outside and doing stuff with a map full of "interesting" things that was given to her by one of her mother figures.

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That comparison is pretty odd. Arts as philosophical exercises have very little in common with formations as Ling Qi has experienced them, and Ling Qi genuinely enjoys cultivating arts even meditatively, and tinkering with ideas in her musical compositions. Which is the more apt comparison, imo.

 

[LightLan]

Finding spirit stones or materials she can sell for spirit stones is nice, if boring, but won't be that big of a benefit. We've got our budget mostly on track, and talismans don't even cost spirit stones anymore. Same issue with finding cultivation sites: she already has what she needs there, and any improvement is likely to be a marginal increase rather than something significant.

Click to shrink...

We lack a Darkness-site since we blew up Zeqing.
Might find one.

 

[olamide]

I'm not sure that what will happen to Liling is what matters at all to Shao. He is using her as a tool to send a message. He seems to believe that the only reason the empire isn't still trying to crush the Bai is because they have grandmother snake who will wreck everything if they push too much. He wants to ensure his family survives after he dies. He is the only nuke the clan has now and once he passes he fears they will be wiped out. No way will the Bai not send another kill team into the jungle to wipe out his work. Well if he turns Liling into some spirit blooded creature and marries the jungle then his clan has its own nuke. He wants to turn the jungle into his own great ancestor to save the family and from what we have seen you need some sort of spirit blood link for that to work. So who cares if Liling is harmed, she really only needs to be able to usable as a threat to the rest of the empire. Really she just needs to be able to have more spriti blooded kids for the clan to continue. So long as they exist the empire will know that the jungle can be awoken like any other great ancestor. Her goals, her future, and even herself is all secondary to saving the family.

 

[Thor's Twin]

This would be a lot more convincing to me if Ling Qi had ever approached exploring anything with any of this in mind, uh, ever. For being a character so thematically driven by searching out stories and lost lore, she's never actually done it on purpose, or appreciated it when it happened, outside the single time she got kidnapped by moon aunties and stumbled into a library of frozen flame. These are not things Ling Qi actually does, and while it would be nice for her to actually start, it would be a weird place in the narrative for her to do so.

For instance, connecting with the fung-eye entity would have been a nice starter, but that flopped, but not in a way that really gives motivation for Ling Qi to go out there and try to commune with spirits. There's no narrative thread that's really active that works as a prompt to get out there and explore, at the moment. She has... a lot of other plates spinning right now.

And I didn't ignore the benefits of sites and such. I discounted them. There's a difference.

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I do stand corrected, you did mention sites.

And why, exactly, would it be a weird place in the narrative for her to start doing so? She's cultivating SSC which promotes such actions, it seems perfectly reasonable to go out and do things that a personalized cultivation art wants you to do. To argue that really digging into a cultivation art doesn't merit doing what the cultivation art wants you to do seems bizarre.

The claim that there is no narrative thread that's active for going out there and doing things that SSC wants us to do falls flat when we are actively cultivating SSC. SSC is, in and of itself, the thread that would prompt us to go and do these things. It seems non-sensical to argue, then, that there must be other threads to prompt a narrative shift in how Ling Qi goes about exploration.

 

[AbeoLogos]

We lack a Darkness-site since we blew up Zeqing.
Might find one.

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All our Darkness arts have a second element that we do have a site for, and sites don't stack.

I do stand corrected, you did mention sites.

And why, exactly, would it be a weird place in the narrative for her to start doing so? She's cultivating SSC which promotes such actions, it seems perfectly reasonable to go out and do things that a personalized cultivation art wants you to do. To argue that really digging into a cultivation art doesn't merit doing what the cultivation art wants you to do seems bizarre.

The claim that there is no narrative thread that's active for going out there and doing things that SSC wants us to do falls flat when we are actively cultivating SSC. SSC is, in and of itself, the thread that would prompt us to go and do these things. It seems non-sensical to argue, then, that there must be other threads to prompt a narrative shift in how Ling Qi goes about exploration.

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Mostly Ling Qi's circumstances, and the fact SSC has had a really weak presence in the story. The only significant event that involved it was when we got it tailored to us, back when we were still cultivating EPC. Since then, not much. A line or two noting we cultivated it, and a mention related to spirit growth while chatting with Alingge, and that's it as far as I can remember.

Recently, Ling Qi's focus has largely been inwards on family matters, or related to Renxiang's orders and related skills, and the sect/barbarian conflict. But these matters are still active and ongoing. They haven't been resolved, she's really just getting into the proper meat of them. For me, it would be weird for Ling Qi to suddenly decide that SSC-exploring the lands is an important priority. There are things that can happen while exploring that could relate to these ongoing topics, but not things I think Ling Qi can aim for, so those possibilities don't change her intent.

And that's my big issue here, the question of why Ling Qi would make the choice to go exploring, and whether it's justifiable or desirable with where she's at at the moment. And I don't feel that is the case.