Sun Flower Sea

But this method was even less reliable than judging by a Spirit Beast's traits, because far too many Spirit Beasts could change the color of their own Soul Power.

At that moment, Ning Haiyan also gave his answer.

"The best method is to wait until your cultivation is strong enough to judge directly by the strength of a Spirit Beast's Soul Power, but even that isn't absolute. In the end, you still need to rely on your own experience, and that takes time to build."

"I understand!"

Xu Yang understood as well. To put it plainly, when it came to judging a Spirit Beast's age, aside from studying, the only path was accumulating experience.

However, Xu Yang did not leave right away. Instead, he compared the Wind Baboon's traits one by one with the descriptions in the book. This was the best time to learn and accumulate experience, and he did not want to miss it.

Ning Haiyan waited at the side, silently watching, no one knew what he was thinking.

"All right! Uncle Ning, let's go!"

Before long, Xu Yang stood up and smiled at Ning Haiyan. He had not forgotten the main purpose of this trip. Studying Spirit Beasts was only something they were doing along the way.

The two continued forward. The farther they went, the taller the trees became, and every one of them was unusually lush, completely different from the surrounding forest.

Having studied sun flowers, Xu Yang knew that this was a characteristic of the area where sun flower Spirit Beasts lived. Because sun flowers could draw in and gather sunlight, the flowers, grasses, and trees around sun flower Spirit Beasts all grew exceptionally luxuriant, with astonishing vitality. They could even cause these ordinary plants to become Spirit Beasts.

After passing through this forest, what came into view was a sea of flowers. It was a Sun Flower Sea, covering an area as large as a basketball court. Sun flowers of all ages swayed their petals, drawing in and gathering Sun Power. They not only absorbed it themselves, but also passed on what they could not absorb to other plants.

The temperature here was also clearly much higher than in the other parts of the forest. The dense Sun Power made the surrounding air begin to distort, carrying a sweltering heat and a scorched smell.

"Good grief, so many sun flowers, and an environment like this..."

Standing in such an environment, Xu Yang only felt the Sun Martial Soul in his body grow restless, and the Soul Power within him also began circulating. He felt that cultivating for one day in this place was worth more than ten days of cultivating elsewhere.

This was the Mimicry Environment most suited to his cultivation.

"This is the Sun Flower Sea within Sunset Forest. It has sun flowers ranging from ten years to ten thousand years old. If you want to find a Golden-Edged Sun Flower suitable for you, it would be hard to find one anywhere else besides here."

Ning Haiyan looked at Xu Yang, who was too shocked to speak, and the corners of his mouth curved into a smile as he introduced this area.

"But Uncle Ning, with this many sun flowers here, even you might not be able to come out unscathed!" Xu Yang said, somewhat worried.

Although he knew that Golden-Edged Sun Flowers were very rare, and there might not even be one among tens of thousands, in this kind of environment, it was simply too dangerous.

One must not underestimate this football-field-sized Sun Flower Sea. There were a full ten thousand sun flowers living here. Although their cultivation levels generally were not high, only at the hundred-year or thousand-year level, with so many sun flowers gathered together, the Soul Power they could unleash was something even a Soul Saint might not be able to withstand.

And the instinct of weak Spirit Beasts was to huddle together for warmth. Thousands upon thousands of low-level Spirit Beasts gathering together was precisely what they relied on to live safely in the forest.

"No need to worry about that. Plant-type Spirit Beasts are still very different from animal-type Spirit Beasts. Before becoming ten-thousand-year Spirit Beasts, they don't have much intelligence, only instinct. Most of the time, they rely on the ten-thousand-year Spirit Beast, the Sun Flower King, to coordinate their attacks.

Two years ago, I brought sect disciples here to hunt sun flowers, so I know that the Sun Flower King here only broke through to ten thousand years not long ago. Its intelligence has just formed, and its will is relatively weak. As long as I unleash the full aura of a Soul Saint, it will immediately choose to retreat into its shell instead of fighting. When that time comes, I'll help you seize a sun flower of a suitable age, and you only need to kill it and absorb its Soul Ring!"

As he spoke, Ning Haiyan looked confidently toward the huge sun flower at the center of the sea of flowers, his eyes full of mockery.

Following Ning Haiyan's gaze, Xu Yang looked over as well. He saw that within the sea of flowers, there was an enormous sun flower with a body over five meters long and twenty-one petals, its petals inlaid with golden edges, like a giant sunflower.

"Twenty-one petals in bloom, body over five meters long. It really is a Sun Flower King that only recently broke through ten thousand years!" After observing it for a while, Xu Yang also confirmed the Sun Flower King's age and knew that Ning Haiyan's words were true. He immediately smiled and said, "Then next, we only need to find a suitable Golden-Edged Sun Flower!"

"Exactly!" Ning Haiyan nodded with a smile.

As long as you did not threaten their lives, Spirit Beasts like sun flowers generally would not take the initiative to attack. So the two of them could search from the outside first, and once they found one, Ning Haiyan would make his move and capture the sun flower of the suitable age.

The two circled the outer area a full three times. Unfortunately, they did not find any sun flowers with golden edges, though they did see quite a few with silver edges.

"If there aren't any on the outside, then only the inside is left!"

With this guess in mind, the two turned their gazes toward the area beside the Sun Flower King. Sure enough, around the Sun Flower King were many Golden-Edged Sun Flowers, ranging from thousand-year ones to hundred-year ones, and there were quite a number of them.

To see more clearly, Xu Yang climbed directly up a large tree about ten meters tall and began observing. Soon, he saw one that was very suitable, but he could not be certain, so he shouted loudly to Ning Haiyan below.

"Uncle Ning, the seventh plant to the left of the Flower King. It's about one meter tall and has seven petals in bloom. Those are the traits of a seven-hundred-year Golden-Edged Sun Flower, but it's too far away. I can't be completely sure!"

When Ning Haiyan heard this, Soul Power circulated beneath his feet, and his whole body rose into the air, landing beside Xu Yang. Following the direction of his finger, he began observing from afar.

With his cultivation having reached Soul Saint, his body had long since transformed and was no longer like that of an ordinary person. His five senses were even sharper to the extreme, comparable to a 98K with a four-times scope, far beyond what a Spirit Master like Xu Yang, who had only just awakened his Martial Soul, could compare with.

"Not bad. It is indeed a Golden-Edged Sun Flower of over seven hundred years!"

"Young Master, your powers of observation are quite good! This is your first Spirit hunt, yet you can accurately judge a Spirit Beast's age!"

Ning Haiyan only glanced at it once before determining that this sun flower's age matched Xu Yang's previous requirements. He immediately gave Xu Yang an appreciative look, then his whole body turned into an arrow loosed from the string and shot toward that Golden-Edged Sun Flower.

While he was still in midair, a large saber burning with crimson flames suddenly appeared in his hand. Seven Soul Rings—yellow, yellow, purple, purple, black, black, black—rose from beneath his feet and wrapped around his body. Then a terrifying aura erupted like a volcano.

The instant danger was sensed, the first to close its flower bud was the Sun Flower King at the very center, which fled underground. Immediately after, the other sun flowers also chose to close their buds. But they did not have the Sun Flower King's ability to burrow into the ground, and could only place their hopes on this method to avoid danger.