Soul Spirit Contract

As she landed, Lin Mo finished inscribing the formation on the ground.

"Is this what that soul spirit contract needs? Just drawing some pictures on the ground?"

Unable to make sense of any of it, the Ice Empress asked in confusion.

"Yes, but that's not all. Power has to be infused into it too. Next, Ice Empress, you and Little Yao should stand in the large and small circles respectively. Then relax your minds. Relax, and don't resist at all."

The Ice Empress had never been a timid, fussy person... or beast.

With a light leap, she entered the larger formation.

Standing outside, she hadn't sensed anything unusual about the formation at all. But once she was actually inside the circle, she inexplicably sensed something boundless, as though power was gathering.

That unknown power, which she could nevertheless sense clearly, instinctively stirred a trace of wariness and fear in her.

Huo Yuyao was the complete opposite. She wasn't nervous in the slightest. Although she sensed that unusual power too, she felt no fear, for one simple reason.

Trust.

She believed her brother would never hurt her.

"Don't worry. This power won't hurt you. But you must open your minds completely, or the contract ritual will be interrupted."

As the one presiding over the ritual, Lin Mo naturally sensed the Ice Empress's wariness and hurried to reassure her.

After readjusting her state of mind, the Ice Empress nodded to him.

Once everything was ready, Lin Mo called to his teacher in his Sea of Consciousness.

"Teacher, everything is ready. Are you free?"

"Yes."

Electrolux replied with only a quiet "yes."

The next instant, gray energy began to emerge continuously behind Lin Mo.

A dense aura of death and its complete opposite, an aura of life, surged and collided behind him, finally coalescing into a spiritual body.

Light silver hair danced in the air with the fluctuations of energy as Electrolux's features emerged. His face was exceptionally handsome, with pale skin, slender brows, and gray-gold eyes that held an air of detachment and the weariness of ages.

He wore a gray robe with golden runes flowing across it, and tightly gripped a staff whose black, white, and gold patterns spiraled around one another.

At the tip of the staff sat a white skull-shaped crystal. Gray flames burned in its eye sockets, while ornate, twin-spiked decorations extended from either side.

The Sky Dream Ice Silkworm was so stunned at the sight of Electrolux that he could barely speak. This was his first time seeing Electrolux unleash his power.

The tremendous disturbance made even the Ice Empress, who had already closed her eyes, open them again. Huo Yuyao did the same.

"You... you're?!"

Watching power that had completely transcended the realm of spiritual power surge through the air, the Ice Empress, a four-hundred-thousand-year soul beast, realized within moments what level of expert this soul before her truly was.

"A god?"

"Wow, what a cool staff!"

Huo Yuyao's attention always landed in the most unexpected places.

"H-hello, Elder Yi."

"Hello, Elder Yi."

After witnessing Electrolux's entrance, the Sky Dream Ice Silkworm couldn't help lowering his head in greeting.

Lin Mo found Tian Meng's reaction rather amusing. After all, the Tian Meng in the original story had never cared how powerful Electrolux was. His attitude had been: no matter how strong you are, I'll curse you out just the same.

Yet this feminized version of Tian Meng was particularly polite, even though his usual personality was no different from the previous Tian Meng's, with the same fondness for mischief and jokes.

Huo Yuyao bowed politely. Elder Yi glanced at them, merely nodded, and replied with a quiet "mm."

"Let me introduce myself first, little scorpion. I am the Holy Necromancer, the Undead Calamity, Electrolux. You may call me Elder Yi, as they do."

"Elder Yi."

Electrolux began waving his staff.

"Next, I will initiate the soul spirit contract for you both. Think of nothing, relax your minds, and do not resist."

"Yes."

"Yes."

As a gray-black glow rose from the staff in Electrolux's hand, the formations beneath the human and beast lit up as well.

The Ice Jade Emperor Scorpion's body first trembled slightly. Then emerald-green ripples radiated from her entire body and surged toward Huo Yuyao.

Guided by the formation, that vast spiritual power gradually flowed into Huo Yuyao's body. Furthermore, the soul spirit contract required a considerable amount of power at the outset.

Electrolux drew together the pure ice elements between heaven and earth, sending them into the formation as well.

With that raging power coupled with such pure Ice Element energy, the Ice Empress noticed her cultivation steadily climbing.

Meanwhile, as the Ice Empress's soul power and spiritual power settled into Huo Yuyao's Sea of Consciousness, emerald green enveloped it. The Extreme Cold Power churned ceaselessly, while emerald spiritual power wove the Ice Empress's figure in the air above the sea.

"This is wonderful, wonderful! Bingbing is about to become my roommate too!"

Hidden within the Sea of Consciousness, the Sky Dream Ice Silkworm wriggled his true body as he spoke, all the while repairing the sea, which had become somewhat unstable under the tremendous power.

After some time, the entire Sea of Consciousness gradually stabilized, and the Ice Empress successfully entered it. Sensing her own energy, she let out a long breath, then looked at Huo Yuyao.

"Little Yao, I'll call you that from now on. After all, we're grasshoppers tied to the same string now."

"All right, Ice Empress."

Huo Yuyao spoke somewhat awkwardly.

"You should know that a hundred-thousand-year soul beast will always yield a soul bone. Normally, I should have produced a three-hundred-and-ninety-thousand-year soul bone for you. But thanks to Elder Yi's help, I have now successfully crossed the four-hundred-thousand-year threshold. In other words, I'll produce a four-hundred-thousand-year soul bone for you. I intend to condense a torso bone. After all, skull bones and torso bones are the hardest to come by, and you may not find a better soul bone in the future, so I'll condense one for you first."

Listening to the Ice Empress's explanation, Huo Yuyao felt both excited and delighted.

"All right! Thank you, Ice Empress!"

"No need to thank me. As I said, we're grasshoppers tied to the same string now. Naturally, I'll help you pursue the best."

"A torso bone from a four-hundred-thousand-year ferocious beast-Little Yao, you're probably the only person on the continent who has one."

"Hehe, thank you all so, so much! I'll work hard. I won't let you down!"

At the sight of Huo Yuyao brimming with confidence, the Ice Empress burst into laughter.

"All right, hurry and absorb the soul bone's power. This soul bone should give you two soul skills, which are also my strongest soul skills."

"Mm!"

Outside, the soul spirit contract ritual had already ended. Huo Yuyao remained seated cross-legged, absorbing the torso bone the Ice Empress had given her.

"Come to think of it, my martial soul doesn't need to absorb soul rings. What am I supposed to do about soul bones?"

"Hm?"

"After all, whatever soul bones I get in the future, they'll have to make up a top-tier set. But normally, ten-thousand-year or hundred-thousand-year soul bones are absorbed together with their soul rings, since that's how you bring out a soul bone's full potential. So soul bones really do seem to be a bit of a problem for me."

"After all, you need neither to absorb soul spirits nor to hunt for soul rings."

"Exactly. Hunting soul beasts just for their soul bones would be downright beastly."

Outside, Electrolux and Lin Mo chatted idly as they waited for the final result.

"You seem to care a great deal about soul beasts, Little Mo."

Having learned about this world, Electrolux naturally knew that the conflict between humans and soul beasts was difficult to reconcile.

He had also noticed that, while researching the soul spirit contract with him, his disciple had constantly sought a point of balance between the two sides.

"I just think soul beasts and humans might be able to find a balance. After all, if soul beasts disappear, soul masters will naturally disappear too."

Electrolux gave Lin Mo a long, searching look but said nothing further.

Time ticked by. Finding little of interest, Electrolux returned directly to Lin Mo's Sea of Consciousness.

A full half hour passed, and even Lin Mo was growing bored with waiting.

But just then, a faint wave of air spread outward from Huo Yuyao.

Slight though the disturbance was, Lin Mo still caught it. He hurriedly turned to look at Huo Yuyao, who sat cross-legged in the center of the formation.

Just as he turned, another wave of air spread from her body. This time, however, he could clearly feel an aura of extreme cold beginning to swell.

The waves grew stronger and stronger, changing from the initially invisible currents into emerald-green surges, their force rising without cease.

"N-no, this ain't right!"

Seeing the situation grow increasingly outrageous, he realized that if he stayed here any longer, he might drop dead on the spot.

Unfortunately, by the time he realized all this, it was already too late.

Huo Yuyao's body was enveloped in green light. In an instant, an emerald beam rose from the ground and shot straight into the clouds.

The terrifying blast hurled Lin Mo two li away.

"Waaahhh!"

Unlike Lin Mo, who had been forcibly flung away by the blast, Huo Yuyao floated into the air upon the pillar of light.

Light enveloped the girl's body. As the green pillar slowly faded, she abruptly opened her eyes. Her once azure-blue irises had turned emerald green.

On her fair, delicate back, a scorpion that sprawled across its entirety shone with blood-red light.

The girl landed steadily on the ground. Her presence was no longer as sweet and shy as before, but cold and haughty instead.

A blood-red soul ring emerged beneath her feet. One, two, then three golden markings were imprinted upon it in succession.

A few dozen seconds after the third golden marking finished forming, a fourth slowly appeared.

A four-hundred-thousand-year soul ring.

The contract was complete.

Sensing the energy dissipate, Lin Mo, who had nearly been buried in the snow, scrambled to his feet.

"Ugh, damn it. I-I feel like I almost got buried."

He stood back up, shook his head, and looked toward the girl standing in the snow not far away. The light surrounding her was slowly fading too.

As though noticing his gaze, the emerald light in the girl's eyes flashed and vanished. Then she turned back excitedly, waving at him and calling out.

"Brother Xiao Mo, I did it!"

As she spoke, the girl ran toward him. Although she herself felt nothing unusual...

"Y-you idiot! Y-your clothes!"

Lin Mo covered his eyes as he spoke.

"Clothes?"

Having gained her second martial soul, the Ice Jade Emperor Scorpion, she no longer felt cold. Coupled with her overwhelming excitement, that had kept her from noticing anything wrong with her appearance.

"Little Yao!"

"Honestly, you idiot!"

The Sky Dream Ice Silkworm and the Ice Empress flew out of the Sea of Consciousness one after the other, one as a humanoid spiritual body and the other as a humanoid soul spirit, blocking the space between the two.

"Aaahhh!"

With his eyes covered, Lin Mo heard only the girl's mortified shriek from nearby.

"Hm? What happened? Did something go wrong with the contract?"

Electrolux had returned to his Life-and-Death Fragment earlier to conduct new research. Feeling that about enough time had passed, he came out to check. The moment he left his Life-and-Death Fragment and entered Lin Mo's Sea of Consciousness, he noticed Lin Mo's embarrassment and heard a scream.

"N-no, it's nothing, Teacher!"

Lin Mo's rare stammering and embarrassment piqued Electrolux's curiosity. Then he noticed Huo Yuyao emerging from behind the two soul beasts. The only difference was that the girl's clothes had changed.

At the sight, Electrolux more or less understood the cause and gave a helpless, wry smile.

"The powerful soul power must have shattered her clothes during absorption. Little Mo, you've lived two lives, yet your reaction is far too exaggerated."

"W-what am I supposed to do? Even in my previous life, I only lived to twenty. I was still a student back home. There's no way I'd have seen anything like this."

Lin Mo spoke in embarrassment, then stopped paying attention to Electrolux's faint smile.

"B-Brother Xiao Mo... d-did you see anything just now?"

Walking up beside Lin Mo, Huo Yuyao's little face was flushed red. For a moment, she didn't know what to say. Even though she had asked the question herself, she still felt unbearably embarrassed.

Lin Mo was hardly any better. At the question, he instinctively denied it.

"No, no, no. I didn't see anything."

"Uuuh..."

Huo Yuyao let out an intensely embarrassed whimper at those words. Yet as her pitiful eyes gazed at Lin Mo, they held not only embarrassment, but a trace of another emotion as well.

Wanting to dispel the awkward atmosphere as quickly as possible, Lin Mo thought it over and decided that changing the subject was still the best solution.

He looked at the Ice Empress and asked.

"How do you feel? Your current body should count as a physical body, rather than a spiritual one."

"Yes. Thank you and your teacher very much for providing this method. It's truly incredible. I never imagined humans had already developed such a miraculous method."

"That's good."

As Lin Mo replied, he noticed the faintly forlorn expression on the Sky Dream Ice Silkworm's face beside her.