By the time Xuan Qing reached the outskirts of the Star Dou Forest, it was already the middle of the night, so he slipped straight into his space and slept there.
When he woke the next day, feeling refreshed, he finally examined what the extra reward actually was.
Xuan Qing carefully sensed the information in his mind.
"Uses of a God King-level projection?"
His eyes widened.
"One chance to act every ten levels? Are you kidding me? That's absurd!"
But then he thought it over and suddenly understood. Every God Trial site on Douluo Continent had a High Priest.
Take Bo Saixi of Sea God Island and Qian Daoliu of Spirit Hall, for example. Weren't they essentially Azure Dragon's High Priests?
The only difference was that this one was rather unusual: Azure Dragon had personally sent down a projection.
So what did he have to worry about?
Even if the Silver Dragon King awoke, a God King-level projection of Azure Dragon could pin her to the ground and grind her into the dirt!
Xuan Qing rubbed his hands together excitedly. "This is more than a bodyguard—it's a walking nuclear bomb!"
Forget one Silver Dragon King. Even if the Dragon God came back to life and joined the Five Great God Kings in attacking, whether they could beat a God King-level Azure Dragon was another matter entirely.
The methods of the immortals were beyond anything Douluo Continent could match. After all, one of the Sea God's strongest skills, Never Return, amounted to throwing a trident.
He left his space and walked into the town, intending to ask around for information about Soul Beasts.
A few thugs crowded around him. Their leader was a scar-faced man with a leering gaze.
The scar-faced man chuckled sleazily, revealing a mouthful of yellow teeth.
"Out here all alone, kid?"
"Get lost!"
Ever since his Azure Dragon Martial Soul awakened, his hair had indeed changed. That wasn't unusual. Could a Martial Soul affect hair color?
These men saw a young boy dressed plainly, yet carrying himself with an uncommon air. His long, blue-green hair certainly stood out.
His clothes were cheap, but paired with his looks, he was the spitting image of a fallen young noble.
The scar-faced man had clearly gotten a crooked idea. He wanted to rob the boy and sell him off.
"Got quite a temper."
He gave a signal, and his underlings closed in tighter.
Since it was obvious they meant trouble, Xuan Qing couldn't be bothered to waste words. He swept his left hand, and the Qilin Seal shot out, growing as it rode the wind.
In an instant, it swelled to the size of a small mountain and crashed down!
The scar-faced man didn't even have time to scream before he was smashed into a pulp. The ground caved in beneath him, leaving a huge crater.
The dozen or so underlings behind him were petrified. After standing frozen for two seconds, they turned and ran.
"Did I say you could run?"
With a thought, Xuan Qing used the power of space to appear directly in front of them.
The underlings skidded to a halt and crashed into one another. They stared at Xuan Qing as if they'd seen a ghost.
"Want to live?"
The dozen men nodded frantically.
"If you want to live, go gather information for me. Find every report you can on five-hundred- to thousand-year-old lightning-attribute, wood-attribute, and sub-dragon Soul Beasts. Consider it the money you owe for your lives. Otherwise, I'll crush you where you stand."
He raised his hand, and the Qilin Seal floated in the air. It was only the size of a brick, but it was still more than intimidating enough.
The underlings nodded over and over, then fled in a panic. Xuan Qing's display had thoroughly cowed the onlookers who'd been nursing crooked ideas.
Xuan Qing found a tea stall and sat down, secretly letting out a breath of relief. Only he knew that he'd just relied on the Qilin Seal's own weight.
Even so, the effort had taken a lot out of him. The short-range spatial jump had nearly drained his Soul Power.
If he hadn't managed to scare them off, he would've had no choice but to hide in his space.
He ordered a pot of tea and sipped it slowly, waiting for his Soul Power to recover.
About fifteen minutes later, the underlings returned, carrying several worn maps and notebooks.
Their leader approached carefully and held them out to Xuan Qing.
"My lord, it's all here."
Xuan Qing took them and looked through them. The handwriting was messy, but the information was fairly complete.
A seven-hundred-year-old Purple Lightning Snake had been spotted in Thunder Marsh to the east.
A six-hundred-year-old Azure Lightning Python was often seen in the northern swamps.
An eight-hundred-year-old Azure Wood Dragon Lizard had been sighted in Ancient Wood Forest to the southwest.
A twelve-hundred-year-old Dragon Blood Green Vine was said to dwell in a canyon to the west.
"My lord, please understand—we've brought you all the information we could get." The underlings looked anxious.
Xuan Qing waved them away. "Get lost."
The underlings fled as if pardoned, vanishing in the blink of an eye. Xuan Qing stayed where he was, sipping tea as he weighed his options.
In the end, he decided to hunt the Azure Wood Dragon Lizard. It was a wood-attribute sub-dragon. It wasn't a True Dragon, but it would do.
It wasn't that he didn't want a True Dragon. Whether he could beat one was another matter, but the main problem was that there simply weren't any around.
True Dragons were rare on Douluo Continent to begin with, and wood-attribute ones were even rarer—rarer, perhaps, than space-attribute ones.
Xuan Qing wandered through the forest, encountering plenty of Hundred-Year Soul Beasts. He killed quite a few with the Qilin Seal and stored their corpses in his space. They were all money, after all.
By noon on the third day, Xuan Qing was getting annoyed. He hadn't caught so much as a glimpse of his target.
He steeled himself, activated Martial Soul Possession, and let out a long roar at the sky. A dragon's roar rang out in every direction—a blatant provocation.
If he couldn't find the Soul Beasts, he'd make them come to him. The strongest Soul Beasts in this area were only a thousand years old.
The Ten-Thousand-Year Soul Beasts were farther away, so they'd arrive more slowly than the thousand-year ones. He'd have plenty of time to choose a target.
Xuan Qing jumped into a tree, withdrew his Martial Soul, and suppressed his aura to the utmost.
About two minutes later, a surging tide of beasts charged over like an army laying siege. All kinds of Soul Beasts were among them, ranging from a few dozen years old to several thousand.
Xuan Qing's eyes lit up when he spotted his target. The Azure Wood Dragon Lizard was covered in green scales, its powerful body radiating strength. Its aura was gentle yet dangerous, like a beast lying in wait.
With his target identified, Xuan Qing struck at once. The Qilin Seal shot out, swelling in the wind as it crashed toward the Azure Wood Dragon Lizard!
The Qilin Seal moved too fast. It slammed squarely into the creature's back, and the Azure Wood Dragon Lizard cried out and collapsed.
Xuan Qing used the power of space to close the distance in an instant, grabbed its tail, and, with a thought, returned to his space with both himself and the Soul Beast. The entire process took no more than three or four seconds.
Back in his space, he saw that the creature was still alive. He summoned the Azure Sky Demon-Breaking Spear and stabbed it three times. The Azure Wood Dragon Lizard twitched a few times, then breathed its last.
A Yellow Soul Ring appeared, but its color was unusually deep, yellow tinged with purple—almost a thousand years old!
Xuan Qing's expression shifted.
"Over eight hundred years old—nearly nine hundred?"
He gritted his teeth.
"Fine, I'm going for it! It's only nine hundred years. I can handle it!"
He immediately sat cross-legged and began meditating to restore his Soul Power before absorbing the ring. Meanwhile, the forest had erupted into chaos.
Just moments earlier, Xuan Qing had stood beneath that tree, and every Soul Beast had dropped to its knees, trembling and too afraid to lift its head.
A middle-aged man in a black robe appeared out of nowhere. His face was stern, and his pupils were golden dragon eyes.
"Speak! What happened just now?"
The Soul Beasts shakily recounted what they had seen: a child, a giant seal, and a sudden spatial jump?
The more Di Tian listened, the more bewildered he became. Such a commotion, all to capture one Soul Beast?
Since when had Douluo Continent been home to a dragon clan this powerful?
But the dragon might he'd sensed had been unmistakable.
And with so many Soul Beasts describing the same thing, they couldn't all be wrong. That child was likely an elder of the dragon clan who had chosen to reincarnate and cultivate anew!
Otherwise, he absolutely refused to believe that a child who had only recently awakened his Martial Soul could wield such power.
Di Tian furrowed his brow and thought it over. In the end, he decided to return first.
Di Tian returned to the depths of Life Lake and bowed toward the water.
"My Lord, by the time I arrived, there was nothing left at the scene."
In an isolated space beneath the lake, the silver dragon opened her eyes. Her cool, feminine voice rang out.
"Find him at any cost! But you must not offend him. His aura is still faint, but his standing is far too high. If we cannot win him over, then we absolutely must not make an enemy of him. You and Zi JI will handle this."
With that, the silver dragon closed her eyes.
Di Tian respectfully accepted the order and turned to seek out Zi JI to discuss the matter. This was far too important.
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