Body Martial Soul, Nine Body Secrets

Zhua Yun began recounting a long-buried past in a low, solemn tone.

"My master told me, back when his mind was still clear, that his surname was Gu. But as for his full name..."

"Even he himself had forgotten it beneath the passage of countless years and the torment of his mind."

"He once followed the previous previous sect master of our Body Sect. Back in those arduous years when the sect was first being built and expanding its territory, he rendered tremendous service. He was a true elder and benefactor of the sect."

"Upon reaching middle age, my master became obsessed with researching Martial Souls, especially the essence of our Body Martial Souls."

"Along with several like-minded fellow disciples, he devoted himself to the vast undertaking of exploring the 'Secret of the Body.'"

"They poured in countless efforts and endured innumerable failures and attempts..." Reverence entered Zhua Yun's voice. "In the end, they succeeded."

"One of their most fundamental and greatest achievements was the 'Body Martial Soul Secondary Awakening'—the secret art now passed down by no one beyond the Body Sect, one that inspired awe in countless Spirit Masters!"

Long Zhanye was deeply shaken.

The Body Martial Soul Secondary Awakening was the supreme realm every Body Sect disciple dreamed of attaining, one of the foundations that allowed the sect to stand above its peers!

Who would have thought that one of its original developers was actually the "Mad Old Man" in that Underground Secret Chamber?

Zhua Yun's voice lowered, tinged with grief and indignation. "But at the same time, during that long and intensive research..."

"Thanks to his astonishing talent and nearly obsessive spirit of exploration, my master also proposed many other bold ideas and theories concerning Body Martial Souls."

"He built an enormous theoretical system that he called the 'Nine Body Secrets.' Unfortunately..."

"Those even more advanced, even shocking theories were resolutely rejected and excluded by the sect master at the time, as well as the next two generations of sect masters, for various reasons."

"They believed my master had gone astray, that his ideas were absurd and even... heretical."

His fists clenched involuntarily. "All my master's life's work, aside from the 'Second Awakening,' was dismissed as worthless dregs."

"Faced with the increasingly distant gazes of his fellow disciples, and the sect master's merciless doubts and rejection, amid long years of suppression, loneliness, and misunderstanding..."

"My master's mind finally broke. At times he was lucid, at times mad, until he ultimately became what he is now!"

"He could only hide beneath that lightless underground, accompanied by his research and those... samples."

"He might look gaunt and skeletal, but do you know that his true age has already surpassed... two hundred years?"

Zhua Yun dropped an even more astonishing piece of information.

"Two hundred years?!" Long Zhanye finally cried out in genuine shock, unable to remain composed any longer.

"That's impossible! An ordinary Titled Douluo only lives two or three hundred years at most!"

"Even a legendary Limit Douluo might only be able to touch the threshold of a thousand years!"

"But when I sensed his Soul Power aura last time, he was definitely not at the Titled Douluo level. He might not even have been a Soul Douluo!"

"With his cultivation, living past a hundred would already be remarkable. How could he possibly live for more than two hundred years?! This... this is simply unheard of!"

"Yes, it does sound unbelievable." Zhua Yun had clearly expected this, and he nodded.

Then he offered an even more chilling explanation. "But do you know why?"

"Do you remember... when my master grabbed you last time and said he wanted to take some of your blood?"

Long Zhanye recalled the icy dagger and the old man's crazed words, and a shiver ran through him.

"It might sound cruel, but... according to my master, it truly has miraculous life-extending effects."

Zhua Yun's voice remained calm, though what he said made one's scalp tingle.

"One of the Nine Body Secrets contains a method for using the blood of young Spirit Masters, combined with various precious medicinal ingredients, to refine special life-extending elixirs."

"By consuming these elixirs, refined with human blood as an essential ingredient, he was able to break through the lifespan limits imposed by his cultivation and live for such an extraordinarily long time."

"Over all these years, he has... consumed the blood of an unknown number of people for this purpose."

Long Zhanye was dumbfounded, a chill shooting from the soles of his feet straight to the top of his head.

Even though he had already thought of him as the "Mad Old Man," he had never imagined that the man had truly delved into such a sinister, bloody field!

Using human blood to refine medicine and extend one's life? That sounded like something only the evil Spirit Masters of legend would do!

But after his shock subsided, a strange thought surfaced: If... if one only had to give some blood without losing one's life, in exchange for a long lifespan...

"Wouldn't that be an irresistible temptation for many old monsters stuck at bottlenecks and nearing the end of their lives?"

"This method might be wicked, but in a sense, it was still a... 'solution,' wasn't it?"

He forcibly suppressed the turmoil in his heart and asked another question, one that was even more crucial and more terrifying:

"Then... what about all those human organs displayed in jars inside that secret chamber? Could they also be...?"

Zhua Yun's expression turned even more solemn, and he nodded.

He then gave an explanation that Long Zhanye found even harder to believe. "Those truly are human organs."

"But their significance goes far beyond that. The overwhelming majority of them correspond to... Body Martial Souls."

"What?!" Long Zhanye almost thought he had misheard.

"Those organs were not obtained through the indiscriminate slaughter of innocents." Zhua Yun's tone carried a heavy reverence.

"Most of them came from elders, stewards, and fellow disciples who had died fighting for the sect or fallen for other reasons."

"My master obtained the consent of the individuals before their deaths, or permission from their closest relatives."

"After they passed away, he carefully preserved the organs that possessed Body Martial Souls, using them as the most precious research samples."

He paused. "After accumulating them for so many years, there are already hundreds, perhaps thousands, of such samples."

"That secret chamber could be said to be the one-of-a-kind 'Body Martial Soul Sample Repository' my master built with all the efforts of his life."

Long Zhanye's heart surged, while an indescribable shock filled him.

If what Zhua Yun said was true, then that old man surnamed Gu had devoted his entire life to exploring the ultimate mysteries of Body Martial Souls.

The price of his persistence and devotion was moving, yet terrifying.

"Then... did your master discover anything from those samples?"

Long Zhanye could not help asking. He vaguely felt that the answer might determine whether he could be "cured."

"Excellent question!" Zhua Yun's eyes lit up. He knew that the most crucial part had arrived.

"This is precisely why I called you here today! I mentioned earlier that my master proposed the theory of the 'Nine Body Secrets.'"

"Besides the already public 'Second Awakening,' while studying under my master, I was fortunate enough to learn part of the seventh secret among the others."

"My master called it—the 'Body Martial Soul Grafting Technique'!"