Three Qianjun Ant Emperors
After everything was settled, Tang San stood up.
He thought for a moment, then looked at Shui Bing'er and the other two and said, "There's one more thing to do before we leave. I know there are Three-headed Qianjun Ant Emperor near this core area. I plan to take care of them as well."
Xiao Wu, Shui Bing'er, and Ye Lingling nodded without asking any further questions, and each got up and followed behind him.
Xiao Wu glanced back at the Lake of Life; she no longer had any attachment to that land.
A month passed quietly in the search of the core area of Star Dou Great Forest.
Tang San began searching in all directions, using the Lake of Life as the center.
Although his Life Domain can cover a very wide area in the forest, the Qianjun Ant Emperor, as an ant-like Soul Beast that is nearly 100,000 years old, lives deep underground and its senses are extremely well concealed.
Their nests are often hidden hundreds of meters deep in the earth, their presence blocked by the thick layers of soil. Even Tang San's Life Domain cannot pinpoint their location accurately from a distance.
He could only track the ants' activity range step by step by sensing the subtle vibrations in the ground and the traces left by them.
A month later, the group finally found the Three-headed Qianjun Ant Emperor.
They were larger than expected, each several meters long, with a dark brown carapace covered with a rough texture. Their limbs were thick and powerful, each of their six legs as thick as an adult's arm, and their ends were sharp claws that could easily pierce through hard rock.
The Qian Jun Ant is a top-tier strength-type Soul Beast, naturally adept at carrying heavy loads and digging. The nests of the Three-headed Qianjun Ant Emperor are connected, resembling an underground palace.
The moment they saw Tang San and his companions, they immediately turned and burrowed underground.
But Tang San was prepared.
He activated the second Soul Skill of the Titan Giant Ape, "Power of the Earth," which he had just acquired.
The ground within a radius of several hundred meters instantly hardened like iron. The ant queen's claws scraped against it with a screeching sound, and it took all its strength to dig even a little bit open.
Shui Bing'er's Ice Phoenix Domain spread out and covered them, greatly reducing their movement speed.
The three of them worked together, using every trick in the book, to prevent them from escaping.
Seeing that they could not escape, the three Qianjun Ant Emperor brothers turned around and fought Tang San and his companions head-on.
The battle lasted for fifteen minutes.
Shui Bing'er's Ice Seal, Xiao Wu's control abilities, and Tang San's heavy hammer.
The three's coordinated attack left the Three-headed Qianjun Ant Emperor with virtually no chance to retaliate.
The moment the last Qianjun Ant Emperor fell, three black Soul Rings tinged with red simultaneously appeared above its corpse.
The Soul Rings are a color between black and red, a mark of nearly 100,000 years, and each one exudes a calm and profound energy fluctuation.
The Three-headed Qianjun Ant Emperor's cultivation was close to 100,000 years, and it was just a little short of crossing that boundary.
Without hesitation, Tang San walked directly to the corpse of the Three-Headed Ant King, sat down cross-legged, and began to draw upon the three Soul Rings.
Absorbing three Soul Rings at the same time might have been a risky move for Tang San in the original story, but for the current Tang San, with his Spiritual Power and physical power, it's not a problem at all.
His meridians, having been tempered and strengthened by the Forest of Life, are already capable of withstanding energy impacts far exceeding those of the norm.
Tang San's Spiritual Power, honed through Six Lifetimes of Reincarnation and 300,000 years of Head Soul Bone refinement, is now capable of simultaneously withstanding the mental attacks of three lingering spirits from Soul Beasts.
The moment the three streams of energy surged into Tang San's body, he could clearly feel the intensity of the impact.
However, Tang San's meridians only trembled slightly in the face of that impact before they began to be guided, diverted, compressed, and merged in an orderly manner.
The three streams of energy converged on his Clear Sky Hammer along different paths, and were simultaneously absorbed, fused, and solidified upon contact with the hammer body.
Three Soul Rings took shape on his Clear Sky Hammer.
The Third Soul Ring, Fourth Soul Ring, and Fifth Soul Rings each changed color from their initial blackish-red hue to dark red, then to pure bright red, eventually reaching the level of 100,000 years.
When Tang San opened his eyes, his Clear Sky Hammer already had five Soul Rings, all of them red.
Five rings of red light were arranged on the dark red giant hammer, and the basic weight of the Clear Sky Hammer was increased to 50,000 jin, exuding a heavy and majestic aura.
His Soul Power continued to rise, breaking through from the peak of level 95 to level 96, and then continued upwards, finally stopping at level 97.
The power of the Three-headed Qianjun Ant Emperor brought him a level and a half boost.
In the Titled Douluo stage, the energy required for each level up becomes astonishingly large, making such an improvement quite considerable.
Unfortunately, none of the Three-headed Qianjun Ant Emperor were originally 100,000 years old. It was only because Tang San absorbed them at the same time that they broke through the threshold of Hundred Thousand Year Soul Rings through a special mutation.
Therefore, Tang San only gained one Soul Skill from each of the three Soul Rings.
The Clear Sky Hammer's Third Soul Skill, "Power of Qian Jun," increases both strength and defense by 300%. It's an extremely simple and direct amplification skill, without any fancy tricks; it simply triples both strength and defense.
The Clear Sky Hammer's Fourth Soul Skill, "Qian Jun Barrier," is an ultimate defensive Soul Skill. It condenses a shield wall from heavy earth-elemental gravity energy, making it extremely strong under the weight of gravity. Attacks below the god level are difficult to penetrate it. It can cover a single person or deploy a large-scale barrier to protect multiple people.
The Fifth Soul Skill of the Clear Sky Hammer, "Earth Ant Emperor Slash," condenses a thick earth-element gravity hammer light, delivering a powerful, long-range, straight-line slash with destructive power and extremely strong penetrating force.
One boost, one ultimate defense, and one ultimate attack. Tang San was very satisfied with this.
What surprised him even more was that the energy of the Three-headed Qianjun Ant Emperor was not devoured or consumed in any way when Tang San killed them. Instead, it gathered together and condensed into a piece of torso bone at the place where they fell.
Faced with this sudden and unexpected joy, Tang San was puzzled. Logically, the Three-headed Qianjun Ant Emperor shouldn't have produced any Soul Bones.
Tang San thought for a long time before he came up with a possible reason.
In the original story, Tang San defeated the three Qianjun Ant Emperors by absorbing the energy of the Devouring Golden Threads. This time, however, Tang San killed them with a direct attack, resulting in an extremely high degree of energy integrity, which is why this torso bone, which is over 100,000 years old, was formed.
Tang San squatted down and picked up the piece of torso bone.
It was a dark brown bone, heavy in the hand, almost twice as heavy as an ordinary Soul Bone, with thick earth-elemental energy fluctuations flowing inside.
However, Tang San did not choose to absorb this torso bone, because his target for the torso bone was already the Deep Sea Demonic Whale King.
The torso bone is the most important of all the Soul Bone positions, and he wanted to reserve that position for the most suitable and strongest Soul Bone.
Tang San put away the Soul Bone, looked around, and realized that the Qianjun Ant Emperor was an earth-attribute Soul Beast, which was not suitable for Shui Bing'er and Ye Lingling, but it was somewhat compatible with Xiao Wu.
However, Xiao Wu is Hundred-Thousand-Year Soul Beast in human form, so absorbing her Soul Bone should be considered carefully.
"Don't rush to use the Soul Bone. Keep it for later when you urgently need it."
Tang San stored the torso bone in his Storage Soul Tool, then put away the Clear Sky Hammer, and the five red Soul Rings disappeared.
So far, Tang San's Clear Sky Hammer has five Soul Rings, and he is still missing four.
He only had one last God-Given Soul Ring left, and Tang San wanted to save it for his Seventh Soul Ring.
In addition, with the Deep Sea Demonic Whale King planned as the ninth Soul Ring, there are still two Soul Rings missing.
He now has two choices.
First, continue searching for high-age, Ten-Thousand-Year Soul Beasts in the Star Dou Great Forest to complete the two Soul Rings.
Secondly, we should refrain from acquiring Soul Rings for the time being, stabilize our current cultivation level, and complete the acquisition when a more suitable opportunity arises later.
Tang San chose the latter without much hesitation.
Based on Tang San's own standards, every Soul Ring on the Clear Sky Hammer must be at least 100,000 years old; there is no room for compromise.
Furthermore, his Soul Power surged to level 97 in just a few days. Although his foundation was solid, it still needed time to settle and digest.
Tang San turned around and looked at Shui Bing'er, Xiao Wu, and Ye Lingling.
"Let's go back to Heaven Dou City."
The four of them took to the air and flew towards the northwest.