When Tian opened his eyes again, he found himself laying on his back in a dark place, looking up into nothingness. This was a familiar place.
Looking to the side, he saw the terrifying one-eyed creature looking at him, eyeing him from head to toe. This was his inner world, or at least, that's the only way he knew how to describe it.
"Why are people so cruel, monster?"
Tian's eyes were solemn and his expression lifeless. His face no longer held that smile he was always known for.
[Because you were weak. Helpless. Unable to fight back.]
Tian said nothing as he stared at the darkness for hours, lamenting the fate of his mother and Su Yan. They were innocent in this affair. He was innocent in his affair.
But not anymore. He had learned a tough lesson here today. The idea that if he treated the world with kindness, it would return that same kindness, was shattered instantly. Today was the day he would finally step into what was rightfully his.
Glancing at the creature beside him, Tian said, "What are you, really?"
Whipping its Ten-tails around, the creature looked at bit excited when Tian started talking to it.
[I am the Ten-Tails. I was born when you were born. We grew up together, but you never accepted me. I am you. Together, we will be one. Tian. Me. Whole being. Complete being. Stronger. Stronger than anything.]
Tian was surprised by this revelation. No wonder the creature appeared here. No wonder it never truly felt separate from him. It was the closest being to him all his life, but yet, he rejected it because of fear. Fear of his own self.
"I see. Then I apologize. I've treated you the way people have treated me my whole life. I hope you can forgive me."
The creature nodded and responded, [Do you accept me?]
Tian, now at the end of the road and at the cusp of change, hardened his heart and resolve. With a firm gaze, he locked eyes with the creature.
"Yes."
WHOOSH!
The moment those words left his mouth, the creature rushed into his body with incredible speed, causing him to suddenly wake up in the real world.
"Huh?"
Jumping up from his stupor, Tian stood on his feet and realized that his body felt surprisingly healthy. His eyesight was restored, the slashes on his chest had healed, but he was still missing his arms. Even so, his body was brimming with vitality.
Feeling something floating behind him, Han willed for the object to come forth. When he saw a floating back ball in front of him, he was a bit confused, but the term [Truth-seeking Orb] suddenly appeared in his mind.
With that, came an influx of information concerning his eyes, his missing arms and any other abilities of his body that he had ignored over the years.
"This…"
Even with just a basic overview of his powers, Tian was taken aback. If there was one word that could describe everything, it would be Versatility. If one used their imagination well, they could access what felt like infinite variations of some abilities.
Molding the truth-seeking orb with his mind, Tian turned into a flat platform which he used to pick up Su Yan's body that was close by. Jumping on the platform himself, Tian willed it to float up the cliff, which actually worked to his pleasant surprise.
Getting to the top of the cliff, Tian's expression was melancholic as he walked into his destroyed house with Su Yan's bloody limbs all over it. The Xiao Sect would pay dearly for this cruel display.
When he located his arms, Tian tapped into one path of his Rinnegan, the Asura Path. The Rinnegan's main ability was called the Six Paths Technique. The Six paths in question followed the naming schemes of Six samsaric realms of reincarnation, namely, The Deva Path, Asura Path, Animal Path, Human Path, Preta Path and Naraka Path.
Each path offered different abilities.
The Asura path, which Tian was now employing allowed him to mechanically alter his insides, turning him into a machine made for slaughter.
"Let's see if this works…"
Using the wires which now replaced his veins and blood vessels, Tian extended them towards his arms, connecting and pulling them back into place.
Almost as if they were made to do so, his arms connected to his body naturally, healing themselves from any damage instantly.
Even when he released the power of the Asura Path, his arms stayed intact as if they had never been cut off. Now that they were back, Tian took another look at them.
His left arm that contained the crescent moon seal, was known as the Six Paths Yin Seal, while the sun-like seal in his right was the Six Paths Yang Seal.
While the true abilities of these seals remained to be tested, he had a basic idea of what they could do.
Now, it was time to deal with the limbs of his father, Su Yan. Tian went to personally retrieve them and the man's body from the truth-seeking orb platform.
Digging a hole behind the house, Tian neatly put Su Yan's body in, covered it up and knelt down with his forehead glued to the ground for one day and one night.
"Father, thank you for raising me."
Su Yan's teachings were engraved onto his hardened heart. He would never forget this part of himself or the times he they spent together.
But now it was time for him to step out into the martial world, time for him to forge his own path forward.
Tian got up from his knees with a certain sharpness in his eyes and went back into the house to locate the letter his mother had written.
It wasn't long until he found what remained of it. Just little shredded pieces from the Xiao Sect's disciples' sword strikes.
Tian took a long look at the shredded paper and blew it away with a flick of his wrist. It's contents were already etched into every part of his mind. It was time to move on from this place, and that letter was the last thing holding him here.
As he walked outside on the cliff where he was just thrown off, his gaze hit the silhouette of New Moon City once again.
"I've decided. From this day forth, I will be known as Cang Tian. New Moon City…you will be the place where I start my story from. But for now, I need to gain a bit of strength and understanding about cultivation. Wait for me."
Changing into a new set of plain black robes he grabbed from the house, Cang Tian took one last look at the place before jumping onto the platform made by the truth-seeking orb, flying off into a random direction.
[Several days later]
A figure could be seen wandering through a large mountain range on foot, his senses on high alert. Cang Tian let his truth-seeking orb float behind him as he made every step, ready at deploy it at a moments notice.
Cang Tian stopped at this mountain range because he located several different creatures here, each one giving a stronger energy signature than the last. So he decided that this would be a good place to train.
It wasn't long before he happened upon a pack of wolves that had blood red fur, their teeth coated with the innards of their previous prey.
Cang Tian steeled his resolve and jumped into the middle of the pack, causing the wild animals to immediately rush at him.
Surrounding himself with the Truth-seeking orb to form an omnidirectional shield, Cang Tian could feel the beasts trying to get through, their aggression increasing from their prey being so close.
"You better dodge, beasts."
Cang Tian turned the barrier of the orb into sharp elongated spikes, skewering several beasts with one move.
Retracting the spikes, Cang Tian opened the barrier slightly to find two wolves slowly circling him, as if they were waiting for him to show an opening.
Just as he shifted his attention to one of them, one of the wolves he thought was already dead woke up and charged into the barrier, its massive jaws clamping down on his arm.
"Ugh!"
Cang Tian closed the barrier to prevent other enemies from charging in and grabbed the wolf by the back of its neck, slamming it into the inside of the shield.
Immediately after, Cang Tian surged forth with a punch, his physical strength so tyrannical that it pierced through the body of the wolf as if it was made of paper.
Dropping the barrier, Cang Tian approached the two wolves like a madman, his steps leaving tiny craters in the ground.
Attacking him on instinct, the two creatures tried to overpower him by teaming up, but Cang Tian seemed to grow more powerful with each passing moment.
Grabbing one wolf by its jaws, Cang Tian tore its entire body in half and used it as a weapon against the second wolf, battering it with several huts.
"Awoooi!!!"
The last wolf howled in pain but Cang Tian was merciless as he finished it off with a jumping stomp, splattering the beast's innards across the ground.
"That was my first time killing something, but yet, why did it feel so easy? Would it be the same if I killed a human?"
Cang Tian threw the corpse of the wolf to the side and continued to charge into the forest, fighting anything he could get his eyes on. This was how he planned to train for the remaining future.