Outer Region

The next day, at the first light of dawn.

On the edge of the Far North.

Snowflakes were still drifting down, and while soft sunlight filtered through them, it brought not a shred of warmth to this world of extreme cold.

At this moment, Xu Lanqing was being carried by Jing Hongchen using a flying Soul Tool, drifting slowly a few meters above the ground.

He had originally intended to walk on the ground, but the moment he took a step, half his body was buried in the snow. Lacking the strength to skim across the surface without sinking, he had no choice but to resort to this.

Lacking the strength meant he couldn't even enter; for the first time, Xu Lanqing experienced the power of nature. Compared to the might of heaven and earth, an individual was truly insignificant.

"Your Highness, this is only the outermost snowfield. Once we head further in, the temperature will drop even lower, and the snow will freeze into ice upon hitting the ground. You will be able to walk on it then."

Jing Hongchen explained with a smile from the side.

Hearing this, Xu Lanqing felt even more depressed. If no one were carrying him, he probably wouldn't even know how he died. This only strengthened his resolve to become stronger; only power held in his own hands could provide him with a sense of security.

However, looking at the swirling snow all around, a hint of doubt appeared in Jing Hongchen's eyes. Was this snow falling a bit too heavily?

He had never been here before, so he didn't know if this was considered normal.

"Hey, old Zheng, have you been here before? This snow is falling quite heavily."

"No. Who would come to this godforsaken place for no reason?"

Zheng Zhan's pace was relaxed; the snowflakes were evaporated by his soul power before they could get within three meters of him, creating a misty haze.

He looked up, unimpressed: "It is quite heavy, but it's just snow. How much worse could it get?

Stop being so suspicious all the time. Even if there were danger, with our strength as Title Douluo, we would be able to detect it in advance."

That was true. It seemed he was overthinking things. He had been feeling like he was being watched in secret, but that sensation had vanished once they reached the small town, making it hard for him not to overthink.

But such heavy snow couldn't be man-made. If it were, the fluctuations of soul power would be impossible to hide.

As for Soul Beasts, he hadn't failed to consider them, but the more powerful a Soul Beast was, the closer it stayed to the core of the Far North. Furthermore, Soul Beasts were extremely territorial and would never easily step into the territory of another.

In these outer regions, the probability of running into a ten-thousand-year Soul Beast was about the same as winning the lottery.

But what Jing Hongchen didn't know was that the Far North differed from other Soul Beast forests in that, under the leadership of the Ice Empress, the head of the Three Great Heavenly Kings of the Far North, they were incredibly united internally.

For the time that followed, Xu Lanqing and the others circled the outer region in search of Soul Beasts.

"Strange, why are there so few Soul Beasts here? We've been searching for ages and only found this one."

They were currently standing in front of a white tiger, a powerful pressure enveloping it.

The tiger was two meters long, snow-white all over, and lay in the snow, its body twitching uncontrollably. A patch of snow behind its rear had turned yellowish-brown; it had actually been frightened into incontinence.

"What a pity, the age is too low, just barely over a hundred years."

Zheng Zhan shook his head: "Let's go, let's look elsewhere. We need to find one quickly and leave; this godforsaken weather, the snow is getting heavier."

As he spoke, he withdrew his pressure. After confirming it wasn't a suitable Soul Ring for Xu Lanqing, he chose not to kill it.

After ten thousand years of evolution, the Soul Master world now had an unwritten rule: if a Soul Beast wasn't suitable for you, try not to kill it if you don't have to.

Ten thousand years ago, there was a massive disparity between the strength of humans and Soul Beasts. However, as time passed, the number of human Soul Masters grew, and more and more Soul Beasts were hunted for their Soul Rings.

Over the course of ten thousand years, the number of Soul Beasts was now far lower than it used to be.

If this continued, and if there were no other way to solve the problem of Soul Rings, would Soul Masters eventually become history?

Faced with this anxiety, humans naturally formed this latent rule.

Jing Hongchen nodded and continued to carry Xu Lanqing forward.

Strangely, even after they had moved far away, the white tiger remained lying on the ground, not daring to move a muscle.

It was a bit odd. Even if the Far North had relatively fewer Soul Beasts, it shouldn't be this sparse.

Hearing what Zheng Zhan said, Xu Lanqing glanced at the white tiger, and he too felt that something was wrong.

"Lanqing, be careful. The ice elements here are abnormally active."

Inside the Sea of Consciousness, the voice of Electrolux suddenly rang out.

Ever since sealing the God Core of the Golden Dragon King, Electrolux's divine sense had been overly depleted, and he would occasionally fall into a deep slumber to recover. Having just awakened, he immediately sensed the abnormality in the outside world and spoke up to warn Xu Lanqing.

Xu Lanqing, on the flying Soul Tool, froze for a moment. He glanced at Jing Hongchen and Zheng Zhan, and seeing they hadn't noticed anything, he closed his eyes, pretending to rest, and sank his consciousness into his Sea of Consciousness.

"Teacher, what is it? Is something wrong?"

Xu Lanqing felt terrible. Had he awakened the protagonist's luck of Conan? Trouble followed him wherever he went.

Electrolux continued: "The reason those two outside haven't discovered it is because their spiritual level is too low. But I am different; I possess divine sense. Although my power is weaker than theirs, this is a difference in class. Divine sense is divine sense, and mortal spirits are mortal spirits—a difference as vast as heaven and earth.

Therefore, I can sense that the wind and snow outside are being controlled by someone, or rather, not a human, but what you call a Soul Beast in this world.

It has cleverly borrowed the power of this frozen world. Its soul power is integrated into heaven and earth, and it likely possesses extreme control over ice and snow itself. That is why those two cannot detect it."

Xu Lanqing gulped, though his consciousness body inside the Sea of Consciousness had no saliva to swallow, yet he still felt it was incredibly messed up.

When did his luck, as someone with such bad fortune, become so good that he could run into anything?

"What do we do now?"

"Are you stupid? Of course we run! Take advantage of the fact that you haven't entered the core area of the domain yet; if you run now, you might still make it. There's someone inside the domain holding them off for you."

"Who would be so kind?"

Xu Lanqing was stunned again, then he slammed his right fist into his left palm, suddenly enlightened.

"It must be that someone else provoked the Soul Beast here, and we just happened to run into it. People really can't be unlucky forever."

Xu Lanqing quickly exited his Sea of Consciousness and said anxiously to Jing Hongchen, "Hall Master Jing, let's go, we need to leave here immediately."

Jing Hongchen looked at him in confusion; although he didn't understand, he still chose to retreat.

Just then, Jing Hongchen and Zheng Zhan looked ahead abruptly, their faces full of vigilance.

A black shadow broke through the curtain of snow, gradually growing larger. Zheng Zhan stepped forward, a giant silver-white shield appearing in his hand, and nine Soul Rings emerged as he activated his Martial Soul Possession.