Soul Crystal

For now, he would treat the Little Black Fur Ball as a kind of demon.

Then, unknown consciousness fragments equaled inherited memories of the Demon Race's bloodline.

Unknown energy essence equaled elemental energy that had yet to be converted after absorption.

Unknown biological blood essence equaled the racial bloodline of the Demon Race.

Yin Ming could understand all of that, except for this—Mental Essence.

It should not have appeared among the Scavenger Gourd's extractable options.

"Mental Essence!"

The Scavenger Gourd was merely an innate spiritual treasure with a divine restriction. It could not take in just anything.

For things possessing their own will, they could only be drawn into the gourd after their will had completely given up resisting.

Other than Yin Ming, the Scavenger Gourd's artifact master,

no one else could be taken into the yellow-skinned gourd, even if they trusted Yin Ming one hundred percent.

Resisting control was a creature's instinct. If even that shred of free will was lost, it could no longer be considered a living creature at all!

Take the dead Jeroen Hoven, for example. The yellow-skinned gourd could take in only his soulless body, not his soul.

It was not that the Scavenger Gourd could not extract lifespan, memories, talent, or mental power.

Rather, those things were connected to self-will and could not be drawn into the gourd.

"If the black crystal can extract Mental Essence, that means it contains mental power stripped of self-will."

In the Immortal Path System, humans had three treasures: essence, qi, and spirit.

When the form shed away and only qi and spirit remained, one became a ghost. Ghosts had no roots and dwindled by the day. Yet if one cultivated immortal methods until qi and spirit reached perfection, one could attain the Dao as a Ghost Immortal.

When qi shed away and only spirit remained, it became formless and immaterial, an awareness within the unseen. When the spirit was full and lodged within a magical artifact, one could attain the Dao as a Corpse-Liberation Immortal.

When spirit shed away, it was said that there was still the True Spirit—the self-will without thought, sensation, form, or shape.

Yet the True Spirit could only be perceived by oneself. If only the True Spirit remained, it would have neither thought nor sensation, and was thus regarded as nonexistent.

Therefore, among observable phenomena, when spirit scattered, the True Spirit scattered; when spirit gathered, the True Spirit gathered.

The Blue Star Cultivation World had argued without end over whether the True Spirit truly existed.

"Mental power is practically born alongside self-awareness. How could it possibly be stripped away?"

Yin Ming was especially curious. If he could solve this technical obstacle,

the Scavenger Gourd could extract vast amounts of Mental Essence, greatly accelerating the accumulation of mental power.

[Extract!]

Yin Ming extracted everything valuable from the black crystal.

The crystal sphere serving as its vessel split into four.

One gray Inheritance Memory Crystal the size of a fingertip!

One colorless Mental Essence Crystal the size of a pea!

One black Unknown Energy Crystal the size of a grain of rice.

One Bloodline Crystal the size of a marble, with a dot of crimson at its center.

Yin Ming decided to examine the inherited memories first. Perhaps they contained knowledge he happened to need.

With a crisp crack,

the gray Inheritance Memory Crystal shattered in response!

Yin Ming felt as though he had been placed in a dark, damp basement. Before him stood a Gray-Skinned Giant concealed within the shadows!

It had large ears, enormous eyes, long thin limbs, and only a tuft of hair at the tips of its ears. Its mouth was full of sharp fangs, and an unknown beast hide was wrapped around its body.

Within the Little Black Fur Ball's bloodline lay an absolute belief in submission to the Gray-Skinned Giant.

"My consciousness entered the Little Black Fur Ball's perspective. Converted by proportion into a human perspective, the Gray-Skinned Giant would only be a little runt around one point four or five meters tall."

Yin Ming woke from the images in the inherited memories.

He learned that the Gray-Skinned Giant was not a native creature of this world.

It came from the Abyss: a first-ring dark creature, a Quasit.

It was a low-level demon that lived in the Abyss!

Low-level carried no derogatory meaning, just as human Wizards below the third ring were called low-level Wizards.

In the Abyss, any creature called a "demon" was a powerful extraordinary creature.

Quasits were naturally wary and cowardly, accustomed to hiding in darkness and rarely showing themselves.

The Little Black Fur Ball was a Quasit descendant, tasked with parasitizing humans and collecting chaotic souls that had died by murder for the Quasits.

Within the Little Black Fur Ball's inherited memories, Yin Ming also found the source material for Mental Essence.

[Ritual: Dretch Sacrifice!]

[Offer the chaotic souls of those who died by murder to Abyssal Quasits, and receive Soul Crystals that increase mental power in return.]

The core of the ritual required an item tainted with the aura of the Abyss.

The Quasit blood extracted by the Scavenger Gourd fully met the requirements for the sacrificial ritual.

Yet Yin Ming had no intention of offering sacrifices to the Abyss. Jeroen Hoven's obsession with murder had mostly been influenced by his Quasit bloodline. Quasit descendants fed on Soul Crystals, and the parasitic methods of a first-ring Demonic Beast might not be something an elementary Wizard apprentice could guard against.

Soul Crystals were a specialty of the Abyss. To obtain them, one did not necessarily have to sacrifice to demons; hunting demons was another path.

As for how Soul Crystals were formed in the Abyss?

He estimated that few Abyssal demons knew. At the very least, a first-ring Quasit knew nothing.

"Since Jeroen Hoven is dead anyway, I might as well digest the Mental Essence before going back."

With another crisp crack,

the colorless crystal shattered in response, and a stream of pure mental power spilled forth.

Like a colorless, tasteless drop of water falling into a dark and fathomless ink pool, it was swiftly stained, assimilated, and absorbed.

Yin Ming's mental power limit rose from 10.3 to 11.

He had completed ten percent of the mental power accumulation needed to permanently solidify his second Mental Rune.

Moreover, because this was pure Mental Essence without impurities, its only side effect was that he needed some time to deepen his own imprint upon the mental power.

"..."

The setting sun was like blood!

The sky gradually darkened.

When he walked out of the Magic Beast Forest, Tulip Manor was unusually deserted.

The stonemasons and gardeners building flowerbeds were nowhere to be seen, and the serfs clearing rubble had vanished as well. Tools lay scattered chaotically across the ground, along with a pungent smell of blood.

"Eno, you're still alive?"

The moment Yin Ming returned to Blackstone House, Randy circled him and scrutinized him from head to toe.

It was already dark and past mealtime. The serfs who had not returned were basically doomed.

The two of them had nearly begun mourning for Yin Ming. They had never expected him to return alive!

"I almost didn't make it back. I saw a Magic Beast while hauling stones, so I hid until now before daring to return."

Yin Ming had prepared his excuse long ago. With Jeroen Hoven dead, no one would investigate further anyway.

"Was it a jet-black panther, bigger than a tiger, and unbelievably fast? Four serfs and one guard died at the manor, while more than a dozen others suffered light injuries." Randy said, still shaken.

"Luckily, Young Master Adams Arthur had just returned from the western battlefield. He shot the Magic Beast in the eye with an arrow and scared it away. He's organizing the knights to hunt that panther Magic Beast right now." Jack spoke animatedly as he described the perilous scene.

A Shadow Leopard!

There really was a Magic Beast?

That made his excuse about seeing a Magic Beast all the more credible.

Yin Ming had sat in on Adams Hank's lessons and recognized most common Magic Beasts. After hearing Jack's description, he knew it was an intermediate Magic Beast: a Shadow Leopard.