Purple Mist Scorpion King, Saving Dugu Yan!

Gu Qing folded the map and tucked it into his clothes, his tone unaffected by Liu Erlong's doubts. "Teacher Erlong, everything you said is right. Under normal circumstances, the limit for a fourth soul ring is indeed around five thousand years. Those capable of absorbing a ten-thousand-year soul ring are already freaks among freaks.

"But you saw it with your own eyes at the academy gates today. Little San's third soul ring is an extreme configuration nearing ten thousand years, while my first soul ring is a thousand years old. We were never within the bounds of 'normal.'"

Liu Erlong crossed her arms, her brows still tightly furrowed. "Even if your first ring is a thousand years old, the spiritual shock of a seventy- or eighty-thousand-year soul ring is on an entirely different level from that of a ten- or twenty-thousand-year one. What makes you think you can withstand it?"

Gu Qing looked at her, the corner of his lips curving slightly. "Teacher Erlong, you just said you wanted to join Self Academy as a teacher. From this moment on, you are Self Academy's probationary instructor."

"Self Academy's first teaching principle: believe in your companions, trust the headmaster! As for how I can do it, I'll explain it to you in detail once we return to the academy."

Liu Erlong froze for a moment. Believe in your companions... She recalled Gu Qing's earlier words: "Learn to trust your companions." At the time, she had assumed it was merely a grandiose slogan, yet now he had used those four words to answer every one of her doubts.

"Third Sister, do you believe me?" Gu Qing turned to Tang San.

"Yes." Tang San answered without the slightest hesitation, her voice brief but resolute.

Gu Qing turned back to Liu Erlong without speaking, merely raising an eyebrow slightly. That expression suddenly made Liu Erlong want to punch him—and laugh at the same time.

Liu Erlong gritted her teeth, then finally sighed. "Fine. You're the headmaster, so I'll listen to you! Just don't regret it later. If the spiritual shock backfires on you, I'm not taking care of you."

"You won't need to." With that, Gu Qing turned and headed deeper into the dense forest.

Tang San followed close beside him. As she passed Liu Erlong, she gave her a calm glance. There was no hostility in her eyes, yet there was a quiet possessiveness to it, as though she were declaring her claim.

Liu Erlong inexplicably felt a twinge of guilt under that gaze, then quickly reassured herself. What are you feeling guilty about, Liu Erlong? You haven't done anything!

The three of them traveled through the forest for about half an hour. The air near the swamp grew increasingly damp, while the ground beneath their feet became softer and softer. Every step caused a layer of dark water to seep up from the soil.

Gu Qing remained at the front, his steps light and steady. Enhanced by the passive effect of the Heavenly Heart Lotus, his spiritual perception spread across several hundred meters around him.

"There are people ahead." Gu Qing suddenly stopped and lowered his voice. "At least four soul power fluctuations. One aura is very weak, as if they're seriously injured. The others are fighting something."

The three quickened their pace through the forest. The trees ahead grew sparser and sparser, until a clearing blasted open by violent force appeared before them. Several ancient trees lay broken and scattered across the clearing, while the ground was covered in scorched marks and claw tracks several feet deep.

At the center of the clearing, four youths dressed in Heaven Dou Royal Academy uniforms stood back to back in a shaky defensive formation. Their uniforms had originally been an elegant combination of gold and white, but they were now so stained with blood and mud that their original colors were no longer visible.

At the front stood a tall young woman. Her long, dark-purple hair hung messily over her shoulders, its ends stuck to her cheeks with blood. Her features were exquisite and cold, but her dark-green snake eyes had narrowed into dangerous slits, and several jade-green scale patterns spread from the corners of her eyes. This was the mark of the Jade Phosphorous Serpent Emperor's Martial Soul Possession.

A jade-green glow covered her entire body. Snake scales extended from her neck to her collarbones and the backs of her hands. Her nails were sharp and pointed, gleaming with a dark-green poisonous luster. At that moment, a bone-deep wound marred her left shoulder, blood flowing down her arm and dyeing her entire sleeve dark red. Yet she clenched her teeth and stood at the very front without retreating a single step.

"Dugu Yan, battle Soul Elder of Heaven Dou Royal Academy. Martial Soul: Jade Phosphorous Serpent Emperor." Liu Erlong spoke softly. "The other three are her teammates. And the thing hunting them... is only one soul beast."

Everyone's gaze fell upon the other end of the clearing. It was a giant scorpion as large as an adult rhinoceros, its entire body covered in dark-purple armor. Dark-green poisonous mist seeped from the seams between every plate of its shell.

Its two pincers were each half the size of a person, their claws covered in serrated barbs. Several strips of cloth torn from Heaven Dou students' uniforms still hung from those barbs.

Most terrifying of all was its tail hook, raised high in the air. The venomous stinger at its tip was over a foot long, and every drop of poison that fell onto the ground corroded a small pit into the earth.

"Purple Mist Scorpion King, around five thousand years old." Gu Qing frowned slightly. "This kind of soul beast usually lives in the cave regions deep within Sunset Forest. It shouldn't be appearing at the edge of the swamp. Unless..."

His gaze swept over several sword wounds still bleeding on the Purple Mist Scorpion King's armor, as well as the trail of corrosive marks stretching along the ground behind it. This Purple Mist Scorpion King had been enraged by the sword wounds inflicted by Dugu Yan's group and had pursued them all the way here.

But this kind of soul beast possessed an extremely strong territorial instinct and normally would not chase prey this far. There had to be something behind it that made it even more afraid to return.

At the center of the clearing, Dugu Yan's breathing grew more and more ragged. Her Jade Phosphorous Serpent poison had almost no penetrating power against the Purple Mist Scorpion King's armor, while the scorpion's poisonous mist was slowly eroding the soul power barriers around her and her teammates.

Dugu Yan could feel the soul power within her draining at a visible rate. At most, they could last for another half-incense stick before their defenses completely collapsed.

Just as anxiety rose in her heart, a figure emerged from the forest behind her.

He was a youth who looked no more than fourteen or fifteen, tall and slender with handsome features. He had not released his Martial Soul, displayed any soul rings, or even assumed a fighting stance. He simply walked calmly to the edge of the clearing and stopped outside the Purple Mist Scorpion King's poisonous mist.

"Need help?"

Dugu Yan spun around sharply. She had not sensed any aura at all! When had this person appeared? His soul power fluctuations were nearly nonexistent, yet his presence was strange—so strange that it instinctively made her feel danger.

The Purple Mist Scorpion King had clearly noticed this uninvited guest as well. It let out a shrill hiss, aiming its tail hook toward Gu Qing as a drop of dark-green venom condensed at its tip, ready to fall at any moment.

Gu Qing did not even look at it. His gaze landed on the still-bleeding wound on Dugu Yan's left shoulder, then swept across her three teammates behind her, whose faces had turned black from the obvious scorpion venom poisoning.

He stepped forward, entering the edge of the poisonous mist. When the dark-green mist touched his skin, it did not even leave behind the faintest red mark.

Dugu Yan's eye twitched. That was the poisonous mist of the Purple Mist Scorpion King. Even she, a Jade Phosphorous Serpent Emperor soul master, needed a soul power barrier to resist it. Yet this person had simply walked into it with his bare body?