Soul Ring Selection

With a plan in mind, Ye Luochen turned his attention back to the group of soul beasts before him.

Regardless of external factors, this was the Fourth Soul Ring he would actually absorb and integrate into his own body; he could not afford to be careless.

Since the attributes of these soul beasts were highly compatible, Ye Luochen took a quick scan and focused his priority on their cultivation age.

Although theoretically, the higher the age, the more powerful the resulting soul skill, there was a certain range of soul ring ages that a soul master could safely absorb at any given level.

Taking Ye Luochen's current level of forty as an example, it was generally considered safe to stay under five thousand years.

If one blindly pursued a higher age, their body would likely collapse under the strain of the soul ring's energy.

However, it was clear that Ye Luochen did not intend to follow these guidelines.

This was because the standard, summarized by a certain master ten thousand years ago, was not absolute.

Over the past ten millennia, many had broken this standard.

To name just one, Tang San, the master's own personal disciple—it was common knowledge across the entire continent that his fourth soul ring was of the ten-thousand-year level.

If even the master's own disciple didn't follow his theories, why should he?

In truth, Ye Luochen hadn't been entirely sure what age of soul ring he should aim for in the future.

It was a question that was notoriously difficult to answer with precision.

Martial soul quality, spiritual power intensity, physical constitution, the presence of soul bones... all of these factors influenced a soul master's capacity to bear a soul ring.

Among these, only the soul bone factor could provide a simple and intuitive result.

As for the rest, especially spiritual power and physical strength, there had previously been no way to accurately measure them, as they lacked the precise, data-driven grading that soul power possessed.

One could only make a rough judgment.

For instance, an assault-type soul master generally possessed greater physical strength than other types, and a spiritual-attribute soul master certainly possessed stronger spiritual power than others.

But such vague rules clearly could not account for individual differences.

This led to many situations where soul masters, when absorbing a soul ring, either chose the conservative path of absorbing a lower-age ring or gambled their lives—succeeding meant soaring to greatness, while failure meant death.

Clearly, this was not what Ye Luochen wanted.

Fortunately, today was different from the past.

In the past, these factors could only be estimated, but now, he had soul guidance technology.

After expressing his thoughts, it wasn't long before various machines were transported before Ye Luochen.

These were the very same physical examination devices he had experienced when he first enrolled.

Through these soul guidance devices, he could clearly and intuitively see the values for every aspect of his being; the results would undoubtedly be far more accurate than any self-estimation.

After all, even he could not claim to have an absolute understanding of himself.

Ye Luochen understood this point better than anyone.

In his past life, he had seen too many Jiahaos who swore they could easily break ten seconds in the hundred-meter dash, only to clock in at twelve or thirteen seconds when measured by an electronic timer.

They would then turn around and complain that the timer was rigged, claiming that capitalism had ruined their college dreams.

After a series of tests, Ye Luochen's latest data was released:

Physical strength: Soul King level. Physical flexibility: Soul Emperor level. Power: Soul King level. Speed: Soul King level. Spiritual power: Approaching Level 5 Soul Guidance Master level.

Aside from his soul power level, all of Ye Luochen's attributes far exceeded the standard for level forty.

Under these circumstances, if he were to follow conventional wisdom and honestly absorb a five or six-thousand-year soul ring, it would undoubtedly be a waste of the attributes he had polished through countless hours of sweat.

Thus, Ye Luochen skipped over the soul beasts under the ten-thousand-year mark.

He arrived before the metal cages housing the soul beasts that were ten thousand years or older.

Watching this move, Jing Hongchen's brows twitched slightly.

To be honest, he really wanted to advise Ye Luochen not to overthink things.

He had originally intended for those ten-thousand-year soul beasts to be saved for Ye Luochen's subsequent soul rings.

Although the data showed that Ye Luochen's physical strength far exceeded that of a Soul Ancestor, choosing a decent thousand-year soul ring would undoubtedly be safer.

Because this was the Sun Moon Empire, and this was Mingde Hall.

They possessed soul guidance technology, and it was incredibly powerful soul guidance technology at that.

These soul guidance technologies were their true focus.

However, the words reached his lips, but Jing Hongchen ultimately did not speak them.

As the Hall Master of Mingde Hall, he knew very well that their long-standing approach was not entirely correct.

Admittedly, by relying on soul-guiding technology, they could to a significant extent smooth over the deficiencies in their martial souls and contend with the original Douluo Three Kingdoms.

Yet, in terms of top-tier combat power, the Sun Moon Empire still had a considerable gap compared to the original Douluo Three Kingdoms.

Those Super Douluo, or even Limit Douluo-level soul master powerhouses, were not something their side's Level 9 soul engineers could contend with.

At least in the last few decades, soul-guiding technology could not achieve this.

They could only hope to catch up a little in terms of soul power cultivation.

And to obtain a higher ceiling in soul power cultivation, they naturally could no longer be conservative when it came to soul rings.

They had to be bolder.

Jing Hongchen had actually seen this clearly long ago, but for so many years, he had never truly put it into practice.

The reason was simple: there were no suitable candidates.

The people of their Sun Moon Empire generally had martial souls of low quality; wanting to absorb soul rings that broke conventional wisdom was completely unrealistic and would be a pointless death.

Of course, there were exceptions.

Xiao Hongchen and Meng Hongchen were both geniuses with extremely high-quality martial souls and innate full soul power.

Moreover, as Jing Hongchen's grandson and granddaughter, with that blood relationship, they completely had the resources to obtain higher-age soul rings.

But success lay in this, and failure also lay in this.

If it were anyone else, Jing Hongchen would certainly not have missed the opportunity and would have found a way to let them try absorbing higher-age soul rings.

But these two—he could not bear it.

He could not allow, nor could he accept, his own grandchildren taking such a risk.

Therefore, despite their excellent martial soul talent, the first four soul rings of the Hongchen siblings remained honestly yellow, yellow, purple, purple.

But the situation was different now.

Standing before him now was Ye Luochen.

A person with impressive talent, a deep foundation, and most importantly, no familial ties to hold him back.

Since that was the case, why not let him try?

Thinking of this, Jing Hongchen ultimately did not open his mouth to stop him, but instead let Ye Luochen walk step by step toward the cages where the ten-thousand-year-level soul beasts were imprisoned.

Of course, Ye Luochen was unaware of Jing Hongchen's inner thoughts.

At this moment, he was facing yet another difficult problem.