Million-Year First Soul Ring

As he spoke, a faint multicolored halo rippled out from the Treasure Beast and drifted toward Ling Tianchen.

Ling Tianchen instinctively released his spiritual power and connected to that wisp of divine consciousness.

At once, he felt his sea of consciousness tremble violently, as though the heavens and earth had been turned upside down. Then, the halo of divine consciousness belonging to the Phoenix God King, which presided over his sea of consciousness, quivered and drew in the Treasure Beast's wisp of divine consciousness.

Ling Tianchen's spirits lifted. He could now sense every emotional and energy fluctuation from the Treasure Beast at any time. Moreover, it seemed that with a single thought, he could immediately kill the Treasure Beast completely.

What an overbearing slave contract!

This thing no longer existed at all. It was an exceptionally ancient kind of contract. From this, it was clear that the Treasure Beast had indeed existed for an extremely long time.

With the slave contract in place, Ling Tianchen relaxed and withdrew his suppression over the Treasure Beast's divine consciousness. It quickly returned to reality.

"Master, the sacrifice is about to begin."

Golden flames rose from the Treasure Beast's body, burning it completely to ashes before it transformed into a streak of golden light and flew into Ling Tianchen's sea of consciousness.

An invisible spiritual ripple spread outward from the Treasure Beast. That terrifying spiritual power covered every corner within a hundred-li radius almost instantly.

Ling Luochan and the others had only just awakened from the illusion and had yet to open their eyes to figure out the situation around them when they were affected by that spiritual ripple again, temporarily losing their ability to think.

At that moment, the sky, which had been incomparably clear just a second ago, suddenly darkened. A thunderous boom rang out high above, and in that instant, the sun's radiance was completely blocked by darkness. An immense, suffocating pressure descended from the heavens.

A stream of gray air descended from the sky as if drawn by an enormous suction force, about to burrow into Ling Tianchen's sea of consciousness.

"Master, I'll stop him! A divine consciousness even more broken than mine actually dares to attempt possession!"

"Xiao Bao, stop. Let him in. He can be considered an old friend of mine. Don't assume everyone is like you."

Without the Treasure Beast's obstruction, the gray stream smoothly entered the back of Ling Tianchen's head.

"With sun and moon in hand, I pluck the stars. There is none in this world like this old man—"

The aged voice cut off abruptly before it could finish.

Hm? Why are there two strands of divine consciousness in this sea of consciousness stronger than this old man's?

Never mind. I'll sleep first.

The gray stream transformed into a gray bead no larger than a soybean, then fell silent.

At last, the absorption was complete. Ling Tianchen slowly opened his eyes and let out a long breath of stale air, feeling lighter than ever before.

He clenched his fist, and a series of crisp pops immediately rang out from between his bones.

His sea of consciousness, which had already become ten times broader before the attempted possession, expanded another tenfold. His spiritual power soared in a single leap to the late stage of tangible but formless.

Ling Tianchen happily began to whistle.

Tangible but formless spiritual power could suppress ultimate soul power and envelop it for cultivation. This meant that the weakness of ultimate martial souls—their slow cultivation from rank thirty to rank seventy—was gone. His future cultivation would be smooth sailing.

A dazzling golden soul ring slowly rose beneath his feet before floating behind him.

A million-year soul ring!

An enormous amount of information flooded into his mind as well.

His first soul ring had granted him four soul skills in total.

Spiritual Detection and Sharing needed no explanation.

Myriad Forms Transformation could completely imitate the aura, soul power, martial soul, and even appearance of himself or a target, so long as he had sufficient spiritual power. However, it could only display his original strength. With the assistance of the Genesis Godhood, even a God King would find it difficult to see through his transformation.

Treasure Seeking allowed him to sense the approximate locations of spiritual treasures in the surrounding world and bestowed an extremely powerful ability to seek fortune and avoid disaster.

Illusory Binding instantly pulled an enemy's consciousness into an illusion, where they would experience all manner of cruel tortures according to his will, leaving them unable to move. Its duration depended on the gap between their spiritual powers.

The million-year Treasure Beast skull soul bone had only two soul skills: Spiritual Domain Time Reversal and Spiritual Reflection Shield.

Time Reversal could currently only rewind two or three seconds, and it could not affect anything beyond his own strength.

The Spiritual Reflection Shield could rebound all physical, energy, and spiritual attacks. If the opponent was weaker than him, the attack would be reflected in full. If the opponent was stronger, only part of it would be reflected, while the Treasure Beast would bear the rest.

All six of these soul skills had room to grow and would continuously become stronger as Ling Tianchen's strength increased.

Aside from Treasure Seeking being somewhat underwhelming, the rest could all be called divine skills. At the very least, they were far stronger than the so-called Spiritual Interference and Spiritual Shock Tianmeng Iceworm had given him.

Yet after carefully sensing the changes in his soul power, Ling Tianchen could not help frowning, his expression somewhat strange.

"Soul power... rank fifteen?"

A Treasure Beast that had once possessed god-level strength had sacrificed itself, along with a million-year skull soul bone, yet it had only raised him from rank ten to rank fifteen?

He had just been secretly delighted that his soul power would no longer suffer from the slow cultivation of an ultimate martial soul. Why was this happening to him now?

"What is going on, Xiao Bao? Why did my soul power only rise by five ranks? You'd better give me a reasonable explanation!"

The Treasure Beast immediately put on an expression as though it wanted to cry but had no tears.

"Master, this really isn't Xiao Bao's fault!"

"Although Xiao Bao is a divine beast, Xiao Bao is severely injured now. In truth, Xiao Bao's cultivation is only equivalent to that of an ordinary ten-thousand-year soul beast on the Douluo Continent."

"To prevent Master's current body from being unable to withstand it, Xiao Bao followed your instructions and divided the origin into ten portions. Right now, only the first and second portions have truly fused with you. The remaining eight portions are temporarily sealed in Master's sea of consciousness. As Master's strength rises, they will gradually be unsealed and fused. Once they are fully absorbed, Master's spiritual power will be able to break through to the Divine Origin Realm with ease."

Having said that, it hurriedly added another sentence.

"Also, Master's martial soul is simply too overbearing. The stronger a martial soul is, the more soul power it can contain. Not to mention that the true phoenix bloodline within Master's body will also suppress your cultivation speed."

"With all these factors combined, for the same increase of one rank, Master must accumulate far more soul power than an ordinary soul master. So although you are only rank fifteen on the surface, if we speak solely of total soul power, you are likely no weaker than a Grand Soul Master above rank twenty. The reason you were able to rise five ranks at once is also because Xiao Bao's million-year skull soul bone was such a tremendous help."

By the end, it covered its eyes with its two front claws and began fake crying pitifully.

"Wuwuwu... Xiao Bao has already given everything it can to Master..."

Ling Tianchen's mouth twitched slightly as he shot it an irritated glance.

"Why did you not say so earlier?"

"And what kind of behavior is this, crying and sniveling? Do you want me to apologize to you?"

Upon hearing that, the Treasure Beast immediately wiped away its tears. Its previously pitiful little face instantly filled with a fawning smile.

"Master must be joking! Being able to follow Master is a blessing Xiao Bao has cultivated over several lifetimes! From now on, if Master tells Xiao Bao to go east, Xiao Bao will never go west. If Master tells Xiao Bao to chase dogs, Xiao Bao will never catch chickens!"

Watching the Treasure Beast make such a complete reversal, Ling Tianchen was speechless.

"Don't call yourself a Treasure Beast anymore. How about Chameleon?"

"Thank you, Master, for bestowing a name! From this day onward, Xiao Bao shall be Master's most loyal Chameleon!"

The Treasure Beast skillfully prostrated itself beneath the feet of his spiritual body and gave him a clean kowtow.

Fine, people—or at least soul beasts—should not be this shameless...