Earth and Fire

"Awaken, Flame Lord."

Within the dark sea of consciousness, the Flame Lord martial soul, which had seemed like a lifeless object, finally reacted to Yan's repeated calls. Flames blazed in its eyes, and a ball of light blossomed within the space.

"This is the strange power within me that Dawn deduced. Unfortunately, even the current intelligent brain cannot analyze its nature. It seems to be some kind of spiritual power."

Yan's consciousness watched as the strange glow approached his martial soul. As dazzling light erupted, his martial soul began to change.

"Though I don't know its nature, as long as I can wield it and use it to split my martial soul, that is enough. Even if there are hidden dangers, I can find a way to resolve them later."

Yan's consciousness remained focused on his martial soul space, naturally noticing the rapid changes in his martial soul. Under the influence of that strange glow, the Flame Lord martial soul seemed to be gradually splitting apart.

"Pfft..."

The instant the two masses of light tore apart, Yan's vision went black and his consciousness space rapidly shattered. In the real world, his seated body jolted violently, and he spat out a mouthful of blood.

"Little Yan!"

Liya, who had been watching Yan the entire time, hurried over at once. Feng Lin, who was maintaining the formation, also quickly withdrew his Soul Power.

The light of the awakening formation gradually faded. After staggering, Yan's body collapsed toward the ground. Fortunately, Liya arrived in time and caught him before he fell. Two yellow and one purple soul rings lit up in succession, and warm healing light fell upon him. Yan immediately felt much better.

Liya carefully supported Yan, afraid that something might happen to him again. "Little Yan, how are you feeling? Are you all right?"

"I'm fine now, Sister Liya."

Yan shook his head to indicate that he was fine, then turned toward Feng Lin and asked, "Lord Feng Lin, are you all right?"

Fine beads of sweat covered Feng Lin's forehead, but after a brief period of recovery, he had regained some strength. Hearing Yan's question, he opened his eyes and shook his head. "It is nothing. I merely used up some Soul Power. But your secret technique... did it fail?"

"No, it succeeded."

Yan shook his head again before smiling bitterly. "I simply had not considered things thoroughly enough. My method was probably too crude. At the very end, the martial soul backlash nearly left me seriously injured."

Through feedback from the intelligent brain Dawn, Yan had also figured out what had just happened. This was his first time splitting a martial soul, and his method had been somewhat too rough. The backlash during the final tearing had nearly made him bleed from all seven orifices and left half his body paralyzed.

As Yan spoke, he extended both hands. Two masses of light emerged from his palms. In his right hand was a flickering ball of flame, while in his left was a hazy earthen-yellow glow.

Within the flame in his right hand stood an Abyssal Fire Demon with a rather ferocious aura. This was the downgraded Flame Lord after the split—or rather, it should now be called the high-grade martial soul, Flame Commander.

Yan's original top-grade martial soul, the Flame Lord, belonged to the Underground Abyss fire demon clan of the ancient era. This clan should have been of the same race as the Flame Monarch and the Dark Flame Demon King from the world of "Yin-Yang Crown."

However, Yan's Flame Lord was somewhat unusual. Although the Flame Monarch and the Dark Flame Demon King were divided into yin fire and yang fire, they were both fundamentally single fire attributes. His mutated Flame Lord, however, possessed both fire and earth attributes.

After being split and downgraded, his primary martial soul returned to a single fire attribute and became the Flame Commander, one rank below the Flame Lord. However, it could still evolve again.

The earthen-yellow radiance in his left hand was the separated secondary martial soul. It somewhat resembled the fire demon clan, except it took the form of a sand-and-stone giant. For the time being, he would call it the Earth Commander.

Yan slowly withdrew the earthen-yellow glow in his left hand and silently invoked Martial Soul Possession. As flames bloomed over his body, Yan's appearance changed greatly.

Faint black demonic patterns emerged across his skin, shrouded in a layer of red light. Crimson flames coiled around his body, making him seem like a powerful god of fire and war.

Yan quietly sensed the difference between the Flame Commander martial soul and the Flame Lord martial soul, and he already had his answer. As expected, after this downgrade, both the quality and power of my martial soul have clearly declined.

Yan withdrew the flames and clenched his palm. Crimson fire shimmered with red radiance and looked quite extraordinary, but Yan could feel that this crimson flame was not as powerful as his original dark-red flames.

Yan's original dark-red flames had been the Lava Force created by the fusion of earth and fire within the top-grade Flame Lord martial soul. What he possessed now was merely pure fire power.

In the real world, ordinary flames could not compare to magma. The most obvious difference was their temperature.

The orange-red flames produced by burning ordinary materials such as firewood were only a few hundred degrees hot. Magma capable of melting metal and stone, however, had a temperature of at least a thousand degrees.

Yan had once been able to easily calcine limestone because the Lava Force had helped him greatly. If he used his current fire power instead, he might not be able to do it at all.

However, fire power was already enough for him at present. Although the Lava Force was stronger, magma had a limited upper temperature limit. Fire was different. Its lower limit might be lower, but its upper limit far exceeded that of magma, and it could continue to transform in the future.

After a brief moment of reflection, Yan withdrew his martial soul. As strands of red light faded away, the courtyard returned to calm.

"Little Yan, that just now was..."

Liya had been watching Yan's condition the entire time. Seeing his series of actions—the crimson flames and earthen-yellow radiance—left her mind in complete turmoil. What had happened today truly challenged everything she believed.

"Sister Liya, that was my second martial soul. I hope you can keep the secret that I possess Twin Martial Souls for now."

Yan smiled slightly at Liya before offering an explanation. He made up a casual explanation, and Liya seemed to simply accept it.

Yan did not dwell on it too much. The matter of Twin Martial Souls could be either significant or insignificant. Even if it were exposed, at most it would reveal his exceptional talent early and draw more attention to him.

Yan did not particularly care about it being exposed, but neither did he wish to reveal his talent too early. Fame meant trouble, and he hated trouble. For now, he had no intention of exposing himself, so he reminded Liya once more.

"You... you actually succeeded."

In another corner of the courtyard, Soul King Feng Lin stared blankly at Yan and kept muttering to himself. Even after Yan approached him, he had yet to regain his composure.

A related chapter was also updated today. Everyone can go take a look.