Ten billion pills—an astronomical sum—had bought a single Nirvana Pill. The purchase also emptied the private treasuries of the Six Great God Monarchs, leaving them scraped clean. But the exchange was worth it. With the pill, the Nebula Baby's power skyrocketed; it now commanded twenty-seven divine abilities and was strong enough to stand its ground even against Golden Core masters. And through this, Fang Han had finally separated the Seal of Apotheosis from his embryonic core.
All in all, a profitable deal.
If he hadn't encountered the Human Emperor's Brush on Demon-Sealing Ridge—if that crushing pressure hadn't forced his Unity Realm to its extreme, condensing a "False Core"—Fang Han absolutely would've swallowed the Nirvana Pill on the spot.
But now that a False Core was formed, he stood only half a step away from a true Golden Core. He chose instead to push himself through insight and comprehension, to break into the seventh realm—Golden Core—by his own hand. That path would give him firmer foundations, and a deeper grasp of cultivation itself.
Forming a Golden Core required tremendous qi.
And for someone like Fang Han—someone who'd cultivated fifty-five divine powers—the amount of qi he needed to metamorphose his core was far beyond what normal experts could even imagine.
So his plan was simple: rely on the Seal of Apotheosis and the Six-Eyed God-Sealing Tablets, merge them into his organs, fuse the five-elements qi of his viscera with the energy of his six bowels, and push his physical body into terrifying new territory.
Only then could his qi reach the volcanic intensity needed to form a Golden Core.
Under Fang Han's breathwork, the six tablets shrank until they turned into six mysterious eyes—small, blinking spheres of divine vision. One by one, he swallowed them, guiding each into a different organ: the large intestine, small intestine, bladder, triple burner, gallbladder, and stomach.
Inside him, the six tablet-eyes wove together with the Seal of Apotheosis that Zhao Xuanyi had painstakingly refined. Slowly, they fused.
Back then, Zhao Xuanyi had hoped one day to implant these tablets into his own body, strengthening his longevity and physique. But now, everything had fallen neatly into Fang Han's hands.
"Seal one's fate, preserve eternal youth…" he recited, refining the mystic art. The Six Bowels simmered, each one trembling with growing power.
The first to transform was the stomach. It churned violently, radiating such force that Fang Han felt it could digest a mountain.
He knew that right now, even if he swallowed steel or diamond, his stomach would pulverize it effortlessly.
As the six bowels steadily strengthened, the World Tree drew torrents of celestial qi from the Immortal Realm, washing through every inch of his flesh and bone before surging into those organs, fueling the power of the fused divine tablets.
Gulu—gulu—
No telling how long it took.
Then, in every one of the six bowels, a sound echoed. The seals and tablets fused completely, melting into his flesh. In that instant—
Whoosh.
Fang Han felt six new eyes open inside his body, each one illuminating the inner workings of his physique. He had never felt so vividly aware of himself.
His body, he now realized, was composed of countless microscopic particles—so small that even spells could not magnify them. Billions upon billions, arranged in cosmic patterns like a living formation.
He sensed that if he could fully comprehend these particles, he could cultivate an immortal body. An impossible task—but the glimpse alone was enough to expose him to the essence of life itself.
The mystery of the flesh.
"Five viscera, six bowels—Five Elements, seal as one! Transform the flesh!"
As the seals integrated, the six inner eyes lit up simultaneously. Fang Han triggered the five-element qi of his viscera.
It was like pouring oil onto a blazing fire.
BOOM.
Every tendon in his body thrummed; his flesh ignited like a roaring flame. Beneath the skin, his muscles wriggled as if countless tiny creatures were rearranging him from the inside out.
Metal being melted, shredded, reforged—this was the sensation.
Thunder, demonic fire, five-element force, sealing power… Tens of thousands of energies erupted around him. The metal floor of the chamber warped, melted.
The transformation was earth-shaking.
Fang Han's body had already been formidable. Now it advanced toward a level beyond terrifying.
Crack—crack!
As he reached a critical peak, the strengthening abruptly halted. Fine cracks appeared on his skin like broken porcelain. Blood seeped out.
A sign of imminent collapse.
"Not good! It's happening!" Yan panicked. "You can't refine the body this chaotically! You need a proper cultivation method—like the Yama Golden Body or the Primordial Martial Saint Form! You're mixing everything together—at this rate, the flesh will collapse!"
Yan recognized the danger immediately. Fang Han, obsessed with pushing himself higher, had abandoned structured body-refinement altogether, blindly innovating his own path. He blended techniques—Yama Golden Body, Primordial Martial Saint, and several obscure body-forging secrets—trying to force out the strongest possible route.
Even with his deep foundation—eighteen years of constant instruction inside the Taiyuan Immortal Mansion—he wasn't exempt from the risks. Experience couldn't replace time-tested methods.
Yan opened its mouth to shout for him to stop—
—but in that instant, Fang Han's qi suddenly compressed. A thousandfold. Ten thousandfold.
Yan froze.
This compression… it was like the moment the Human Emperor's Brush shrank into a singular "chaos well"—a microcosmic black hole. As Fang Han's qi condensed, the cracks on his skin sealed instantly, blood flowed back into his veins, and his body compacted, becoming denser and more perfect.
Especially his left hand: under the crushing compression, the black runes of the Heavenshadow Demon Hand cracked like eggshells and dissolved, merging seamlessly into his body.
"The Heavenshadow Demon Hand… completely shattered and fused!" Yan gasped. "You planned this! You learned from the Human Emperor's Brush—you're tearing yourself down to rebuild!"
Fang Han exhaled. His body shifted slightly, and the bones inside him chimed like celestial bells. His muscle fibers rippled, and from his pores came faint echoes—horns blowing, drums beating.
Not spellcraft. Purely the sound of his flesh.
"Your body… can generate horn and drum resonance?! How strong is your physique?" Yan shrieked.
"Blood Night King. Strike me with everything you've got."
The Blood Night King leapt forth, forming a blood-red blade. Its aura climbed higher and higher until—
SHOOM.
It vanished, reappearing above Fang Han's head, and brought the blade crashing down.
CLANG!
The instant blade met flesh, it bounced off violently. The Blood Night King staggered back, reforming as a cloaked youth with a look of absolute disbelief.
"I'm a Dao-artifact! I can kill gods and demons—yet I can't cut you?! Your body… it's as tough as a Dao-artifact!"
"My body isn't immortal yet," Fang Han said calmly, "but after merging the Six-Eyed Tablets and the Demon Hand, I'm close. Zhao Xuanyi and the Ghost Emperor forged these treasures to extend their life and strengthen their bodies. They just never grasped the final insight. I only did because I saw the Human Emperor's Brush—man and artifact as one. Now, unless someone is extraordinarily powerful, they can't kill me."
He raised his hand. His aura surged.
"My body is stronger than ever. My qi is surging. This is the moment—time to form my Golden Core."
Above his head, his personal talisman flew out, radiating celestial tones—horns and drums echoing in perfect harmony with the sound within his body.
He poured qi into the talisman.
The talisman—housing fifty-five divine powers—turned once more into a "phantom core." Under the flood of qi, the illusion began to solidify.
Others formed Golden Cores through danger and struggle. Fang Han did it like a man strolling through a garden.
His preparations were too thorough.
The monstrous vitality in his reforged body was the perfect fuel for the transformation.
Just as the core neared completion, the entire chamber trembled. Qi surged into the Yellow Springs Diagram.
At that moment—
The Kunpeng egg stirred.
Sensing unparalleled qi, the devouring array etched on its shell roared to life. It swept the surroundings clean—and then the egg shot forward, aiming directly at Fang Han's forming Golden Core.
It swallowed the phantom core in one gulp.
"Not good!"
In an instant, the colossal qi Fang Han had gathered vanished. His nearly-complete Golden Core unraveled, collapsing back into a phantom.