"Awake? Pack up. We're leaving."
Bing Yekong paused. "Where to?"
"The Far North." Shui Qingrou rolled up the map and tucked it into the storage pouch at her waist. "You're stuck at the level-seventy bottleneck. Without your seventh Soul Ring, you won't be able to continue down the road ahead. Yang Wudi, Elder Dugu, and I discussed it. While the weather is good these next few days, we'll take you to hunt a Hundred-Thousand-Year Soul Beast."
"A hundred thousand years?"
"Your sixth ring was already a hundred thousand years. Would a fifty- or sixty-thousand-year seventh ring be remotely fitting?" Shui Qingrou glanced at him, her tone leaving no room for argument. "Setting aside the Ice Dragon King Martial Soul for now, the Heavenly Frost Sword possesses Ultimate Ice. Only ice-element Soul Beasts from the Far North are worthy of becoming its seventh ring. One hundred thousand years is the minimum. Ideally, it should be a true ice-element overlord."
Bing Yekong fell silent for a moment, then nodded.
He did not refuse. The level-seventy bottleneck truly was unbearably stifling. Whenever his Soul Power circulated through his body, he always felt as though something was missing—like a barrel filled to the brim with water but lacking a lid. Any more, and it would overflow.
The seventh Soul Ring was the key to a qualitative transformation. The difference between a Soul Saint and a Soul Emperor was not merely an increase in Soul Power Level, but the awakening of the Martial Soul Avatar.
Seeing him agree, Shui Qingrou turned and headed outside the courtyard. "Gather at the east gate in half an hour. Yang Wudi and Dugu Bo are already waiting there."
Half an hour later, Bing Yekong had changed into a thick white robe meant to ward off the cold, slung a