Taiyi slowly opened his eyes.
These past days, he had kept to himself, venturing only within this mountain range.
Apart from occasionally replenishing his food supplies and searching nearby for spirit medicine or rare treasures, he had devoted himself almost entirely to cultivation.
After refining the few stalks of spirit medicine he had obtained earlier, along with the medicinal power of the Sacred Fruit remaining in his body, he had unknowingly expanded his bitter sea to roughly the size of a pigeon's egg.
"With the medicinal properties of those spirit medicines, expanding my bitter sea this far and condensing twenty-one divine marks... have I already reached the limit?"
He murmured to himself.
Unhurriedly, he extended his right hand.
He pressed his pale middle and index fingers together like a sword.
Whoosh! A beam of golden light shot from his fingertips.
It instantly pierced the cave wall, leaving a finger-sized hole whose bottom could not be seen.
The sight would have left anyone dumbstruck, their scalp prickling.
Yet for Taiyi, this was merely a small test of his blade.
If he truly cast aside his restraints and struck with all his strength...
The entire cave would have been blasted into collapse.
"That should do!"
He circulated the Sun True Scripture.
The divine radiance surrounding him withdrew completely into his body.
Over three months of cultivation, repeated exploration, and constant experimentation...
With the complete Wheel Sea Scroll of the Sun True Scripture gradually manifesting in his mind, along with some simple secret arts and their applications...
Taiyi had mastered the method of concealing his aura and manifestations, allowing him to keep his divine power contained within.
So long as he did not circulate the Sun True Scripture at full power, he would no longer shine like a humanoid sun as he had before, every inch of flesh and every strand of hair glowing so brightly that avoiding attention was impossible.
Now, if he deliberately concealed himself...
As long as powerful cultivators did not scrutinize him...
They would not readily notice his unusual physique.
Boom...
He rose to his full height and walked to the cave entrance.
Looking at the boulder blocking the cave, he punched without hesitation.
The boulder, several meters tall, shattered outright, breaking into pieces that scattered across the ground.
"Time to leave..."
With a small pack on his back...
Taiyi, dressed in clothing made from bearskin, headed toward the world outside.
Through repeated verification over these past days, he had discovered an astonishing fact.
He did not merely possess a sun physique. He had an even more astonishing sun sacred body, combining every characteristic of two rare physiques: the desolate ancient sacred body and the sun physique.
Moreover, his physical body was unimaginably powerful.
Cultivating an art as supremely forceful and yang-aligned as the Sun True Scripture yielded twice the results for half the effort, as though aided by the gods.
He suspected that he might not only be a descendant of the Sun Saint Emperor, but very likely the descendant of someone with a sacred body as well.
Through an ancestral reversion of his bloodline, the two special origins had fused perfectly, miraculously producing an unprecedented sun sacred body. It possessed the traits of both a sacred body and a sun body, yet this was no simple addition. An inconceivable qualitative transformation had occurred, granting him boundless potential and terrifying divine power.
Though this extraordinarily powerful physique far surpassed rare king physiques such as the hades physique, star physique, and Yuhua king physique, and even exceeded an ordinary sun body or sacred body...
There were both advantages and drawbacks.
The good news was that, with his sun sacred body, his future was bright.
In terms of physique alone, he firmly believed that his sun sacred body might not fall far short of an innate sacred body dao embryo.
Once he matured, he would certainly be no weaker than someone with a sacred body, and might even be stronger.
In all likelihood, he would not suffer the curse of the desolate ancient sacred body, facing disaster upon breaking through to the four extremes secret realm and having his path ahead severed.
Moreover, unlike the desolate ancient sacred body, even without resources, the unique nature of his physique allowed him to absorb solar essence, the spiritual energy of heaven and earth, and other energies through cultivation, slowly increasing his strength.
The bad news was that his physique was too powerful. Just like the desolate ancient sacred body, it was a bottomless pit.
If he wanted to break through quickly, he needed vast quantities of rare treasures and precious medicines, or even the legendary, naturally formed "source," which contained enormous amounts of life essence, to absorb.
Otherwise, if he simply hid in these remote mountains and ancient forests, cultivating bitterly without encountering any opportunities...
Even three to five years, or longer, might not be enough to advance a single minor realm. He would have to expend long years and effort accumulating power, slowly grinding his way upward.
The five great secret realms of cultivation were the sea of bitterness, dao palace, four extremes, dragon transformation, and immortal platform.
The sea of bitterness secret realm was further divided into four realms: bitter sea, life spring, divine bridge, and other shore.
One could say that the first two secret realms placed the greatest emphasis on "resources."
Naturally, Taiyi was unwilling to spend too much time in the sea of bitterness and dao palace secret realms.
It was not that he lacked such perseverance and resolve, but that he believed it unnecessary.
On the contrary, he had no shortage of the adventurous spirit needed to forge ahead boldly and blaze new trails.
Nor would he keep hiding, afraid to show himself before others, merely because he feared that accidentally exposing his sun sacred body might invite unnecessary trouble.
Caution was naturally necessary.
But excessive caution was cowardice in disguise.
It might also cause him to lose his edge without even realizing it.
Gradually, he would lose the resolve and spirit to stake everything and advance without looking back.
Then his future achievements would be all too predictable.
Since ancient times, those contending on the Emperor's Path had advanced over heaps of bleached bones.
How could a true man standing between heaven and earth grovel timidly, forever looking over his shoulder?
He had no desire to become a mere backdrop for someone else.
Rather death than failure to attain the Dao!
He was, after all, a cultivator of the bitter sea realm.
Though Taiyi could not yet fly outright, his speed was still far beyond that of ordinary people.
After leaving this primeval mountain range, he traveled dozens upon dozens of miles without seeing a single person.
Of course, Taiyi remained cautious, giving the powerful savage beasts a wide berth.
Most of those savage beasts were demonic beasts that adhered to ancient methods, retaining their beast forms as they cultivated. Their strength was terrifying, their ferocity towering to the heavens.
Some were even comparable to mighty figures who dominated entire regions, and were naturally far beyond anything he could provoke at present.
Eventually, he passed through several villages and a small town.
At a shop, he exchanged the beast hides he had stripped from his hunting kills over these past days for two sets of well-fitting new clothes.
They were anything but lavish, but they were clean and neat, and could not conceal his exceptional, sunlike bearing or his striking beauty.
A child of eight or nine traveling alone through the Great Wilderness...
Naturally, he attracted attention, and some with ill intentions even tried to follow him into the wilds.
Yet without betraying any emotion, he killed a fierce tiger with a flick of his finger.
That frightened off some of the criminals.
Roar-
In the blink of an eye...
More than ten days passed.
Taiyi traveled during the day.
At night, he found a cave in the wilderness or excavated one himself to cultivate in.
At his level, he could already gather the spiritual energy of heaven and earth to sustain himself to some extent. Though he had not completely freed himself from the need for food, going ten days or half a month without eating posed no problem.
He kept moving, capturing two bandits who had tried to abduct him and questioning them.
He learned that demonic beasts haunted a nearby forest, often devouring hunters and travelers who wandered inside by mistake.
Whoosh! Whoosh!
He flicked his fingers.
Two beams of golden light flew out.
They pierced straight through two skulls, leaving bloody, finger-sized holes.
Taiyi showed no mercy in sending the two bandits to their deaths. One glance told him they frequently burned, murdered, and pillaged, had stained their hands with many innocent lives, and were thoroughly dishonest even under questioning. His expression remained calm, with little discomfort.
He sped onward.
After half an hour...
Following the directions the bandits had given him, he finally arrived in that mountain range.
He explored carefully, remaining vigilant at every moment.
As he proceeded, he occasionally spotted the bones of wild beasts amid the dense forest.
There were even human skulls.
The sight made his scalp crawl.
Roar...
Far in the distance.
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