Grand Ancestral Bloodlines

Ryu's senses flourished, after what felt like eons of battling it out in his own mind, he could finally feel the freedom of having full control of his faculties once more, and quite frankly, it was exhilarating.

Up until this point, the Protector Spirits had caused minor changes to his muscle memory, they didn't actually change anything fundamental about his body and he expected that this would continue.

Whatever the Diamond Protector Spirit gave should be far beyond what the other spirits had been capable of, but whether this was a good thing or a bad thing, still remained to be seen.

Until now, the focus that Ryu had toward increasing his own muscle memory and increasing his battle prowess while working with what he had was great. However, the breakthrough in his understanding of his Bloodlines and how they might be related to the Seven Corporeal Souls made him less enthusiastic about it.

He no longer needed Martial Forms, or even the self created fusion of his Martial Forms, because he could tap into the truest strength of his Bloodlines whenever he wanted now. The Martial Forms weren't necessary.

Of course, this Martial Form would still be the perfect foundation for the future rebuild of his Clans, but that was of no use to Ryu now. Although it sounded selfish for him to not be excited about this, the return of Ryu's Clans was entirely dependent on his personal strength. While there were still his parents alive, and Ryu believed in them as much as a person could believe in their parents, he still chose to see things this way as there was no better method of spurring him onward.

With that framework in mind, while such a boon would be useful, it wouldn't be useful enough in the interim. In fact, it might even be detrimental.

If he had all of these other muscle memories, pulling and tugging at his body while he was trying to battle, he would have to waste valuable time and mental fortitude to pick the right one amongst them and use that. It might even force him to change the current paths he wanted his Bloodlines to take to be more in line with what his body wanted to do now.

Of course, this was all the worst case scenario. Ryu had more belief in the Heavens than that. It couldn't possibly reward him for going above and beyond expectation by strapping him down with a greater burden, right?

He thought this somewhat jokingly as he was fully prepared for this to be the case. He had come to understand the Heavens as an entity that could be sometimes a useful idiot, at other times an unwitting pawn, and somehow still choose to be a devil incarnate and a holy saint back to back on the very same day. This was just the way of the Heavens.

This trial didn't seem like it was formed for just one person to benefit, and in the eyes of the Heavens, if Ryu overestimated himself by doing this, then he only had himself to blame, much like he had almost died just hours ago.

Even so, Ryu wasn't worried. If he was strapped with another negative gift, then he would just have to break through like he had just now, taking his fate into his own hands. One day, he'd be able to make whatever curse he was afflicted with a blessing.

He smiled to himself. He had all of these thoughts in the blink of an eye, but when he actually explored into the truest center of his body, his heart couldn't help but skip a beat.

Ryu's current body was formed of what he liked to call six important centers of power.

There was his dantian, which was currently an endless ocean of white waters, covered by a dancing white flame that looked more like cotton than it did an oppressive fire. In the middle, his Cosmic Seeds had intertwined their roots and they almost looked like Dao Pedestals.

There was his heart, or rather his heart and Realm Heart combination, which both housed his true Spiritual Foundation, and that at the same time contained his Realm Heart, a trump card that had saved his life on more than one occasion.

There was his Spiritual Sea, which was currently an ocean of black, containing an array formed of red-gold flames. It looked like clear, black epoxy had been poured in two portions, one portion forming the foundation. and the second sandwiching a gorgeous formation of intricate patterns and runes.

Of course, his Spiritual Sea also contained his Birthed Soul and the various Primordial Yins of his women.

The fourth was his body. This included the new pathways that he had learned controlled his Focus Qi and various other hidden secrets of the Heavens that he wasn't too familiar just yet.

The fifth was, of course, his Meridians. They contained a world within and Ryu would never forget about such things. It had its own mysterious strengths to unearth and he was also mindful to consider how best to take the next steps of his cultivation so that he didn't suddenly lose every aspect of this Chaotic Silk Meridians. Though, he had been far less concerned about that ever since he gained his second Spiritual Foundation back. He was certain that very soon, he would have already laid the perfect foundation for his Meridians and would no longer need to fret. Instead, his focus would be much better spent on figuring out the best ways to utilize his Chaos Qi and what techniques he could either steal or create himself that would benefit him.

Finally, there was a new addition, his Bone Structure. They too seemed to hold a world of their own, but this world wasn't one that existed anywhere else on the outside, but was instead solely his own...

His own Boundless Chaos.

Right this moment, within his body, he could feel a faint link between all of these aspects. He had felt this sort of feeling before, it was one that came only when his [Intuition] activated and he could feel the silky strings of Karma pulling him forward.

He was astonished. He understood what this meant immediately.

The reward for absorbing the Diamond Protector Spirit wasn't a curse at all, in fact it was far better than anything that he could have ever imagined.

He had been wrong all along. The real reason it had taken him so much effort to fuse with the Diamond Protector Spirit wasn't even because of him, it was instead because of the Heavens.

It had been taking its time to read him, to analyze himself, to fuse everything that it knew about him into a single cohesive whole.

The Heavens had been creating a cultivation path for him, not just a cultivation path, but a method of one day fusing all of his talents into a single mighty flag pole.

It was weak and even incomplete but Ryu could feel it. If he allowed these subtle feelings to pull him along, he could read ahead to find out exactly what path the Heavens wanted for him. If he used his self-created Mental Realm cultivation method, the feeling wouldn't even have to be subtle, it would be like having a cultivation jade handed to him for his perusing.

He couldn't even fathom what it meant to have gained such a reward, but he could guess something.

Was it that the powerful Clans of the Eighth Dimension, the ones that had fused all of their talents into a single path and had formed True Great Circle Talents, had all received this reward in the past? Was that how they had built their hegemonies?

Ryu's heartbeat threatened to rush out from his chest and he let it all sink in one beautiful thought at a time. And then, he couldn't help but laugh to himself heartily.

It was no wonder this reward was "meant" to be split.

If he had enlisted the help of others, this reward could have been split most probably about a dozen ways. They wouldn't have allowed the rabble to participate, so it would have been himself, Selheira, those other three "Immortal Deities", and probably Starlight as well.

If he had gotten a sixth of the benefits, the rewards would have still been excellent and beyond him imagining, he could have probably focused the lines of Fate on his Chaotic Silk Meridians and elucidated their truest path for himself.

But now, he could do that and then some.

He knew that there was a limit to what he was feeling right now.

For one, there was time. As more time passed, the Lines of Fate would grow weaker and it would be harder to gleam the secrets the Heavens wanted him to see.

Second, there was his strength. He could read the Lines of Fate clearly, but only up to a certain point. Anything beyond was marred by mysteries that even Dao Lords and beyond would have trouble seeing through, and he would need his Dao to be at least that strong to peer into the secrets.

However, what did it matter? Since this was a reward of the Heavens, he didn't just need to ramble about and wish that he was correct, he had 100% confidence in its validity.

Of course, this was only in the individual strands of his various talents. Whether he agreed on how the Heavens wanted him to fuse them together was another matter, but that was a bridge he would tackle when he got there.

Right now, he could finally see through the true path of his Chaotic Silk Meridians, and he didn't hesitate to delve into the Lines of Fate to see what it was.