After the pain disappeared, a large volume of information suddenly appeared inside of his head, giving him the answer to his previous question: the Nine Sun Immortal Codex.
It seemed his Heavenly Physique had its own unique cultivation technique.
He wondered if all Heavenly Physiques possessed their own innate cultivation techniques or if he was simply lucky; however, after thinking about it for a few moments, he shook his head.
He quickly realized that even if he learned the answer to that question, it would be unlikely to be useful to him anyway.
"Whatever, let's focus on analyzing this technique... hopefully it's strong."
The Nine Sun Immortal Codex functioned fundamentally on the principle that as he absorbed more spiritual energy and his cultivation level increased, he would be able to unlock more of the powers of the nine suns within his body.
The first sun had already been unlocked since he was currently in the Elementary Profound Realm, and it provided two basic abilities.
The first was [Sunseed Ignition]. Once the first sun stabilized, his body's resistance to heat and fire would increase exponentially. It was essentially a passive ability, although he did not yet know the exact magnitude of the buff.
It also granted his spiritual energy the properties of "sunfyre"—whatever that was. He assumed it was likely just a much stronger version of normal fire.
The second ability was called [Sunseed Brand]. Each time he attacked an enemy, it would plant a Sunseed Flame inside of them that slowly burned their spiritual energy and vitality over time.
...
"BURNS THEIR SPIRITUAL ENERGY AND VITALITY?! ISN'T THAT RIDICULOUSLY STRONG?!"
He started to breathe heavily as he quickly realized the implications of this kind of ability. If he were in a fight with an enemy, the longer the fight lasted, the higher his chances of winning became.
If he encountered an enemy stronger than himself, unless they could kill him instantly, he could simply keep attacking and running away to let the flames do their work.
"Okay, calm down... let's look at the kind of abilities I'll have when I reach higher cultivation realms."
Filled with a sense of anticipation, he quickly tried to access the information regarding the higher levels of the Nine Sun Immortal Codex, but he quickly realized there was a problem.
[Information Cannot Be Accessed – Insufficient Cultivation Base]
Seeing this notification from his system, he sighed to himself before shaking his head in disappointment.
He admitted it was fairly obvious that he shouldn't be able to see the higher levels of the cultivation technique at his current level, and even if he were privy to that information, it wouldn't really do him any good yet.
After thinking for a couple of seconds and wallowing in the joyous feeling of slowly becoming stronger, he started to plan his future actions.
"The immediate course of action will be to stabilize my foundation. Because of the sudden integration of my heavenly physique, my cultivation base rapidly rose from having basically no cultivation at all to the 4th Level of the Elementary Profound Realm."
"Next will be to learn more about this world. I need to read as much as possible about the Azure Dragon Sect and the greater world at large; the more information I have, the more prepared I'll be."
"Finally, I must find some way to improve my stepmother's talent for cultivation. I don't really know how I will do that yet, but hopefully, the system has a way to make it happen."
Finally having arranged his thoughts, he quickly went to work on his first goal. He closed his eyes and sat cross-legged, beginning to cultivate the Nine Sun Immortal Codex.
As he looked inside his body, he saw his meridians glowing with pure golden light. Tiny specks of spiritual energy flowed through them as he started to focus on stabilizing his foundation.
"Let's just focus on cultivating for now. Mother said I'll be called later for dinner; hopefully, I'll be finished by then."
A couple of hours passed in silence. Without him noticing, the sun began to fall from the sky, plunging the world into darkness while the moon bathed him in moonlight.
Knock, knock.
After knocking a couple more times on his door, Li Mei—Huang Shi's stepmother—finally gave it a slight push and entered the room before speaking softly.
"Shi'er, let's go. We need to eat dinner; your father is calling for you."
Hearing his beloved mother calling out for him, he quietly opened his golden eyes. They shone with a powerful light; in fact, if one looked closely, they could see golden flames burning in his eyes before the glow disappeared without a trace.
Seeing the look in her son's eyes gave Li Mei the shock of her life. She quickly rushed to his side and spoke in a trembling voice.
"Sh-Shi'er, what's wrong? Are you injured again? Why were your eyes that color?"
Seeing his mother react in this manner made him chuckle. He gave a slight smirk before speaking in a confident tone.
"Don't worry, Mother. I'm fine. In fact, I'm the best I've ever been."
Before his mother could react, he slowly raised his right hand and opened it, allowing a small flame to rise from his palm that glowed with the light of the sun.
Seeing the tiny flame, his mother's mouth gaped as if she had seen something unbelievable.
"Sh-Shi'er... have you regained the ability to cultivate? But how is that possible? When I checked last time, you were clearly crippled!"
Seeing the look of doubt in his mother's eyes, he calmly gave the answer he had prepared to explain his situation.
"I don't know, Mother. What I remember is that right before I thought I would die, I saw a glowing golden light flash in my vision before it went inside of my body. I don't know what it was, but it somehow fixed my meridians and even improved my cultivation base!"
Sensing that her son had his own secrets and was perhaps not willing to fully divulge them yet, she quietly smiled and spoke in a joyful tone.
"That's great, Shi'er. With this, you'll be able to protect yourself in the future."