Deciding on a Ten-Thousand-Year Soul Ring as the First Ring

"Changge, if... if you trust me, I can give it a try and see whether I can help you obtain a Ten-Thousand-Year Soul Ring as your very first Soul Ring.

"You should know that even Sea God Tang San, the legendary god of Shrek, only obtained a Ten-Thousand-Year Soul Ring as his fourth Soul Ring.

"I can let you possess a Ten-Thousand-Year Soul Ring from your very first one. You should understand how great that gap is. And if you possess a Ten-Thousand-Year Soul Ring, you will also be able to quickly recover to your original level of Innate Soul Power.

"Your physical constitution is not bad either. You often train your body and such. Your physique is much stronger than that of ordinary six-year-old children."

What Electrolux said made sense. Absorbing a Ten-Thousand-Year Soul Ring required sufficiently formidable spiritual power and physical strength.

Xiao Changge had trained his body and cultivated Soul Power at Shrek Academy, but the problem was that Ma Xiaotao would always absorb his Soul Power. However, his muscles and other aspects of his physical constitution had not been taken away; only his Soul Power and the power of his Martial Soul had been absorbed.

According to Electrolux's observations, Xiao Changge's current physical constitution was already quite impressive. He had also studied the Soul Master knowledge of the Douluo Continent and mastered many theories.

In Electrolux's view, even without his help, Xiao Changge was qualified to fight a Thousand-Year Soul Beast and absorb a Thousand-Year Soul Beast's Soul Ring.

But Electrolux wanted to give Xiao Changge the best. At the very least, he hoped that his disciple could obtain a Ten-Thousand-Year Soul Ring, accelerate his growth, and then properly take his revenge.

Thus, if necessary, it had to be a Ten-Thousand-Year Soul Ring. The significance of having a Ten-Thousand-Year Soul Ring as one's first ring was entirely different from having a Thousand-Year Soul Ring as one's first ring.

The gap was simply too great. That was obvious.

However, Xiao Changge was somewhat worried.

Tang San's first Ten-Thousand-Year Soul Ring—the fourth ring: the Earth Cave Spider Emperor.

When Tang San was still a Soul Ancestor, how painful was it for him to absorb a Ten-Thousand-Year Soul Ring? It was suffering on an entirely different level:

The energy was too immense. His meridians were constantly forced wider by black currents, and his body swelled like a balloon, ready to burst at any moment.

It was not merely scorching heat. A bone-chilling cold invaded from the depths of his mind, numbing his nerves and making his body feel as though it no longer belonged to him amid a raging storm.

His bones crackled and popped in rapid succession. Black energy bored through every opening and entered each meridian. Only the resilience gained after tempering his body with Icefire Immortal Herbs kept his meridians from rupturing.

He absorbed it for five hours. After succeeding, he was utterly exhausted and immediately fell asleep. Even Yu Xiaogang said that without the body tempering of the Icefire Immortal Herbs and the Mysterious Heaven Skill, he would have burst apart on the spot.

Compared with the first ring's "Magma Five-Viscera Burning," a Ten-Thousand-Year Soul Ring brought the dual collapse of a body swelling to the point of rupture and a mind corroded by icy cold.

It could be said that absorbing a Ten-Thousand-Year Soul Ring was incredibly difficult. Moreover, there was another major problem: the hatred of the Soul Beast.

There was also a mental issue unique to Ten-Thousand-Year Soul Beasts: "Soul Shock."

This was backlash that Thousand-Year Soul Rings did not possess, something that only began with Ten-Thousand-Year Soul Rings. Xiao Wu's original words in Douluo Continent laid out the key point:

Before dying, a Ten-Thousand-Year Soul Beast had already developed intelligence. Its remnant soul had not dispersed and would condense into a Soul Shock that charged into the absorber's sea of consciousness.

It was not "pain." It directly smashed into one's spiritual world—resisting being devoured by an outsider, carrying the savage aura of beasts, the obsession of slaughter, and the unwillingness of death.

A Soul Ancestor's body had not fully matured, and their spiritual power was weak. If they could not withstand it, their consciousness would shatter and they would become an idiot, a fate worse than death. Only after level fifty, when both body and spirit had matured, would this damage diminish drastically.

Attributes and resentment could inflict additional damage.

The innate attributes of Soul Beasts were violent and mixed, such as the Earth Cave Spider's chilling cold and the Man Faced Demon Spider's tyrannical poison. If they clashed with one's own Martial Soul attributes, they would tear at each other within the meridians, causing piercing, searing agony.

A Soul Ring was wrapped in the resentment and ferocity a Soul Beast bore in life. It would not consciously attempt possession, but it could magnify pain and lure one's mind into panic and self-destruction.

In summary: when a Soul Ancestor absorbed a Ten-Thousand-Year Soul Ring, their body was pushed to the brink of exploding by Ten-Thousand-Year Soul Power, their mind was struck to the edge of idiocy by the remnant soul's shock, and their attributes and resentment tore at them from within and without. Failing at any one of the three meant death. Tang San only made it through that time because he had every advantage stacked upon him and the willpower of two lifetimes. Yu Xiaogang's heart had nearly stopped at the time.

Xiao Changge was worried about precisely this point.

"Teacher, you should know about Soul Shock, right? Shrek's ancestor, Sea God Tang San, nearly got himself killed when he absorbed a Ten-Thousand-Year Soul Ring as his fourth Soul Ring, when he was at the Soul Ancestor level. There is something called Soul Shock. Only sufficiently strong spiritual power and strength can resist it."

Xiao Changge wanted to become stronger too, but he did not want to gamble away his life or become an idiot.

However, Electrolux said at that moment, "I know about that as well, so I have already thought of a solution. In my original world, I bore the title of Holy Necromancer. Manipulating the souls of the dead is my specialty. I can help you resolve the trouble caused by Soul Shock.

"Are you willing to try? If you are, I will do everything in my power to help you hunt a Ten-Thousand-Year Soul Beast. I can help you. You have no reason to be afraid."

"..." Xiao Changge was still extremely worried. This was completely a gamble. If he failed, the consequences would be severe.

But at that moment...

[Option One: Agree with Electrolux's proposal, then choose to hunt a Ten-Thousand-Year Soul Beast with Electrolux, overcome the obstacles, and obtain a Ten-Thousand-Year Soul Ring. Completion reward: low-grade Earth Tier combat technique, Flame Splitting Wave Ruler.]

[Option Two: Politely refuse and choose to hunt a Thousand-Year Soul Beast instead. Reward: high-grade Profound Tier combat technique (a combat technique from Yao Lao's Storage Ring).]

[Option Three: Choose a Hundred-Year Soul Beast. Reward: Yellow Tier combat technique (a combat technique of the Xiao Clan).]

After seeing this, Xiao Changge understood. Naturally, he had to choose the most powerful Earth Tier combat technique. There was no other way now. For the sake of an Earth Tier combat technique, he could only risk it all.

"Teacher, I choose to hunt a Ten-Thousand-Year Soul Beast with you and obtain a Ten-Thousand-Year Soul Ring. People always have to take a gamble. There is no other way now. For revenge, for the sake of reclaiming everything I have lost, suffering a little is nothing."

Xiao Changge had no choice now. He could only obtain the Earth Tier combat technique, Flame Splitting Wave Ruler, by hunting a Ten-Thousand-Year Soul Beast with Electrolux. There truly was no other way. Once he obtained this combat technique, his power and strength would rise by a great deal. This combat technique was genuinely formidable. Xiao Yan had used it many times.

Even Flame Emperor Xiao Yan had praised this combat technique. It was extremely practical!

"Then let us hunt a Ten-Thousand-Year Soul Beast now. This Holy Necromancer can still fight, so rest assured. Besides, I have received care from the origin of your Martial Soul and have already recovered somewhat."

Electrolux recalled that the reason he had entered Xiao Changge's mind was because Xiao Changge had awakened his Martial Soul.