The Great Strength Vajra Bear was, after all, a near-top-tier Martial Soul, specializing in defense and strength without any particular shortcomings in other areas. So even though the modified Hell White Tiger was stacked with buffs and could unleash the combat power of a Soul King, it didn't put Zhao Wuji under much pressure.
The shield of light was somewhat troublesome, though. Unless it was shattered in a single blow, it would continuously absorb external energy and attacks to restore itself, while also replenishing the Soul Power of those inside. It complemented the enormously costly Martial Soul Fusion Skill perfectly.
If not for the lesson, Zhao Wuji would certainly have used a Ten-Thousand-Year Soul Skill to break it through sheer force, but that would have defeated the purpose of testing their strength.
Besides... it had been a long time since he'd fought head-on like this. The Hell White Tiger could be called the same type of opponent as him, the Immovable Wisdom King.
Bang! Bang! Bang!
Bear paw and tiger paw slammed into flesh with deafening force. Golden light and a black-and-white figure collided again and again in the arena, leaving the six of them completely unable to approach. Ma Hongjun's flames were dispersed by the shock waves before they could even get close, and Tang San's Blue Silver Grass was shredded to pieces.
Only Ning Rongrong's support light could add a splash of color to the battle.
Xiang Yang's second Soul Skill was still on cooldown, so he immediately used Sunlight Seeds to restore his teammates' Soul Power. At the same time, he had Xiao Wu find a good position and prepare to launch a sneak attack when the Hell White Tiger exhausted its strength and left the fight.
Speaking of cooldowns, they were rather strange. The original work had drawn on games, but now that this was a real world, why did such things still exist?
Only after he obtained his own Soul Ring did he discover that this so-called cooldown was the time needed to infuse a Soul Ring with Soul Power. Under normal circumstances, Soul Rings were filled with Soul Power in advance, so the first use, which would normally require a cooldown, could be activated directly.
Soul Skills that consumed little Soul Power could be used in succession, but if a Soul Skill consumed too much, it had to be replenished promptly.
So a cooldown for Soul Skills was actually rather reasonable.
Seeing the Hell White Tiger driven back again and again by Zhao Wuji's blows, Xiang Yang called out, "Little Ao, Little San!" The two understood him at once, and two Yellow Soul Rings lit up.
"Cute Fragrant Tender Tofu!"
It instantly restored 10% of his Soul Power and stamina.
"Blue Silver Jade Dew, condense!"
The Blue Silver Grass's first Soul Skill—Clear Dew Drink, enhanced version. Using a Soul Incantation that had originally been unnecessary as a catalyst, it consumed more Soul Power to give the Soul Skill several times its original effect.
A droplet of water four or five times its original size condensed in his hand in an instant. That was his current limit. (This was combat training, so of course he couldn't use anything prepared in advance.)
Xiang Yang first ate the tofu, then took the palm-sized leaf and drained it in one gulp. Feeling his spirits lift, he immediately summoned his Sunflower Martial Soul and said solemnly:
"Golden disk gathers the sun, filled to the brim, light is born."
Following his words, a golden halo the size of a washbasin condensed in front of the Sunflower.
"Guide its force and shape its form, nine turns to condense the core."
The irregular halo gradually solidified as it rotated. By then, the Hell White Tiger was already nearing its limit, and it dissolved into a man and a woman: Dai Mubai and Zhu Zhuqing. Their stamina and Soul Power were both exhausted, and they lay on the ground, gasping for breath, clearly unable to fight any longer.
"Seven Treasures Have Names, first: strength!"
The Seven Treasure Glazed Tile Pagoda in Ning Rongrong's hand shot out two rays of colored light to support Ma Hongjun and Xiang Yang.
Following their earlier plan, Ma Hongjun was now positioned to the right of Zhao Wuji, who was opposite Xiang Yang, less than five meters away.
"Now we're talking! Take my Phoenix Fire Line!"
Golden-red flames, their effect enhanced by 30%, sprayed toward Zhao Wuji, who was exposed after just delivering a charged blow.
The little fatty's flames clung fiercely, and Zhao Wuji didn't want to end up covered in soot, so he had no choice but to forcefully summon and unleash his Soul Power. "Immovable Bright King Body!"
"One shot pierces the air..."
Zhao Wuji blocked the flames with golden light and glanced behind him. "Hmph, I've already seen through your tactics. It's certainly impressive that you managed to stall for so long, but this Soul Skill takes too long to unleash. You've already..."
Suddenly, he felt something binding his feet. Looking down, he saw countless strands of Blue Silver Grass wrapping around him, coil after coil.
It turned out that while Zhao Wuji was fighting the Hell White Tiger, Tang San had used Flying Fluff Burst's seeds to take root throughout a thirty-meter radius. He naturally knew he couldn't make the seeds land directly on Zhao Wuji, so he could only settle for the next best thing and expand their range as much as possible.
"So that's how it is," Zhao Wuji said indifferently, looking at the mass of Blue Silver Grass wrapped around him. "But this still isn't enough." With that, he moved to force his way free.
A cry of "Moon Shadow!"
I've been hit again? When? I clearly looked away in time!
Zhao Wuji didn't know that Xiao Wu could delay the activation of her Soul Skill's effect. When he had repelled the Hell White Tiger just now, he had seen Xiao Wu hidden behind it and immediately looked away, but he had already been locked on to. Xiao Wu had simply decided the timing wasn't right and waited until now to activate it.
Forcibly deprived of his sight, Zhao Wuji ignored the others' attempts to stop him and lunged straight toward where he remembered Xiang Yang standing. He hit him!... Didn't he? Why did the thing beneath his palm feel like that when he pulled his strike?
A second later, when Zhao Wuji's sight returned, all he saw was a human-shaped figure made of Blue Silver Grass, which had even been set alight by the Phoenix Flame that had kept following him.
"All Things Wounded!"
Sunlight Cannon! Fire!
A whoosh came from his right. Zhao Wuji turned to see a ball of light as large as a fist hurtling straight at him.
Having expended a little under half his Soul Power, Zhao Wuji clearly sensed a hint of danger and unleashed his strongest Soul Skill without hesitation:
"Seventh Soul Skill, Martial Soul Avatar!"
As a deep-black Soul Ring flickered, the phantom image of a Great Strength Vajra Bear flashed over his body. Then his entire body swelled to five meters tall, transforming into a gigantic brown-furred bear in an instant.
For thirty minutes, his other Soul Skills required no cooldown, and their effects increased by 50%, while his defense increased by 200%.
Zhao Wuji crossed his arms and met the ball of light head-on.
A heaven-shaking boom rang out, audible for miles. Despite having been warned in advance, Tang San and Xiao Wu nearby, as well as Dai Mubai and Zhu Zhuqing lying on the ground, were left dizzy by the shock.
When the light and dust cleared, they saw that Zhao Wuji was unharmed at the center of the explosion, but the ground in front of him had been blasted to pieces, reaching a depth of four or five meters at its nearest point.
And that was with him blocking it head-on. The power of that strike was plain to see.
Zhao Wuji dismissed his Martial Soul Avatar and grinned at the crater before him. "Good, good, very good. That strike was already close to a Soul King's full-powered blow. Crossing a gap of more than twenty Soul Power ranks, you really are something."
Xiang Yang glanced at Tang San, Oscar, and the others beside him and replied, "Haha, it was thanks to Teacher Zhao holding back and the brothers' support. Otherwise, that strike could only have barely reached the Soul Ancestor level at best."
For that attack, Oscar had first restored his Soul Power, and then Tang San had boosted his mental power, allowing him to control Soul Power energy far beyond his own rank.
Most importantly, he had also added the Sunlight Energy originally contained within his Martial Soul. As a form of natural energy containing the sun attribute, both its inherent quality and its offensive power far surpassed his own Soul Power. It was daytime now, so the Sunlight Energy had been used up as soon as it was absorbed.
Finally, although Ning Rongrong's strength boost couldn't directly increase the power of Sunlight Cannon, a purely Soul Power attack, it had indirectly raised Xiang Yang's endurance limit and control by strengthening his physical body. That allowed him to add more Sunlight Energy, raising the final power another notch.
Only with so many conditions had he been able to use level-twenty-two Soul Power to fire a Sunlight Cannon approaching the full-powered strike of a level-fifty Power Attack System Soul King!
Yu Xiaogang pondered for a moment, then folded his arms. "This move won't be easy to use in the arena, but as long as the coordination is right, it can still serve as a trump card." He looked at the students before him; Zhao Wuji was taking several Soul Skill foods and stuffing them into his mouth. "From now on, we'll have combat training on the last day of every week."
"Yes!" ×8
Tang San and Oscar, who had expended the least, supported Dai Mubai back to the dormitory, while Zhu Zhuqing was helped by the other two girls. The group each returned to rest.
In Xiang Yang's view, "Sunlight Cannon" couldn't strictly be considered a "Soul Skill" at all; at most, it was a little trick. Just as he had said, it merely gathered energy, compressed it, and finally released it under control. The principle was simplicity itself, no different from Dai Mubai's White Tiger Fierce Light Wave or Ma Hongjun's Phoenix Fire Line.
The reason these very basic things had never been developed ultimately lay in the Douluo Continent's Soul Master system. One only needed to attach a Soul Ring to obtain all kinds of skills, so naturally everyone thought about finding a Soul Beast that could give them powerful skills, rather than spending time training hard.
Besides, most people didn't have the talent for it. Just like learning from books in his previous life, without sufficiently rapid feedback, it was hard for people to have the patience to keep at it.
These combined reasons had kept "Self-Created Soul Skills" the exclusive domain of geniuses and peerless experts.
For example, Tang Chen in the original work had single-handedly brought the Clear Sky Hammer to the position of the world's number-one offensive tool Martial Soul. There was also Gale Demon Wolf Continuous Slashes, which had been trained to a level comparable to Disorder Splitting Wind Hammer by spending a great deal of time during the golden years.
There wasn't much to say about the former; in this era, he was on a level all his own, with a sheer cliff between him and the rest. As for the latter, many people said he had wasted his golden cultivation years and his talent for Innate Full Soul Power, and that he should be focusing on improving his Soul Power now.
But people's creativity usually came when they were young. At that age, they had drive, and their ideas ranged as freely as heavenly horses across the sky. If he didn't do it when he wanted to, but put it off until later, there was no telling whether he could still accomplish it.
But looking at it the other way, with Innate Full Soul Power and the aptitude of a near-top-tier Mutated Martial Soul, his upper limit was visible. Since that limit was there no matter what, why couldn't he take another path? Perhaps it was even a shortcut: understanding one thing could lead to understanding others.
From that day on, in addition to their daily cultivation and combat, the students of Shrek Academy had another course: "Soul Incantations—Energy Shaping."
Ning Rongrong and Oscar in particular spent the most time on it. The former needed no explanation; as for the latter... everyone could see the reason. The past two years hadn't gone by for nothing, and he had learned about some of the Seven Treasure Glazed Tile Sect's rules.