A towering beast emerged out of the orange sand, a mammoth with two giant ivory-white tusks and long brown furs. It was larger than any beast Alex had seen to this day.
And since size was usually a very good indication of a beast’s strength, Alex could tell this one was going to be difficult to fight.
More importantly, it was going to be difficult because it had a Sunheart in it. The mere coolness of the air in its surroundings was a clear indication of that.
Alex had wondered many times, but had still failed to come up with an answer.
Why did beasts with Sunhearts have a stronger Body Cultivation than the beasts that didn’t? Despite the fact that they both lived in the same region.
Did the Yang they gathered have something to do with it? Or did the lack of Yang in their surroundings have something to do with it?
The imbalance between Yang and Yin was deeply low around a beast with a Sunheart, but the lack of imbalance shouldn’t cause such an anomalous result.
Or maybe he was entirely wrong about it all. Perhaps the presence of a Sunheart had nothing to do with their strength at all. Alex didn’t believe it, but he had to be open to the possibility that a Sunheart’s presence had no causality in the strength of a beast.
‘But they are clearly so much stronger,’ Alex thought. ‘How so?’
His questions had no answer for now, so Alex focused his attention on the fight.
The physical strength of the mammoth came to around late Immortal Transcendent Realm. For him from just a week prior, this would have been a fight that was impossible to beat.
But for him right now, he could win.
Blood flowed around Alex, forming his armor. More of the blood flowed onto his sword, encasing it in his Blood Aura as well. Then, Alex charged at the beast, using every bit of strength he had to fight it.
The mammoth attacked with its trunk when it could and tried to stomp on Alex the other times. Alex dodged every attack, doing his best to cut through the mammoth.
The mammoth’s hide was tough to break through. Even with his Blood Aura, it took a while to make it bleed. Once he got through, however, the remaining battle took no time at all.
Alex delivered a killing blow on the mammoth, finally bringing the giant beast down.
Alex wiped his brows. “That was more difficult than I thought.”
The Exolites he had fought before would have failed to do anything to this beast. It was clear to him now why the people of the outer region of the desert never ventured into the deeper region.
Even if they could fight the beasts in the border, just a few days in and they would have to go against such a strong beast.
After it was dead, Alex went through the mammoth’s skull until he found the Sunheart. He pulled out the Sunheart, staring at it with a look of awe.
This Sunheart was still teardrop-shaped, but it was much larger than any Sunhearts he had seen before, at least by 20%. The Yang it drew in was also quite potent, making a small sphere of space around it be incredibly hot as a result.
“This is so much stronger than the other ones,” Alex thought. “This is going to draw out more beasts with Sunhearts, isn’t it?”
Those beasts were territorial, coming out whenever there were other beasts with equally strong Sunhearts in the region. Alex had had the thought that the reason so few of them had come out was partially because his Sunhearts were from way outside of the Sand Wall that none of these stronger beasts were threatened by it at all.
But now, things would change.
And change they did.
Just 3 hours later, another beast emerged from the sand, coming out to fight him.
2 more beasts came out after that before night fell. Once night came around, however, there were fewer beasts that came up.
It was almost as if these beasts were scared of the Sunheart and so most of them chose not to mess with him. Not all were that cowardly or that smart, and they chose to fight him.
So, Alex’s day and night were filled with battles with the beasts, each fight slowly improving him to become better and better with his Sword Intent.
He had also continuously eaten the raw flesh of each beast he killed, which he hoped would continue to improve him.
There was no rest in his journey at all. If any, it was when he ate an infected beast core and sat down to cultivate. That took around half a day to a whole day when it happened, before he continued on in his journey.
Many days passed, many weeks. And still, Alex had yet to see a single human civilization at all.
Every place was littered with beasts. He was unsure just what he was supposed to do at this point. Was he even walking in the right direction anymore?
More days passed.
Around nighttime, Alex finally saw a glint of light in the distance. His eyes brightened in hope as this was the first light he had ever seen in the desert at all.
He hurried toward it, hoping to reach it before he was attacked by the other beasts. He didn’t mind being attacked; it was training after all. But right now, he was starting to get so bored that he even decided to fly toward it.
As Alex flew, he saw the light growing larger and larger. It was getting large much faster than he was flying.
Alex stopped at some point when he saw the color of the light.
Yellow, like that of a sun.
“Dammit!” he couldn’t help but curse as the thing that he had seen was in fact a Sun Wraith.
Sun Wraiths were naturally stronger than the beast that existed when it was alive due to it consuming all the energy of the Sunheart.
And that Sun Wraith was making its way right toward him.