Hi. I'd like to read some stories where the protagonist has a good reason to grow more powerful. There's no more boring motive than to grow stronger just for the sake of power. If it's like in Ze Tian Ji, where he's got to reach a point in his cultivation before a certain age or his illness will kill him, that's way more interesting than just wanting to become stronger than everyone else. I like it best when the cultivation is a tool, not the protagonists driving force. I don't like the "I shall become the strongest under the heavens and no one will dare look down on me!" approach, nor the "Oh, I found this artifact/I have this bloodline that can make me strong, better not waste this opportunity to bring me/my family glory!". Yes I know that it's realistic that people want power. But wanting power just to be more powerful than others isn't an admirable trait in my opinion. Especially as it usually means an arrogant character. Looking forward to your recommendations!
maybe World of Cultivation? MC just wants to be a farmer and make money and he cultivates to become a better farmer at first but then war happens and he cultivates because they'll all die if they don't get stronger. the first half of the novel is pretty good the second half is a little messy.
What about protagonists who cultivates not for the sake of power but for the sake of revenge or/and meeting someone?
It feels like most cultivation stories will devolve into that regardless of the original motive. You can only dangle an overarching goal for so long.
Yeah I could go for that, as long as he's got a reason to continue cultivating after doing that (if the story doesn't end at that point). E.g if he cultivates to meet back up with his love interest, he'll need a new motivation after accomplishing that, and not just go on keep spending years cultivating instead of actually being with her, when the reason he started cultivating was to get to her in the first place.
I agree that they seem to devolve into that, but the goals can change without being pure pursuit of power. Earn status to get together with love interest -> Bad guy that's more powerful kidnaps their child -> get powerful enough to beat evil kidnapper -> uncovers a plot that threaten his home -> etc etc. The goals doesn't have to be super complicated, I mainly dislike the arrogance of power-seeking protagonists.
Just discovered this really good novel called Battling Records of the Chosen One, it has 192 chapters released. The reason is probably revenge, but anything more than that and i'd call that a spoiler Never saw anyone talking about it.
Library of Heavens Path perhaps. The protagonist was poisoned and has to cultivate to a certain realm to remove it from his body.
It seems like that is just a recipe for revolving door villains. That's probably why authors use the self improvement/want to reach the peak mentality in the first place rather than justifying why someone spends 90% of their life in training.
sadly most cultivation novels have a reborn/ transmigrated MC (even if it's never mentioned again) who ends up in the body of some families "trash" and then proceeds to avenge himself on the bullies and get stronger. he often forgives the family that bullied him and it goes from there. maybe I Shall Seal the Heaven's? MC starts cultivating because he was kidnapped by the sect after failing the test to become a civil servant (or one of Er Gen's other novels). it still has a lot of cliche cultivation moments but there's no rebirth/ transmigration involved. or Cultivation Chat Group, which is modern day and comedy oriented. he starts cultivating after he finds out its real. no revenge or rebirth in that one.
Library of Heaven's Path. He starts to do so to gain credibility and act as a master teacher and get money to buy pills and help his hardly gained students to advance their cultivation, then slowly gained the strength to become a real master teacher so nobody can trample him and help his students find their way of life whilst traveling the whole continent.
Divine Throne of Primordial Blood Mc wants to make techniques for regular pepole without bloodlines to increase the power of the human race.
Normally, XianXia novels are most of the time...well all the time, somewhat dressed up dog eat dog world, either you are able to protect what you have and strong enough to fight for resources you need or someone else will take it from you, thus the common theme of must grow stronger in order to not be under someone's mercy. So to find the main motivation of getting stronger for something other than for the sake of getting stronger ...such as Ze Tian Ji's reason, it's not too common because underlying all of that, such as protecting someone/thing, exploring, supporting auxiliary hobbies, etc, there is still to not be at the mercy of someone else as an underlying reason in order for you to progress and keep at the 'main' reason.