The Advantages and Disadvantages of Ultimate Attributes

"What did junior brother need to see senior brother about?" Xu Yang asked cautiously.

Seeing Xu Yang's manner, Qian Renxue found it amusing. She thought this senior brother of hers was quite interesting; every time she saw him, he seemed like a different person.

It seemed Xue Qinghe's identity was still very useful.

With a smile at the corner of her lips, Qian Renxue retorted, "Can't junior brother come see senior brother if there's nothing wrong?!"

"Of course you can, of course. It's just that senior brother needs to focus on cultivation right now and truly doesn't have much time?!"

"That's why junior brother came to find senior brother personally and waited here in the library."

"You knew I would come to the library..." The moment the words left his mouth, Xu Yang realized what he had said. Smiling bitterly, he said, "Right. With your status, it would be easy to investigate my habits. You should know that I come to the library to read and study theoretical knowledge."

Whenever he had free time at the Seven Treasure Glazed Tile Sect, he would head to the archives. He had even spent long stretches practically living there and reading books. Given Qian Renxue's status, figuring out his daily habits could not have been easier.

He had been stupid to ask such an idiotic question.

"Senior brother, are you really that resistant to me?" Qian Renxue looked at Xu Yang with a face full of grievance.

"Junior brother, it's not that senior brother is rejecting you. It's just that I don't know how to interact with you right now. You know it too—you're an imperial prince, while I was originally just an orphan. If not for having a little talent and luck, I wouldn't even have the chance to sit here and speak with you."

Although Xu Yang spoke of the prince's identity, what truly concerned him was Qian Renxue's actual identity. Being a prince was manageable; he himself was Ning Fengzhi's disciple, so the gap in their status was not that great. It would not be a problem for them to associate through the Seven Treasure Glazed Tile Sect.

But Qian Renxue was, in essence, a member of Spirit Hall—one from its absolute core. The Seven Treasure Glazed Tile Sect and Spirit Hall were at odds. This was not merely because the two factions stood opposed to one another; there was also bad blood from the previous generation.

For one thing, apart from Chen Xin and Gu Rong, the Seven Treasure Glazed Tile Sect had no other Supreme Elders. That alone was thought-provoking. The Seven Treasure Glazed Tile Sect had not only become one of the Upper Three Sects in the past decade or two; it had always been one of the Upper Three Sects.

What was the hallmark of the Upper Three Sects? Titled Douluo!

Without a Titled Douluo, what gave you the right to be counted among the Upper Three Sects?

Then why were none of Ning Fengzhi's generation of Titled Douluo still around? Xu Yang had personally asked Ning Fengzhi about it. It turned out that the older generation of the Seven Treasure Glazed Tile Sect had been wiped out in battles against Spirit Hall, including Chen Xin's father. The two sides were already mortal enemies.

It was not only the Seven Treasure Glazed Tile Sect. The Blue Lightning Tyrant Dragon Clan was the same. Only the Clear Sky Sect, because it had Tang Chen, a Limit Douluo, had managed to preserve most of its strength amid the chaos and struggles between the continent's major powers.

Though it was said that the essence of dealings between great factions was profit, whether they were willing to exchange benefits was still controlled by personal feelings. With such a blood feud, Ning Fengzhi would most likely never cooperate with Spirit Hall.

So, before he became strong enough, it was better to provoke Qian Renxue as little as possible. Even if she herself was love-brained and would not target him because their martial souls were mutually attracted, there was no guarantee that the force behind her would not.

Qian Renxue was the designated heir of the Angel God, after all. Qian Daoliu would never allow anything to happen to her.

This was also why, aside from getting close to Qian Renxue during class, Xu Yang absolutely would not leave the Seven Treasure Glazed Tile Sect unless necessary at other times.

"Alright, then!"

Qian Renxue nodded helplessly, thinking only that Xu Yang felt somewhat inferior. After all, many commoners had this mindset. Even if they suddenly rose to a high position, that mentality remained whenever they faced someone of even higher status.

"But I still hope you won't care about my identity. The two of us should interact as equals!"

"I'll do my best."

Xu Yang gave a perfunctory reply, then shifted his gaze to the books before Qian Renxue: "Glazed Meditation Method," "Visualization Method," "How to Accelerate Cultivation," and "Spirit Fusion Skill's Bonus to Cultivation."

This immediately left him somewhat puzzled. With Qian Renxue's innate Rank 20 aptitude, together with the meditation method passed down through the Angel Lineage, she should not need these books. Curious, he asked, "Junior brother, why are you reading these books?!"

"This?" Qian Renxue waved the copy of "How to Accelerate Cultivation" in her hand before explaining, "It's nothing much. After I reached Rank 30, my cultivation speed kept getting slower and slower. I'm looking for a solution."

"Her cultivation speed is getting slower and slower."

Xu Yang frowned. Before the age of thirty was the golden period for cultivation. Logically, cultivation speed should not slow down; it should instead grow faster and faster with physical development. How could it be getting slower?

"What makes Qian Renxue different from other Spirit Masters?!"

"Innate Rank 20 Soul Power?!"

"A god-tier Six-Winged Angel Spirit?!"

"No, it should be Ultimate Attributes. The Six-Winged Angel Spirit possesses both Ultimate Light and Ultimate Fire. I vaguely seem to remember that Ultimate Attributes come with a cultivation debuff. Cultivation between Rank 30 and Rank 70 is probably slow as a turtle's crawl, and only after reaching Soul Saint does the cultivation speed become incredibly fast."

"If I remember correctly, Ultimate martial souls cultivate slowly because the body needs to adapt to their powerful attributes. In other words, the physical strength of someone with an Ultimate martial soul rises along with their Soul Power, and they can also suppress others through attributes. Most importantly, after Rank 70, once they have adapted to their own martial soul's attributes, they will have no bottlenecks all the way to Rank 98."

"So that's it. No wonder Qian Renxue, despite having innate Rank 20 Soul Power, was more than ten years older than Tang San in the Original Work yet only had Soul Power a little over ten ranks higher than his. Aside from infiltrating the imperial family, the greater reason was probably the turtle-slow growth caused by Ultimate Attributes."

After figuring this out, Xu Yang began to yearn intensely for Ultimate Attributes. The fact that there would be no bottleneck before Rank 98 alone made it worthwhile for him to cultivate his Sun Martial Soul, which was already close to Ultimate Fire and Ultimate Light, into an Ultimate Attribute.

"Can I take a look at these books?!" Xu Yang asked, extending his hand.

"Of course!" Qian Renxue pushed the four books on the table toward Xu Yang. He picked them up and began reading.

First, "Glazed Meditation Method" was an ordinary high-grade meditation method, the best cultivation technique in the Heaven Dou Royal Academy library. By imagining oneself as a crystal-clear piece of glazed glass, it made one's body and spirit purer. It was quite decent.

Xu Yang casually flipped through it twice before placing it back on the table. It was of no use whatsoever to him, and it would be equally ineffective for Qian Renxue.

He then opened "How to Accelerate Cultivation." After flipping through only a few pages, he tossed it onto the table. Every theory inside was nonsense, baseless speculation. Not only would following those theories fail to speed up cultivation, it would instead cause irreversible harm.