Ning Dagang, You Have Courted Death!

Ning Dagang turned around, forcing what he believed was a kindly smile onto his stiff face. "Tang San, you're here. Have a seat."

Qian San did not sit. He merely watched Ning Dagang quietly, waiting for him to continue.

"I spent the entire night yesterday researching materials and tailored a future development path specifically for you." Ning Dagang walked to his desk, bracing both hands against its surface as he fixed Qian San with a burning gaze.

"Your Martial Soul is the Blue Silver Spider. While it possesses a certain degree of vitality, as a spider, its greatest flaws are its lack of venom and powerful offensive capability."

Qian San nodded. That was indeed true.

Seeing his agreement, Ning Dagang's eyes flashed with satisfaction as he continued, "According to the Ten Core Competencies of Martial Soul theory I proposed, plant-type Martial Souls can absorb animal-type soul beasts' Spirit Rings, and vice versa! Therefore, I've decided to take you to the Soul Hunting Forest and find you a highly venomous plant-type soul beast, such as a Mandala Poison Vine."

"As long as your Blue Silver Spider absorbs its Spirit Ring, there's a strong chance it will inherit its venomous attribute! Then your spider will no longer be useless, but a terrifyingly poisonous creature! This is the greatness of theory!"

At first, Qian San's heart did stir slightly. Plant and animal types were interchangeable? Using plant venom to make up for the Blue Silver Spider's shortcomings? It sounded somewhat reasonable. If the Blue Silver Spider could truly gain deadly venom, it would indeed greatly benefit his use of Tang Sect hidden weapons.

However, that thought remained in his mind for less than a second before he extinguished it.

His father Qian Xunji's unquestionable gaze before leaving surfaced in his mind. His father had said that he would personally find Qian San's first Spirit Ring. Qian San held an almost blind trust in his father.

"Teacher, your theory sounds very ingenious." Qian San bowed slightly and calmly declined. "However, regarding my first Spirit Ring, my father already made arrangements before he left. He will handle it personally."

The moment those words fell, the atmosphere in the office dropped to freezing point.

The smile on Ning Dagang's face completely froze, replaced by anger at being questioned and defied. What he hated most in life was people looking down on his theories. He had finally accepted a genius with Innate Full Soul Power to prove himself. How could he allow such an unexpected variable to appear?

"Your father?" Ning Dagang sneered, his tone filled with undisguised, condescending contempt. "Tang San, you're still young. You don't understand the cruelty of the soul master world. Your father is nothing more than a barefoot country doctor treating people in some remote village! Does he understand Martial Soul Mimicry? Does he understand the maximum age limit for Spirit Rings?"

The more Ning Dagang spoke, the more agitated he became. He suddenly slammed a hand onto the desk. "What can he give you? A few gold coins? Or a ten-year Piglet Beast? Can he give you priceless theories like mine, theories into which I've poured half a lifetime of effort? If you follow him, your talent will only be completely buried!"

Boom—

Almost the instant Ning Dagang's words ended, an icy, bone-piercing killing intent, almost tangible in its intensity, erupted without warning from Qian San's small body!

Qian San abruptly raised his head. The clarity in his eyes had been replaced by a chilling, frosty gleam.

A dragon had a Reverse Scale. Touch it, and death was certain.

For Qian San, who had been an orphan in his previous life, his father—who had raised him since childhood in this life, who could watch over the stove for hours just to make him a pot of bone soup—was the one and only Reverse Scale in his heart, absolutely untouchable!

"Say one more word slandering my father. I dare you."

Qian San's voice no longer carried any childish innocence. Instead, it held a hoarse, chilling quality, as though it had weathered mountains of corpses and seas of blood. He stared fixedly at Ning Dagang and coldly pronounced his judgment in his heart: You have courted death!

"If you dare show even the slightest disrespect toward my father again, then the bond between teacher and student ends here today!"

Ning Dagang staggered back two steps in shock at the sudden killing intent, his lower back slamming heavily against the desk. He stared in disbelief at the child before him, only six years old, while cold sweat instantly seeped across his back.

That was the gaze of someone who had truly seen blood!

How could a village child possess such a terrifying look?

"You... you..." Ning Dagang swallowed hard, forcibly suppressing the panic in his heart. His face alternated between green and white before he finally flicked his sleeve with hollow bluster.

"Rotten wood cannot be carved! Fine, since you're so stubborn, then I'd like to see what remarkable Spirit Ring that barefoot doctor father of yours can find for you! When your Martial Soul is ruined, don't blame me for not warning you!"

Qian San gave him a cold glance, said nothing, turned, and strode out of the office, slamming the door shut with a bang.

Late that night, in the small forest behind Nuoding Academy.

Qian San sat cross-legged atop a massive boulder, circulating the Mysterious Heaven Skill to calm the anger from earlier that day, when a faint sound of air being cut came from above him.

He abruptly opened his eyes and looked up warily.

A tall, straight figure drifted silently down from the treetops. Golden hair glimmered faintly beneath the moonlight. Though travel-worn, the composure and authority carved into his bones had not diminished in the slightest.

"Father!" Qian San froze for a moment, then irrepressible delight burst from his eyes as he leaped down from the boulder.

Qian Xunji looked at his son, and a gentle smile appeared on his stern face. Without wasting words, he lightly brushed his right hand across the storage Soul Tool at his waist. With a muffled bang, a strange soul beast as large as a water buffalo, tightly bound by golden beams of light, crashed heavily onto the ground.

It was a spider.

Yet unlike an ordinary spider, its entire body shone with a dark silver metallic luster. Its eight long legs resembled eight sharp steel spears, reflecting a heart-palpitating chill beneath the moonlight. Though tightly restrained, silver-gray viscous fluid continued dripping from its mouthparts. When the liquid fell onto the rocks below, it produced a hissing corrosive sound and instantly dissolved a small pit into the hard stone.

"This is..." Qian San drew in a sharp breath.

"An Iron-Eroding Polymorphic Spider, five hundred and seventy years old."

Qian Xunji dusted off his hands and pointed at the spider on the ground. "This beast is rare even in the Star Dou Forest. It doesn't eat meat. It survives exclusively by Devouring various metal ores. Because it has Devoured metal for so long, its body is as hard as iron, while the spider silk it produces is a peculiar kind of Liquid Metal."

At this point, Qian Xunji gave Qian San a deeply meaningful look.

"Tang San, over the years in the village, you often secretly collected scraps of iron. You liked tinkering with strange little components and hidden weapons yourself. And the grappling techniques and peculiar hand techniques you practiced in the courtyard... your father has seen them all."