Yes baron clans have a high turnover rate, but that has two main causes. They either get absorbed into a more established clan by marriage early on, or the new clan head dies before they get to Cyan during military service or the early days of establishing their fief. I'm not claiming the rode isn't difficult, I'm claiming those who aren't equal to the task of reaching Cyan relatively quickly either A- die before the issues you talk about arise, B- don't reach Green before the age of 17, or C- decide that managing their own fief is probably too difficult and choose a more comfortable life marrying into an established clan, staying with a sect, or joining a ministry.
And yes we both agree that Cyan is the point where a baron is all but guaranteed to maintain their title, but that isn't necessarily 'stability.' A new baron clan with a Cyan and a couple other mostly irrelevant cultivators is going to have a less safe/stable fief than an established baron clan with at least a couple dozen cultivators of varying ability. Established clans could potentially even have multiple Cyans among their clan Elders.
Ling Qi has been in the third realm for roughly a year and is almost halfway through. Someone who just barely makes the grade to become a baron before they're too old is still moving at about 1/3 our speed. Setting aside hitting one of the third realm's many bottlenecks it would take someone like that 6-7 years to reach peak Green. Even considering that they have fewer resources than us or get stuck at one of the levels for longer than they should if they aren't at least knocking on Cyan's door 20-30 years down the road then they fucked up somewhere and are probably going to end up dead. You can argue about how nobles who have more resources have gotten stuck at Green for decades, but here's the thing: did that one older sister of Xiulan's manage to reach Green by the age of 17? Could they have still managed that feat if they hadn't had the resources of a viscount clan behind them? Any commoner who reaches Green that fast is some degree of prodigy, even if it's hard to remember since we're an even bigger prodigy.
And your entire scenario also depends on a baron clan being unlucky enough to have clan head that gets stuck in mid Green for decades but ends up with kids that reach the third realm at a young age rather than being more common talents who take awhile to get through Red and Yellow, especially considering that this clan is going to be hurting for resources. Your situation could happen but it seems like it would be rare.
Tldr; a new baron clan head could definitely get stuck in Green, but that results in them getting killed trying to manage a fief in a death world that they're under-leveled for, not needing to worry about surviving for decades long enough that the next generation is competing with them for resources.
Those who get absorbed into a higher title family usually don't even get land in the first place though, and for A nah they likely mostly end up treading water through a combination of being in debt from their liege bailing them out, and without a Cyan to pacify the local region the initial assessment of "Probably safe enough 3rd realm can hold land in the area" will eventually break B Then they aren't Barons C More like many usually wait until they've got a pretty solid pile of resources, and connections to add on top of whatever loans their liege is willing to give them in the hopes they'll hit the ground running.
Well to be more accurate it is the point where any clan with one can achieve stability within the lifetime of the Cyan since for land given to a Barony Cyan is the point where everything on it is
lower* in the pecking order meaning they in theory should be able to tame the spirits... well as much as can be done within their lifetime, and a Cyan should be able to reliably hold against external threats until their liege sends aid, which they absolutely will as a vassal clan with a Cyan isn't a joke. Uh having
multiple at the same time Elders in the Cyan realm means they've not only got enough resources to support them alongside a bunch of failed scions, but a wide archive of art suits from various Ways, and depending on how
far those art suits go into Cyan the clan might very well be close to getting
multiple 5th realm cultivators, which per Ruan Shen is the point where a liege basically runs out of wiggle room to hold viscount status up in paperwork.
The many bottlenecks are why most cultivators get stuck in the third realm though as without tribulations to generate the needed advanced insights you literally cannot advance, and you need four of those. Any noble who earns a title by 17 is decently talented, and hard working, but most run into a issue of lack of resources even with parents able to provide a degree of resources. A handful solve this by earning the attention of a GS, but most get resources from a noble scion whose family gave them resources for the purpose of procuring someone to tame a slice of clay, or room with someone whose leftover resources are invaluable to someone with talent.
Because beyond having sufficient talent, and motivation to cultivate going from mortal to green is in fact something that
can be solved through sufficient resources, which are
cheap compared to a GSS. Meanwhile the road from Green to Cyan is a very personal one that
cannot be solved with merely having enough resources, but nonetheless requires a monthly resources consumption that makes the previous two realms look like a joke based upon their maximum monthly cultivation cost.
Except the clan will be hurting for resources valuable to a 3rd realm cultivator wants whereas the
discount exchange rate for RSS to 1 GSS was 200 to 1, which means that testing for talent among their children/grandchildren through having them cultivate a couple months requires** the Clan Head to be lean for a month, or two.
That seems like a rather bleak assessment that would be at odds with their liege being willing to support a new noble in the first place as they're at a minimum giving out a loan to their new vassal who needs resources to found a settlement, and more realistically outcome is their successors dying out in a number of possible ways with ever increasing odds until they produce a Cyan whereupon they're on top of the pecking order within their fief unless somebody really
really messed up the survey of the region. This permits the clan to pacify*** the region around the settlement, and thrive as a result.
*This is actually rather important as it allows the clan in question to solve problems in house, and not be constantly in favor alongside monetary debt to their liege due to needing assistance.
**Okay it requires art suits as well, but I imagine the great sects are more than happy to rewards a lifetime of service with giving of red/yellow arts to meet this demand, or however else low ranking nobles can expand their art suits.
***Based upon what we've seen in the argent sect this is something that requires regular work to maintain.
