What?

"Where did that shadow come from?!"

The Xu siblings, who were in the middle of absorbing soul power, suddenly noticed the light around them dimming in an instant.

The two of them looked up at the same time.

They saw an enormous ape plummeting viciously down from midair.

"Brother, how is there a Titan Giant Ape in the elementary Spirit Ascension Platform?"

Xu Xiaoyan tightened her grip on her brother's sleeve at the sight, her voice trembling.

"How would I know?"

Xu Xiaoyu's scalp went numb, his heart pounding wildly.

In the elementary Spirit Ascension Platform, a ferocious beast of this level should not exist at all.

"D-Don't tell me the Spirit Ascension Platform's system bugged out?

"Let's get out of here!"

"Okay, brother."

The siblings were crushed breathless by that ferocious pressure, and no longer cared about confirming whether it was real or not.

They raised their hands and slapped the emergency buttons on their wrists.

Two flashes of white light flickered, and the two of them exited the Spirit Ascension Platform directly.

"Damn it, why did they run?!"

Fang Yuan's heart jolted in shock.

His charged-up Mount Tai Pressing Down had hit nothing but air.

With no target beneath it, the enormous beast body slammed heavily into the muddy ground.

Seeing that his move had failed, he changed back into human form.

"Hiss... My butt really hurts from that fall."

Fang Yuan braced himself against the ground and slowly climbed up, raising a hand to brush the mud and grass off his backside.

At that moment, Tang Wulin and the other came running in his direction.

Xie Xie spotted him at a glance, and his eyes lit up with a whoosh, filled with the excitement of surviving disaster.

"Little Brother Fang Yuan, you came to save us!"

"Mm..." Fang Yuan answered lazily.

Beside him, Tang Wulin swept his gaze over the surroundings, then raised a hand and pointed at the slowly fading halos of soul power. "Xie Xie, Little Brother Fang Yuan, look around!"

"What is it?" Xie Xie turned to look in the direction he was pointing.

"There's still soul power here that they didn't finish absorbing. Let's hurry up and absorb it!" Tang Wulin said excitedly.

"Good grief, this time it's all thanks to those siblings running off in a panic. We basically picked up the soul power of a thousand-year soul beast for free!"

Xie Xie smiled until his eyes narrowed into slits, his face full of delight at having gotten a huge bargain.

"In the end, it was still Little Brother Fang Yuan making a move that held the situation down. Otherwise, those two siblings might have turned back to make trouble for you," Tang Wulin said, a teasing note in his voice.

"What would I be afraid of them for? The Spirit Ascension Platform can't actually hurt people!" Xie Xie stuck out his neck, stubborn as ever.

As the two of them bickered back and forth, Gu Yuena had already walked quickly to Fang Yuan's side.

She caught sight of the bits of grass stuck to the top of his head, raised her hand, and gently rubbed them away, her voice extremely soft. "Does it hurt?"

Fang Yuan shook his head. "It doesn't."

"Don't be so reckless next time." A trace of helplessness flickered through Gu Yuena's eyes, and her tone softened, carrying a hint of admonition.

"I'll be careful, Mother."

"That's good."

As soon as she finished speaking, Gu Yuena turned her face.

Her gaze instantly cooled.

She swept a cold look over Tang Wulin and Xie Xie beside them.

Her tone was flat, without the slightest ripple.

"All right, stop wasting words and hurry up to absorb the soul power."

"The two of you have weak spiritual power. You won't be able to last long in the Spirit Ascension Platform."

"Don't waste the chance Little Fang Yuan gave you to enter the elementary Spirit Ascension Platform."

"Yes, Boss Gu Yuena." Xie Xie gave her a perfectly serious salute.

Tang Wulin turned to look at Fang Yuan, who had not moved, confusion in his eyes.

"Little Brother Fang Yuan, aren't you going to absorb it?"

"No... My first soul ring was already thousand-year to begin with. For this stage, it's enough."

"Besides, this scattered bit of soul beast soul power won't do much to raise my soul spirit's age level. You can keep it," Fang Yuan said.

"Thank you, little brother Fang Yuan. I'm really glad I could make a friend like you!" Tang Wulin smiled from the heart.

Fang Yuan blinked, silently muttering to himself.

This guy is way too full of himself.

From start to finish, they had never had a proper, in-depth conversation.

He didn't know Fang Yuan's likes, didn't know his goals.

Just because Fang Yuan had given up a small benefit, he had immediately decided they were friends.

If something that small was enough to define friendship, then that kind of bond was nothing more than cheap fair-weather camaraderie.

Gu Yuena keenly caught the tiny change in his expression. She reached out, gently pinched his little cheek, and spoke in a low voice.

"What soul beasts do you still have that you haven't recorded into your tool martial soul, Little Broken Watch?"

"Let me see..."

Fang Yuan raised his hand and took a bound soul beast illustrated guide from his spatial storage ring.

He lowered his head and flipped through the pages, reading aloud word by word.

"Human-Faced Demon Spider, and thousand-year Dark Gold Terrorclaw Bear, thousand-year Shadow Demon Leopard, Stone Armor Bear, thousand-year Ancient Vine..."

He flipped through it for quite a while before reading out the whole list one by one.

"There are quite a lot," Gu Yuena said, lowering her eyes to the guide as she bent slightly back down.

"With your little self's spiritual power, lasting a day or two in the Spirit Ascension Platform won't be a problem, but your body in reality may not be able to."

Fang Yuan looked up at her and grinned, an idea forming in his mind.

"Mother, I want to record them all before this afternoon."

"Heh heh."

"Don't we happen to have two errand boys right here?"

"If we have them help us look, won't that save us trouble?"

"That's true..." Gu Yuena laughed helplessly.

Holding the soul beast guide, Fang Yuan walked over to the two of them.

"Wulin, Xie Xie, can you help me with something?"

"I'll help if I can..." Tang Wulin was about to agree on instinct.

Quick-eyed and quick-handed, Xie Xie grabbed Tang Wulin's wrist and hurriedly stopped him.

"Wulin, what are you doing? You can't just agree to help with anything. If even Gu Yue and Fang Yuan need us to help with it, it's definitely something difficult."

"Little brother Fang Yuan brought us into the Spirit Ascension Platform and gave us such a huge benefit. We owe him for that. If there's something we can help with, we should try, all right?" Tang Wulin said seriously.

"Fine..." Xie Xie ground his teeth and reluctantly nodded.

"It's nothing major. I just need to trouble you to help me look for these soul beasts. I need to record them into my tool martial soul," Fang Yuan said.

Xie Xie was much more cautious than Tang Wulin. His mind was nimble, and he didn't seem like someone who could be used so easily.

"Oh, so that's all. Then it's fine. Just a small thing. We'll try our best to help you."

After hearing that, Xie Xie let out a long breath, and his tense shoulders relaxed.

"Thanks."

Fang Yuan tore a few pages recording the soul beast information from the illustrated guide and handed them to the two of them.

"A hundred-year Human-Faced Demon Spider?"

"A thousand-year Ancient Vine?"

Tang Wulin and Xie Xie looked at the names on the paper, and their expressions stiffened at the same time.

"It's not like we're asking you to hunt them, only to search for their tracks. What are you scared of? If you're chickening out, just say so," Gu Yuena said, her voice carrying a touch of coolness.

"We're not chickening out. It's just looking for soul beasts. We'll look, then," Xie Xie said through gritted teeth, forcing himself to stand firm.

He had heard that inside the Spirit Ascension Platform, if one's spiritual body suffered heavy damage, then one's own spiritual power in reality would also be injured.

The moment he thought of what it would feel like to be severely wounded in one blow by a thousand-year soul beast, fear crept into his heart.

"All right, we'll split up now," Fang Yuan arranged.

"If you find a soul beast, lead it toward this meeting point. If you run into danger, or if your spiritual power can't hold out, press the emergency button to exit."

"Searching for soul beasts will take a lot of time, right? If we keep searching until night and the dorm closes, what are we supposed to do? The teachers will scold us!" Tang Wulin's brows furrowed slightly, his face full of worry.

"Is that so? Do you want to stay at my house for a night, then? Or you can stay at Xie Xie's place," Fang Yuan suggested.

"Wulin, come to my place," Xie Xie immediately said.

"Let's not discuss whose house to go to yet. It'd be best if we found the soul beasts early and made it back before the dorm closes. I don't want to get punished again," Tang Wulin said, shaking his head.

Deep down, he was extremely envious of Fang Yuan's status as a day student.

He could spend every day with his family.

"All right, then let's go."

Fang Yuan nodded.

Gu Yuena very naturally took his small hand, slowing her pace to match his steps. From time to time, she raised a hand to brush aside the drooping branches in front of him, her movements intimate and natural.

Following the habitats marked in the illustrated guide, the two of them walked forward together.

"Wulin, let's go too." Xie Xie patted Tang Wulin on the shoulder.

"Okay."

The four split into pairs and headed off in different directions through the Spirit Ascension Platform forest.