Martial Soul Second Awakening

Eighty-one days had passed in the blink of an eye.

Xiao Mu's second martial soul awakening had reached the count of eighty-one. The forty-nine-day threshold Mu Ye had initially estimated had long since been left far behind.

But the growth of power never came without a price.

Over these days, Xiao Mu's body had become increasingly unstable.

The power within him was like a wild beast growing its fangs, becoming more ferocious with each passing day, while his body served as the cage containing it. The cage was shaking, deforming, and groaning under the unbearable strain.

Today was the eighty-first day.

Xiao Mu surfaced from the deep sea, his eyes shining with an astonishing brilliance.

Seawater slid off his body, splashing back into the ocean with a loud crash.

Mu Ye stood upon the surface of the sea, looking down at the youth who had emerged.

He knew the time had come.

He took a tiny crystal vial from his robes, inside of which a single drop of blood was sealed.

When that drop of blood fell into the water, the sea changed completely.

Centered on the point where the blood dropped, a crimson halo spread out in all directions, moving with the speed of a tripped electrical grid, instantly covering several miles of the surrounding sea.

The color of the entire sea shifted instantly from deep blue to ink black, as if some gargantuan creature had risen from the seabed to block out all light.

The first dorsal fin broke the surface. It was silver-gray and stood as high as a battle flag, approaching rapidly from the distance and carving a straight white line across the water. Then came the second, the third, and the fourth. The fins were like blades, slicing through the waves.

"As expected, Demon Soul Great White Sharks are easy to summon. But since they're here, the Evil Spirit Orcas shouldn't be far behind."

The largest Demon Soul Great White Shark leaped from beneath the water, its silver-gray body tracing an arc in the air. The white scales on its belly reflected the sunlight, and the fin on its back resembled a curved saber.

Xiao Mu looked at those fins and couldn't help but remark, "Is that it?"

"Don't underestimate the Demon Soul Great White Shark; they are, after all, top-tier predators of the sea," Mu Ye said.

Xiao Mu stood atop the waves, his force field expanding beneath his feet, forming an invisible barrier around him. "Let me see just how much the Sea God favors you all."

The largest Demon Soul Great White Shark leaped out of the water and fell back in, splashing waves several meters high.

The next moment, it began to circle Xiao Mu, like a blade being sharpened.

The other sharks circled as well. Their dorsal fins drew circles on the water's surface, the circles intersecting like some ancient hunting ritual.

"Is this the hunting pattern of a shark?"

As Xiao Mu spoke, the force field beneath his feet expanded abruptly, spreading in all directions like a transparent film. The seawater was compressed and surged outward, forming a depression dozens of meters in diameter. Xiao Mu stood in the center of the depression, as if standing in a giant bowl.

The dorsal fins of the Demon Soul Great White Sharks stalled simultaneously.

The largest one was the first to catapult from beneath the water, moving as fast as a silver bolt of lightning. Its blood-red maw opened, aiming straight for Xiao Mu's waist.

Xiao Mu remained unruffled; he flipped his force field, and the trajectory of the Demon Soul Great White Shark was violently twisted. It slid past Xiao Mu's side and crashed heavily into the water, sending up a spray of foam.

"That power is indeed immense," he evaluated. "Fortunately, to deflect a thousand pounds with four ounces, one must at least possess those four ounces of strength."

At the same time, the other Demon Soul Great White Sharks took action.

Four silver-gray figures shot out from four directions, their fins slicing through the waves and leaving white lines of foam in their wake. They were faster than the previous one.

Xiao Mu raised his hand, causing the surrounding currents to stagnate. Through precise manipulation, he prevented the water from entering their gills.

The four Demon Soul Great White Sharks sank simultaneously, struggling; this was nothing short of demonic, directly seizing their lifeblood.

The largest Demon Soul Great White Shark leaped out of the water once more. This time, instead of a direct pounce, it twisted its body in mid-air, its tail whipping toward Xiao Mu like a lash.

The wind pressure generated by the tail split the seawater in two.

Xiao Mu sidestepped, the tail sweeping past his face and leaving him covered in a mist of water. He wiped his face, and the blades of his Dark-Gold Dread-Claw popped out from his fingertips.

"Damn, why is this shark's body so heavy! It's better to just kill it directly."

He stepped off the waves, his speed so great that only a blur remained in the air. The blades of the Dark-Gold Dread-Claw sliced across the Demon Soul Great White Shark's belly; the silver-gray scales were torn apart like paper, and dark-gold blood gushed out, spreading through the ink-black seawater and attracting another group of creatures.

The Demon Soul Great White Shark let out a low, mournful cry, its body stiffening in mid-air before crashing back into the water, the resulting spray instantly dyed blood-red.

It did not surface again, but instead, a black soul ring floated up.

In the distance, Mu Ye was slightly stunned to see this. This hadn't even pushed Xiao Mu to his limit?

How could this be! How was he supposed to undergo the second martial soul awakening?

It couldn't be a natural disaster, could it! Or perhaps a Hundred-Thousand-Year Soul Beast?!

It was at this very moment that the other dorsal fins slowly sank; they needed to find oxygen, or they would face a slow death.

Xiao Mu straightened up, the beads of blood on his Dark-Gold Dread-Claw sliding down the blades and dripping into the sea, rippling outward in circles.

"So weak."

At that very moment, the surface of the sea changed once again.

The sea level rose, as if something were emerging from the depths, pushing the water surface up into a mountain.

The ink-black seawater cascaded down from the peak with a thunderous roar, the white foam shattering into mist as it fell.

Then, the giant waves surged.

It wasn't just one; it was countless.

They surged from the edge of the horizon, each wave higher and faster than the last, like a moving wall of water that completely erased the boundary between the sky and the sea.

At the crest of the giant waves, dorsal fins pierced the surface.

This time, it wasn't the Demon Soul Great White Sharks, but the Evil Spirit Tiger Sharks. Each dorsal fin was twice the height of a Demon Soul Great White Shark's, snapping in the waves like black battle banners.

They feared no natural disaster; their massive forms allowed them to move through the ocean currents with reckless abandon.

They charged straight ahead, wrapped in the giant waves like a moving cataclysm.

Xiao Mu tilted his head back as the wall of water rapidly magnified before his eyes, blotting out half the sky.

No way, am I being targeted by the Sea God?

Before the words could leave his lips, the giant wave crashed down. It felt as if a mountain had slammed into him, the terrifying force piercing directly through his force field.

Xiao Mu had no time to adjust his posture before tens of thousands of tons of seawater slammed him into the depths. The impact traveled through his force field and straight into his bones; his internal organs groaned in unison, and his eardrums felt as if they had been struck by a hammer, a ringing sound filling his entire brain.

Seawater flooded his ears, nasal cavity, and throat. He tumbled within the surge, unable to distinguish up from down.

His consciousness blurred for a fleeting moment.

In the distance, on an island.

Na'er stood atop a reef, her silver eyes fixed on the horizon. The giant waves rose at the edge of her vision, and Xiao Mu's figure, small as a grain of sand before the wall of water, vanished without a trace in an instant.

"What's going on?"

Her hands tightened slightly, revealing her intense anxiety.

Yet in the darkness, under the absolute pressure, Xiao Mu's martial soul underwent a transformation, his entire body shifting into a kaleidoscope of iridescent colors.

The next moment, the seawater was instantly decomposed, broken down into elements like oxygen, hydrogen, chlorine, and sodium.

A vacuum zone instantly formed around Xiao Mu.

And his hands suddenly erupted with a distinct, brilliant light.

"I really like this ability. I was just wondering how I would synthesize heavy water, but now, everything has become simple."