At Feng Xiaodi and Ozka's reactions, Dugu Bo finally smiled. Only then did he tell them about Yu Xiaogang.
"Well, Yu Xiaogang... Calling him well-read would be a stretch! At most, you could say he's read a lot of books. But he doesn't understand what he reads, and he's copied down bits and pieces at random to put together this book you're holding, Ten Core Competencies of Martial Soul. The whole book is either spouting nonsense or more nonsense. And whatever isn't nonsense is all misinformation that leads students astray! It's downright harmful!"
With that,
Dugu Bo pointed to the section on how many years old a Soul Ring could be and said, "Look here. It says the absorption limit for a First Soul Ring is 423 years! Tell me, do a Soul Master with a Rat Martial Soul and one with a Blue Lightning Tyrant Dragon Martial Soul have the same physical constitution? Can they absorb Soul Rings of the same age? If a rat Soul Master tried to absorb a Soul Ring at that 423-year limit, he'd be dead for sure!"
Feng Xiaodi's mouth twitched. His face was full of disdain.
Ozka also couldn't help but complain. "And what about this? It says Martial Souls are divided into Tool Martial Souls and Beast Martial Souls! Are you telling me my Sausage Martial Soul doesn't deserve its own food-type category? Don't Plant-type Martial Souls deserve to be called Plant-type on their own? Earlier, he even said, 'Plant-type Soul Masters can absorb beast Soul Rings, and beast Soul Masters can absorb Plant-type Soul Rings'! Did he gobble up the words 'Plant-type' himself right after writing them? And what about Elemental Martial Souls, Body Martial Souls, and Star Martial Souls? What are those supposed to count as?"
Feng Xiaodi snatched the book Ten Core Competencies of Martial Soul, flipped through a few pages, and cursed, "Damn! What a load of crap! If he had even a shred of logic, he wouldn't have written such nonsense!"
Ozka said, exasperated, "Maybe I should just go slaughter the whole Tiandou Empire! I can't take this anymore! What is all this supposed to mean? And this is someone they call a Grandmaster? Is he insulting people's intelligence? Does he even know what 'core competencies' means?"
Feng Xiaodi continued, "I thought someone called a Grandmaster would be incredible! And this is all he's got? It's my fault! I completely overestimated this world! My fault!"
Ozka fumed, "Again... again... another huge misunderstanding! So from now on, if I ever jump to conclusions again, I'm a dog! Burn it all! Burn every last one of these damn things! Damn it!"
Xiao Wei didn't understand any of this, but seeing that Ozka was in a bad mood made her unhappy too.
Seeing this, Dugu Bo thought, That's more like it! This is the Immortal Court I've been longing for. I was right to pledge my loyalty to the Immortal Court! Whew... As the first person in Douluo World No. 1 to join the Immortal Court, I have a chance at godhood!
"By the way, what's the story with Yu Xiaotie from your Immortal Court? You don't seem to think much of him."
Feng Xiaodi waved a hand dismissively. "Yu Xiaotie? He's quite the legendary figure!"
"A legendary figure? What makes him so legendary?"
Dugu Bo asked. Xiao Wei was also listening with her ears perked up.
"Well, when Yu Xiaotie awakened his Martial Soul, he had only half a level of innate Soul Power, too! But his Martial Soul was an External Martial Soul, something never before seen across the Douluo Continent!"
Dugu Bo exclaimed, "An External Martial Soul, Luo Sanpao! The Yu Xiaogang in our world has the very same kind of External Martial Soul!"
"Oh... Their doppelgangers have quite a lot in common."
After a brief sigh, Feng Xiaodi continued, "A few years later, Yu Xiaotie hit a bottleneck in his cultivation and went to Spirit Hall to study. Oh, and at the time, the Blue Lightning Tyrant Dragon Clan was still a sect, and Emperor Qingtian was the pope of Spirit Hall. The unusual nature of Yu Xiaotie's External Martial Soul caught Emperor Qingtian's attention! So Emperor Qingtian gave him some pointers. He told him he'd chosen the wrong Soul Rings for his Martial Soul, and that his External Martial Soul had an incredibly powerful bloodline! Unfortunately, Yu Xiaotie didn't believe him at all! He wouldn't listen to anyone else's advice! And he was even less willing to admit that the first two Soul Rings he'd chosen for himself were mistakes! In the end, he flew into a rage, and then he was angry for a bit!"
"He flew into a rage, and then he was angry... for a bit? That's it? All right! What happened after that?" Dugu Bo asked, speechless.
"After being angry for a bit, he left Spirit Hall! His Soul Power Level remained stuck at 29, and he couldn't break through the bottleneck. Later, when Emperor Qingtian revealed Martial Path cultivation techniques to the entire continent, Yu Xiaotie finally broke through the bottleneck at level 30! But he still did whatever he pleased, adding Soul Rings to his Martial Soul that stifled its evolution and growth. He became a textbook example of what not to do!"
Dugu Bo: "???"
Ozka added, "Later, when Emperor Qingtian was unifying the continent, the Blue Lightning Family wanted to stay neutral and keep out of trouble. But after Yu Xiaotie gave them a string of alarmist advice, they joined the Star Luo Empire and swore to fight Spirit Hall to the death! What's more, the young Yu Xiaotie became the Star Luo Empire's Imperial Preceptor! For a while, he was the talk of the continent!"
Dugu Bo's eyes widened. "An... an Imperial Preceptor? Uh... Did Yu Xiaotie die in the end? People like that are a waste of air!"
At the mention of this, Ozka's expression turned strange. He sighed. "He's alive and well!"
"What?"
Dugu Bo was dumbfounded. He hurriedly asked, "Emperor Qingtian couldn't have been that softhearted, could he? He actually let him live? No way... I'm not deliberately doubting Emperor Qingtian, it's just..."
Ozka cut off Dugu Bo's explanation and clarified, "It's not what you think. Back then, when Emperor Qingtian's forces reached the Star Luo Empire, he said, 'Those who surrender will not be killed!' And just as the Star Luo Empire was united and its fighting spirit was sky-high, Yu Xiaotie was the first to activate Star Luo's defensive formation and lead the surrender! The Star Luo Empire was defeated without a fight! So in the end... sigh. Emperor Qingtian always kept his word. He said those who surrendered wouldn't be killed, so he spared those who surrendered!"
"Damn! That's badass!" Dugu Bo couldn't help swearing.
Xiao Wei timidly said, "Could the Yu Xiaotie you're talking about have surrendered on purpose? War... kills a lot of people. Lots of people from our village were conscripted into the army, and they never came back."
Ozka turned to Xiao Wei and gently explained, "If it were someone else, maybe! But Yu Xiaotie was just afraid of dying. Back then, Emperor Qingtian's sword strike had nearly shattered the Star Luo Empire's defensive formation! And with an army of Titled Douluo bearing down on them, Yu Xiaotie was so scared he wet himself. He feared that the moment the city fell would be the moment he died, so he stabbed the Star Luo Empire in the back! Later, the Blue Lightning Family was even punished by the Star Luo Empire's remaining forces for Yu Xiaotie's actions! Seven or eight out of every ten members of the whole sect were killed! His father, Blue Lightning Douluo Yu Yuanzhen, even took his own life to atone for his sins! But Yu Xiaotie? When the remnants of the Star Luo Empire surrounded and attacked the Blue Lightning Family, he secretly fled!"
"Oh... I see. Yu Xiaotie's awful! He's so bad!" Xiao Wei pouted, indignant.
Feng Xiaodi summed it up. "Self-righteous and stubborn! Arrogant and conceited! A coward with no sense of responsibility! In the end, he harmed both others and himself!"
Dugu Bo asked, "So what about now? What happened to Yu Xiaotie?"
"Heh heh... If you want to talk about a legend, his life now is the real legend! The Blue Lightning Family took him back, and he even married and had children! They say he has seven or eight lovers on the side, too! He's living the high life!"
Dugu Bo: "Huh?"
Feng Xiaodi shrugged and continued, "Our Immortal Court's marriage laws allow only one husband and one wife, but Yu Xiaotie keeps a harem!"
"Why? How could the Blue Lightning Family still protect him? They're supporting his eating, drinking, and merrymaking? If it were up to me, I'd have killed him ages ago!"
"Alas... Emperor Qingtian once said that Yu Xiaotie's Martial Soul, Luo Sanpao, had an incredibly powerful bloodline. If the Blue Lightning Family wanted to rise again, they couldn't do without Luo Sanpao!"
"Uh... So he's a stud! I get it now." Dugu Bo finally understood the Blue Lightning Family's choice. He speculated, "I bet his life in the Blue Lightning Family isn't all that comfortable! If I were the clan leader, I'd keep the child and get rid of the father! At the very least, I'd whip him every day to blow off steam!"
"Who knows? Anyway, enough about Yu Xiaotie and Yu Xiaogang. They're both weirdos! One's a good-for-nothing, and the other's even worse! Nothing but harmful nonsense!"
Feng Xiaodi waved a hand and changed the subject. "By the way, Senior Dugu, I heard from the elders that you know Tang San pretty well?"
"We're fairly familiar." At the mention of Tang San, Dugu Bo remembered how Tang San had deceived him. Once he had reached Great Perfection in the Vajra Indestructible Divine Skill he'd learned from Feng Xiaodi, he'd go find Tang Hao and settle the score!
Dugu Bo didn't want to trouble Dugu Xue with his personal grudge.
Besides, Dugu Bo already knew how the Immortal Court treated doppelgangers: if they could avoid killing them, they did.
But Dugu Bo always repaid his grudges! As far as he was concerned, Tang San had forfeited his right to live!
Feng Xiaodi asked, "Then do you know where Tang San got his internal cultivation method?"
"An internal cultivation method?" Dugu Bo was puzzled. "Uh... Are you asking about Tang San's connection to Spirit Hall or the Heaven Dou Imperial Family? He shouldn't have any ties to either of them, right? Those two bought the Dao Scripture and Yijin Jing. They wouldn't give them to Tang San."
"I'm not talking about those two techniques! I mean a different one. Judging by how proficient Tang San is at cultivating it, he must have practiced it for several years at least! He may even have started before he awakened his Martial Soul!"
"Several years? Even before he awakened his Martial Soul?" Dugu Bo furrowed his brow slightly and asked in disbelief, "Are you saying Tang San's cultivating an internal method that can be practiced even without Soul Power?"
"Mm!"
"That doesn't make sense!" Dugu Bo shook his head. "Here in Douluo World No. 1, I've never heard of any such Martial Path technique! I'm one of the very strongest people in Douluo World No. 1, but I've never heard of a technique like that. Even when Spirit Hall tried to recruit me, they never mentioned one! If they'd had a technique like that, I might have joined Spirit Hall long ago!"
Feng Xiaodi said, perplexed, "That's strange... Could it be that someone in the Clear Sky Sect in this world is as extraordinarily gifted as Emperor Qingtian? Maybe they created a Martial Path technique but kept it secret, teaching it only to their own descendants!"
Hearing this, Dugu Bo nodded thoughtfully and agreed. "You make a good point! I've spent the past few days thinking about parallel worlds, and I believe that if Emperor Qingtian could create cultivation techniques, then someone in our world ought to be able to do it too! Of course, whoever it was definitely couldn't compare to Emperor Qingtian! Emperor Qingtian is one of a kind! No one can match him!"
Dugu Bo was very politically correct!
Ozka joined in. "Now that you mention it, I think you're right, too! Douluo World No. 1 isn't as powerful as we imagined, and it probably isn't nearly as mysterious either! The technique Tang San cultivates must have been created by some genius! I remember the Immortal Court's expeditionary army commander, Tang Wan, used to be the Clear Sky Sect's leader. He was a once-in-a-generation genius when he was young! So it wouldn't be surprising if Commander Tang Wan's doppelganger in this world had created a cultivation technique! As for Tang San, he's only thirteen. There's no way he could have created a complete internal cultivation method! And he certainly didn't get it from another parallel world! It's not as if there's anyone else besides you, me, and the elder who crossed over from a parallel world carrying Martial Path techniques, right? Impossible. Absolutely impossible!"
Little did he know, Ozka had just denied yet another truth.
Before you continue