"So that's how it was..."
After returning to the dormitory, Chen Yumo collapsed onto his bed, completely exhausted.
So this was how the louse swarm battle in the original story had come about. It seemed that whether Chen Yumo existed or not, it would not stop Xiao Chenyu, the City Lord's son, from becoming the backdrop for Tang San to show off.
The dignified son of the City Lord had cultivated for years, yet he still could not defeat Tang San, a Spirit Master who had only just broken through. The Spirit Ring Yu Dash had chosen for Tang San was simply too fitting—too freaking powerful!
Chen Yumo let it go.
So it had all been Yu Dash's evil plan. Now he understood.
The only frustrating part was that Chen Yumo probably could not avoid becoming a Work-Study Student. Once Xiao Chenyu got his head stomped on repeatedly by Tang San and Xiao Wu tomorrow, Xiao Chenyu and the louse swarm under his command would be working for the Work-Study Students for free.
He had chosen to enroll as a paying student in the first place precisely because he did not want to waste time working, yet in the end, he still failed to escape Boss Xiao's thousand-layered scheme.
The Meditation Method Boss Xiao had given him was Chen Yumo's only consolation.
Thinking of that Meditation Method, Chen Yumo hurriedly forced himself to sit up through his drowsiness. He took out the little booklet and began reading.
For the previous three months, he had not cultivated at all because he lacked a method. The content in the novels had ultimately been too vague and mystifying, though it was not as if Chen Yumo had never tried on his own.
But simply emptying his mind and using his Martial Soul to absorb the ambient energy of heaven and earth was far too inefficient.
With Innate Level One talent and an Ice Silkworm Martial Soul weak as hell, Chen Yumo's self-taught cultivation method was slow as a turtle crawl. Rather than waste time on that, he might as well get a good night's sleep, restore his energy, and finish reading the Encyclopedia first.
Thus, three months had passed since he awakened his Martial Soul, yet his Soul Power had barely increased at all.
It was a double restriction of hardware and software.
Now that the great Boss Xiao had generously sponsored him with a Meditation Method, allowing Chen Yumo to break free of the software restriction, how could he not give meditative cultivation a proper try?
The booklet was not thick. Having spent three months reading books until he had gotten the hang of it, Chen Yumo quickly finished the Meditation Method. All he could say was that his newly produced brain really worked well. After reading it only two more times, he had memorized every sentence in it.
After finishing it, Chen Yumo could only say that the experience summarized by those who came before was indeed incomparable to anything he could blindly fumble his way toward himself.
Meditation was not merely about emptying one's mind.
Besides the most basic meditation cultivation and the absorption of spiritual energy from heaven and earth, the Meditation Method Xiao Chenyu had given him also included a technique for stimulating a Martial Soul's activity, making it more active during meditation and speeding up cultivation.
Although the increase was not large, this was a Meditation Method. Over time, it would naturally be a step faster than those unorthodox paths without such a meditation technique.
Boss Xiao was too righteous.
After sighing to himself, Chen Yumo impatiently began cultivating according to the method described in the Meditation Method.
Empty his mind, sense the energy between heaven and earth, then use the Soul Power in his body to stimulate his Martial Soul, making it more active and improving cultivation efficiency...
Stimulate the Martial Soul, stimulate the Martial Soul...
Stimu...
Wait?
Chen Yumo abruptly opened his eyes. Looking down at the Ice Silkworm Martial Soul in his palm, which was wriggling slightly faster, his eyes nearly popped from their sockets.
Could it be...?!
He cautiously reached out and poked the Ice Silkworm with a finger. The Ice Silkworm actually responded, wriggling its body as if interacting with Chen Yumo.
Was that something a normal Martial Soul was supposed to do?
Thinking back to the day he awakened his Martial Soul, Brother Tao had said that his Martial Soul seemed a little strange. At the time, Chen Yumo had not taken it seriously and had even complained internally about Brother Tao being unreliable.
Now, all he wanted was to slap himself hard across the face.
An External Martial Soul!
An External Martial Soul like Gangzi's Luo Sanpao!
"So it was the same type of stand-in?" Chen Yumo muttered, momentarily at a loss for words.
"Brother Tao, you were right!"
Looking back now, Su Yuntao had probably vaguely sensed that Chen Yumo's Ice Silkworm was a little unusual because of the traits of an External Martial Soul. And Nuoding City just so happened to be home to the only other owner of an External Martial Soul on Douluo Continent besides Chen Yumo.
More precisely, an External Martial Soul should be called an Independent Beast Martial Soul!
There were countless Martial Souls that could be released outside the body and exist independently. Such Martial Souls were generally classified as Weapon Martial Souls—objects that could be summoned by Spirit Masters.
Beast Martial Souls, without exception, possessed and enhanced their Spirit Masters, changing their forms.
As for External Beast Martial Souls whose Martial Souls retained independent consciousness after leaving the body, Chen Yumo could only think of Yu Xiaogang after looking through every series set on Douluo Continent!
As for why Chen Yumo had not realized from the start that his Ice Silkworm Martial Soul was an External Beast Martial Soul like Yu Xiaogang's Luo Sanpao, the reason was simple: his Ice Silkworm was too weak. And that weakness did not merely refer to its strength and origin, but also its intelligence.
What kind of consciousness could one expect from a bug smaller than a pinky finger?
At first, it had been completely under Chen Yumo's control, showing no sign of possessing its own consciousness. How was Chen Yumo supposed to determine what kind of Martial Soul this was?
It was only when he had cultivated using the Meditation Method Xiao Chenyu gave him, stimulating his Martial Soul with Soul Power according to its instructions, that he sensed that faint, nearly imperceptible trace of consciousness from the Ice Silkworm Martial Soul.
There was truly only the tiniest trace.
It did not even possess the most basic emotions. It lived only to eat.
Yet it really did count as an independent consciousness.
Then wasn't this an External Beast Martial Soul just like Luo Sanpao?
Chen Yumo sat on the bed in silence for a long time.
During the previous three months of study, he had imagined countless possible evolution paths for his Ice Silkworm Martial Soul. Yet at this moment, he completely overturned every evolution plan he had been uncertain about.
The way an External Martial Soul was cultivated was absolutely different from the way a normal Martial Soul was cultivated.
Gangzi was the best example.
He clearly possessed a powerful Martial Soul with the bloodline of the Golden Sacred Dragon, clearly possessed the one and only External Beast Martial Soul in all history, yet in his hands, it had become a complete useless waste that could not even break through Level Thirty and whose only Soul Skill was farting.
Now that Chen Yumo knew his Martial Soul was an External Beast Martial Soul, he needed to plan his evolution path even more carefully!
First—eating!
One of the most special aspects of an External Beast Martial Soul was that it could actively eat!
Just yesterday, Yu Xiaogang had even told Tang San to buy a large number of white radishes to feed Luo Sanpao and make it fart, so that it could release bigger and smellier farts while hunting Spirit Beasts.
Chen Yumo would never be as shortsighted as him. Such a heaven-defying ability, and he actually used it to make something fart!
"As an insect that undergoes complete metamorphosis, the most important thing in a silkworm's evolution is eating—constantly accumulating the energy needed to pupate, then finally breaking cocoon!"
A silkworm was merely the larval stage!
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