Zheng Qing knew that Taiyi's path had already been severed.
After all, the Giant God Soldiers were merely artificial alchemical creations. Being able to occupy a Legendary position was already legendary in itself. Moreover, "control" and "freedom" were natural contradictions. If First University wished to control those two Giant God Soldiers, it could not possibly grant them independent consciousness. And without independent consciousness, advancing further in cultivation—or even tracing back along the River of Time and Fate to anchor themselves in other living beings—was nothing but a fantasy.
Even if Zheng Qing gave up his own path and completely fused with a Giant God Soldier like Professor Montria, he still could not advance any further. The sturdy shells of Yuanshi and Taiyi were both protection, allowing weak beings like them to disregard the attacks of other Legends, and shackles, firmly binding their souls and thoughts to those corpses.
The Yellow Calico Cat had made this very clear—the reason a Side Door was called a Side Door was because its path had already reached its end. It was "not the proper path," and thus had been classified as a Side Door.
The words "path severed" sounded terrifying.
But to the countless Ordinary Wizards of the Wizarding World who found even the realm of Grand Wizard unattainably lofty in their entire lives, Taiyi and Yuanshi were existences too lofty to look up at—true titanic figures, even the outcome countless Grand Wizards dreamed of.
In other words.
If "a severed path" could be exchanged for a Legendary Fruit Position, 99.99 percent of wizards in the world would not hesitate in the slightest. Hesitating for even a second would be blasphemy against Legend. As for the remaining 0.01 percent, they either had already glimpsed the hope of becoming true Legends, or they were oddities