Faced with Ye Xinyu's solemn demeanor, Lingyuan was somewhat stunned. After hesitating for a moment, she slowly raised her head and looked straight at her.
"Your problem isn't difficult to solve, but I need you to tell me—what exactly are you planning to do by gathering so many people who may not even become Soul Masters?"
If they were all Soul Masters, Lingyuan could understand. But there was no way a thousand Soul Masters could be gathered in such a remote place. That meant these thousand people merely possessed a trace of Soul Power. Whether they could even become one-ring Soul Masters was questionable, let alone anything beyond that.
Other than wasting resources, Lingyuan truly could not think of any reason to gather so many people.
If there was no suitable reason and she simply went along with Ye Xinyu's nonsense, the Pope might not do anything to Ye Xinyu, but Lingyuan would definitely be the one to suffer.
"What if I said I was confident I could raise them to at least Soul Elder within six years?"
As she spoke, a round crystal shining with a pale yellow light appeared in Ye Xinyu's palm. The crystal was tiny, no larger than a fingernail, but upon sensing the energy contained within it, a grave look flashed through Lingyuan's eyes.
"What is this?"
"By refining a Hundred-Year Soul Beast, you can obtain one of these. I call it a Hundred-Year Essence Soul. Although it doesn't improve a Soul Master as much as a soul ring does, consuming it can still increase a Soul Master's cultivation by the equivalent of a hundred days of hard training without side effects. Even someone with terrible talent can probably rise one level below level ten with a single one. Below level twenty, it would still