"If that kid's moves really let him control people at will, he wouldn't have deliberately provoked you into attacking him," Golden Crocodile said.
"Perhaps his Martial Soul requires certain special conditions to activate—and those conditions may be passive."
Jiang Mo's expression stiffened. "Does that mean we really can't make a move against that kid?"
If they attacked first, they risked being controlled?
"At least for now. After all, even the Grand Priest couldn't resist that kid's control. There's no way we could," Golden Crocodile said.
"If we're talking weaknesses, he should only be able to control one person at a time. And when he activates the control, his body loses control. It's probably a backlash, and that clone was likely something he activated to protect his body."
"Then does that mean there's nothing we can do about him?" Jiang Mo asked gravely.
"No." Qian Daoliu furrowed his brows.
"There must be other limitations to that kind of control. Otherwise, he wouldn't have had me ambush Golden Crocodile just now. He would've made me kill myself like Demon Bear!"
Perhaps his Spiritual Power was strong enough, or perhaps the Angel God Power inside him had blocked some of the control.
But that kid's mind control absolutely couldn't let him do whatever he wanted!
"What do we do now?" Qian Jun Douluo asked.
"The people in the Elder Hall are already scared out of their wits. They'll probably all join Bibi Dong's side now."
"Don't make any moves for now," Qian Daoliu said.
"Until we understand that kid's abilities, we absolutely must not attack first."
"Then... what about Xiao Xue?" Golden Crocodile asked anxiously.
"You saw it yourself. That kid's a complete lunatic. He really is capable of anything!"
Qian Daoliu fell silent for a moment. "He probably won't. If he really wanted to take us down with him, he wouldn't have used Xiao Xue to provoke me again and again."
"He's reminding me where my weakness lies."
His greatest concern in not letting Qian Jun and Jiang Mo attack just now had been Qian Renxue!
If they failed to kill that kid for good today, it would truly be a fight to the death!
A lunatic lurking in the shadows!
Damn it! He'd avoided going after the Clear Sky Sect because he feared lunatics like this!
First Tang Chen, and now there was another, even more dangerous lunatic!
"What if he does?" Golden Crocodile asked anxiously.
Qian Daoliu fell silent for a moment. "I'll go talk to Bibi Dong. Hopefully, that madwoman hasn't gone completely insane yet."
"Would she even care?" Golden Crocodile asked skeptically.
"Maybe. It's the only option we have right now. If it doesn't work..." Qian Daoliu's gaze sharpened.
"Then we'll take each other down!"
"Well, well! Where are you all off to?"
After Qian Daoliu left, Nan Feng walked to the meeting table and picked up two Soul Bones.
Taking advantage of the moment, the six Titled Douluo, led by Ghost Leopard Douluo, quietly tried to slip away.
"Uh..."
Seeing Yue Guan and Gui Mei standing silently by the Elder Hall's entrance, the elders froze in place, their expressions stiff.
Damn it! You two really have no loyalty!
"My business with Qian Daoliu is settled for now. What about you?" Nan Feng said with a smile.
"Don't you want to show a little appreciation? Or do you need me to take the initiative?"
"No, no!" The elders panicked.
If you took the initiative, would any of us still be alive?
They were afraid of dying, but not that afraid. The problem was that nobody wanted to die for no reason!
How humiliating!
"But we don't have any Soul Bones," Ghost Leopard Douluo said awkwardly.
Soul Bones were entirely a matter of luck!
Most Titled Douluo didn't have a single Soul Bone!
And even if they did, they would have absorbed it right away. There was no way they'd have one to spare.
"None? You're that poor?" Nan Feng raised an eyebrow.
"You've worked for Spirit Hall half your lives, and you couldn't even get your hands on a bone?"
At that, even Yue Guan and Gui Mei looked a little uncomfortable.
Seriously, what did you think Soul Bones were?
Cabbages by the roadside?
If hunting a Soul Beast yielded a Soul Bone, the Soul Master who killed it would usually absorb it along with the Spirit Ring. There was no way it would end up in circulation.
If a Soul Master died of old age, the Soul Bone would dissipate along with their Soul Power and become an ordinary bone!
To take a Soul Bone from a living person, you had to use a special method to remove the part of their body that had absorbed it while they were still alive. If you simply tore it out, the Soul Bone would shatter, lose its spiritual nature, and become a useless chunk of bone.
Besides, extracting an absorbed Soul Bone inevitably caused damage. Most were incomplete.
Pass one down for a couple of generations, and it would still end up as a worthless Soul Bone.
The only way to remove a Soul Bone without damaging it at all was for a Titled Douluo to cripple their own cultivation before dying!
That was how the Clear Sky Sect and the Blue Lightning Tyrant Dragon's inherited Soul Bones worked. They only passed one on after confirming that the successor had the potential to become a Titled Douluo.
And most Soul Masters—or rather, any Soul Master who could cultivate to the Soul Saint level or higher—wanted to die with dignity. Who wanted to die with their corpse in pieces?
"Don't be nervous. Sit down. Make yourselves at home," Nan Feng said.
The elders returned to their seats, looking utterly miserable.
Why had they even come here today?!
Spirit Hall had sixteen Titled Douluo in total, excluding the Pope—more than the Seven Great Sects combined. Besides the seven Grand Priests led by Qian Daoliu, it had nine Titled Douluo elders. Yue Guan and Gui Mei were on Bibi Dong's side, and Demon Bear had just died. That left only six Titled Douluo elders.
Pufferfish, Snake Lance, Ghost Leopard, Ling Yuan, Sacred Dragon Sect Master Tuoba Xi, and the "Ninth Elder," who was practically invisible.
"Tsk. What a miserable way to die." Nan Feng walked over to Demon Bear's corpse, his face full of pity.
"Look at him. This is what Qian's family's loyal dog gets. He's dead, and no one even bothers to collect his body."
Qian Daoliu was cold and ungrateful. So was Qian Xunji, and so was Qian Renxue. It was practically a trait passed down through the Qian Family. Bibi Dong, whom Qian Xunji had raised, was much the same.
He couldn't see a trace of human warmth in Spirit Hall, nor had he seen any sense of belonging to Spirit Hall among its elders and bishops. That was just the organization's culture.
The mediocre were dismissed; the capable rose to the top. That had made Spirit Hall the organization most popular with Soul Masters, and made it powerful—but it had also doomed the organization to fragility.
It had no cohesion whatsoever!
Apart from the few Soul Masters who'd been raised from childhood on a steady diet of indoctrination, every Soul Master who joined Spirit Hall later in life treated it like an "electronics factory." They were more enthusiastic than anyone when it came to making money. Just look at the Spirit Hall Empire Bibi Dong established in her later years. In only a few years, it expanded until it was powerful enough to suppress the Two Great Empires.
But when there was no money to be made, they ran faster than anyone!
After Bibi Dong and Qian Renxue died, the Spirit Hall Empire collapsed almost instantly!
Just like the Jiangnan leather factory going bankrupt—once it was gone, it was gone.
To outsiders, human warmth was a disgusting thing. It created privileges and bred corruption. But in a society of people, could anyone really do without it?
Most people hoped that one person's success would lift their whole family, not that they'd cut ties with every last relative.
Who didn't want a relative with power and influence?
Why? Of course they wanted to benefit from it.
But what if someone else had a powerful, influential relative?
"Corruption! This is outrageous! Why don't they just die?!"
Before you continue