Do You Expect Me to Absorb a Ten-Year Lone Bamboo?

[If you could transmigrate into one of the following three worlds, which would you choose?]

[A: Transmigrate to the Primordial World and become Pangu's Fourth Pure One, formed from a portion of Pangu's primordial spirit and a drop of his blood essence.]

[B: Transmigrate to Journey to the West and become Sun Wukong's upper-bunk senior brother in Crescent Moon Three Star Cave.]

[C: Transmigrate to Douluo and gain the twin martial souls, Pill Furnace and Meridians, but possess only level 0.5 innate soul power.]

Wang Chen stared at the options before him, his mind full of question marks.

Just moments ago, he had been playing a game when these options suddenly appeared on his computer.

Thinking his computer had caught a virus, he tried to shut it down, but no matter how he pressed the power button, it would not turn off.

He had even unplugged it, yet, unbelievably, the screen before him had not gone dark.

This was a desktop computer. It did not even have a built-in battery.

"Fuck, is this haunted?"

[Thirty seconds remaining. If no selection is made, transmigrating to Douluo will be selected by default.]

The Fourth Pure One of the Primordial World, Sun Wukong's senior brother in Journey to the West, or a random nobody in Douluo—anyone with half a brain knew what to choose.

Wang Chen hurriedly moved his mouse and pointed at option A.

[By selecting this option, you will transmigrate to Douluo Continent and gain the twin martial souls, Pill Furnace and Meridians, but possess only level 0.5 innate soul power.]

[Do you wish to select this option?]

"Wasn't this supposed to be one choice out of three? Where's my Primordial World?"

Cursing under his breath, Wang Chen moved the mouse to the Journey to the West option.

[By selecting this option, you will transmigrate to Douluo Continent and gain the twin martial souls, Pill Furnace and Meridians, but possess only level 0.5 innate soul power.]

[Do you wish to select this option?]

"What the hell? Fine, you won't give me the Primordial World, but you won't give me Journey to the West either?"

Wang Chen moved the mouse to the Douluo option.

[By selecting this option, you will transmigrate to Douluo Continent and gain the twin martial souls, Pill Furnace and Meridians, but possess only level 0.5 innate soul power.]

[Do you wish to select this option?]

"Three options, and they're all Douluo. You still want me to choose?"

"Douluo? Not even a dog would choose it."

Wang Chen simply let go of the mouse. He wanted to see whether this thing could really transmigrate him.

[3, 2, 1. Countdown complete. You have chosen to transmigrate to Douluo. Constructing your transmigration passage.]

Then a flash of white light appeared, and Wang Chen vanished from where he stood.

Douluo Star.

Notting City, Junior Soul Master Academy.

In the classroom, the previously lax and carefree atmosphere had vanished, replaced by one of grave oppression, thick with the smell of gunpowder.

The students who liked sleeping raised their heads, while those who liked whispering shut their mouths. All of them stared fixedly toward the podium.

Wang Chen extended his right hand and looked at the pill furnace resting in his palm.

The pill furnace was the size of a palm.

Its outer layer was bronze-colored, engraved with a sun pattern, carrying the smell of copper and riddled with a hole.

A faint flame burned within it, seeming as though it would go out with a single gust of wind.

This was Wang Chen's first martial soul.

Within his body, Wang Chen could also sense every minute change in the meridians throughout his body. This was his second martial soul: Meridians.

For now, however, Wang Chen was mainly cultivating his Pill Furnace martial soul.

Wang Chen frowned, staring at Yu Xiaogang in disbelief. "You're saying that my pill furnace, with its metal-attributed shell and flames inside it, should absorb a Lone Bamboo instead of absorbing an Ironclad Turtle with defensive attributes to strengthen its defense, or a fire-attributed soul beast to increase the power of its flames?"

"Wang Chen, your martial soul is the support-type Pill Furnace. Though it possesses metal and fire attributes and can follow either a defensive or offensive path, the furnace itself is too weak. It reeks of copper and even has a hole in it; its flame is as tiny as a candle flame and could go out at any moment. Your Pill Furnace martial soul is neither a defensive martial soul nor an offensive martial soul. Whether you take the defensive path or the offensive path, it will never compare to a pure defensive or offensive martial soul. Forcing it down either route will not grant much benefit."

At this point, Yu Xiaogang raised his head at a forty-five-degree angle, puffed out his chest, clasped his hands behind his back, and said, "The Pill Furnace is a support-type martial soul. The path it should take is the support path."

The greatest weakness of the support path was its lack of mobility. Once someone caught up to you, you would have no choice but to be killed.

The martial soul you should absorb most is Lone Bamboo, to gain jumping ability and improve your chances of escape."

Good grief. If Wang Chen had not read plenty of novels in his previous life, he might actually have believed Yu Xiaogang.

It was true that Wang Chen's pill furnace martial soul could not compare to defense-attribute soul masters on the defensive path, nor could it compare to attack-type soul masters on the offensive path.

But Yu Xiaogang was wrong because he did not know that absorbing soul rings of the same attribute could strengthen a martial soul and even improve its quality.

In the original story, Tang San's martial soul was Blue Silver Grass.

Blue Silver Grass could be found everywhere on the Douluo Continent and possessed tenacious vitality.

For a Blue Silver Grass soul master, the best path was to absorb high-year Blue Silver Grass soul rings, allowing their Blue Silver Grass martial soul to gain even greater vitality and evolve.

In the original story, Yu Xiaogang initially wanted Tang San to absorb a ten-year Lone Bamboo soul ring not because he saw that Lone Bamboo's life attribute matched Blue Silver Grass's life attribute, but because he was too weak and had no confidence in obtaining a better soul ring for Tang San.

Later, he had Tang San absorb a four-hundred-year Mandala Snake soul ring solely to give Blue Silver Grass toxicity and paralytic power.

No, if you wanted a poison's paralytic effects, wouldn't it be better to simply get some poison, control it with Blue Silver Grass, and throw it at your opponent?

Was it necessary to sacrifice the utility of an entire soul ring skill for a little toxicity?

The soul rings Yu Xiaogang later had Tang San absorb were even more outrageous. To give Blue Silver Grass the ability to form webs, he had the Blue Silver Grass martial soul absorb a spider martial soul.

Good grief, wasn't Blue Silver Grass Tang San's martial soul?

Couldn't Tang San control it himself?

Couldn't he control it himself and make the Blue Silver Grass weave into a net?

To gain Blue Silver Grass's web-forming ability, he sacrificed yet another soul ring.

Wang Chen wanted to say that if Tang San had not been a transmigrator with cheats like Mysterious Heaven Skill, Mysterious Jade Hand, and Encyclopedia of Hidden Weapons, and if he did not have another martial soul, the Clear Sky Hammer, Tang San would have been crippled long ago.

Now, the same trick originally used on Tang San was being used on Wang Chen.

Wang Chen wanted to say, You old bastard, you're truly rotten to the core.

Wang Chen asked, "Then why absorb a ten-year Lone Bamboo instead of a hundred-year Lone Bamboo?"

Yu Xiaogang replied confidently, "That is because your pill furnace martial soul only has half a rank of innate soul power. Your martial soul is too poor; it simply cannot withstand the impact of a hundred-year soul ring."

Wang Chen looked at Yu Xiaogang. "If I remember correctly, Master, your martial soul, Luo Sanpao, also had only half a rank of innate soul power, right?"

An ugly expression flashed across Yu Xiaogang's face before he quickly returned to normal. "That's right, my innate soul power was only half a rank. But there are no useless martial souls, only useless soul masters.

"Through my own efforts, I proposed the soul master world's renowned Ten Core Competencies and made major contributions to soul master theory.

"I am a master in the field of martial soul theory."

After saying that, Yu Xiaogang revealed a proud expression.