Time slipped by,
and in the blink of an eye, another two years and seven months had passed.
Over the years, Xia Yan had joined no academy. He wandered the continent alone, traveling from the Extreme North Snow Plains to the Blazing Volcano, through deserts, plains, and rainforests. He had been to many places,
and had truly been hunted, too. Once, the intelligence said there were eleven Wolf Bandits. When he arrived, he found more than fifty, packed together in a sprawling mass,
Fortunately, he had the Demon Suppressing Pagoda. Otherwise, things could really have gone wrong.
He had also trained to Level 30.
The outer reaches of the Star Dou Great Forest,
Xia Yan sat atop the canopy of an ancient tree. Before him, the deep green foliage rolled in the wind, unchanged from two years ago,
As he felt the cool morning breeze,
Xia Yan took a map from his Storage Soul Tool,
Yes, he finally had a Storage Soul Tool. It was a silver bracelet with an interior space of ninety cubic meters, worth ninety-six thousand Gold Soul Coins,
His friendly Wolf Bandit friends had paid for it with their lives.
He unfolded the map. The shape of the Star Dou Great Forest was printed on supple yellow paper, with fine black lines marking the major strength-type Soul Beasts in different regions. It mainly covered the outer and middle regions; the closer one got to the forest's interior, the less information there was,
Everything from the middle region onward was blank,
Xia Yan looked at a corner on the eastern side of the map. It listed a Soul Beast that could be encountered there: the White Tiger.
This was the third Soul Beast Xia Yan planned to contract: the Light White Tiger.
It had to be a White Tiger with the light attribute. Wind Tigers and Fire Tigers wouldn't do,
Because
the White Tiger could evolve into another powerful Soul Beast: the Dark Demon Evil God Tiger.
Legend had it that the Dark Demon Evil God Tiger was born when the power of the Evil God descended upon a White Tiger with the light attribute, causing it to undergo an extreme mutation.
It possessed six supreme attributes—evil, darkness, wind, thunder, time, and space. Unable to cultivate, it could grow only by devouring life. It was so powerful that, at just sixty thousand years old, it could fight back and forth against the combined might of a Hundred-Thousand-Year Titan Giant Ape and Sky Azure Bull Python.
It even managed to retreat unharmed in the end, which showed just how powerful it was.
So Xia Yan had come to the Star Dou Great Forest to contract a White Tiger.
As for how to evolve the White Tiger into a Dark Demon Evil God Tiger,
he certainly couldn't make the Evil God's power descend again. But just beyond the edge of the Star Dou Great Forest's core region lived the only Dark Demon Evil God Tiger on the entire continent.
It had an Evil God Pearl inside it,
and refining that pearl would let the White Tiger evolve into a Dark Demon Evil God Tiger, greatly increasing its strength.
After choosing his direction,
Xia Yan set out at once.
There were no longer many Soul Beasts in the outer reaches of the Star Dou Great Forest that could threaten him, so he didn't need to be as cautious as he had been two years ago.
Six days later,
"Roar!"
In the dense forest,
Xia Yan heard a tiger's roar from far away,
and followed the sound.
In the forest about a mile away, he spotted a huge white tiger with golden markings, at least four meters long.
Its sharp golden claws brushed across an ancient tree, easily carving a conspicuous mark into the bark,
Its thick tail swayed gently as it wandered about, leisurely and at ease,
Every so often, it let out a deep growl,
making the treetops tremble,
Over the past few days, Xia Yan had encountered at least ten tiger Soul Beasts, but not one had been a Light White Tiger. This one, however, definitely was!
And judging by its appearance, it was over three thousand years old,
far exceeding the two-thousand-year absorption limit for a Third Soul Ring,
But that didn't matter. Xia Yan's constitution could easily withstand the extra thousand years.
Xia Yan summoned the Demon Suppressing Pagoda, which floated in midair. The White Tiger naturally noticed it at once,
but before it could do anything,
the Demon Suppressing Pagoda unleashed an overwhelming suction force and pulled it straight inside.
A space opened up on the pagoda's third floor.
At the same time,
Xia Yan's Soul Power began to surge, breaking through the Level 30 bottleneck. Level 31, Level 32... Level 34!
A direct increase of four levels!
Even more surging Soul Power coursed through his meridians!
He gained a new Soul Skill: Light Slash.
By concentrating light Soul Power in his arms and hands, he could unleash a powerful slash with a range of up to thirty meters. He could also keep the energy within himself, continuously strengthening his arms for close-quarters combat,
At last, he had a single-target attack skill.
Meanwhile, the ages of the Datura Snake and Jade Green Bird had also increased,
The Datura Snake's age rose to two thousand eight hundred years,
and the Jade Green Bird's to two thousand five hundred years.
The power of the Soul Skills they granted increased as well,
The Datura Snake's Snake Shadow Binding now had a wider range, and the summoned snake shadows were stronger, roughly equivalent to Soul Beasts with fifty to seventy years of cultivation,
In battle, he could release dozens or even hundreds at once—snake-shaped Soul Beasts with fifty years of cultivation, each carrying the Datura Snake's venom,
Just thinking about it was terrifying.
The speed boost from the Jade Green Bird's Jade Shadow Flowing Light increased from fifty percent to sixty percent,
It was a group skill that could be applied to Soul Beasts like the Datura Snake and Jade Green Bird.
By then, he would have nine Hundred-Thousand-Year Soul Beasts at his side. The power he could gain from this boost alone
would be enough to make the whole world's jaws hit the floor!
In the forest outside Notting City,
beside a clear little river,
Tang San, stripped of his clothes, soaked in the water, then climbed dripping onto the bank. He lathered himself up three times and scrubbed hard with a white towel,
His recent training had been too intense, and he'd been sweating too much. If he went a few days without bathing, he began to smell sour,
Xiao Wu had already been cold toward him, and now she was even less willing to go near him. Even his teacher, the person in the world who cared for him most and looked after him best, had tactfully advised him to bathe more often,
Even the blacksmith at the smithy had said he smelled of sour sweat.
It was fine. He just needed to bathe a couple more times.
As he scrubbed, Tang San looked down admiringly at the sharply defined abs beneath his dark, soapy skin, his chest muscles, and the clear lines along his arms and sides,
He also thought of his twenty-sixth level, his outstanding strength, unmatched by anyone at Notting Academy, and his invincible Tang Sect Hidden Weapons, Mysterious Jade Hands, Ghost Shadow Perplexing Track...
Hmph. Xia Yan had only escaped because he ran fast. Otherwise, Tang San would have long since trampled him underfoot!
Whenever he remembered how his teacher had looked both happy and worried upon hearing that Xia Yan had left, and how lost and helpless Xiao Wu had seemed afterward, his anger flared,
That detestable Xia Yan! If he wanted to leave, fine—but he had deliberately left without saying goodbye,
He had even made his teacher and Xiao Wu lose their appetites!
Ten months later,
By then, five years had passed since Xia Yan left Notting Academy. It was now the sixth year. This time next year, Tang San would have graduated from Notting Academy and traveled a thousand miles to join Shrek Academy,
To make sure that he wouldn't miss Shrek's enrollment when he returned to Holy Soul Village,
and to give himself a stable, safe place to cultivate,
Xia Yan planned to join Shrek Academy for a year first, then leave early.
Suotuo City was one of the Balak Kingdom's two major cities.
It was also the major city closest to the Star Luo Empire's border in the Heaven Dou Empire—the closest by far,
Xia Yan walked along the road paved with blue bricks,
with pedestrians coming and going,
The rows of shops on either side, the aroma of food from the restaurants, the clang of hammers from the smithies, and the cries of children all came together in a lively bustle. Compared with prosperous but relatively cold Heaven Dou City, he preferred cities like Suotuo City,
They felt more human.
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