Rem

With a sweep of his right hand, Bai Xiao scattered the flames from the fireball in every direction. In an instant, they burned away the beast blood on the ground, though they also scorched some plants, leaving a bare patch of earth.

Bai Xiao pulled out a piece of turf from behind him and laid it directly over the spot.

Don't overthink it. The turf Bai Xiao had just taken out was his "Bai's No. 2 Invisibility Cloak." There were heaps upon heaps of grass seeds in the forest anyway, so gathering them was no hardship at all. Bai Xiao had made dozens of them in one go.

Good heavens, that night, after Bai Xiao harvested the finished cloaks, an entire patch of forest floor had been stripped bare. Bai Xiao guessed the herbivores that came by must have been utterly dumbfounded, like humans stumbling upon crop circles.

"Which bastard was so hungry? Like it hadn't eaten since the day it was born! One beast actually gnawed an entire patch of forest bare. If it could climb trees, it probably would've eaten every leaf too!" A group of Soul Beasts vented furiously.

Bai Xiao felt not the slightest guilt. Blue Silver Grass? Wasn't that stuff everywhere? Pulling out a little couldn't possibly be too much.

What Bai Xiao did not know was that herbivores all had territories. The herbivores that had originally lived there—

Because Bai Xiao had plucked every blade of grass from that patch, some had run to other territories to fight, and if they won, they got to eat someone else's grass.

Those who lost could only stare longingly at the leaves overhead, praying that today's meal would fall down sooner.

Bai Xiao carefully used flames to scorch the blood on the rabbit's body, reducing the spread of the bloody smell.

Some of the rabbit's fur was scorched as well, giving off the stench of burnt hair.

As for the source of the flames in Bai Xiao's hand, it naturally came from the innate skills of Bai Xiao's Cell Martial Soul: "Copy," "Paste," and "Evolution."

Over the course of three months, Bai Xiao's stamina had greatly increased after becoming a Soul Master. So, he returned to his old trade. It had to be said—after becoming a Soul Master, looting corpses felt completely different.

With better stamina, he could travel farther, and naturally encountered more corpses. Bai Xiao could feel that the number of corpses he looted each day had averaged five or six times what it used to be.

Besides, all Bai Xiao could get from corpses before had been the scant bits of money and clothing on them. Now, there was much more he could do—for instance, extract their genes!

Bai Xiao discovered that just as he had been able to extract the genes of Blue Silver Grass after Assimilating it, the Cell Martial Soul could likewise extract a corpse's genes after Assimilating its cells, and could transform the Cell Martial Soul into those cells!

During this time, he had looted plenty of corpses: Soul Beasts, Soul Masters, and ordinary people.

Bai Xiao recorded all of their DNA with his Cell Martial Soul.

While experimenting with his Martial Soul, Bai Xiao discovered that he could actually control flames. More accurately, Bai Xiao could make the Cell Martial Soul generate the specific organs of Soul Beasts.

Just as the Flame Lion King sprayed flames through glands in its mouth, and the Red-Patterned Boar released fiery patterns through the pores on its back.

These were innate physiological abilities of Soul Beasts, relying on special soul power organs.

Bai Xiao could make his Martial Soul completely transform into those Soul Beasts, so naturally, he could transform it into those special soul power organs as well.

The core of the fireball in Bai Xiao's hand was naturally a special Soul Beast organ transformed by his Martial Soul.

Bai Xiao transformed the flame-producing organs of several fire-element Soul Beasts and studied their mechanisms in detail.

In the end, Bai Xiao selected the best among them, choosing the most efficient structure. After further modifications, he raised its efficiency severalfold before finalizing it.

But if Bai Xiao could obtain something better in the future, he would definitely replace the organ inside the fireball's core. As his methods were upgraded step by step, they would only grow stronger and stronger.

However, as the number of recorded genes continued to increase, Bai Xiao found organizing all that data increasingly troublesome. The gene bank was far too vast and chaotic.

So Bai Xiao embarked on a mad plan: "Create a system inside his brain."

The brain could be regarded as a kind of computer. Computers connected through circuits, while the brain connected through neural synapses, with nerve impulses serving as signals. Some fantasy works on Blue Star featured people inputting their consciousness into computers as data—the so-called "brain-computer interface."

Bai Xiao tried using his Cell Martial Soul to create a "System Assistant" inside his brain—and somehow, he actually succeeded!!

Even Bai Xiao himself could not figure out how he had done it. The brain of a Carbon-Based Life had actually created a Silicon-Based Life, as though Bai Xiao himself had always been a Silicon-Based Life...

He could use it to handle certain matters and simplify his work.

Bai Xiao silently said in his mind, "Rem, bring up the Soul Beast genes I stored."

"Master, there are currently nineteen types of Soul Beast genes related to flames. All have been brought up for you."

An ethereal young girl's voice replied in Bai Xiao's mind.

"Who doesn't have a little sister these days?" Bai Xiao said with a smile.

Rem's calculations were based on Bai Xiao's brain and memories. She could draw upon the knowledge and memories in his mind, automatically classify and organize the genes stored by Bai Xiao's Martial Soul, and even record Bai Xiao's routes...

Up to this point, Bai Xiao had not studied knowledge regarding the different types of Soul Beasts. His current judgments of Soul Beasts all came from the experience he had accumulated himself.

The advantage was that Bai Xiao's experience could be effectively applied in actual combat. The disadvantage was that he could not categorize Soul Beasts systematically.

After three months of cultivation, Bai Xiao finally reached level ten soul power, which also meant that he could finally absorb his first Soul Ring.

The first Soul Ring Bai Xiao had chosen for himself would be a plant-type Soul Ring.

Plant-type Soul Rings possessed powerful vitality. They could enhance the proliferative ability of Bai Xiao's Cell Martial Soul, and there was also a strong possibility that they would increase Bai Xiao's control over plants.

By planting modified plants over a large area, Bai Xiao could assist his own cultivation and even provide or strengthen his "False Domain" in battle.

Most of the plants where Bai Xiao currently was were products of his modification. They possessed stronger competitive abilities than ordinary plants, such as shorter growth cycles, greater absorption ability, and higher seed production.

Within a month, they had rapidly gained a foothold in the forest.

Drawing a circle with Bai Xiao's current location as the center and a radius of one thousand meters, nearly everything within it was Bai Xiao's "False Domain."*

Bai Xiao could control plants to conceal his scent and scout for dangers around him.

In battle, they could all sense the surrounding environment as though they were extensions of Bai Xiao's own body. Bai Xiao could even modify certain plants into traps.

Within this "False Domain," Bai Xiao dared say that he had a chance to kill any Soul Beast under a thousand years old or any Soul Master below level thirty! Of course, as long as there were not too many of them.