After a good while, Yang Kai finally let out a long, slow breath. He retrieved a fresh set of clothes and dressed himself, while the corroded wounds across his skin healed at a speed visible to the naked eye. Scabs fell away to reveal brand-new skin beneath.
The onlooker gulped audibly, his face filled with horror.
Yang Kai turned his head and fixed his gaze on the man, then flickered forward, arriving before him in an instant.
This person had a cultivation of the Dao Source Realm's second stage — in the entirety of the Shattered Star Sea, that level of power was neither particularly high nor particularly low, placing him in the lower-middle tier. He had an odd appearance, with a weasel-like face and shifty eyes that made him look like no good sort.
Seeing Yang Kai suddenly appear in front of him, the man flinched and stumbled backward two steps, stammering in alarm: "Wh-what are you going to do?"
Yang Kai regarded him with an unpleasant expression and snorted coldly: "I just heard you say this place is the Origin Sea?"
"Y-yes! This is the Origin Sea!" The man's tongue seemed to be tying itself in knots as he answered without pause.
"What exactly is the Origin Sea? Explain it to me clearly."
The man's face twisted into a grimace. "The Origin Sea is just the Origin Sea… Massive amounts of Origin Power converge here, and the place looks just like an ocean, so everyone calls it the Origin Sea. There's nothing more to it than that."
"How did you find this place? And why are there so many people here?" Yang Kai stared at him icily.
"I came with my senior brother. He was called over by someone else… My friend, what exactly do you want to know?" The man seemed to have regained some composure. Seeing that Yang Kai harbored no real malice toward him, curiosity overtook his fear as he gazed back.
"Tell me about the Origin Sea. Everything you know — tell me all of it."
The man looked suspicious. "My friend, have you truly never heard of the Origin Sea?"
Yang Kai smacked him across the head and snapped: "If I'd heard of it, would I be asking you?"
The man ducked his head, a flash of anger crossing his mind, though he dared not show a trace of it. He exclaimed: "That can't be right — your cultivation is far from weak. How could you have never heard of the Origin Sea? This place should be recorded in the texts of every major sect."
"Every major sect?" Yang Kai raised an eyebrow.
"That's right. The Origin Sea is one of the most famous locations in the Shattered Star Sea, because it contains an enormous quantity of Origin Power that we can continuously absorb and refine. Once you find this place, there's no need to go hunting for the shattered fragments of stellar origin. But the Origin Sea doesn't appear every time — its timing and location are both unpredictable. Still, out of every three openings of the Shattered Star Sea, it appears at least once. This is a true cultivation paradise for martial artists!"
"Is it only Origin Power here? Then what is that blue luminescence? Why does it carry such intense corrosive force?" Yang Kai asked in a deep voice. He had just suffered from that blue glow firsthand — it had looked like seawater, and even his Divine Sense had detected no danger whatsoever, but the moment he plunged in, he had felt terrifyingly powerful corrosive energy. Had he not retreated quickly, the injuries would have been far worse.
"Nobody can say for certain what that blue luminescence actually is. It's been there since the very first time the Origin Sea appeared. But it's incredibly dangerous — anyone who rushes into it is as good as dead…" At this point, he suddenly remembered that Yang Kai had, in fact, not died. He gave an awkward smile. "My friend is quite remarkable, to be able to withdraw from inside it."
"I have you to thank for that!" Yang Kai said with a sardonic laugh.
This fellow had been watching from nearby the whole time and hadn't so much as called out a warning when Yang Kai had charged in. Granted, they had no prior relationship, but to just sit there and watch without lifting a finger — that was downright wicked.
If a martial artist of slightly lesser strength had charged in rashly, they would never have come out alive. But one couldn't really blame the man. Bystanders had every right to stand by and watch.
The man caught the reproach in Yang Kai's tone and couldn't help but give an embarrassed smile.
"Keep talking!" Yang Kai grunted.
The man hurriedly cleared his throat. "The benefits one can gain in the Origin Sea are enormous. Many people who find it simply stay here for the entire time, absorbing and refining Origin Power until the Shattered Star Sea closes. As you can see, friend, the Origin Sea stretches out as vast as a real ocean — so even if ten times as many people came, they'd never manage to exhaust the Origin Power. And… let me tell you a secret: the Origin Sea doesn't just contain fragments of origin power. Some people have even found complete Stellar Origins and Five Elements Origins within it!"
"A complete origin?" Yang Kai's expression shifted.
As a Star Lord himself, he understood better than anyone the vast gulf between a fractured origin power and a complete one. A complete origin could allow a martial artist to effortlessly comprehend the Heavenly Dao and the Martial Dao, while a fractured one was far less effective.
He had never imagined that the Origin Sea would contain complete origin powers — and not merely Stellar Origins, but Five Elements Origins as well.
The Phoenix True Fire he had obtained earlier was indeed a fire-type origin power, but it was a Sacred Spirit origin, not a Five Elements origin. There was still a meaningful distinction between the two.
The reason his Mysterious World Bead could not allow anyone to advance to a major realm within it was because the heavenly laws were incomplete. And to fill in those heavenly laws, a complete origin power was absolutely essential.
If he could find a complete origin power here and infuse it into his Small Mysterious Realm, the heavenly laws within the Small Mysterious Realm might become whole. In the future, whenever he needed to advance, he could do so entirely inside the Small Mysterious Realm without worrying about outside interference.
Upon learning that the Origin Sea contained complete origins, Yang Kai's heart immediately surged with excitement.