The Secret of Ring Fusion, Traces of the Nethervine

Yu Chen did not stand on ceremony when it came to the five academies' promise to open their core inheritances. He knew well that the accumulation and collision of knowledge were vital fuel for his own progress. Although most inheritances—such as the high-level Soul Skills and Meditation Methods unique to each academy—served mainly as references and broadened his horizons, with limited effect for someone who possessed the Blue Lightning Tyrant Dragon Clan's top-tier inheritance and Thunder God Power, one unique secret technique from Blazing Fire Academy—Ring Fusion—greatly piqued his interest.

After carefully reading the Detailed Explanation of Ring Fusion Secret Technique, Yu Chen's eyes shone as enlightenment dawned on him.

"So that's how it is! Xu Sanshi's awakening of the Black Tortoise Bloodline in Douluo Dalu 2 was probably inseparable from this Ring Fusion secret technique!" He combined his vague memories from his previous life with the technique in his hands and began deducing. "Xu Sanshi most likely learned Ring Fusion first, but the technique placed extremely high demands on its user. Given his condition at the time, it would have been difficult for him to use it normally. It required lengthy preparation and had a low success rate. Yet it was precisely this arduous process of performing Ring Fusion that, to some extent, stimulated or guided the dormant Black Tortoise Bloodline within him, causing it to resonate and ultimately awaken! The bloodline awakening brought a comprehensive increase in his basic attributes, especially the growth of his Spiritual Power and his deep control over his Martial Soul Origin. Only then could he smoothly use Ring Fusion in turn!"

The principles of the Ring Fusion secret technique were exquisitely ingenious yet harsh. Its core lay in using Spiritual Power far beyond one's current Soul Power Level as the control hub, forcibly and temporarily "fusing" the Soul Power Origin of one or more Soul Rings into another Soul Ring, causing it to undergo "sublimation" for a short period and erupt with terrifying power far beyond its original age level!

However, there was a subtle yet crucial hidden requirement that could easily be overlooked—the Soul Beast origins corresponding to the Soul Rings involved in the fusion had to possess a certain "connection" or "commonality"! That connection could be shared race, highly compatible attributes, or even a predator-prey relationship. If the Soul Rings came from conflicting or completely unrelated attributes, forcibly fusing them would very likely result in the Soul Rings clashing and backlash upon the user.

Yet even if the condition of Soul Ring connection was met, the greatest threshold still stood before the vast majority of Soul Masters—Spiritual Power!

Ring Fusion's demands on Spiritual Power were outrageously high. It did not require a Soul Master's total Spiritual Power to be exceptionally vast. Rather, its "quality" and "control precision" had to far exceed the user's current Soul Power Level—higher than Soul Masters of the same cultivation level and Martial Soul quality who practiced normally without focusing on Spiritual Power. In other words, a Soul Master needed Spiritual Power that exceeded the standard.

This created an awkward situation. In a Soul Master World generally lacking systematic methods for cultivating Spiritual Power, a Soul Master's Spiritual Power growth mainly depended on the passive boost from increased Soul Power and the tempering of Soul Shock when Absorbing Soul Rings. For Soul Masters with "ordinary" Martial Soul quality, their Soul Power progressed relatively slowly. If they were born with relatively strong Spiritual Power—though still far inferior to a monster like Yu Yuanchen, whose two lifetimes had stacked together—they might temporarily possess Spiritual Power that exceeded the standard at a certain stage, allowing them to luckily learn Ring Fusion. This was also why, in the original work, some Soul Masters whose Martial Souls did not seem particularly outstanding could instead master this technique.

But what about disciples of sects with top-tier Martial Souls? Their Martial Souls were powerful, and their Soul Power advanced rapidly, often reaching high levels at a young age. Yet the growth of their Spiritual Power could not keep pace with the surge of their Soul Power. Even if a sect occasionally produced a gifted child with innately powerful Spiritual Power who learned Ring Fusion early, as his Cultivation Level rapidly increased, his Soul Power Level would soon catch up to or even surpass the extent to which his Spiritual Power exceeded the standard. The Ring Fusion secret technique he had once been able to use would then become impossible to perform in later stages because his Spiritual Power was "relatively insufficient"! It was truly a helpless paradox.

"No wonder... no wonder neither the Elephant Armored Sect nor even my Blue Lightning Tyrant Dragon Clan has ever had anyone known to be proficient in this technique." Understanding dawned on Yu Chen. "It isn't that the secret technique isn't powerful enough. Rather, its cultivation requirements fundamentally conflict with the growth pattern of top-tier Martial Souls."

But none of this was a problem at all for Yu Yuanchen!

Because the souls of his two lives had stacked together, the foundation and potential of his Spiritual Power far surpassed ordinary people from the start. Even more terrifyingly, this stacking was not a simple one plus one. Under some mysterious law, it produced a geometric growth effect akin to multiplication! This meant that whether in total amount, quality, or growth speed, his Spiritual Power always remained slightly ahead of his Soul Power Level, barely meeting Ring Fusion's incomparably demanding requirement of Spiritual Power exceeding the standard!

"This technique was practically tailor-made for me!" Yu Chen was thrilled. If he could master Ring Fusion, he could fuse the power of lower-age Soul Rings into higher-age Soul Rings at crucial moments. And if he obtained a Hundred Thousand Year Soul Ring in the future, then temporarily fused the power of all his previous Soul Rings into it... he hardly dared imagine the power it would unleash! Perhaps he could even use it to temporarily awaken the Thunder Sacred Dragon Bloodline. At that time, his strength might be enough to fight a Soul Douluo head-on without being defeated. This would become another powerful Trump Card of his.

However, he did not immediately begin cultivating it. Ring Fusion was good, but finding an opportunity to overcome the bottleneck in tempering his liver was more urgent. He temporarily put off cultivating the Ring Fusion secret technique and began extensively reviewing the five academies' library records on all kinds of Lightning Attribute Soul Beasts, Plant Spirit Beasts, and exploration reports concerning famous Dangerous Places and secret realms across the continent. What interested him was not the hidden foundations of the academies themselves, but the public or semi-public information that had been widely circulated and brought back from all over the continent by generations of explorers or academy seniors.

His goal was clear—find traces of the Thunderclap Nethervine!

Whether it was to comprehend the mysteries of lightning's Life Force that might surpass his Awakening Spring Thunder Artistic Conception, or to obtain a Soul Ring and Spirit Bone containing Ultimate Thunder and the Thunder God Bloodline, the Thunderclap Nethervine was the best choice he could think of at present.

Yu Yuanchen had already learned a little about the Thunderclap Nethervine from the clan's records, but those accounts were sparse. They merely stated that it was a legendary Lightning Attribute divine creature with the Thunder God Bloodline and that its whereabouts were difficult to trace. Yet after combining that knowledge with the far more extensive collections of the five academies, his understanding of this super Soul Beast gradually became clearer and more complete.

The Thunderclap Nethervine was unquestionably the emperor of Lightning Attribute Soul Beasts! It was born with the Ultimate Thunder attribute, and its Origin Power surpassed that of the vast majority of Lightning Attribute Soul Beasts in the world. It even carried a trace of the Thunder God Bloodline, granting it an exceptionally lofty status. Furthermore, it was unique. In any given era, only one existed across the entire Douluo Continent. Only after the current one died could the next be nurtured over long years in a Gathering Place of Heaven and Earth lightning essence.

Yet the heavens were impartial. While granting it unparalleled talent and potential, they also imposed the cruelest shackles upon it. Its method of increasing its Cultivation Level was not simply absorbing Heaven and Earth Origin Qi. Instead, it cultivated mainly by "devouring heavenly tribulation lightning"! Every time it drew in and devoured Heavenly Thunder, it was like dancing on a blade's edge, like opposing the rules of the entire world. This was because tribulation lightning was, in a sense, a manifestation of Plane Law. Devouring Heavenly Thunder was equivalent to stealing the Plane Origin! From the moment of its birth, the plane rejected and suppressed it, refusing to tolerate its existence.

For this reason, the Thunderclap Nethervine could almost never break through the fifty-thousand-year cultivation barrier. Historical records seemed never to have documented a Thunderclap Nethervine beyond fifty thousand years. That fifty-thousand-year chasm was likely a true death sentence for it: a Thunder Tribulation with no chance of survival. Even so, with less than fifty thousand years of cultivation, relying on Ultimate Thunder and the Thunder God Bloodline, its true combat power was already no weaker than that of an ordinary Hundred-Thousand-Year Soul Beast! In terms of quality, it was undoubtedly the pinnacle of all Lightning Attribute Soul Beasts on Douluo Continent, without equal!

"Devouring Heavenly Thunder, stealing the Plane Origin... it is going against the heavens." Yu Yuanchen was shaken, but his determination to find it only grew firmer. Such a heaven-defying creature surely possessed an unimaginable level of Life Force and control over lightning. It was precisely the key to tempering his liver and comprehending lightning's Life Force!

He buried himself in the sea of books, refusing to overlook a single fragment of information. Combining the clan records with the scattered information from the five academies, he cross-referenced and reasoned through them.

After several sleepless days of research and analysis, several seemingly unrelated pieces of information scattered throughout different ancient texts gradually linked together in his mind, pointing toward a possible direction:

An expedition record from Godwind Academy concerning a valley somewhere in the Star Dou Great Mixed Zone mentioned that a hundred years ago, the area had experienced abnormally frequent and concentrated thunderstorms. The lightning had been a rare Deep Purple, and after the storms, the valley's plants had not been scorched and withered. Instead, they had displayed an unusual exuberance of Life Force.

A mineral chronicle from Blazing Fire Academy recorded the discovery of a peculiar Thunder-Struck Stone in an area near the edge of the Core Zone in Star Dou Great Forest. What it contained was not pure destructive lightning energy, but a faint trace of residual Life Aura. Its cause of formation was unknown, though it was suspected to be related to some Powerful Being capable of granting Life Force to lightning.

An ancient hydrological map annotation from Skywater Academy vaguely mentioned that the waters of the upper reaches of an underground river in Star Dou Great Forest had long contained trace amounts of active Lightning Element. Unlike ordinary violent Lightning Element, it leaned more toward nourishment.

Even a Boulder Academy report on geological formations mentioned that the geomagnetic field in a certain location within Star Dou Great Forest was unusually active. Its fluctuation frequency differed from that of ordinary lightning regions and carried a distinctive rhythm.

Viewed individually, these pieces of information might have been nothing more than strange anecdotes. But when he marked them all on a continental map, especially after focusing on the vast and mysterious Soul Beast habitat of Star Dou Great Forest, Yu Chen discovered that although these anomalous locations were scattered, they faintly formed a fan-shaped region pointing toward the forest's northwest, near the boundary between the Mixed Zone and the Core Zone!

"Star Dou Great Forest... the northwest region..." Yu Chen's finger pressed heavily onto that location on the map, sharp light flashing in his eyes.

Though it was still only a conjecture and the area remained vast, this was already the most likely clue he could find regarding the Thunderclap Nethervine!

The opportunity to temper his liver, the temptation of an Ultimate Thunder Soul Ring, and the mystery of going against the heavens to steal Thunder Tribulation all drove him to make this trip!

He decided that after making a few preparations, he would leave Elemental City under the pretext of gaining experience and venture deep into Star Dou Great Forest in search of the legendary Thunderclap Nethervine! This would be a journey where opportunity and danger coexisted.