Huo Yuhao finally recovered from the shock of "Brother Sky Dream" turning into "Sister Tian Meng."
Though the change had come out of nowhere, now was clearly not the time to investigate why. They still had a process to follow.
Besides, he had to take the initiative!
"Tian Meng, enough talk. Let's get the process started first."
Huo Yuhao's voice was calm and certain, carrying an unquestionable authority.
Before his words had even faded, he suddenly pushed off the ground!
Dust stirred beneath his feet. His body shot forward like an arrow loosed from a bow, covering the two-meter distance in an instant and appearing directly in front of Sky Dream Ice Silkworm's enormous head!
Before Sky Dream Ice Silkworm could react, her golden eyes wide as saucers, Huo Yuhao had already bent forward without hesitation and firmly pressed his forehead against the center of her cool, smooth, jade-like brow!
"Chotto matte! Wait a second! It hurts... Huh?"
Sky Dream Ice Silkworm cried out instinctively and tried to resist, only to discover in horror that her enormous body was completely unable to move!
An invisible force of suppression, originating on the level of the soul, accompanied by some sort of higher aura transmitted through their touching foreheads, kept her from so much as lifting a single feeler!
This was completely turning the natural order upside down!
She was a dignified million-year Soul Beast, yet an apparently ten-something-year-old human child with pitifully weak Soul Power had subdued her in an instant, leaving her no room to fight back?! Was there any justice in this?!
Just as she was furiously grumbling to herself, another sudden change took place!
A dazzling golden light, brilliant as if it held an endless galaxy within, burst forth from the point where their foreheads touched!
The light shone so brightly that it instantly illuminated the shadowy forest around them.
The ten golden rings on Sky Dream Ice Silkworm's body, each representing a portion of her cultivation, seemed to have been infused with life. They pulsed like living golden dragons, radiating intense light.
Immediately afterward, streams of pure, vast white light surged out of her body. Like fledgling swallows returning to their nest, they swiftly spread and enveloped Huo Yuhao.
Intricate, mysterious white rings filled with an ancient aura began to appear and circulate across Huo Yuhao's skin, as if imprinting some ancient and sacred ritual upon him.
At the same time, Sky Dream Ice Silkworm's enormous seven-meter-long body began to rapidly shrink and turn ethereal, like a deflating ball.
Her white jade body broke apart into specks of light, which ultimately gathered into an incredibly condensed golden stream. It flowed through the point where their foreheads touched and continuously merged into the white rings inside Huo Yuhao.
As the golden stream flowed in, the white rings were rapidly stained gold, turning into an even more dazzling and majestic brilliant gold!
An indescribably terrifying surge of spiritual power erupted from Huo Yuhao, like an ancient behemoth awakening from its slumber!
"Boom—!"
An invisible spiritual tempest burst out from Huo Yuhao, expanding violently in every direction in a sphere!
Throughout the southern reaches of the Star Dou Great Forest, within a hundred-mile radius, every creature—from tiny insects to powerful hundred- and thousand-year Soul Beasts—felt an indescribable shudder and oppression deep in their souls!
Every sound vanished in an instant. All living things fell silent, plunged into absolute stillness as dead as the grave!
At the very moment the spiritual tempest swept across heaven and earth—
"Crack—!!!"
A peal of thunder boomed high above in the distance, as if it could rend the heavens and shatter souls!
The clear sky was instantly swallowed by boundless darkness!
It was not a mass of dark clouds, but a purer, more unsettling and profound darkness!
Immediately afterward, a thread-thin but incomparably condensed stream of gray energy seemed to be pulled by both the terrifying spiritual power below and some special force of attraction. Like a meteor falling to earth, it shot down from the endless darkness!
It moved faster than thought!
In the blink of an eye, the gray stream disregarded all spatial distance and burrowed with pinpoint accuracy into the space between Huo Yuhao's brows, vanishing without a trace.
Within the Sea of Spirit.
Reborn Huo Yuhao naturally had no intention of passively accepting Sky Dream Ice Silkworm's "sacrifice" as he had in his previous life.
The moment the fusion began, he used his familiarity with Sky Dream Ice Silkworm's Spiritual Origin from his previous life, the essence of his own Divine Origin Realm soul, and the power of the Eye of Destiny to seize control instead.
With absolute mastery, he swiftly and thoroughly refined and integrated Sky Dream Ice Silkworm's vast yet diffuse spiritual power, along with her soul core, seamlessly incorporating them into the structure of his own soul and making them his own.
Of course, this was also thanks to Sky Dream Ice Silkworm's initial shock and the fact that, after sensing the aura of the Eye of Destiny, she had not truly fought back with all her strength.
Even if she had resisted, with Huo Yuhao's current abilities, he still could have grabbed her and refined her in an instant.
At this moment, the Sea of Spirit had undergone a complete transformation.
The hundred-zhang "pool," once pale blue, had expanded several times over. Its color had turned a deeper, denser dark blue, and the "water" of spiritual power had thickened like syrup, its surface gleaming with a gentle luster.
An ancient gray-white gate floated quietly in one corner.
Above the center of the Sea of Spirit, the golden Eye of Destiny still floated motionlessly, radiating its unchanging aura of destiny.
Beneath the Eye of Destiny, a small golden orb of light slowly shifted its shape.
As the light faded, it transformed into the figure of a human girl who looked about twelve or thirteen.
Her brilliant golden hair, bright as sunlight, fell softly over her shoulders, its ends curling slightly.
Her small, delicate face was fair and faintly plump, giving her a cute, mischievous look.
Her large, azure eyes were as pure as the sea. They were wide with shock and confusion.
She wore an unusual loose-fitting white jumpsuit and floated barefoot above the surface of the sea of spirit.
She was Sky Dream Ice Silkworm after taking human form—Sister Tian Meng.
"Who am I? Where am I? What just happened?"
Sister Tian Meng raised her newly small, fair hands and turned them over and over, then touched her face and pinched her clothes. Her expression was the very picture of utter bewilderment.
Had she really... been fused with someone just like that, so easily and without the slightest chance to resist?
Her million years of cultivation had vanished just like that, and she had even turned into a little human girl? This wasn't how the script was supposed to go!
But when she looked up and saw the golden vertical pupil floating above, radiating a vast, majestic, supreme aura, the shudder and sudden realization rising from deep within her soul instantly gave her a "reasonable" explanation.
"A divine artifact... and there's the aura of true divinity on it... I couldn't mistake it!"
Sister Tian Meng muttered to herself, her big azure eyes filled with even greater astonishment.
What did this mean?
Did it mean that the human she had randomly chosen was actually a "chosen one" selected by a god?!
No wonder she had been utterly powerless to resist!
While Sister Tian Meng was still caught up in her shock and piecing together her own explanation, Huo Yuhao's spiritual body also took shape and appeared before her.
He still looked like an eleven-year-old boy, but the depth and composure in his eyes clashed starkly with his youthful appearance.
"Who exactly are you? That vertical pupil has the aura of divinity on it. I couldn't mistake it!"
Sister Tian Meng came back to her senses and looked at Huo Yuhao, her tone complicated—tinged with shock, confusion, a trace of discontent at having been forcibly fused, and even greater curiosity.
Huo Yuhao was silent for a moment.
Being reborn was far too bizarre, and it involved his ultimate hatred for Tang San. Though Sister Tian Meng had been deeply bound to him in his previous life, they had only just met in this one—and even her gender had changed. He needed some time to process it.
"My name is Huo Yuhao," he said slowly, his voice calm. "As you can see, I'm a chosen one. The god who chose me is called the 'God of Destiny.'"
He raised a hand and pointed to the golden vertical pupil above them. "This is the divine artifact he bestowed upon me—the Eye of Destiny."
"And our meeting wasn't a coincidence, either. It was... destiny's arrangement."
He had not been entirely dishonest.
The divine position he had created in his previous life had been "Destiny," so there was nothing wrong with calling himself the chosen one of the God of Destiny.
The Eye of Destiny truly was his divine artifact, so saying it had been bestowed by a god was not entirely unreasonable.
As for their meeting being destiny's arrangement... He had been reborn and met her again. Was that not a kind of destiny?
Before you continue