Moving through the mystic realm in the direction of what would be the ninth celestial gate, Xuan Hao began to prepare for what he might end up encountering during the ninth celestial trial.
Learning from the eighth celestial trial, he intended to be far more careful about entering a celestial gate in the future, as he realized that it was a very real possibility that he would end up stuck inside the celestial gate in case some part of the celestial trial ended up malfunctioning like had happened during the eighth celestial trial.
Even if getting stuck inside a celestial gate might not end up killing him as his current cultivation realm allowed him to survive without the need for food and instead only relied on spiritual qi to sustain himself, he still didn't want to potentially end up getting stuck inside a celestial gate for hundreds- if not thousands of years.
