Condensing a Soul Core

Spiritual energy still filled the Ice and Fire Yin Yang Well.

"Are you ready?" Jiang Baiyu looked at Dugu Bo, whose face was ruddy and whose aura was stronger than ever.

Beside them, Su Wu had already summoned his martial soul, the Jade-Green Nine-Jointed Bamboo, and stood ready. Since Jiang Baiyu had brought him to the Ice and Fire Yin Yang Well the day before, they had worked without pause to heal Dugu Bo's hidden injuries and strengthen his body, preparing to try the Soul Core method Jiang Baiyu had described.

"Enough talk. I've never felt better," Dugu Bo said bluntly. Ever since he had agreed to try the Soul Core method, Jiang Baiyu had gone to absurd lengths, refining pills to strengthen his body at every opportunity. In just a few days, even the Soul Power barrier he had thought unbreakable had become fragile. If not for the need to keep the experiment stable, he could have broken through at any moment!

"Then please wait a moment." The Shennong Cauldron was filled with water from the Ice and Fire Spirit Springs, and Pill Flame blazed beneath it. "Gather!" At Jiang Baiyu's gesture, several spiritual herbs nearby swayed and released motes of their essence, which he drew toward himself.

"What's that?" Su Wu's brows jumped as he watched the plants Jiang Baiyu had drawn upon.

One herb grew in a crevice beside the cold spring, its body as white as snow. Its supple stem and leaves bore fine silver-white patterns like silkworms nestled among them. It was Snow Silkworm Grass, prized for enhancing mental strength. The amount Jiang Baiyu had just extracted was enough to raise someone's mental strength from a Soul Elder's level to a Soul King's. Yet he was using it to make a pill, and it was far from the only ingredient.

A clump of Frostfire Heart-Stilling Grass grew unchecked. Its stems were slender but tough, and its leaves naturally divided into two contrasting halves, yin and yang. It excelled at steadying a cultivator's turbulent heart meridians and countering both reversed Soul Power and inner demons. It was also ideal for breaking through bottlenecks and stabilizing one's cultivation.

Another plant, a chrysanthemum, possessed the strongest spiritual vitality of all. Its central stamens rose more than half a foot above its petals, their tips shimmering faintly gold. Even the tiny bit of essence it released was pale gold.

Was that... the Singular Velvet Sky Chrysanthemum? Su Wu's eyes widened. He had only ever read of this immortal herb in an incomplete family record.

Then he looked at Jiang Baiyu, who was gathering all those essences into a single cauldron. Is little Baiyu trying to create a god outright? He's sparing no expense. Su Wu could only stare.

The Shennong Cauldron glowed red and blue as it drew in the power of heaven and earth. "Grandpa, help me! I'm running out of Soul Power!" Jiang Baiyu called to Su Wu while carefully watching the ingredients inside.

This boy. Pale-green Soul Power streamed from Su Wu toward Jiang Baiyu, stirring the essence of the surrounding plants. The Medicine Flame inside the cauldron flared at once.

The twin energies of ice and fire entered the cauldron, one yin and one yang. Following Shennong's ancient method, Jiang Baiyu refined the ingredients over a gentle flame, then condensed the pill with fierce heat, leaving only their purest medicinal power.

Before long, the Shennong Cauldron hummed, and the fragrance of the pill filled the air.

"It's done!" Limited by his own Soul Power, Jiang Baiyu had often borrowed Su Wu's to refine pills lately.

A translucent white pill wreathed in faint blue and red light flew from the cauldron. Jiang Baiyu caught it. "The Singular Velvet Sky Chrysanthemum is the primary ingredient, supported by Snow Silkworm Grass, Frostfire Heart-Stilling Grass, and water from the Ice and Fire Spirit Springs. Taking it can forge a nigh-invulnerable body and increase Soul Power. It also strengthens mental power, making Soul Power easier to control."

He handed the pill to Dugu Bo, his eyes burning with anticipation. "Senior, it's time."

Dugu Bo accepted the miraculous pill and looked at Jiang Baiyu, his expression solemn. "Boy, whether this succeeds or not, you've earned my respect. If it works, you'll have no stronger connection than me!"

A fierce resolve flashed deep in his green eyes. Poison had plagued him and his family all his life. It had tormented him for a century and held his cultivation at an impassable bottleneck. Now that he had a chance to rise in a single step, what did he have to fear?

He swallowed the pill. Incredibly pure Soul Power surged through him, rapidly opening his meridians. So much power flooded in that his meridians nearly burst. At the same time, a cool sensation flowed into his mind, giving him finer control over his Soul Power. "Now!" he said.

Jiang Baiyu, who had been watching Dugu Bo closely, pointed a finger. The white petals of the Snow-Colored Swan Kiss trembled. The awakened immortal herb released its essence without restraint, and its invisible, terrifying field of ten-thousandfold poison amplification spread around Dugu Bo before slowly closing in.

The next instant, the Jade Phosphor poison that had lain dormant in Dugu Bo's body for a hundred years erupted!

Under the Snow-Colored Swan Kiss's extraordinary power, the dormant poison multiplied without limit: once, tenfold, a hundredfold, a thousandfold, ten thousandfold!

Billowing dark-green poison mist burst from his pores and the gaps in his meridians and bones. Toxic light blazed around him, its dreadful pressure setting the spiritual energy throughout the Ice and Fire Valley trembling. The poisonous Soul Power in Dugu Bo's body swelled at a near-maddening pace. What had once been a thin, gaseous current filled out, pressed together, piled upon itself, and condensed.

Dugu Bo felt his whole body swell and go numb. He recalled the key to the Soul Core method Jiang Baiyu had taught him and relied on the resilience of his newly strengthened meridians.

Vast quantities of gaseous poisonous Soul Power compressed layer upon layer, growing ever denser. Within a few breaths, the roiling poison shed its gaseous form and became a thick, heavy liquid spring that flowed without end. A pool of dark-green poison formed in his dantian, vast and potent beyond anything his hundred years of bitter cultivation had ever achieved.

When the poison had fully liquefied and was nearly solid, the old poison core he had formed deep in his chest during an early transformation of his martial soul sank into the pool on the current of liquid poison. Dugu Bo's gaze hardened. He drove his Soul Power into the old core and detonated it. It instantly became pure Soul Power, which the Snow-Colored Swan Kiss amplified in turn. As that power joined the liquid poison, its purity brought the pool even closer to solidifying.

"Now!" Dugu Bo's eyes blazed.

His eyes snapped open, sharp light bursting from them. The entire pool of liquid poison spun furiously, compressing and solidifying. Sensing Dugu Bo's sudden surge of Soul Power, Jiang Baiyu guided the yin and yang energies of the Ice and Fire Yin Yang Well toward him. It was time for the second step in forming a Soul Core: comprehending the laws of heaven and earth!

At his side, Su Wu gathered his pure plant-aspected Soul Power and sent it toward Dugu Bo as well.

Dugu Bo already possessed a head soul bone, and with Jiang Baiyu's help, his mental strength had grown immensely. He slowly drew his now-solid Soul Power together into a Soul Core. As he sensed the power of heaven and earth that Jiang Baiyu sent him, the core kept spinning, compressing, and condensing!

At the life-or-death instant when the Soul Core was about to form and most likely to collapse, a vast consciousness descended. It was the primordial consciousness of Douluo Star. A gentle yet irresistible force brushed across Dugu Bo's Soul Power, sealing the poison that had run wild and instantly calming his turbulent energy. The power of heaven and earth swept away the danger of the Soul Core's collapse.

His Soul Power compressed to its limit!

His aura condensed to its limit!

His essence became pure to its limit!

Dugu Bo's mind cleared, and the world before his eyes changed. Controlling his Soul Power became effortless. Within his dantian, a pure and mighty poison-aspected Soul Core spun without pause. Translucent dark green, it held boundless truths of the poison path within, while a yin-yang sheen flowed across it. With every rotation, his Soul Power grew stronger.

A poison-aspected Soul Core—the first Soul Core on Douluo Continent—had formed!

At the same time, the Soul Power within Dugu Bo surged!

Level 91! Level 92! His Soul Power shot upward until it reached level 95, placing him among the Super Douluo!

In a single breakthrough, the venomous snake became a dragon!