Waves crashed against the shore, icy cold. Feng Lin opened his eyes and found himself lying in the seawater, floating with the waves.
He blinked, utterly bewildered.
What exactly happened?
Wasn't he just fighting those Eastern Islanders, struck by that sinister Amaterasu Black Flame? What happened after that? How did he end up here?
...
A massive blank gap in his memory left him baffled.
Suddenly, he felt a weight in his palm. Looking down, he was shocked to find an iron rod tightly clenched in his hand, his grip unyielding.
The rod was pitch-black and perfectly round, inscribed with eight characters: "No fixed form, only the power of the mind."
Wasn't this the Eastern Divine Pillar?
How had it become so small?
...
Feng Lin was stunned. A sharp pain shot through his head as countless memories flooded his mind.
He saw himself suddenly awakening, wreaking havoc everywhere—a power far beyond what he possessed now!
It felt like... like...
He had become someone else!
Old Sun, me?
The words spoken by that unfamiliar version of himself sent chills down Feng Lin's spine. Could Sun Wukong be resurrecting through his body?
Was there always a monkey living inside him?
Ready to take over his body at any moment?
...
These thoughts were unbearable for Feng Lin. Though he walked the path of Sun Wukong's myth, he was still himself—he didn't want to become anyone else.
Even if that monkey dominated the Three Realms and laughed at gods and demons, what of it?
No matter how mighty, it wasn't him!
No, that's not right!
After the initial panic, Feng Lin—no ordinary man—gradually calmed down.
Mythical figures resurrecting through mythical genes had never happened in the three-thousand-year history of interstellar human cultivation. It defied the theory of mythical genes!
Those ancient mythical figures had long vanished into the river of time, leaving nothing behind but their mythical genes.
If they could resurrect, they would have done so long ago. Why wait until now?
This peculiar phenomenon had never occurred in anyone else. It was unheard of. Why was it happening to him?
Feng Lin racked his brain, wondering what made him different from others.
Suddenly, his heart skipped a beat. Could all this be related to the Supreme Mythical Path?
The more he thought about it, the more plausible it seemed.
In the ancient era of cultivation civilization, Supreme Divine Beings reached heights ordinary people could never imagine. Their very existence possessed transcendent traits—memories, will, thoughts—all fused into one, passed down through mythical genes.
When later generations awakened the corresponding mythical genes, they inherited the memories and will of those Supreme Divine Beings.
It seemed Sun Wukong's will was simply too strong, interfering with him!
Recalling the overwhelming arrogance that had filled him earlier—a disdain for heaven and earth—Feng Lin pondered.
The Great Sage's will?
What chilled him was that he had only awakened the Stone Monkey gene, yet the Great Sage's will was already this powerful. If he continued down this path, Sun Wukong's memories and will would keep awakening, gradually influencing him.
If he reached the end of this mythical path, would he become another Sun Wukong?
Wouldn't that mean Sun Wukong was effectively resurrecting through him?
Feng Lin knew himself well. He was just a mortal. In a contest of wills with Sun Wukong, could he truly win?
The odds were minuscule!
The Sun Wukong mythical path had set him on a transcendent journey, but one day, he would have to break free from its limitations.
The Supreme Mythical Path held great promise, but he didn't have to reach its end and become the ancient divine being itself. He only needed to borrow its cultivation experience, refine himself, and ultimately forge his own path.
With this thought, Feng Lin's mind cleared like a cloudless sky, free of any shadow.
A seed of cultivation was deeply planted in his heart, waiting for the right moment to take root and sprout!
Feng Lin silently gripped the iron rod in his hand, his mind stirring.
Infinite Divine Iron!
He instinctively knew the true name of this artifact.
It was a strange treasure controlled by the power of the mind. The stronger the mind, the greater the rod's power.
If the mind was infinite, the Divine Iron could change at will, possessing endless mysteries—hence the name Infinite Divine Iron.
But to refine this artifact, one's mental power had to be immensely strong. The previous Feng Lin couldn't have done it.
Yet, by a twist of fate, the Great Sage's will had awakened within him, unleashing a surge of mental power that resonated with the Infinite Divine Iron. With a single command—"Rod, come!"—he had refined it and summoned it into his hand.
Feng Lin realized that the Infinite Divine Iron functioned much like the Ruyi Jingu Bang, also passed down from ancient ruins.
This rod must have a close connection to the Ruyi Jingu Bang, resonating with the Great Sage's will and recognizing him as its master.
In the end, Feng Lin had benefited from the Great Sage's will.
As for the exact truth, Feng Lin pondered for a long time without figuring it out. He would have to explore it later.
Holding the Divine Iron, Feng Lin willed it to shrink rapidly in his palm, turning into a sewing needle.
He was about to put it in his ear but stopped, feeling foolish. He wasn't a monkey!
He reshaped the Infinite Divine Iron, shrinking and bending it into a ring, which he slipped onto his index finger. It fit perfectly, sitting alongside his spaceship ring.
Opening the folded space, the Huaguoshan spacecraft reappeared on the sea surface. Feng Lin boarded it, and in an instant, the ship vanished over the ocean.
He left without a care, unaware that Earth was in chaos.
For some unknown reason, the Eastern Island nation suddenly launched a fierce condemnation against Earth's Huaxia Nation. A powerful cultivator surnamed Sun had stolen the Eastern Divine Pillar, causing the Eastern Island territory to continue sliding into the Mariana Trench. Five to six hundred million Eastern Islanders were in peril, panic spreading across the nation. They demanded Huaxia hand over the cultivator surnamed Sun for punishment and return the Divine Pillar.
Huaxia, skilled in the art of Tai Chi, naturally denied everything. The two sides bickered endlessly, neither backing down. The key issue was that the Eastern Island nation had no evidence—a mythical secret realm had been completely destroyed, and they hadn't even caught a glimpse of the culprit.
The two major nations on Earth were locked in a dispute, and the cultivator surnamed Sun became infamous. Countless people speculated about his identity.
How had he managed to make the Eastern Island nation suffer such a loss?
As the instigator of it all, Feng Lin paid no attention. He had returned to Earth's second-deepest trench, the Tonga Trench, to continue his cultivation, avoiding all distractions.
In the blink of an eye, over twenty days passed!
Feng Lin opened his eyes at the bottom of the 15,000-meter-deep trench. His essence was internalized, and a qualitative change was taking place within him.
His new life attributes were as follows:
"Name: Feng Lin Life Force: 218 Original Genes: Stone Monkey Gene: 10; Mind Gene: 10 Basic Genes: Ape Gene: 10; Stone Embryo Gene: 10; Adrenaline Gene: 1; Spirit Gene: 9; Psychic Gene: 6; Spiritual Gene: 8 Gene Potential: 2988%"
After all these days of cultivation, his life force had broken through the 200 mark, growing from 208 to 218—a modest increase.
However, his Stone Monkey Gene and Mind Gene were both maxed out, yet for some reason, he couldn't evolve the Intelligent Stone Monkey Gene.
Feng Lin was puzzled. After much thought, he found the answer in Sun Wukong's myth.
As cultivation levels rose, the conditions for mythical gene evolution became increasingly stringent. Specific requirements had to be met.
The Intelligent Stone Monkey had absorbed the essence of the sun and moon for countless years, forming a celestial embryo before bursting forth from a stone, endowed with innate, powerful talents.
To awaken the Intelligent Stone Monkey Gene, he had to grasp the key to it, causing a qualitative change in gene evolution.
Mythological records were concise. Knowing the myth didn't mean understanding it; one had to perceive the essence of the myth.
Unfortunately, a month was too short. The second round of the Cosmic University enrollment assessment was approaching, and Feng Lin couldn't afford to waste more time.
He had no regrets. With a life force of 218, he was no worse than the average elite cultivator.
He was determined to succeed in the second round.
Breakthroughs in cultivation required steady progress; there was no need to rush.
As the assessment deadline neared, Feng Lin stored the spacecraft back in the folded space. Suddenly, he soared into the air, riding clouds toward the Huaxia region.
Feng Lin was no longer the same person. His abilities had全面提升, and his flight speed was astonishingly fast. He no longer crawled through the clouds but streaked across the sky like lightning.
The clouds beneath his feet swirled in the air, resembling the somersault cloud that could travel 108,000 li in a single leap, leaving a long trail in the sky that lingered for a long time.