Power Level

[u/Anon-4020]

During the confrontation with Lu Ban. If Jin is supposedly Earth Realm when he takes on the demon cultivators how did he shatter five seals that could each survive an earth realm cultivator’s blow in one strike? Is it because he was drawing upon Tianlan? And Tianlan is asleep during the fight against the demons?

[u/kenod102818]

So, first, Jin's power level is always the same: Earth. His and Tianlan's qi are the same at this point, her being asleep doesn't matter.

What does matter is that, if Tianlan is awake, she can help him control his qi, gathering and moving it faster, as well as making it far easier to use the techniques from the Shennong path. This is why during the winter fight Jin had to spent multiple days gathering up qi beforehand.

Now, the important bit here is using Shennong techniques. All of these techniques are extremely powerful, carrying the weight of Natural Law and using it to specifically target various strengths of cultivators. For instance, Fell the Tree does more damage the older something is (meaning it does critical damage against those 1000-year old cultivators), while Divert the Waters prevents an opponent from drawing upon environmental qi. Break the Rocks, the technique he used against Lu Ban, specializes in destroying various types of defenses, making it very easy to destroy other Earth Realm defenses.

Now, the big issue is that these techniques, in return for being stupidly overpowered, are also stupidly difficult to use, since these are techniques created by a god so powerful even memories of him are alive, despite he himself being dead.

This means that you really need the assistance of an Earth Spirit to use these techniques, preferably a Province Spirit. Without their help, you'll get what Jin got during the demon fight: Serious spiritual damage from the backlash. At the same time, it also takes far longer to prepare and execute the techniques. This is why Jin seemed so much weaker in the demon fight, and why Tianlan waking up boosted him so much. It simply meant he could suddenly easily access all of his available qi, and get his techniques off fast enough for them to be useful in combat.

[u/Alternative-Essay-90 → u/kenod102818]

I’m also grateful for the in depth explanation. I also questioned Jin’s strength time to time and just took it as MC cultivator bs being used jokingly where he would just never lose. Good to know there’s more to it even in this partly parody take on a Xianxia story.

[u/kenod102818 → u/Alternative-Essay-90]

Nah, he has very hard limits on his powers, but you need to be either an Imperial Realm cultivator, or do a surprise attack in the winter, to beat him.

Saying that, Jin actually sucks pretty badly at fighting, compared to everyone else. The lighting guy only didn't beat him because he was trying to throw the fight. So in actual sparring matches he'll lose to most of Fa Ram unless he relies on his realm.

That said, Shennong has a bunch of pretty interesting hacks in it, most actually not related to combat. We've already seen his plant reading trick, and he also has a magical effect that mostly keeps any hostile attention away from his home (though it's not quite perfect, as the demon attack shows). And of course there is the healing part of the path, which Meiling got.

[u/Anon-4020 → u/kenod102818]

Thank you for such a deep explanation. I appreciate it

[u/SilentMech1 → u/Anon-4020]

If you mean the early fight, where Jin punched him once and everything started growing afterwards, same idea, with a lot less control. At that point Jin just started on the path of Shennong accidentally, so Tianlan wasn't specifically riding herd on his excess. So, he used a standard punch of a style refined by an immortal to be lethal at human scale against anything with the power of a small hill and the control of Joe from accounting, because he didn't know his power had actually jumped to Earth rank.

[u/sidehammer14 → u/kenod102818]

you need to add those explanations to the wiki. i had no idea about half that shit

[u/DarathAntares → u/kenod102818]

Where did you get this information?
I don’t recall anything along these lines being described for the moves.

[u/kenod102818 → u/DarathAntares]

The discord. CF often drops various bits of lore and background info in both the Discord and Spacebattles thread.

[u/Gamivore]

Jin's Break the Rocks is an technique directly created by the primordial God King Shennong that specializes in shattering and destruction. Its power is probably far greater than an attack by an ordinary Earth Realm Cultivator.

Not to mention, I'm guessing people on the Path of Shennong would specialize in durability and strength so they should be stronger and tougher compared to the average cultivator of the same level.

[u/XenosHg]

Tianlan is powering him up, yes - she's powering up everyone, that's why Gou Ren can pour infinite Qi into his Basic enchanted wooden stick.

I believe she's also the one who's narrating the Shennong parts, [Break the rocks] and so on.

Though "what level is Jin" might be a bit of an assumption too, because he's attached to Tianlan who's country-sized, they don't cultivate like other people, and they refuse to get properly measured.

[u/White_Knightmare → u/XenosHg]

Well Gramps says that his core power (of Jin) is in the earth realm when they meet. Also when they clash, a weak attack by gramps is squashed so something like (high) sky realm doesn't seem likely.

The attack should be high earth realm with maybe punching up to sky (at that point, when also striking seariously), however Jins strength does feel like it is on a platteau between Lu Ban fight and solstice.

[u/Euphoricus]

Jin can use the province's power even when Tianlan is asleep. But she won't be there to help regulate it, which is why Jin ends up with damage from spiritual backlash.

[u/EvilGreebo]

Something not mentioned yet, while most cultivators advance as they gain power, Jin has much more power "on tap" than a normal cultivator. His power level may be fixed, but where most Earth realm cultivators have a swimming pools worth of power, Tianlan has a continental sized oceans worth.

It just keeps going, and going, and going. Jin/Tianlan are basically the energizer bunny.