Electrolux Acquired

Just as the Sky Dream Ice Silkworm began its sacrifice, a thunderous boom suddenly erupted in the high heavens, and the entire sky plunged into darkness.

Attracted by the immense energy generated by the Sky Dream Ice Silkworm's sacrifice, a stream of gray energy tore through space and descended from the sky, hurtling toward the back of Huo Yuhao's head.

This was a lingering wisp of divine consciousness left behind by Electrolux.

Feng Piaoling had been waiting for a long time, remaining hidden deep underground beneath Huo Yuhao's position.

The moment the sky turned black, Feng Piaoling lunged upward, intercepting the space between the gray-white light and Huo Yuhao's back.

At this moment, the divine consciousness of Electrolux was on the verge of collapse and possessed little independent awareness. After merging into Feng Piaoling's body and seeing that he had opened his Mental Barrier, it abandoned any intention of leaving, settled in, and fell into silence.

Feeling the changes within his mental sea, Feng Piaoling felt a sense of profound relief, and a look of satisfaction finally appeared on his face.

At this time, the sacrifice of the Sky Dream Ice Silkworm had also reached its final stages.

Because Huo Yuhao's constitution was too weak, and the sacrifice was occurring while he was in the middle of absorbing a ten-year Wind Baboon soul ring, the Sky Dream Ice Silkworm had to divert more energy to stabilize the soul ring and apply seals for Huo Yuhao, leaving it with no capacity to attend to anything else in the outside world.

Feng Piaoling looked at the ground where the Sky Dream Ice Silkworm had yet to recover its molted remains. A subtle arc curled at the corner of his mouth as he gathered them up and stuffed them into a storage Soul Tool ring he had prepared in advance.

He then tucked this Soul Tool ring into yet another Soul Tool.

Repeating this process seven or eight times, he created a nesting-doll effect that ensured even with the Sky Dream Ice Silkworm's formidable mental power, it would be unable to locate its remains.

After finishing all this, Feng Piaoling retreated back into the ground.

The use of his level-nine Soul Tool, the Mental Barrier, had consumed too much of his soul power and mental energy. Even with his cultivation of the Green Lotus Sword Art and the Heaven-Reaching Demon Eye, which granted him exceptionally deep soul power and strong mental energy, he could not sustain it for long.

Before this, he had to pretend to be completely ignorant of the Sky Dream Ice Silkworm's sacrifice to create an alibi.

He still wanted to leverage Huo Yuhao's destiny to find a suitable third soul ring for himself.

He did not want to burn bridges so quickly.

On the other side, the Sky Dream Ice Silkworm was having a miserable time.

"Too weak, too weak! This brother is truly pathetic. Just how many seals must I apply for your frail body to withstand my million-year wisdom soul ring? And why did you have to absorb a Wind Baboon? Any ten-year mental-type soul beast would have been better!"

"Now look at this, you've gained an air-current observation skill. Its only use is to observe the flow of air—tell me, what is the point of that? Even an ice-attribute skill would have been better! Now, even if I wanted to increase the age of your soul ring, I can't. Your first soul ring is effectively ruined. I wonder if this will impact my god-making plan."

(PS: Adding a reasonable headcanon here: The reason the Sky Dream Ice Silkworm sought out a mental-attribute soul master is partly because its origin energy can only increase the age of mental and ice-attribute soul rings.)

"Who did I offend to deserve this? If I had known, I should have sacrificed myself to that cunning brat from earlier. At least he had the talent of Twin Martial Souls."

The Sky Dream Ice Silkworm grumbled to itself while expanding Huo Yuhao's mental sea and applying seals.

At the same time, through the memories branded into Huo Yuhao, it learned of Feng Piaoling.

In Huo Yuhao's perception, Feng Piaoling had taken great care of him along the way and was the only person besides his mother who had ever been kind to him.

To avoid taking too much from this kind person, Huo Yuhao had declined Feng Piaoling's good intentions and chosen to absorb this ten-year Wind Baboon soul ring.

Upon learning this, the Sky Dream Ice Silkworm couldn't help but curse, "Idiot!"

When it finally finished its work and intended to recover its molted remains, the Sky Dream Ice Silkworm—or rather, the entire worm—was stunned.

"Where are my remains? Where did my massive molted shell go? Without it, how am I supposed to take this brat Huo Yuhao to find Bingbing?"

At this moment, the Sky Dream Ice Silkworm felt that its existence had never been darker.

If it lost the Ice Empress, it wouldn't say there was no hope of becoming a god, but the probability would undoubtedly be greatly diminished.

"Forget it. If all else fails, I'll just have to try finding other ice-attribute soul beasts."

In the end, the Sky Dream Ice Silkworm did not choose to abandon Huo Yuhao. Although it still retained its mental origin and could choose someone else, switching to another person would ultimately require paying a heavy price. Unless absolutely necessary, it would not change hosts.

"Regardless, this brother is finally free. Those bastards who treated me as food, you won't have another chance." The Sky Dream Ice Silkworm comforted itself, its voice gradually fading.

The mental power that had covered a hundred-mile radius also retracted at an astonishing speed and vanished.

The very instant the mental power disappeared, a white ring and a translucent white ring emerged silently beneath Huo Yuhao.

One was ten years old, and the other was a million-year ring in a sealed state. Although there were subtle differences in appearance, ten-year soul rings varied in shade depending on their age.

There was no need to worry about raising any suspicions.

After the two white soul rings circled Huo Yuhao's body three times, they faded and merged into his body, disappearing from sight.

Thanks to Feng Piaoling having Huo Yuhao absorb the ten-year Wind Baboon first soul ring early, the Sky Dream Ice Silkworm had been forced to use some of its own origin energy, which had inadvertently pushed Huo Yuhao's soul power to level twenty.

Now, Huo Yuhao was already a level-twenty-one Soul Grand Master.

It was a blessing in disguise.

However, compared to what had been lost, this ten-level increase in soul power compared to the original story was hardly worth mentioning.

Before long, Tang Ya and Bei Bei rushed toward the scene at high speed.

Seeing Huo Yuhao lying unconscious on the ground, firmly protected within the scabbard of the Thunder Tribulation Sword, the two of them came to a halt.

Just at this moment, Feng Piaoling happened to return, looking quite 'disheveled.'

"Did they run into a soul beast attack?" Tang Ya looked at Huo Yuhao on the ground, then at the surrounding terrain ravaged by Fire Bomb Talisman explosions, and asked in surprise.

Bei Bei, meanwhile, examined the corpse of the Wind Baboon with the severed leg nearby.

Logically speaking, a ten-year Wind Baboon could not possibly threaten Feng Piaoling, a level thirty quasi-Soul Elder.

Looking again at the craters blasted into the ground by the Fire Bomb Talismans, and the protective barrier emitted by the level four Soul Tool scabbard.

This meant that they had, in all likelihood, encountered a much more powerful soul beast.

Feng Piaoling had just gone off to lure that soul beast away.

"Mm." Feng Piaoling paid them no mind, merely responding with a soft grunt as he retracted his Thunder Tribulation Sword into its scabbard, sat down cross-legged to the side in silence, and circulated his Green Lotus Sword Art to recover his soul power.

Tang Ya likewise imagined a scenario where Feng Piaoling had braved a powerful soul beast alone to protect Huo Yuhao; she stopped calling him a "mute" in her head, her gaze softening as she looked at him, secretly resolving that she must recruit both him and Huo Yuhao into the Tang Sect.