His Conscience Ached a Little, but Not Much!

Link's first martial soul was Blue Silver Grass. At first glance, absorbing the Hundred Thousand Year Blue Silver Emperor Right Leg Bone seemed just right. After all, the martial soul and soul bone were a perfect match.

But Link intended to walk the great path of proving the Dao through power.

The Blue Silver Emperor Right Leg Bone should have been a life-aspected soul bone. Aside from giving Link a little more soul power and strengthening his body a little, it really would not have been much use.

If he gave up Ah Yin's Hundred Thousand Year Soul Bone, then choosing flight for his first soul skill seemed quite suitable.

At present, the vast majority of soul masters had no means of flying. Even Titled Douluos could only remain briefly airborne using soul power, unless they possessed a wing-type external soul bone.

But there was a problem with that, too.

Once Link became a god or acquired a flight-type external soul bone, flight as his first soul skill would become useless!

Surely he could not follow Tang San's example and make Entanglement his first soul skill!

"That settles it!"

"I'll choose Blue Silver Cage as my first soul ring's soul skill!"

An area-of-effect control skill!

He intended to walk the path of proving the Dao through power, but in the early stages, he might not be particularly fast. If he could not land a hit, all his brute strength would be useless.

Single-target control soul skills demanded too much finesse. Link did not want to go to all that trouble.

By comparison, an area-of-effect control soul skill was the best fit.

After all, Link felt he would have no shortage of opponents in the future.

Only after deciding on his first soul ring's soul skill did Link begin absorbing the adaptive first soul ring rewarded by the Chat Group.

As the Blue Silver Grass martial soul appeared in Link's hand, a transparent soul ring rose from beneath his feet, its color gradually changing from white.

White, a ten-year soul ring!

Yellow, a hundred-year soul ring!

Purple, a Thousand-Year Soul Ring!

Black, a Ten Thousand Year Soul Ring!

In the original story, Tang San had possessed a soul skill like this, also from a ten-thousand-year soul ring. That very soul ring had made him a peerless prodigy in countless people's eyes.

After all, the standard configuration for a soul master's first four soul rings had always been yellow, yellow, purple, purple!

Tang San had obtained a black Ten Thousand Year Soul Ring for his fourth soul ring and truly stolen all the limelight.

Yu Xiaogang regarded Tang San as his finest work, yet that work repeatedly ground Yu Xiaogang's theory of the ten core competencies of martial soul into the dirt.

What a loving father and filial son they made!

Link absorbed his first soul ring very quickly.

He did not even experience the soul shock that came with absorbing a soul beast's soul ring.

Link only stopped absorbing when his body reached its limit, and the soul ring's age finally settled at twenty thousand years!

A twenty-thousand-year first soul ring-if word got out, would he not end up being sliced up for research?

Fortunately, the Chat Group System was sensible enough to provide Link with a disguise service.

Compared with Huo Yuhao in Douluo II, who had to absorb an Ice Silkworm's soul ring and rely on the Simulation skill to change his soul rings' colors, Link's Chat Group cheat was quite considerate.

"Then let's make it yellow!"

Link did not deliberately play the pig to eat the tiger; he made his first soul ring look like a normal soul master's standard configuration.

He had his first soul ring, and he had his soul skill!

Meanwhile, Link's soul power level had shot straight to twenty, and he needed to absorb his second soul ring.

With Xiao Wu's and Qian Renxue's cultivation shared with him, even Link himself was unsure what his soul power level ought to be now.

He did not even know what rank of soul master Qian Renxue currently was.

With his first soul ring, Link had finally become a true soul master. He only needed to get verified at any Spirit Hall branch to receive a monthly subsidy of one Gold Soul Coin.

Life had suddenly become comfortable.

Of course, it was not just his life that had become more comfortable. After acquiring his first soul ring, Link discovered that the effects of the Indestructible Vajra Divine Skill had also improved.

His spiritual power had likewise grown by leaps and bounds, and the power of the Great Dream Heart Sutra had risen along with it.

Even with only one soul ring, the current Link could take on a Two-Ring Soul Grandmaster, or even put up a fight against a Three-Ring Soul Elder or Four-Ring Soul Ancestor.

After all, his methods were not limited to soul skills.

The Indestructible Vajra Divine Skill increased not only his defenses but also his physical strength.

And the spiritual attack methods contained in the Great Dream Heart Sutra were all but impossible to guard against.

Dawn arrived, and the morning sun rose in the east.

Link woke early and practiced the Indestructible Vajra Divine Skill in the courtyard.

When Qian Renxue emerged from her room, Porcupinefish Douluo and Snake Lance Douluo soon had people prepare breakfast as well.

Link did not choose to leave Qian Renxue's side just because he had acquired his first soul ring. After all, staying with a wealthy woman like Qian Renxue meant having no worries about food, drink, or safety.

Only a fool would wander outside alone.

Soul rings?

Once they reached Heaven Dou City, Qian Renxue would naturally become busy.

When that happened, Link would have plenty of time to find suitable soul beasts to hunt for soul rings.

He could go to either Sunset Forest or Star Dou Great Forest.

Most importantly, once he reached Heaven Dou City, he might find a few more group members and reap another round of rewards.

The two basic rewards alone-talent sharing and cultivation sharing whenever a new member joined the group-were already a huge windfall for Link.

He did not even need to cultivate soul power himself!

Over the next few days, Link obediently followed Qian Renxue toward Heaven Dou City.

Occasionally, he traded barbs with Xiao Wu in the Chat Group, then signed in to claim his reward after midnight.

Unfortunately, Link did not get anything particularly good from his sign-ins during this period. He had also noticed that the first three sign-ins all yielded good things. It had been the same for both Xiao Wu and Qian Renxue.

Over these past few days, the three of them had received either Meditation Acceleration Cards or Soul Ring Advancement Cards from signing in.

Meditation Acceleration Cards came in many varieties, ranging from double speed to quintuple speed. As for whether higher multipliers existed, none had turned up in their sign-ins yet.

Soul Ring Advancement Cards were quite good, with even the lowest-grade ones increasing a soul ring's age by a hundred years.

Of course, only Hundred-Year Soul Ring Advancement Cards had appeared so far.

After several consecutive sign-ins yielded rewards that were of little use to him, Link realized that he still needed to bring more people into the group to earn rewards.

At last, they reached Heaven Dou City!

On his first night in Heaven Dou City, Link finally received a good sign-in reward.

An external soul bone!

But it was not a flight-type external soul bone.

It was a pair of palm bones called the Heaven-Splitting Hou Palm Bone.

When he activated the soul bone, a layer of white bone covered both palms. When he clenched his fists, it was tough and resilient; when he spread his fingers, sharp bone fingers extended from them. A casual thrust could pierce steel refined a hundred times over.

"Finally, something good came my way!"

With the Heaven-Splitting Hou Palm Bone, Link had even more ways to attack.

What delighted Link most was that the external soul bone fused perfectly with the Indestructible Vajra Divine Skill, sending its toughness soaring once again.

On his second day in Heaven Dou City, Link had been thinking of exploring the city first, only for Qian Renxue to personally take him to Heaven Dou Empire Royal Academy.

"Cultivate diligently at the academy!"

"If you need anything, have A Luo tell me!"

Qian Renxue personally escorted Link into the academy and arranged for a very pretty young maid to look after his daily needs.

Link opened his mouth, truly at a loss for what to say.

For some inexplicable reason, his conscience ached a little-but not much!