Shrek's students need to gain muscle

After Kong Bo visited the Crown Prince's Mansion, he returned home and went about his business as usual. Even with two young beauties added to the household, Kong Bo still focused his energy on academic research, cultivation, and underground soul fighting. Essentially, after eating breakfast in the morning, he would hug Qing Yuan, Su Ning, and Gu Long'er, and at noon, he would simply add two more sets of bowls and chopsticks to his meal with Gu Long'er.

Qing Yuan and Su Ning were very obedient. Their current cultivation and living environments were vastly superior to what they had known before. They listened carefully to whatever Kong Bo said; when he told them not to enter the basement, they stayed out. They attended school on time, accompanied Kong Bo for lunch and Gu Long'er for dinner, and upon returning home, they would seek out Zi Ji and Ice Empress to practice combat. These two young beauties spent far more time with Gu Long'er than they did with Kong Bo.

Qian Renxue said to Kong Bo, "Our home finally feels a bit like it's inhabited by humans. Otherwise, are there even any humans in this house?" It was true; those living with Kong Bo previously included the Evil Emperor, Snow Empress, Ice Empress, Demon Empress, Zi Ji, Lan Fozi, and Gu Long'er. There were indeed no humans among them.

During this period, Kong Bo had a mission, so he focused his energy on a project researching a Douluo Continent version of "Nine Dragons Pulling the Coffin." Whether it was to seize the Xu Family's throne or to eventually strike at Shrek Academy, a massive amount of capital was required. Even with the Kong Family's wealth, supporting such activities was a stretch.

Therefore, Kong Bo needed money, and naturally, he had to target the wealthiest entity. Since Shrek Academy was currently the richest, Kong Bo intended to earn money from them without providing them with resources—or rather, to earn it from Shrek Academy's powerful soul masters or students possessing powerful martial souls.

In the Douluo Continent, especially by Shrek Academy's definition, what was a powerful martial soul? Naturally, it was those of powerful beast soul masters, specifically those who focused on melee combat. In their eyes, a real man had to fight head-on, adhering to the philosophy that "true power belongs to oneself."

While dissecting evil soul masters, Kong Bo had conducted related research. He discovered that for melee beast soul masters in particular, their muscles were not only the vessels for generating soul power but also containers that bore amplified soul skills and carried soul power, functioning like a combination of an engine and a fuel tank.

With these experimental results, Kong Bo formed a hypothesis: if he could invent a drug, much like the "Nine Dragons Pulling the Coffin" from Earth, that could rapidly increase a soul master's muscle mass, wouldn't those melee beast soul masters be able to rapidly increase their strength? And since rapid strength gains always came with a price, it wasn't as if Kong Bo would be the one paying it.

With an idea and a plan, he needed to find raw materials to begin testing and development. Kong Bo's attempt to create a Douluo Continent version of "Nine Dragons Pulling the Coffin" was something not even found in Mingde Hall's drug development; he had to find materials from scratch.

How to find them? Kong Bo recalled a story he had heard from Di Tian when he lived in the Star Dou Great Forest: the soul beasts in the northern part of the forest would become restless every year between August and October. This phenomenon had existed since Di Tian began governing the Star Dou Great Forest.

According to Bi Ji's own words, "Even a 40,000-year-old White Lynx would dare to go up and scratch an 80,000-year-old Dark Gold Terrorclaw Bear. A 10,000-year-old Night Wolf would dare to bare its fangs at a 40,000-year-old Human-Faced Demon Spider. And according to my observations, the power of their attacks is greater than at other times."

Kong Bo was curious at the time and asked Bi Ji, "Sister Bi Ji, is this phenomenon you speak of only present in carnivorous animals?"

"Not at all," Bi Ji replied. "I was just giving an example. Herbivorous soul beasts are also restless during that period, with significantly increased aggression and attack power."

Kong Bo reached a conclusion then and there. "Sister Bi Ji, soul beasts without intelligence must be similar to wild beasts when it comes to reproduction. Different soul beasts have different breeding seasons, and during these periods, a single species becomes highly aggressive."

Bi Ji nodded. "Exactly, that is where the problem lies."

Kong Bo offered a conjecture: "Then I think they must have eaten something—some kind of plant. Otherwise, it's impossible for herbivorous animals to go mad as well. My hypothesis is that the herbivorous soul beasts eat this plant and become restless because of some substance it contains, and then the carnivorous soul beasts eat the herbivorous ones, causing that substance to enter their bodies as well."

"That makes a lot of sense," Bi Ji said. "But these are trivial matters; at most, it only affects you human soul masters. It has no impact on us."

Kong Bo's way of thinking remained very "scholarly." Upon arriving in a brand-new world, he believed it to be a real world. The family chronicle written to sing the praises of the Tang family did not represent the entirety of the world; there were many unknown existences not recorded in the novels. For instance, this phenomenon mentioned by Di Tian was never once mentioned in the books.

Now that Kong Bo was set on making his Douluo Continent version of "Nine Dragons Pulling the Coffin" to help everyone in Shrek gain muscle and give the continent its own "bodybuilding soul master circle," he remembered this matter. Since it was already August, Kong Bo spoke to the Evil Emperor, asking him to take him to the Star Dou Great Forest to investigate.

After taking leave, Kong Bo had the Evil Emperor bring him to the core area of the Star Dou Great Forest. He explained the matter to Bi Ji and Di Tian. Given Kong Bo's status among the soul beast clan, calling him the "Executive Deputy Beast God" would not be an exaggeration. Kong Bo stated he wanted to see what plant caused the soul beasts in the north of the forest to fall into such a state of agitation, specifically looking for plants that flourished between August and October.

In the Star Dou Great Forest, no one understood plants and plant-type soul beasts better than the King of Ten Thousand Demons. He followed his memory to locate these plants and plant-type soul beasts. At the same time, Kong Bo had the Evil Emperor capture some Soft Bone Rabbits to keep in captivity for his experiments.

Kong Bo then set these Soft Bone Rabbits up as a control group, numbered the various plants brought by the King of Ten Thousand Demons, ground them into juice, and fed them to the rabbits. He then observed their behavior. After one day, he discovered that the Soft Bone Rabbits in the second test group had become extremely aggressive—arguably the most aggressive of all.

Kong Bo began comparing the vital signs of the rabbits in the second test group against those in the others, discovering that the muscle density of the rabbits in the second group was significantly higher. This was, without a doubt, the raw material Kong Bo had been looking for.