Follow the path of Dao from infancy Chapter 1857 Chapter 494: Creation Carving Destiny (2)

To Li Hao, the Life Sea resembled a modest pond, where tadpole-shaped beings kept surfacing endlessly, taking on diverse forms that mimicked peculiar tiny bugs.

These small bugs even harbored their own minds, detectable by Li Hao. A handful boasting greater vitality displayed the most vibrant thoughts. He could feel their urge to venture forth and their fascination with the outer world, yet they remained trapped, unable to surmount the ridges he had shaped around them.

"Their progress is far too sluggish. Were it any other Immortal King Realm expert, they could nurture the existences within their domains, employing them as tools to refine personal Cultivation Techniques and the Dao... yet I lack the patience to await them."

Gazing upon these entities emerging from the Life Sea, Li Hao let out an inner sigh.

For these beings to evolve into viable fighting forces, they must keep advancing in cultivation and multiplying over time. Right now, they lingered in the primal Barbaric Wilds era.

Pulling his focus away from these nascent lives, Li Hao turned back to delving into his Carving Arts.

"The core of Carving..."

"All things can be shaped through carving..."

"He started as mere timber, and through my hands, I transformed him into a person or an animal."

"Time imprints creases upon the visage of existence, a form of carving that bestows..."

"Bestows... vitality?"

Li Hao sank deeply into this realization, his gaze shimmering with flashes, oblivious to the surroundings beyond.

Time flew by in an instant—thirty years elapsed.

Within the domain, a youth remained seated in meditation, clutching a wooden sculpture in his grasp.

The sculpture depicted a charming Little White Fox, innocently playful, its elongated fox eyes exuding an innate charm.

Just like that boy from long ago, beneath the starry night sky, accompanied solely by the Little White Fox.

"Imbuing age with lines, imbuing power, these are all powers inherent to carving."

"Yet at its root... it's reshaping their very Creation!"

The youth whispered softly to himself.

That Little White Fox had crossed paths with him, evolving from an injured wild cub to residing in the famed Divine General Mansion, where opulence became its norm ever since.

Across endless years, life undergoes boundless transformations.

While temporal shifts prove beyond control, alterations via carving... confer Creation itself!

"Life Carving Blade, Creation Realm!"

Li Hao's eyes snapped open, as though myriad stars converged and danced within them, the glow of Dao insight from an epiphany, his Divine Soul now pristine, brushing against the primordial forces of heaven and earth.

[You have grasped the thirteen-stage Carving State of Mind, Creation Life Carving!]

With the system's alert, a torrent of understandings surged into Li Hao's consciousness.

In that instant, visions of infinite carving methods unfolded before him, weaving through eras, amid countless lives, wielded by the intangible Time Blade to etch all creation, all souls, flora and foliage, fauna and wildlife.

All existence bears the mark of carving, all receives endowment, forging a true Creation!

"Ah, so this is the truth..."

Li Hao muttered, his eyes alight with profound insight; this captured carving's true nature.

Bestowing upon all what they lack, to the recipient, it equates to Creation!

"A single slash births a realm; a single etch forms a life; carving's traces become laws, turning everything into mere puppets!"

In this moment, Li Hao at last unveiled the profound source of carving.

Yet shortly after, a notion stirred within him: having pierced the origin via the thirteen-stage carving, what mysteries lay in the fourteenth-stage Carving Arts?

Transcending the bestowal of Creation, delving even further into... Carving Arts?

Doubt clouded Li Hao's gaze, as if he had tumbled into a vast, bottomless vortex, profoundly abyssal and impossibly remote, evoking dread to approach or fathom.

After some indeterminate span, Li Hao regained his composure, sensing chill sweat drenching his robes.

Fresh from attaining the thirteenth-stage epiphany, merely contemplating the fourteenth path felt like drowning in endless depths.

The fourteenth stage, he suspected, aligned with the Immortal Emperor Realm.

Could it represent an Emperor's Path?

"Presently, the Physical Body Dao, Control Dao, and Sword Dao have all been embedded; only the Body Path and Fist Skill await."

"I'll start by elevating the Body Path!"

For Li Hao, boosting the Fist Skill held little weight, since it pertained to offensive techniques that overlapped with Sword Dao.

Enhancing the Body Path, however, promised immense gains, unlocking swift mastery of countless supreme Immortal King techniques.

"Once embedded, reversal is impossible; I need to venture into the Heaven Tower time and again until all four Realm Hearts stabilize, granting me a moment's respite."

Resolve hardened in Li Hao's eyes.

He had poured vast energies into the prior three Realm Hearts, and ideas for harmonizing four eluded him entirely now.

If the approach for three Realm Hearts could adapt to form a quadrilateral with four, might stability follow?

Li Hao mulled over this, his mind adrift in contemplation.

As he delved into these reflections, a gentle voice suddenly drifted to his ears:

"All who perceive my words, cease your current pursuits. I will expound the Tao Collection for three years, and you may absorb whatever you can—this serves as your cultivation boon."

Li Hao identified it as the Star Empress's timbre, and upon opening his eyes to survey, he saw surrounding domains fading away, exposing figures within, each turning toward the Heaven Tower with expressions of astonishment and delight.

"Tao Collection?"

Li Hao recalled one of the elite resources he had traded for earlier, the Tao Collection.

As a cornerstone relic of the Dao Clan, even in its partial form, grasping it enabled perfect comprehension of all heavenly Daos up to Ten Layers!

The value of such an artifact was beyond measure.

"An Immortal Emperor's sermon? And it's the Tao Collection!"

"This is the Dao Clan's sacred canon—how does even the Star Empress possess it?"

"Naturally, an Immortal Emperor grasps all knowledge, though the deepest secrets might elude her, or binding pacts could bar free sharing even if aware."