In the Blink of an Eye, Six Years Passed

Notting Academy, student dormitories.

Rather than dormitories, they were more like small courtyards for elite teachers, similar to Yu Xiaogang's former residence.

As the child of Notting City's lord, getting two private residences was hardly difficult.

Such was the difference in treatment!

If she had not taken a godfather, let alone her current living conditions, she probably would have found it difficult even to enter Notting Academy's gates. What did it matter if she had a domain? In the end, she was just an ordinary person.

Her ability to appraise soul beasts had been deliberately exposed.

There was no helping it. Living off others for free felt inappropriate, and she did not want people gossiping behind her back.

Besides, exposing her ability to appraise soul beasts might make it easier to approach them. Of course, opportunities and dangers might coexist.

Xu Qianqian put away her luggage, did a little cleaning, then sat down in a nearby chair and slowly closed her eyes.

"Domain Winds, Myriad Clouds."

A gentle breeze rose from nowhere, making the potted plants by the door sway slightly.

Specks of light gathered, forming a square outline.

A few seconds later.

A thick book landed in Xu Qianqian's hands.

With a smack!

The thirty-centimeter-thick book slipped from her grasp and fell onto the floor, its pages flipping nonstop.

This book was not Xu Qianqian's martial soul, but something she had condensed through her domain.

"Phew—"

Xu Qianqian slowly opened her eyes and looked at the thick, coverless book on the ground.

"So I really can give form to certain things within the domain."

Going to Yu Xiaogang's place to make trouble today had been worth it.

Though it was somewhat improper to say so, Xu Qianqian and Xiao Chenyu had gone to see Yu Xiaogang not only because of instructions from her godfather and Notting Academy's dean, but also because Xu Qianqian wanted to test other uses of her domain.

The moment she entered Yu Xiaogang's room, Xu Qianqian had activated her domain.

Using the domain's unique properties, she recorded the contents of every book and note in Yu Xiaogang's room.

And the book on the floor was what she got after categorizing and organizing the contents within her domain.

The great sects truly did not think much of Yu Xiaogang's knowledge.

But for ordinary people, much of it was valuable information, and some of it was even confidential material related to Spirit Hall.

Xu Qianqian closed her domain, and the book on the floor disappeared.

A moment later, she focused her thoughts.

As a breeze brushed past her, a mysterious sense of lightness enveloped her body.

Xu Qianqian opened her domain once more and set a verbal command.

"Book."

The domain trembled slightly. Once the domain took shape, the book appeared in Xu Qianqian's hands.

Xu Qianqian flipped through its pages, deliberately using her domain to organize them.

The contents recorded inside covered nearly all the key information marked in Yu Xiaogang's room.

"With a book this thick, it'll probably take half a year to finish." Xu Qianqian's lips twitched.

Six years passed in the blink of an eye.

Xu Qianqian's perception range had also broken through to a radius of one thousand meters.

"Blind Douluo Su Yuntao has gone to the countryside again, awakening martial souls from house to house as usual."

"If nothing unexpected happens, Tang San and Xiao Wu should be entering Notting Academy this year."

Xu Qianqian stretched both arms across the table, wearing an utterly lifeless expression.

"Six years! Do you know how I survived these six years?"

Not only had she finished reading the material she had "stolen" from Yu Xiaogang, she had also read every book in the library related to martial souls.

She had even used her domain and martial soul to record the books hidden in Notting City's Spirit Hall branch, then read them all.

This made her increasingly proficient in using her domain and martial soul.

By all rights, I'm already this strong!

I'm not asking to pluck stars or scoop up the moon, but could you at least give me one more level of soul power?

Six years had passed, yet her performance remained steady—she still could not cultivate any soul power.

Her martial soul, however, had changed somewhat.

A martial soul that had once been blank at a glance—the Chronicle of Time.

It was densely filled with information on many soul beasts. As Xu Qianqian's understanding of soul beasts deepened, anything correct would be recorded within it. However...

Other than her sensory range doubling, she had basically made no progress at all.

She could now detect the fluctuations of others' soul power, yet she herself seemed completely insulated from soul power.

"I want to become a Soul Master, a Soul Master! Aaaaaah!"

After howling like a ghost and wailing like a wolf for a while in the silent, empty library, Xu Qianqian coughed lightly, gathering her thoughts and putting on her usual serious work demeanor.

Dressed in a white gown, her silver-white hair draped over her shoulders, she held a book in both hands, looking every bit like a serene literary girl.

Barely half a minute after she started earnestly acting as a librarian, someone pushed open the library doors.

"Sis, I knew you'd be here." The youth who entered had a distinctly youthful appearance and looked to be in his teens.

"Xiao Chenyu, what did you come looking for me for?" Xu Qianqian asked calmly, gently closing the book in her hands.

"Yu Xiaogang said he wants to take me as his disciple," Xiao Chenyu said.

"You agreed?"

"As if." Xiao Chenyu curled his lip. "I'm more curious where that guy's pride from before went. Didn't he used to look down on anyone with low innate soul power?"

"Hmph. With my measly rank-four innate soul power, I can't possibly aspire to such a teacher."

"You didn't do anything to him, did you?" Xu Qianqian asked doubtfully.

"No. Following your advice not to offend him, I politely declined."

"Come to think of it, why do I feel like you care so much about Yu Xiaogang? He's obviously just a good-for-nothing who loves to brag."

A few years ago, a student had listened to Yu Xiaogang's self-proclaimed Ten Core Competencies and absorbed an unsuitable spirit ring, resulting in utterly mismatched soul skills.

Now, Yu Xiaogang had become famous throughout Notting Academy. If he did not possess at least some knowledge, he might well have been thrown out already.

Using students to test his theories, treating them like lab rats—it was simply outrageous.

"Care..." Xu Qianqian murmured. "I got some benefits from him. Besides, as colleagues, there's no need to make things ugly."

Xu Qianqian still remembered some of the kindness from her "book-stealing" antics six years ago.

Although many of the notes and books in Yu Xiaogang's room contained incorrect information, there was also much worth learning from.

Without those bits of knowledge, Xu Qianqian's understanding of martial souls and soul power would not have reached its current level.

She had also gained a preliminary understanding of her martial soul's current condition. Once Tang San arrived and she saw how the Xuantian Skill worked, she could carry out the next stage of her plan.

So there was no need to go looking for trouble with Yu Xiaogang. Xu Qianqian could not bring herself to do something as ungrateful as smashing the bowl after eating from it.

"Wait, don't tell me you've fallen for Grandmaster Yu? Young grass eating old beef?" Xiao Chenyu tugged at the corner of his mouth.

Black lines filled Xu Qianqian's forehead, and her voice turned cold. "I'm not as adventurous as those Heaven Dou nobles. And what exactly did you come to see me for?"

"I want to obtain my first spirit ring now," Xiao Chenyu said.

"Sigh..." Hearing that, Xu Qianqian sighed. "Wasting a year just for a spirit ring of a few hundred years—is that worth it?"

"If my first spirit ring only barely exceeds a hundred years, I'll look completely useless."

Xiao Chenyu spoke resolutely, recalling the way Yu Xiaogang had looked at him as though he were trash.

Besides, not having a spirit ring did not mean he could not cultivate. At worst, he would cultivate a little slower than Soul Masters.

Xu Qianqian had told him that herself.

Speaking of which, after Xu Qianqian became an honorary teacher at Notting Academy, Notting Academy organized a group expedition to the Soul Beast Forest each semester to hunt spirit rings.

That was right—they helped students obtain a century-old spirit ring so they could become Soul Masters.

Over the past few years, quite a few students at the academy had started with century-old spirit rings for their first ring.

Soul beasts that had only just passed a hundred years were not too difficult to kill or absorb, and safety could be sufficiently guaranteed.

In the past, most students at Notting Academy had only obtained white spirit rings of several decades for their first ring.

That was because they could not accurately determine the cultivation of soul beasts over a hundred years. One mistake could result in their bodies exploding and them dying.

They were not sect disciples or scions of great noble houses, with medicinal baths, nourishing diets, and other safeguards to increase the success rate.

For students from small towns, obtaining a first spirit ring over a hundred years old was far too difficult.

Xu Qianqian's arrival had essentially given Notting Academy an insurance policy.

It could be said that among all the students of Notting Academy, aside from the headmaster, the person they respected most was this special teacher who could not become a Soul Master.

"What does our adoptive father think?" Xu Qianqian tapped her fingers against the table. "A soul beast over three hundred years old is nothing like one that has just passed a hundred."

"Father agreed." Xiao Chenyu's voice carried a trace of speechlessness. "He said it wouldn't matter even if something went wrong—he's still young."

Xu Qianqian: "..."

Was that really his biological father? It sounded more like he had long been planning to raise another account.