Destruction Lion Mastiff, First Spirit Ring

He shook his head and continued walking forward.

The storage rooms further back contained Soul Spirits of higher grades.

A pitch-black Shadow Leopard lay at the bottom of a nutrient tank, dark patterns occasionally flickering across its fur. The nameplate marked it as three thousand one hundred years old, dark attribute, assassin type.

There was also a Steel-Armored Earth Dragon over two thousand years old; its scales reflected a metallic luster under the lights, each one the size of a palm with edges as sharp as blades.

Defense type, two thousand eight hundred years, superior quality.

He Zhiqiu noticed Lin Qingzhou's gaze linger on the Steel-Armored Earth Dragon for an extra second and, thinking he had taken a liking to it, prepared to give a detailed introduction, but Lin Qingzhou had already looked away.

These were not enough.

It wasn't that they weren't strong, but rather that they didn't mesh with the two forces inside his body.

The Silver Dragon King bloodline and the End-of-All Martial Soul—one was a fragment of the Dragon God's other half, the other was the Power of End that had annihilated the entire God Realm.

If an ordinary Soul Spirit were to enter, it would either be suppressed or assimilated, unable to exert its proper function at all.

He Zhiqiu led the three of them to an independent storage room at the end of the corridor.

This room was clearly different from the others; the glass barrier was reinforced with a layer of pale gold soul-guiding light film, and a red warning sign stood at the entrance, reading: "Unyielding Soul Spirit, extremely dangerous, unauthorized personnel prohibited."

There was no floating nutrient solution inside the room; instead, it was filled with dense soul-guiding restraint chains. Each chain was as thick as a wrist and engraved with countless soul-guiding runes, pinning the phantom of a massive Soul Beast firmly in mid-air.

It was a lion, pitch-black as ink, its mane not made of hair but a ring of burning dark red flames.

Its limbs were as thick as iron pillars, claws dug into the floor, maintaining a pouncing posture even while bound by the chains.

Its eyes were deep red, devoid of any bloodthirsty madness, holding only a heavy, stubborn refusal to yield even in death.

"Destruction Lion Mastiff."

He Zhiqiu's voice was exceptionally clear in the quiet corridor.

"Two thousand years of cultivation, a rare Soul Spirit. Dark attribute, assault type. According to the report from the Spirit Pagoda squad that captured it, a dozen people surrounded it, yet this guy would rather shatter its own Soul Core than bow its head."

"This Soul Spirit was found near the edge of the Far North; it's truly a wonder that such a Soul Beast still exists in this day and age outside the core circle."

"Unyielding Soul Spirits are the rarest in the Spirit Pagoda's repository because most of them choose to self-destruct; very few are captured intact."

He paused, his gaze sweeping over Mu Ye and Zhen Hua.

"This Destruction Lion Mastiff has been locked here for nearly two years. Six Soul Ancestors and above have tried to fuse with it, and all have failed."

"Unyielding Soul Spirits are different from ordinary ones. They refuse any Soul Master's subjugation, and the battles they wage take place within the Sea of Spirit, fought with spiritual bodies."

"Once the fusion fails, not only will the Soul Spirit dissipate, but the Soul Master's spiritual power will also suffer a severe backlash. I personally do not advise this young friend to take the risk."

Zhen Hua frowned. He stood before the glass, carefully observing the two dark red lights in the Destruction Lion Mastiff's eyes, then turned to look at Lin Qingzhou.

"The success rate for fusing with an Unyielding Soul Spirit is too low, and since the battle happens in the Sea of Spirit, neither Mu Ye nor I can assist you. Once your defenses are breached on a spiritual level, the consequence isn't just a physical injury—it's the collapse of your spiritual power."

"I can try."

Lin Qingzhou's gaze bypassed Zhen Hua and Mu Ye, falling straight onto the pitch-black Lion Mastiff bound by chains.

Locked up for two years, having rejected six Soul Masters, preferring to self-destruct rather than submit. The temperament of this creature was identical to the laws of survival he had learned in the Ruins of the Divine War.

You can die, but you cannot bow your head.

He Zhiqiu opened his mouth to say something, but Mu Ye raised a hand to stop him.

Mu Ye watched Lin Qingzhou for several seconds, a hint of a curve returning to the corner of his mouth, before turning to He Zhiqiu. "Open it. If this kid says he'll try, let him try. If something goes wrong, I'll take responsibility."

He Zhiqiu hesitated for a moment, then finally nodded and pressed the release button on the control panel.

The soul-guiding restraint chains clattered as they fell from mid-air, dissolving into specks of blue light before hitting the ground.

Freed from its bonds, the Destruction Lion Mastiff landed on all fours, causing the floor of the entire storage room to tremble.

It shook the residual soul-guiding energy from its mane, then slowly raised its head, its two dark red beastly eyes locking firmly onto Lin Qingzhou, who stood at the entrance.

The pure spiritual body floated toward Lin Qingzhou, and it lunged into his mind. Lin Qingzhou sat cross-legged, formally beginning the absorption.

The storage room, the chains, the glass wall, and Mu Ye and Zhen Hua standing behind him all twisted and vanished like water surface caught in a whirlpool.

In their place was an endless, dark void; there was no ground beneath his feet, no sky above his head, only a sensation of floating as if stepping on cotton.

The air was filled with the scorching smell of sulfur, and every breath scraped his throat dry.

In his Sea of Spirit, a lion stood before him.

It was not the translucent phantom of its Soul Spirit state, but a completely solid spiritual body with every strand of its mane burning.

The Destruction Lion Mastiff was a full size larger in the Sea of Spirit than it was outside, its limbs as thick as iron-cast pillars, dark red flames trailing along its spine to the tip of its tail.

Its eyes locked onto Lin Qingzhou, not pouncing immediately, but the low, rumbling growl squeezed from the depths of its chest said everything.

Its ferocity was beyond question.

This also pleasantly surprised Lin Qingzhou; after all, the stronger it was, the greater the harvest would be after absorption.

His own path to becoming stronger could be more rapid, and there would be more hope of resurrecting Na'er.

The Destruction Lion Mastiff pounced.

There were no moves, no Soul Skills, and no flashy footwork in a battle within the Sea of Spirit. The moment the two spiritual bodies collided, it was the most primitive clash of wills.

As the Destruction Lion Mastiff's front paws rested on his shoulders, a searing mental shockwave, heavy with the aura of destruction, poured directly into the depths of his consciousness, as if someone had shoved an entire volcano into his brain.

Pain! It was completely different from the feeling of being torn apart by the shockwaves in the Ruins of the Divine War.

The pain in the ruins was on a physical level, where one could be pulverized and then reassembled. Mental pain was something else entirely; it felt like being peeled alive, with every memory and emotion laid out on a table for the other party to tear into.

The Lion Mastiff rummaged through his mind, unearthing many things. A rainy night, Na'er curled up in a street corner, shivering.

A blacksmith shop, where he swung a hammer onto a red-hot iron billet, sparks splashing against his face. Every time a memory was dragged out, it was accompanied by an even more violent mental shock from the Lion Mastiff. It was searching for his weaknesses; any sliver of hesitation or fear was enough to become a breakthrough point for it to tear him apart.

Damn it, what exactly is this Soul Beast? How can it use illusions? Does it have a mental attribute?

Lin Qingzhou couldn't help but groan inwardly. This illusion was too realistic; every inch of it tugged at the pain deep within his heart.

Lin Qingzhou bit down hard on his teeth. He didn't roar, didn't struggle; he simply stood where he was, pinning his mental projection into the void, confronting the lion. He had lived long enough.

Across two lifetimes, abandoned twice, crawling through the mud at the very bottom his entire life, and dying who knows how many tens of thousands of times in the Ruins of the Divine War.

His mental strength was tempered by countless deaths, not by talent. The Destruction Lion Mastiff could unearth all his pain, but it couldn't find anything that could truly break him.

Because he had already endured those things; he had endured every single one of them.

He would not retreat, so the Lion Mastiff could not advance.

The stalemate lasted for who knows how long. There was no concept of time in the sea of consciousness.

The frequency of the Destruction Lion Mastiff's attacks began to drop. The dark red flames in its eyes were still burning, but that indomitable ferocity was being replaced by a more complex emotion.

It had tried to crush this human's mental projection with pain, only to find that the opponent's pain was deeper than any Soul Master it had ever encountered, yet he simply would not fall.

Then, a deeper, more ancient aura began to permeate from the depths of Lin Qingzhou's mental projection. Purple-gold light patterns emerged on the surface of his mental form, identical to those released by his End-of-All Martial Soul in reality, only this time, they were far purer.

That aura did not belong to soul power, nor to bloodline; it came from the core of the ruins of the End-of-All Divine Realm, the residual law fragments left behind after the fall of the gods, the Power of End that had annihilated an entire plane.

Even if only a faint wisp escaped, it was an unbearable pressure for the consciousness of a Soul Beast within the sea of consciousness.

The pupils of the Destruction Lion Mastiff contracted violently. It finally recognized what that aura on this human was—the one that made it feel uneasy down to its very bones.

It was not the suppression of a dragon bloodline; it was something of a higher dimension.

It was considered a tough nut among the indomitable Soul Spirits, refusing to bow its head to natural enemies even in death. But facing the End-of-All, whether or not to bow its head was no longer a decision it could make.

Lin Qingzhou took a step forward. This step was the beginning of his counterattack.

He reached out, his five fingers hovering vaguely above the lion's brow. He didn't use force; he simply pressed his mental will forward. It wasn't a suppression; it was a dialogue.

"Follow me." His voice echoed in the sea of consciousness, calm and firm, neither a command nor a plea. "I will not treat you poorly."

The Destruction Lion Mastiff looked up at him, a final trace of struggle churning in its dark red beastly pupils. In its entire life, it had never bowed its head to any Soul Master, trapped for two years, having repelled six challengers.

But at this moment, the power pressing down on its consciousness made it feel for the first time that bowing its head was not a disgrace, and there was nothing to be unreconciled about.

It had not been conquered; it had been told an answer it was willing to accept.

The Lion Mastiff lowered its head. The dark red flames on its mane slowly receded, changing from a burning state into a soft, dark glow.

It extended its coarse tongue and licked the back of Lin Qingzhou's mental hand. In the rules of the sea of consciousness, that lick meant the contract was established.

The dark void split open with a white light, and the entire world faded away like a torn curtain.

When Lin Qingzhou opened his eyes, he found himself still standing in the storage room, maintaining the posture of taking a step forward.

The body of the Destruction Lion Mastiff was turning into dark red points of light, from its mane to the tip of its tail, the entire massive body decomposing into countless tiny light particles.

Those light particles did not dissipate; instead, they traveled up along his arm, burrowed into his skin, and found their place within the soul power meridians in his body.

A purple soul ring rose slowly from beneath his feet; it was his first soul ring, coming from the Destruction Lion Mastiff.

A dark purple, slightly silver-tinged mane silhouette flashed briefly on the inner side of the soul ring, as if the lion had branded its mark upon his Martial Soul.

Mu Ye leaned against the doorframe, the curve of his mouth no longer able to be hidden. Zhen Hua released the palm he had been clenching, a faint fingernail mark appearing in his palm at some point.

"Shouldn't this kid's mental strength tester be tested again?"

Mu Ye spoke slowly, his tone carrying a bit of irreverent teasing. "I suspect the previous machine didn't have enough range."