After sobering up, Lu Chen checked his body from head to toe and found that after absorbing the Fourth Spirit Ring...
Nourished by this Ten Thousand Year Soul Ring, his physique had grown stronger still, and he clenched his fist tightly, feeling an inexhaustible strength within his body.
At the same time, his mental power had also undergone tempering, and with the aid of his Blue Silver Grass Martial Soul, he was able to communicate with the surrounding Blue Silver Grass on a much larger scale.
In the past, he could at most communicate with the Blue Silver Grass within a range of two to three hundred meters around him.
As of now, he was already able to communicate with the Blue Silver Grass within a range of two to three kilometers around him.
Whether searching for suitable spirit beasts or preemptively avoiding potential dangers, this ability could exert a greater role.
Regarding this, Lu Chen smiled with satisfaction.
Subsequently, he began to inspect the trunk of the Pure Heart Lotus, dividing it in two from the middle, completely cleaving it in half, and turning it over to examine it back and forth.
In the end he sighed disappointedly:
"It didn't produce a spirit bone, which is quite normal to think about. Spirit bones are encountered by chance and not sought by right; even though the Pure Heart Lotus is a ten-thousand-year spirit beast, the probability of producing a spirit bone is still less than one in ten thousand."
"I have already obtained a suitable spirit ring, and I shouldn't expect the Pure Heart Lotus to still produce a spirit bone. A person should know how to be content."
Putting down the shattered torso of the Pure Heart Lotus, Lu Chen wriggled his body and squeezed out from this rock crevice, arriving outside to breathe a breath of fresh air.
Lu Chen adjusted his mindset, rubbed his belly, and said:
"Go get something to eat to celebrate obtaining my ten-thousand-year Fourth Spirit Ring, and then it'll be time to set off to find my Fifth Spirit Ring."
Half a month later!
At a certain place in the Mixed Zone of the Star Dou Forest, Lu Chen swung the Black Iron Sickle in his hand, chopping away the vines and thorns blocking his way forward.
While advancing with difficulty in the forest, he communicated with the surrounding Blue Silver Grass:
"You're saying there's an evil big guy ahead, very terrifying, and it eats spirit beasts, so I should be careful."
"Mm-mm, I know. Anyway, as long as that evil big guy is a plant spirit beast, it's fine. I'm just going to take a look from afar and won't actively provoke it."
Amidst the communication with the surrounding Blue Silver Grass, Lu Chen knew that not far ahead, there was a plant spirit beast that ate animal spirit beasts. That was a very evil big guy, extremely dangerous.
The intelligence of these Blue Silver Grass was limited, and it was hard to describe the specific situation of that plant spirit beast.
Yet since it was a plant spirit beast, Lu Chen still decided to go take a look.
After half an hour of traveling, Lu Chen arrived at the territory of that plant spirit beast.
The instant he stepped in here, Lu Chen felt a wave of chilliness, which was very strange. Clearly the sun was still hanging in the sky, but it was chilling beyond words here.
Lu Chen looked at the soil all around, which presented a dark red hue, reeking of a rich, putrid odor.
The plants growing on this land, compared to plants in other places, were somewhat excessively lush.
Yet Lu Chen always felt that these thriving plants exuded a trace of evil qi, making people feel uneasy from the bottom of their hearts.
"Third Spirit Skill, Blue Silver Shelter!"
Lu Chen was extremely vigilant. The instant he felt unease, he summoned his Blue Silver Grass Martial Soul.
Only to see a Blue Silver Grass glowing with a golden halo and emitting a divine aura all over its body grow out and wrap around him.
And at his feet, purple, purple, purple, black-a soul ring configuration shocking to the extreme-ascended from beneath his feet.
His Third Spirit Ring suddenly lit up, and after his soul power was infused into the Blue Silver Grass Martial Soul, the Blue Silver Grass Martial Soul burst forth with radiance, propping up a layer of blue barrier around his body.
With this energy protective shield, Lu Chen felt slightly at ease in his heart, and only then did he continue walking forward slowly.
Having walked less than a hundred-odd paces, Lu Chen saw the true face of that plant spirit beast.
That was a towering giant tree twenty-five meters tall, with lush foliage. From the branches and trunks down to the leaves, all presented a dark red hue, and viewed from afar, that dark red gigantic tree crown resembled a heart, exuding evil strangeness.
Lu Chen stared with wide eyes:
"A Demon Spirit Tree! Just as the Blue Silver Grass said, this is an evil big guy."
"The Demon Spirit Tree yields abundant Demon Spirit Fruits. This kind of fruit exudes an unusual fragrance that will attract animal spirit beasts to come and eat them. Animal spirit beasts that eat the Demon Spirit Fruit will have their potential stimulated by the Demon Spirit Fruit, and their strength will directly multiply."
"Yet correspondingly, the animal spirit beasts that eat the Demon Spirit Fruit will also have the killing instinct in their hearts stimulated. Those animal spirit beasts whose killing instincts have been stimulated will continuously kill each other."
"The spirit beasts that survive to the end still have a chance to leave, while the other spirit beasts that die will turn into blood food for the Demon Spirit Tree. The Demon Spirit Tree devours the flesh and blood of these spirit beasts, obtains their vital essence, and transforms it into its own nutritional fertilizer, making itself grow luxuriantly and breed more Demon Spirit Fruits in the coming year."
Lu Chen revealed a hesitant expression, pondering whether to hunt the Demon Spirit Tree as his Fifth Spirit Ring.
From the perspective of cultivation, this Demon Spirit Tree standing twenty-five meters tall had a cultivation of at least twenty-five thousand years, which was undoubtedly very suitable to serve as his Fifth Spirit Ring.
However, the evil nature of the Demon Spirit Tree did not quite match the direction of the spirit rings he had absorbed previously.
Consequently, Lu Chen was extremely hesitant!
After a long while, he made up his mind and thought:
Although this Demon Spirit Tree is weird and evil, that's because it constantly devours the flesh and blood of spirit beasts. The Demon Spirit Fruit of this Demon Spirit Tree possesses the excellent ability to stimulate potential within the body and double the strength of spirit beasts.
Isn't this precisely the skill I want, one that can amplify strength? The powerful inclusiveness of the Blue Silver Grass is sufficient to neutralize the evil nature of the Demon Spirit Tree to a certain extent.
And the most wonderful thing is that the skill of my Fourth Spirit Ring, Blue Silver Baptism, doesn't inherently possess any offensive capabilities, yet it heavily counters evil spirit beasts like the Demon Spirit Tree, giving me the opportunity to calmly defeat it.
If I were to swap to another ten-thousand-year plant spirit beast with different attributes, relying on my meager means, I really might not necessarily be able to beat them.
Having comprehensively considered the reasons from all aspects, Lu Chen ultimately decided to hunt the Demon Spirit Tree, letting it serve as his Fifth Spirit Ring.
Lu Chen raised a finger and pointed at the Demon Spirit Tree ahead:
"Go!"
The next instant, under Lu Chen's manipulation, his Blue Silver Grass Martial Soul began to grow rapidly, and thick vines, resembling snakes and pythons, marched forward, encircling the direction of the Demon Spirit Tree.
Lu Chen's Blue Silver Grass emitted a divine aura all over its body, causing the inherently evil Demon Spirit Tree to gradually feel a trace of unease.
Rustle, rustle!
The Demon Spirit Tree reacted instantly. Root after thick root burst out of the ground, and dense, horrifying barbs could be seen upon those roots.
Hanging upon those barbs were withered skeletons of spirit beasts of various shapes.
Having grown to twenty-five thousand years, in the course of its lifetime, the Demon Spirit Tree did not know how many spirit beasts it had devoured; these withered skeletons were merely a very small portion of them.
Those roots growing barbs quickly became entangled with Lu Chen's Blue Silver Grass, tightly wrapping around each other.
Lu Chen's Blue Silver Grass suffered a minor loss.
Upon the roots of those Demon Spirit Trees were dense barbs which pierced the surface of Lu Chen's Blue Silver Grass and began to devour Lu Chen's soul power.
Detecting this situation, Lu Chen immediately responded:
"Fourth Spirit Skill, Blue Silver Baptism!"
As his voice fell, his fourth black spirit ring lit up with a dazzling and brilliant radiance, emitting a terrifying undulation that made people feel oppressed.
Lu Chen's soul power poured unceasingly into the Blue Silver Grass Martial Soul like floodwaters with opened gates.
His Blue Silver Grass Martial Soul, from vines to leaves, burst forth with shining blue light-divine, pure, bright...
Ah!
Within Lu Chen's ears, an indistinct scream seemed to echo.
Those roots of the Demon Spirit Tree that were still acting fiercely previously actually trembled violently one after another under the illumination of that blue light.
Whoosh! Whoosh! Whoosh! Whoosh!
Winds of weird and evil qi mixed with black and red volatilized from the roots of the Demon Spirit Tree; that was a combination of grievance qi, baleful qi, blood qi, death qi... and other foul and filthy qi.
Under Lu Chen's Blue Silver Baptism, it simply met its nemesis, possessing zero strength to resist.
Seeing this, Lu Chen was overjoyed, manipulating more Blue Silver Grass vines to surround the Demon Spirit Tree three layers deep and three layers outward.
Relying on the purifying power of the Blue Silver Baptism to suppress the original source of the Demon Spirit Tree's power, devoid of those grievances, baleful qi, blood qi, and death qi...
The Demon Spirit Tree completely lost its ability to run amok, utterly collapsing and plunging into a weakened state.