Second Soul Skill: Flash Fire

As Soul Power drew it in, the purple ring of light above the Blazing Sun Eagle's corpse slowly drifted toward Ye Chen's head, then settled over him and spun wildly.

After closing his eyes and entering a meditative state, warmth instantly spread through his body. Ye Chen felt the purple ring of light spinning wildly around him. It first went through a fierce period of rejection before finally beginning to merge with his body.

This purple ring of light was, of course, the Thousand-Year Soul Ring produced when the Blazing Sun Eagle died.

Judging from the Soul Beast's physical characteristics, its cultivation was probably between one and two thousand years.

In the original work, Yu Xiaogang had said that the absorption limit for a Soul Master's second Soul Ring was seven hundred and sixty-four years.

But that claim was wrong.

As long as one's Martial Soul quality and physical strength were adequate, and one's mental power was strong enough, absorbing a thousand-year Soul Ring for the second ring was no problem—one could even absorb a Ten Thousand Year Soul Ring.

Fortunately, absorbing a thousand-year Soul Ring didn't require mental power, so all that mattered was whether one's Martial Soul quality and physical strength were good enough.

Ye Chen wasn't worried about his Martial Soul quality. What concerned him was his physical strength.

To improve it, he had spent five days gambling at the Great Soul Arena in Heaven Dou City. After finally earning two thousand Gold Soul Coins, he'd spent every last one of them on Whale Rubber.

After consuming three pieces of thousand-year Whale Rubber, Ye Chen could clearly feel that his muscles, bones, and meridians had become far more resilient. This had further strengthened his Body Martial Soul as a whole.

With the boost from his thirtieth-level Soul Power, his current physical strength was more than enough to absorb a thousand-year second Soul Ring beyond the usual limit.

As it turned out, Ye Chen had been right. The thousand-year second Soul Ring spinning wildly around him had only resisted fiercely for half an hour before settling down.

While he absorbed the Soul Ring, he felt no pain. Instead, the impact of the thousand-year Soul Ring's energy left him with the soothing sensation of a full-body massage.

Once he had enjoyed that soothing sensation, Ye Chen finished absorbing the thousand-year second Soul Ring.

Countless ripples of Soul Power burst from his body at once. It was a sign that his Soul Power had increased.

An increase in Soul Power meant that he had broken through his level bottleneck.

He had successfully absorbed his second Soul Ring!

Before absorbing the second Soul Ring, he had already accumulated enough Soul Power to reach level thirty.

Then, absorbing a thousand-year second Soul Ring beyond the usual limit had earned him four more levels.

Together, that meant Ye Chen's Soul Power had risen fourteen levels from the level-twenty bottleneck. He was now at level thirty-four and could go obtain his third Soul Ring.

As for the second Soul Skill attached to his second Soul Ring, it was called Flash Fire.

From what he had gleaned while absorbing the Soul Ring, the second Soul Skill, Flash Fire, had been born from combining the Blazing Sun Eagle's Flash Fire talent with the essence of Combusken as a Pokemon Martial Soul.

For half an hour after activating the Soul Skill, Combusken entered a Flash Fire state. It could take no damage from Fire-type attacks or Fire-type recoil, and the power of its next Fire-type move increased by one hundred percent.

In addition, while in the Flash Fire state, it could absorb the light and heat energy around it into its body. Each time it absorbed this energy, it recovered one percent of its overall physical condition.

The more abundant the surrounding light and heat energy, the more effective this overall recovery became. It could heal injuries and restore stamina, Soul Power, and mental strength, but it couldn't cure abnormal conditions such as poison or paralysis.

After taking in all the information about his second Soul Skill, Flash Fire, Ye Chen smiled with satisfaction. The skill came with an additional healing effect that restored his overall physical condition—an unexpected bonus.

The most surprising part was that Flash Fire didn't just make Combusken immune to Fire-type attacks. It also protected it from Fire-type recoil.

The Explosive Eight-Stage Kick was currently a Fighting-type move because it was fundamentally based on the Fighting-type move Double Kick.

If it were based on the Fire-type move Blaze Kick instead, then the Explosive Eight-Stage Kick would be a Fire-type move.

When the Explosive Eight-Stage Kick caused Fire-type recoil to Combusken, Combusken could use Flash Fire to negate the damage and increase the power of all eight Blaze Kicks by one hundred percent.

And if it fought somewhere rich in light and heat, Combusken could use Flash Fire to absorb that energy and recover its overall physical condition. It would be practically invincible.

With that in mind, Ye Chen immediately began planning his third Soul Ring.

The third Soul Skill attached to it could be a transformation-type skill that increased the light and heat energy around him.

For example, it could change the weather within a certain range to Sunny Day. As the sun grew more intense, the amount of light and heat energy in the area would naturally increase.

However, finding a Soul Beast capable of changing the weather was hardly realistic. The original work didn't describe any Soul Beasts of that kind, either.

After considering it for a while, Ye Chen decided there was no need to rush into absorbing his third Soul Ring and advancing.

Now that he had advanced to a Two-Ring Soul Grandmaster, the level restriction had been lifted. He could also speed up his Soul Power growth through the combat experience he gained in battle.

He'd be living in seclusion in Sunset Forest for a while anyway. He might as well hunt for experience and level up as he searched for a Soul Beast suitable for his third Soul Ring.

With that in mind, Ye Chen began his life of seclusion in Sunset Forest.

His strength still wasn't enough to defeat a Ten-Thousand-Year Soul Beast, so he didn't dare venture into the Core Zone. He spent each day wandering only through the Outer Zone.

The Soul Beasts in the Outer Zone were distributed according to a pattern.

The center of the Outer Zone divided it into two parts: the closer an area was to the forest entrance, the weaker its Soul Beasts; the closer it was to the Core Zone, the stronger they became.

The Soul Beasts living in the central area of the Outer Zone had cultivation levels of roughly two to five thousand years.

At first, Ye Chen only dared to make his home in the part of the Outer Zone near the forest entrance. It was a little safer there.

His daily routine was simple. During the day, he went into the central area of the Outer Zone to find Soul Beasts and fight them. At night, he left Sunset Forest and slept near the entrance.

Ever since Combusken had gained the second Soul Skill, Flash Fire, it could absorb light and heat energy to recover its physical condition. This greatly improved its endurance during the sunniest part of the day. It could fight more often and defeat Soul Beasts with higher cultivation levels.

With every battle against a Soul Beast, Ye Chen gained combat experience through his Combusken Martial Soul. Combusken itself also accumulated a wealth of practical experience.

Under Ye Chen's careful coaching, Combusken developed its existing moves, then continually refined and improved them through actual combat.

After half a year, Combusken had learned an entirely new fighting style.

Compared with its previous style, this one had far fewer flashy moves and focused instead on the simplest and most effective way to bring down an enemy.

The general idea was this: if an enemy fought at close range, Combusken would use Focus Energy to improve its aim at vital spots, then attack those spots relentlessly with Slash using its arms and Double Kick using its legs, trying to take the enemy out with a single bout of close-quarters combat.