Rather than "advancing slowly", I think it'd be more appropriate to claim that, the story is placing more emphasis on things that do not seem related to the end-goal of the MC.
Which is, to get to the shadow-world as a powerful group, essentially.
After 20 or so chapters, it keeps telling us that what is actually most important -- is to have conflict of status (how very Chinese), have mini-arcs about seemingly redundant character-growth that could've being left out (Pram's having daddy issues is pretty much only used to attach himself to the MC, it's like creating extra steps instead of just focus on powering up in general)...
I can keep going, but essentially, instead of "powering up", we had much more of interpersonal relationship drama and socio-political squabbles, most of which do not even fully benefit the might of a supremely skilled individual, with information about future events. It feels like the author is just needlessly stretching out the story after it had an explosive start.
I don't think it completely went to shit, but just not yet. It certainly lasted longer than I expected.