Innate Soul Power Level Five?

Innate Soul Power Level Five?

How should one put it? Biluo City was just that kind of place. Poison Soul Masters were rare on Douluo Continent, yet in Biluo City, it was rare to find anyone who was not one.

When people ate here, there was a good chance their food contained several poisonous things. Not because someone had added them, but because they had crawled in on their own. There were hardly any rats in the enormous city, because this damn place had far too many snakes.

The main source of protein for the common folk here was the spicy strips that crawled into their houses. In this place, anyone who could not grab a snake barehanded without getting hurt was not qualified to find a partner. Children of four or five fought insects, pitting poisonous creatures such as scorpions and centipedes against each other.

Even Biluo City's water sources contained some poison. There had even been cases of water-type Soul Masters cultivating in water sources near Biluo City and poisoning themselves half to death.

The fundamental reason Biluo City remained half-dead despite being close to a large gathering ground for poisonous soul beasts was its harsh living environment. Nine out of ten Soul Masters here used poison, and the remaining one probably came with poison resistance. If Soul Masters from elsewhere lived here for several generations, they either died out or evolved toxins or poison resistance.

Treating poison here was all about fighting poison with poison. If you lived, you lived. If you died, you died. Natural selection, survival of the fittest. There were not even bandits around the city, because even the city itself was full of poisonous creatures, leaving no environment for bandits to survive in the surrounding mountains and forests. Even a blade of grass in the mountains might mutate under severe poison pollution into a poison-element soul beast and leap up to attack people.

Here, getting killed by wheat was unlikely, but by no means impossible.

Not just in the Heaven Dou Empire—across all Douluo Continent, Biluo City was famous for its fierce customs. Even during times of continental unrest, no suicidal fool had ever dared set their sights on this damned place.

After the fragrance drifted through the air for a while, the children gradually calmed down. However, they still looked somewhat exhausted, and their bodies lacked strength.

Although the fragrance could knock out an ordinary adult man, this was Biluo City. Even children possessed considerable poison resistance. Moreover, these were all children of Soul Master families. Their inherited Martial Souls either released poison or resisted it; there would be no excessively frail children...

Or rather, in a place where one could encounter poison every three steps and spot a poisonous creature every ten, frailer children would not live to see six.

Seeing their children being helped back up, most of the adults watching from the side could not be bothered to intervene. Instead, they turned their attention to Chen Ming.

The Chen Family had been rooted in Biluo City for more than five hundred years. Their inherited Martial Soul, the Jade Scorpion, was known by everyone in the city.

This Martial Soul and its corresponding soul beast had many names. Aside from Jade Scorpion, the name most familiar to people was Bilin Scorpion.

Together with the Bilin Snake, Bilin Centipede, Bilin Gecko, and Bilin Toad, this Martial Soul was known as the Bilin Five Poisons, universally recognized as some of the deadliest poisons in the world. Its venom killed upon drawing blood, and its close-range offense and defense were both first-rate. Even across Douluo Continent, it could be considered an excellent Martial Soul.

Perhaps because they had spent too long in Biluo City, a place filled with poisonous creatures, the Jade Scorpions of the Chen Family line were not only more venomous than other Jade Scorpion Martial Souls on Douluo Continent, but also stranger, more varied, and harder to guard against or counter.

In terms of Martial Soul quality, there was no second family like them in all of Biluo City.

There were three major powers in Biluo City. One was the City Lord's Mansion, as it represented the Heaven Dou Empire's official authority. The second was Spirit Hall within the city, whose reputation as the holy land of Soul Masters had been a golden standard for ten thousand years. The third was the Chen Family, because they were simply very good at fighting.

However, after living alongside them for generations, these people also knew that the Chen Family's Martial Soul had a flaw that was quite fatal for a Soul Master family. What they cared about now was whether Chen Ming had inherited that flaw.

"Try your Soul Power. Be careful not to shatter the crystal ball. Your strength is not on the same level as before."

Yan Jun handed the crystal ball to Chen Ming, his gaze fixed on it as well.

Having stayed in Biluo City for decades, he knew every family's Martial Soul like the back of his hand. Naturally, he also understood the flaw in the Chen Family's inheritance.

Chen Ming clearly could not have no Soul Power, but what level his Soul Power was posed a major question.

Chen Ming bit his lip and reached out to accept the crystal ball. As he poured in his Soul Power, the crystal ball gradually lit up. The glow was not intense, yet it drew everyone's eyes.

"Innate Soul Power, level five?"

Seeing the glow of the crystal ball, Yan Jun was filled with astonishment. His eyes, which had been narrowed to slits, could not help but open wide.

Level five was above average for ordinary Soul Masters, though not particularly high. Yan Jun himself had been level five back then, and over the years, he had awakened several children with level five or higher. But Chen Ming's level five was different.

Generally speaking, the higher the quality of a Martial Soul, the higher its Innate Soul Power should be. High-quality Martial Souls rarely appeared with low-level Soul Power, but the Chen Family's Jade Scorpion was one of those exceptions.

The Jade Scorpion Martial Souls awakened by this family were of extremely high quality. In terms of attributes, they could already be considered top-tier Martial Souls. Yet they happened to have a major problem with Innate Soul Power.

The Martial Souls awakened by this family generally came with around level two or three Soul Power. Even level-four Innate Soul Power was extremely rare. Over the past century, more and more members of the family had awakened without Soul Power, and most could not even become Soul Masters.

For a family that had remained in Biluo City for five hundred years, they now had fewer than ten Soul Masters, and nearly half of them had married into the family from outside. There were only a handful with the Jade Scorpion Martial Soul.

The Jade Scorpion Martial Soul was high quality, making it easy to pass down to descendants. Yet because of its flaw, descendants were very likely to have no Innate Soul Power, causing the Jade Scorpion to become an ordinary scorpion with somewhat stronger venom. For a Soul Master family, this was an almost unsolvable vicious cycle. Other families in the city did not even dare form marriage alliances with the Chen Family, afraid that bringing Chen blood into their lines would cause their descendants to awaken without Innate Soul Power as well.

More than five hundred years ago, when Biluo City had just been established in that damned place known as Bioluo Gorge, the first City Lord had been a member of the Chen Family. Nearly all of Biluo City had been the Chen Family's private domain. Later, they stepped down from the position of City Lord because their Innate Soul Power was too low, then gradually declined.

Over the past few decades, the other families of Biluo City had been discussing how, within less than a century, the Chen Family would probably completely withdraw from the ranks of Soul Masters because they could no longer awaken children with Innate Soul Power. In the end, they might not even be able to retain their noble title.

Chen Ming's Martial Soul and Innate Soul Power were clearly different from those of ordinary Jade Scorpions, making the onlookers suspicious.

Had the Chen Family stumbled into absurdly good luck and produced a beneficial mutation just as their Martial Soul was about to die out? Not only had its quality risen, but had the inherited problem of low Soul Power also been resolved?

Regardless of anything else, in a small place like Biluo City, level-five Innate Soul Power was the standard of a genius. With someone like him, the Chen Family could at least grit their teeth and hold on for a few more decades. If they managed to endure and the Martial Soul problem truly was solved, then Biluo City would truly see a change in its skies.