Main Soul Warrior

Lu Yan had possessed the Soul Banner for some time. Judging from its performance, it was indeed considered quite impressive among low-grade magical artifacts, but it was still nowhere near the level of the legendary number-one artifact of the Demonic Path.

If the Soul Banner could only control Vengeful Souls, then even if it gathered tens of thousands of them, they would still be no more than a finger's flick for those mighty Golden Core and Nascent Soul cultivators to destroy.

Lu Yan knew that the most important reason was that the Soul Banner had no main soul.

A main soul could only be refined from the soul of a powerful cultivator. The souls of those First Level of Qi Refining workers spawned by the Spirit Talisman Shop village were only somewhat stronger than those of ordinary people—far too weak to be refined into main souls.

If the Vengeful Souls within the Soul Banner were viewed as soldiers, then the main soul was the general commanding them. The strength of a Soul Banner depended to a great extent on its main soul.

The main soul could raise the realm of the Vengeful Souls. If it mastered a Ghost Path Spell, it could also borrow the ghostly energy of the Vengeful Souls to cast it.

Only when the main soul was powerful enough could it command the Vengeful Souls more effectively.

Once the main soul reached a certain level, it could even evolve a Ghost Domain of its own. When the Soul Banner was activated, a Specter Ghost Domain would descend. That was the true might of a Demonic Soul Banner.

However, reaching that level required at least a Thousand Soul Banner comparable to a magical treasure. The low-grade artifact Soul Banner in Lu Yan's hands was still leagues away from that.

A soul comparable to the Mid-Stage of Qi Refinement was already sufficient for Lu Yan at his current stage to refine a main soul.

Glancing at the wandering souls scattered across the ground and the Giant Zombie's soul, Lu Yan ordered the five Vengeful Souls:

"Go guard the entrance and prevent any zombies from breaking in and causing trouble."

Upon hearing this, the five Vengeful Souls guarded the entrance of the apartment building, while Lu Yan began preparing to refine the main soul.

First, he took out the Demonic Path Magical Artifact Secret Records and turned to the page describing the array for refining a main soul. Then he took out a Spirit Stone, crushed it, and began drawing the array with the Spirit Stone powder.

In truth, the best material for refining a main soul was the blood of the main soul's corpse. However, after the Giant Zombie's soul left its body, it had turned into bones, leaving no blood. Lu Yan could only substitute Spirit Stone powder.

The main soul refinement array was not complicated. After all, it was merely an auxiliary array for refining the Soul Banner and could not even be considered a first-order array.

If it had been a first-order array, Lu Yan's knowledge and the materials in his possession would not have been enough to construct it.

After finishing the array, Lu Yan placed the Giant Zombie's soul in its center, then placed dozens of ordinary Zombie Wandering Souls on the other nodes of the array.

The Giant Zombie's soul was missing its celestial and terrestrial souls. On top of that, its soul power had been greatly weakened by the attacks of the five Vengeful Souls. Lu Yan was using ordinary Zombie Wandering Souls as materials to replenish the soul power it lacked.

After arranging the array, Lu Yan activated it with the Soul Banner.

In the next instant, a dazzling spiritual light rose from the Spirit Stone powder. The many ordinary Zombie Wandering Souls transformed into clusters of soul fire and rapidly converged toward the center of the array.

The originally dazed Giant Zombie's soul suddenly awakened after receiving the infusion of soul power, emitting a roar that pierced straight into the soul.

The Giant Zombie's soul tried to charge out of the array. However, under the array's spiritual radiance, the Giant Zombie, reduced to nothing but a soul body, could not shake the array at all. It could only let the array's light cover it.

Ghost Mist once again spread across the Soul Banner, swallowing the entire Soul Sacrifice Array. On the banner's surface, a few simple lines outlined a huge, hideous evil ghost.

The array's light faded, and the refinement of the main soul was complete.

After finishing everything, Lu Yan waved the Soul Banner in his hand, and a massive ghost nearly three meters tall appeared before him.

The giant ghost had a green face and bared fangs. Its body was as robust as a Guardian God in a temple, displaying a style utterly different from that of the Vengeful Souls.

The ghost looked down at Lu Yan from above, its eyes flashing with ferocity, and reached out its right hand toward him.

Lu Yan's expression remained calm, without making the slightest move. The Soul Banner in his hand suddenly stirred without any wind, and vast swathes of Ghost Mist transformed into dim flames that spread across the ghost's soul body.

The ghost's arm was devoured by the dim flames in an instant. Agonized wails came from the giant ghost.

"Roar!!!"

Yet the dim flames did not stop there. Instead, they continued spreading across the ghost's soul body, rapidly swallowing its torso and legs.

As more than half of its soul body was burned by the dim flames, the intense agony of having its soul scorched made the ghost unable to hold out any longer.

It struggled to crawl across the ground with its mutilated body. Its only intact head desperately knocked against the ground toward Lu Yan, begging for his forgiveness.

When the flames completely devoured its body, leaving behind only a hideous head, the dim flames finally went out.

Lu Yan held the Soul Banner and stood before the ghost, which had been reduced to a single head. A humble smile immediately appeared on its hideous, ugly face, and it voluntarily lowered the defenses around its soul body.

Lu Yan raised his right hand slightly. A flame formed from Ghost Mist landed on the ghost's head, like a mark of fire.

"You won't get another chance."

Lu Yan's tone was indifferent as he delivered the final verdict.

Then Ghost Mist gathered beneath the ghost's head and condensed into its body.

However, compared with when it had just completed its refinement, the ghost's soul body was now an entire section shorter, barely breaking two meters. Even its solid soul body had become far more illusory, and the aura around it was no longer stable.

Clearly, the ghost had suffered a grievous wound after losing most of its soul body.

The ghost showed not the slightest dissatisfaction with the result. Instead, it followed behind Lu Yan with a fawning expression, looking exactly like a bootlicker.

Casting a glance at the ghost's robust form, Lu Yan said coldly:

"From today onward, your name is Warrior!"

With the granting of the name, it also meant that Lu Yan had successfully subdued this Mid-Stage Qi Refinement main soul.

Normally, the Soul Banner had extremely high control over the ghost creatures it refined. The refinement of a main soul, however, was the sole exception.

The main souls of all Soul Banners were refined from the souls of powerful cultivators. To preserve the main soul's potential for growth, the master of the Soul Banner would retain a trace of its intelligence during the refinement.

This meant that if the main soul was too powerful, it could very well turn against the master of the Soul Banner.

Throughout history, there had been countless cases of Demonic Path Cultivators being killed by the main souls of their Soul Banners, only to be refined into main souls themselves.

Lu Yan was only at the First Level of Qi Refining. Refining the Giant Zombie's Mid-Stage Qi Refinement soul carried a certain degree of risk, and he could only rely on the Soul Banner to suppress it.

For this reason, Lu Yan had allowed the Ghost Mist to devour Warrior's soul body without resistance, making it develop absolute fear before subduing it.

After this lesson, Warrior's damaged soul body would inevitably decline in strength, falling from roughly the fifth level of Qi Refining to barely the fourth level of Qi Refining.

But Lu Yan did not regret it. Compared with a powerful but unstable factor, a slightly weaker main soul that he could completely control was clearly more valuable.

During the process of subduing Warrior, Lu Yan also discovered something very interesting.

Although Transcendent Zombies possessed powerful souls, their intelligence was clearly far inferior to that of human cultivators.

If a human cultivator were refined into a main soul, they would most likely pretend to be obedient and wait until the right moment to retaliate—especially Demonic Path Cultivators.

Although Transcendent Zombies appeared unruly, both their hostility and their respect were displayed openly. There was no need to worry about them stabbing him in the back.

Moreover, Transcendent Zombies had never seen the wider world and knew nothing about cultivators. Simply using the Soul Banner to devour their soul bodies was enough to intimidate them. Completely subduing them was not difficult.

This brainless nature, paradoxically, made them well suited to being refined into the main souls of Soul Banners.