Failure and Contingency

Just as Feng Piaoling thought he could entice the Sky Dream Ice Silkworm into a voluntary sacrifice, the creature's sudden voice made his expression turn unsightly.

"Such formidable mental power, and Twin Martial Souls at that. What a pity, neither is of the mental attribute. A pity, truly a pity. If Brother could shed tears, I would be weeping rivers right now."

Feng Piaoling's face turned as dark as water, and this was no act.

He knew that because his own Martial Soul lacked the mental attribute, the Sky Dream Ice Silkworm might not take a fancy to him.

To this end, he had made extensive preparations.

While improving himself, he had specifically made Huo Yuhao absorb a ten-year non-mental attribute Wind Baboon soul ring to weaken him.

Yet, when the Sky Dream Ice Silkworm explicitly stated it would not choose him, he nearly suffered a mental breakdown.

No, stay calm, stay calm. Since this worm won't choose me, I must not miss out on its remains and Electrolux.

These thoughts flashed through Feng Piaoling's mind in a mere instant, and the Sky Dream Ice Silkworm had already burrowed out from the ground ahead, revealing its fat body, over a meter in diameter and seven meters long, marked with ten golden rings.

"Don't be afraid, don't be afraid, Brother won't hurt you..."

Just as the Sky Dream Ice Silkworm was about to continue, Feng Piaoling had already unleashed the dozen Fire Bomb Talismans he had been clutching.

After a flash of red light, over a dozen basketball-sized fireballs shot out in a swarm, slamming directly into the target in a dense barrage.

He himself had already retracted his Green Lotus Sword Martial Soul, his left hand gripping the scabbard of the Thunder Tribulation Sword at his waist. After a flash of blue light, the pitch-black scabbard released a layer of blue-purple lightning, shielding both him and Huo Yuhao, who was still in the process of absorbing his soul ring.

"Holy crap..."

The Sky Dream Ice Silkworm had not expected the other party to be so devoid of martial virtue, taking advantage of its speech to deceive and ambush it—a million-year-old silkworm baby.

Caught off guard, it took the full force of a dozen fireballs directly to the face.

A series of "rumbling" explosions erupted, and the blinding red glare flashed before its eyes, rendering the Sky Dream Ice Silkworm unable to see.

Large swathes of vegetation were blown to pieces and reduced to ash. The Sky Dream Ice Silkworm's white skin, marked with ten golden rings, held up for only a few seconds before painfully shattering, revealing cold, milky-white fluid beneath.

Its entire fat body was blasted away, and the spot where it had been was cratered with uneven pits, half a meter deep and over a meter in diameter, turning into a sea of fire in an instant.

Fortunately, the Sky Dream Ice Silkworm possessed an ice attribute, allowing it to resist the flames of the Fire Bomb Talismans; it only suffered from the impact of the explosion. Otherwise, this single strike would have surely made it the first million-year-old soul beast in history to be solo-killed by a quasi-Soul Elder.

Why mention ten-thousand-year beasts? Because to this day, no quasi-Soul Elder had ever solo-killed a ten-thousand-year soul beast, let alone a hundred-thousand-year or million-year-old one.

It seems this worm truly has nothing but its mental power, despite its million years of cultivation.

Feng Piaoling muttered to himself, yet his actions remained swift and decisive. He casually propped the Thunder Tribulation Sword scabbard—which was maintaining the protective barrier—around Huo Yuhao to "protect" him, stepped into his Clone Shadow technique, and drew the Thunder Tribulation Sword from his waist.

Whoosh!

With a blur of motion, Feng Piaoling soared into the air, gliding like a ghost for over twenty meters as he ferociously lunged at the Sky Dream Ice Silkworm.

"Damn it, again?" The battered Sky Dream Ice Silkworm relied on its formidable mental power to narrowly dodge Feng Piaoling's lethal strike.

However, a large tree behind it was sliced in two with a thud.

Feng Piaoling flicked his wrist, and the cyan sword light, wreathed in lightning arcs, danced like Wind Flower Snow Moon—dazzling and impossible to adapt to. It was the strongest move of the Nine Gale Swords: Wind Flower Snow Moon.

"Abominable, Brother is angry!"

The Sky Dream Ice Silkworm had not expected Feng Piaoling to strike so quickly and ruthlessly, with every move aimed at its life.

It immediately stopped holding back and released a soul shock, intending to annihilate the human who sought to kill it.

As for fleeing, it hadn't considered it. It had finally encountered a human with a mental attribute Martial Soul, and with its own lifespan nearing its end, it did not want to miss this chance.

Feng Piaoling had long been guarding against the worm's attacks; his mind remained in a state of high tension, and his Heaven-Reaching Demon Eye was constantly active.

Seeing the signs of the creature gathering soul power, he immediately slapped his chest, where a yellow light suddenly flared.

Hidden there was an Earth Escape Talisman, his second soul skill, hunted from an extremely rare two-thousand-five-hundred-year-old Earth Armored Dragon.

It allowed him to travel freely through the earth and could be stored for twenty-four hours.

Every day, he would craft an Earth Escape Talisman and stick it to his chest as a life-saving measure.

The soul attack emitted by the Sky Dream Ice Silkworm was not only a mental attack but also contained an ice attribute.

In the original story, it had easily subdued Ma Xiaotao, who was over level sixty and in a berserk state.

The cyan sword light of Wind Flower Snow Moon, though powerful and comparable to a ten-thousand-year soul skill, was instantly frozen by the cold of the soul shock and shattered upon impact.

Taking this opportunity, Feng Piaoling had already escaped into the ground, and the cold beam of the soul shock passed through his original position, freezing a large area.

"He actually escaped by burrowing? Damn it, I'm furious!"

Having suffered a major loss, the Sky Dream Ice Silkworm was so frustrated it felt like vomiting blood.

It couldn't catch him; the opponent's speed seemed absurdly fast, already exceeding the range of its mental detection.

Then, it looked at Huo Yuhao. "Clearly, you had that cunning brat to help, yet you chose to absorb a ten-year Wind Baboon soul ring. I really don't know what you were thinking. But it doesn't matter; with Brother here, even a ten-year soul ring can be upgraded to a hundred-thousand-year one in the future."

After saying this, the Sky Dream Ice Silkworm began its sacrifice.

An invisible mental ripple spread outward from the Sky Dream Ice Silkworm as it sacrificed itself to Huo Yuhao. The terrifying mental power covered every corner within a hundred-mile radius in an instant.

Bei Bei and Tang Ya, who had been trying to catch up to Huo Yuhao and Feng Piaoling after a chance encounter to invite them to join the Tang Sect, fell into a brief stupor when hit by this mental ripple. The mental shock did not possess great destructive power, but it could cause all living things to lose the ability to think for a short time.

Feng Piaoling, who had burrowed underground, was naturally not spared from the impact.

Fortunately, he had been well-prepared. Before leaving the Sun Moon Empire, as a confidant of Xu Tianran, he had endured humiliation to obtain a Level 9 Soul Tool from the Holy Spirit Cult: the Mental Barrier.

This was also the reason why Sky Dream Ice Silkworm thought he had left and failed to detect him.

(ps: Some might not understand this part, consider it a small piece of foreshadowing to be explained later.)

Of course, there was a price to pay.

And for Feng Piaoling, this price was precisely the least valuable thing; he only needed to scout a Holy Maiden for the Holy Spirit Cult within one year.

With the level-nine Soul Tool Mental Barrier, coupled with Feng Piaoling's own formidable mental power, the mental shockwave generated by the sacrifice of Sky Dream Ice Silkworm did not cause him any significant impact.

Feng Piaoling kept his surroundings under constant surveillance with his mental power while simultaneously activating the Heaven-Reaching Demon Eye.