Deep winter had arrived. Riding the wind, the bitter frost roared and whirled through the air, while goose-feather flakes of snow drifted down from above, beautiful and cold.
No one liked lingering outdoors in weather like this. Only an old man in white-and-gold robes, with snowy hair and beard and a kindly face, walked slowly up a small mountain shaped like a leaping tiger, leaving a shallow trail of footprints.
In the blink of an eye, the old man who should have stopped halfway up was already standing at the summit of Tiger Leap Mountain, looking down at the little village below, where only a few lamps still glimmered.
"Cross this mountain, then head northeast for another few hundred kilometers, and I'll reach Four Elements City."
Having switched back into his kindly-grandfather guise, Qian Chongling studied the map in his hands and muttered to himself, his sharp eyes gleaming. Suddenly, his brows furrowed. He raised his head and looked toward the village below, his expression solemn and murderous.
"No matter how many times I encounter this aura, it still makes me sick. Damned scum!"
Tiger Leap Village was a small settlement outside Four Elements City, within the Heaven Dou Empire. It took its name from the mountain shaped like a leaping tiger behind it, thus escaping a certain naming curse.
Its population was small, with seventy or eighty households and several hundred residents. The villagers' martial souls were mostly hoes, sickles, and the like, and they made their living through farming.
But just three days earlier, a child from one of those households had undergone martial soul awakening. The child possessed a mutated martial soul-an icicle mutated from a water droplet-with level-five innate soul power!
It was truly a golden phoenix rising from a nest of straw. The simple villagers began celebrating, inviting travelers passing through to join them. Yet this innocent gesture brought disaster down upon their heads.
At that moment, inside a small house in the northwest of Tiger Leap Village, a sinister-looking middle-aged man with bloodred eyes leered at a little girl who had just turned six, dressed in coarse hemp clothing. Beside them lay a shriveled middle-aged couple, long since stripped of all signs of life.
Having watched her parents' blood drained dry before her very eyes, the little girl stared vacantly, terrified beyond reason. The sight had cast a deep shadow over her young heart.
She was too young to understand why the kindly uncle she had met during the day had become a bloodred devil at night.
The sinister-looking middle-aged man, Wang Liao, approached the girl step by step, muttering to himself, "The appetizers are finished. Now for the main course!"
His greatest pleasure was draining young children with decent talent. They had no ability to resist, and they could even improve his own talent a little. In short, low risk, high returns.
Suddenly, a series of knocks sounded at the door. Wang Liao halted and involuntarily turned to look toward the entrance nearby.
Without waiting for the owner's permission, Qian Chongling pushed open the door. Naked killing intent filled his icy eyes, yet the corners of his mouth curved into a faint smile as he said:
"Well now, esteemed Evil Soul Master, I've come calling late at night without bringing a gift. To avoid being discourteous, how about I draw you a clock?"
At those words, Wang Liao's face instantly darkened. He wanted to hack this old man into eight pieces. That mouth in particular-he intended to sew it shut with a needle and thread.
"Old bastard, I hope your blood doesn't stink as badly as your mouth!"
At the same time, blood-black light began spreading from Wang Liao's body. A black-and-red shadow emerged behind him, and six soul rings appeared one after another: white, yellow, purple, purple, black, black.
Without the slightest hesitation, Wang Liao's sixth soul ring blazed with light. His opening move was his sixth soul skill, Blood Feast the World!
A streak of bloodred light shot toward Qian Chongling like lightning! Before the attack reached him, its nauseating aura had already washed over his face!
Expressionless, Qian Chongling gave a cold snort. An utterly terrifying pressure suddenly erupted from him and soared into the heavens! In that instant, Wang Liao's so-called sixth soul skill was scattered outright, vanishing without a trace.
Wang Liao was horrified. To destroy his strongest sixth soul skill through sheer pressure alone, this man had to be a Titled Douluo at the very least!
His own guide was a level-eighty-three Soul Douluo, yet even that Soul Douluo's pressure was nowhere near as terrifying as this old man's.
With his hands clasped behind his back, Qian Chongling approached Wang Liao step by step, wearing a cold smile. With every step, a soul ring rose from beneath his feet. The very first was black!
After nine steps, nine soul rings appeared before Wang Liao: black, black, black, black, red, red, red, red, red. Wang Liao looked as though he had seen a ghost. A Titled Douluo who defied all common sense like this was beyond anything he could imagine.
"Honored Ex-" Wang Liao had barely opened his mouth before Qian Chongling interrupted him.
A faint light appeared on Qian Chongling's right index finger. With a light flick, he sent it toward the little girl, rendering her unconscious. Then he spoke coldly, without a shred of emotion.
"When it comes to Evil Soul Masters, I have always ground every inch of their flesh and blood to dust, torn out their souls, and burned them with the Chaos Flame for seven times seven-forty-nine days! I let them die slowly amid endless despair and agony!"
"Don't dream of talking your way out of this. In my eyes, your entire body reeks of resentment. The souls of nearly a hundred people who died miserable deaths at your hands keep letting out furious wails behind you!"
Indeed, in Qian Chongling's eyes, Evil Soul Masters were mere things, unworthy of being called people. Even soul beasts were nobler than such scum. Alive, they wasted air; dead, they polluted the earth.
What was an Evil Soul Master? A Soul Master who willingly sank into depravity because of personal reasons or their martial soul, committing acts utterly devoid of conscience. Such people were called Evil Soul Masters.
Those unconscionable acts included, but were not limited to, drinking human blood, eating human flesh, and cracking bones to suck out the marrow, with a particular fondness for unborn children still in the womb.
How could anyone who behaved like that be called human? They were worse than beasts!
Among the forces that fought Evil Soul Masters, Spirit Hall was the most renowned. Its policy toward Soul Masters with such evil attributes had always been to kill every one it encountered, forcing those Evil Soul Masters to hide in dark corners and cling to their miserable lives. Otherwise, they would face groups of Soul Douluos, or even Titled Douluos, sent to punish them.
When Qian Chongling served as Pope, his policies toward Evil Soul Masters were even bloodier.
Anyone who harbored an Evil Soul Master was to be buried alive on the spot!
Anyone who knew but failed to report it was to be buried alive on the spot!
Any family member of an Evil Soul Master older than four was to be killed!
The reason for all this lay in the past. Before he had fully grown into his strength, Qian Chongling, then a Soul King who had just turned eighteen, encountered a Soul Saint-level Evil Soul Master while traveling to gain experience. The Titled Douluo secretly protecting him had been held up by other matters and could not get away.
Had he not befriended Dugu Qingyue, the Dugu Family's eldest daughter, during his travels, Qian Chongling would most likely have died at that Evil Soul Master's hands.
Dugu Qingyue first paralyzed the Soul Saint-level Evil Soul Master with blood poison, then killed him by detonating herself. Afterward, Qian Chongling, consumed by darkness, tortured the other three Soul Emperor-level Evil Soul Masters to death. But because he had lost his senses, his elder brother, Qian Chongguang, took him home and confined him there.
After that incident, Qian Chongling's temperament changed drastically. Not only did he cultivate like a madman, but after ascending to the position of Pope, he inflicted every one of Blue Star's Ten Great Tortures of the Qing Dynasty upon Evil Soul Masters, displaying extreme cold-bloodedness and cruelty.
Thus, he was given the name Blood Pope!
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