Late at night, Li Hanqiu sat alone beneath a lamp, a Soul Beast illustrated guide spread before him and a cup of cold tea beside it.
Luo Sanpao lay curled at his feet, dozing with half-closed eyes.
He picked up his brush and, after much deliberation, slowly wrote three lines on the paper.
They described his current three soul skills.
First soul skill: Thunderlight Fang.
An offensive soul skill. When activated, Luo Sanpao spat a beam of golden lightning that exploded upon contact with an enemy and inflicted paralysis. [Obtained from a six-hundred-year-old Dawnlight Thunder Lizard.]
Second soul skill: Holy Light Breath.
Primarily an offensive soul skill, with purification and binding effects. When activated, Luo Sanpao unleashed a milky-white torrent of holy light from his mouth.
The holy light could scorch evil entities and briefly bind a target, preventing movement. [Obtained from an eight-hundred-and-ninety-year-old Holy Radiance White Lizard Dragon.]
Third soul skill: Radiant Dragon Skimming the Sky.
This third soul skill was Li Hanqiu's ace in the hole.
When activated, it could stir the dormant Radiant Sacred Dragon bloodline within Luo Sanpao, cloaking him in gilded wings of light as his entire body became a streak of radiance that swept forward.
It allowed short-distance flight at tremendous speed, and the distortion of light and shadow could conceal his form. The moment he struck his target, holy-light dragon power erupted with a thunderous blast.
[Obtained from a two-thousand-eight-hundred-year-old Brightlight Winged Dragon.]
Li Hanqiu read through his first three soul skills from beginning to end, over and over.
After a long while, his brows drew together slightly. He tapped his brush against the blank paper and wrote two words in a neat hand: lacking defense.
"My offense is decent, my ability to purify evil is quite strong, and my mobility goes without saying," Li Hanqiu murmured, before changing tack. "But a defensive soul skill is what I'm sorely lacking right now."
Over the past year, he had deliberately held off on seeking his fourth Soul Ring while considering which broad category his fourth soul skill should specialize in.
Soul Masters could broadly be divided into six major categories, and soul skills naturally fell into the same six categories:
Power attack, defense, control, agility attack, support, and special (mental abilities, curses, domains, transformations, and so on all belonged to the special category).
In his current battles, Li Hanqiu could rely on his high soul power level to defeat most opponents within a few moves, so his lack of defense had yet to become obvious.
But what about later? Once he entered the true world of Soul Masters and encountered veterans of a hundred battles or exceptionally gifted young geniuses?
His poor defense would become an even greater weakness, eventually leading to defeat.
Thus, Li Hanqiu's fourth soul skill had to make up for his lack of defense.
Li Hanqiu opened the illustrated guide, his finger moving across one page after another.
Every entry that caught his eye shared the same words: sub-dragon bloodline.
His Luo Sanpao had now attained a true dragon bloodline, and evolving into a Radiant Sacred Dragon was only a matter of time. Giving him the Soul Ring of an ordinary Soul Beast would simply squander his quality.
If he was going to choose a Soul Ring, he had to choose the most suitable one.
Half an incense stick's worth of time passed before Li Hanqiu stopped at a particular page.
It was an entry for the outskirts of the Star Dou Great Forest, depicting a reptilian Soul Beast covered entirely in scales, with a small annotation beside it:
Sturdy-Armored Light Earth Dragon: a Sub-Dragon Soul Beast with dual earth and light attributes. Its body is covered in thick holy-light dragon scales. It possesses exceptionally strong innate defenses, while its holy light can purify evil entities and toxins.
Li Hanqiu studied it for a while, twirling his brush between his fingers. After repeated consideration, he still drew an "×" above "Sturdy-Armored Light Earth Dragon."
It had both dragon and light attributes, but unfortunately, they were impure, mixed with an "earth attribute." That was undoubtedly a blemish.
It was not unsuitable for Li Hanqiu's fourth soul skill; it simply fell a little short.
Li Hanqiu patiently continued browsing, focusing on Soul Beasts with "dragon" and "light" attributes.
The farther he went in this illustrated guide, the stronger the Soul Beasts became, and the deeper their habitats lay within the Star Dou Great Forest.
There were even a few thousand-year-old "sub-dragon species" that dared to live in territory occupied by ten-thousand-year Soul Beasts.
That was undoubtedly a major problem.
The deeper he ventured into the Star Dou Great Forest, the older and more powerful the Soul Beasts dwelling there would be. For a level-forty Soul Master like him, venturing in alone posed a considerable risk.
Yet Li Hanqiu still had no intention of changing his mind.
"I absolutely cannot choose my fourth soul skill carelessly!" He raised his brush and wrote beneath "defense": dragon blood takes priority.
Then his brush paused, and he started a new line on the back of the paper.
[Drawbacks of an external martial soul: cannot perform "Martial Soul Possession," lacks the powerful physique enjoyed by Beast Martial Soul Masters, and leaves the host far too vulnerable.]
The greatest drawback of an external martial soul had never been the martial soul itself, but its host.
Luo Sanpao could hold his own and possessed formidable combat strength. But the very fact that he fought outside Li Hanqiu's body meant Li Hanqiu himself was a glaring weakness.
Ultimately, his body was merely that of a level-forty Soul Master, far inferior to a Battle Soul Master of the same level using "Martial Soul Possession."
If an enemy bypassed Luo Sanpao, refused to trade blows with him, and charged straight at Li Hanqiu instead...
Was Li Hanqiu supposed to block them with his head?
Up ahead, Luo Sanpao would be opening his mouth, lightning surging forth and holy light rolling in mighty waves, beating the enemy until they pissed themselves. What an imposing sight!
Then he would turn around.
Well, his own master had been beaten flat and was waving a little white flag in surrender. Tell me that wasn't ridiculous!
At that thought, Li Hanqiu set down his brush and rubbed between his brows.
Throughout his journey, obtaining True Dragon's Blood, raising Luo Sanpao's quality, cultivating soul marks, and increasing his soul power reserves had all, at their core, been about adding bricks and mortar to his "martial soul."
But when it came to strengthening the host himself, Li Hanqiu had yet to find a suitable path.
Tempering his body with whale rubber could only count as foundational work.
To truly address his own physical vulnerability, he needed another solution.
Perhaps there was a method specifically for tempering the body, or some immortal herb capable of strengthening his physique.
Or perhaps, once his soul power rose another few levels, the dragon blood Luo Sanpao fed back to him might gradually improve his constitution.
But those were all merely Li Hanqiu's conjectures. He could not say what the future would actually hold.
Resolving the drawbacks of an external martial soul was not something he could rush. He would have to search for a solution gradually.
He blew on the still-wet ink, folded the sheet, and tucked it into the illustrated guide.
"For now, there's no solution to my physical vulnerability," he murmured. "But I should obtain my fourth Soul Ring first. It won't be too late to make further plans afterward."
Before Li Hanqiu had finished speaking...
Four extremely faint knocks suddenly sounded from outside.
The knocking was very quiet. Had the academy not been deserted and the night so still, Li Hanqiu would barely have heard it.
As the door was softly tapped, Li Hanqiu's gaze sharpened. Alarm stirred in his heart. He had long since grown accustomed to maintaining soul power perception within ten meters of himself.
Yet he had completely failed to detect anyone approaching the door. The visitor's soul power level was far beyond the reach of his perception.
And who would come looking for him at this hour?
Luo Sanpao's ears suddenly pricked up. A low "grrr" rolled from his throat, and his fur stood on end, each hair like a steel nail.
The lamp wick crackled with a "pop," and man and dog alike stared nervously at the door.
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