External Soul Bone, Dark Gold Dreadclaw

"Pfft!"

With his lungs strengthened, Tang Mo immediately spat out a mouthful of murky black blood. It was clotted blood formed from old injuries and impurities that had unwittingly accumulated in his lungs over the past six years.

As he spat out that mouthful of clotted blood, his complexion visibly improved.

Before long, he had completely absorbed the purple Soul Ring, and a pulsing purple Soul Ring had also appeared around his Martial Soul.

Just as he thought everything was over, two streaks of dark gold light suddenly flew out of the Dark Gold Terrorclaw Bear's hands and sank into his own.

"Hiss!"

Two bursts of searing pain abruptly erupted in his hands, then spread throughout his body.

He had never imagined his luck would be so heaven-defying. The External Soul Bone that only a Dark Gold Terrorclaw Bear could produce, the Dark Gold Dreadclaw, had dropped just like that-and it was even a double-yolk egg.

In theory, a single Soul Beast could only produce one Soul Bone. Only a Hundred-Thousand-Year Soul Beast had a chance of dropping two.

Ordinary Soul Bones corresponded to the human body's four limbs, torso, and head. Any Soul Bone outside those categories was an External Soul Bone.

External Soul Bones had the special ability to grow alongside their owners, and their drop rate was extremely low. As such, they were things people had always heard of but never seen.

But nothing was absolute. The Thousand-Year Dark Gold Terrorclaw Bear before him had actually dropped a pair of External Soul Bones.

Had they been ordinary External Soul Bones, absorbing them would have been simple enough. With a Soul Ring of the same origin, the difficulty of absorption would be greatly reduced.

But the Dark Gold Dreadclaws were no ordinary External Soul Bones. Refining them required an exceptionally powerful physique capable of withstanding the impact of their bloodline power.

Had he known External Soul Bones would drop, he would certainly have prepared beforehand. But who could have foreseen that External Soul Bones would launch a sneak attack, slipping straight into his hands?

The meridians and bones in his hands bore the brunt of the Dark Gold Dreadclaws' power. In that instant, he felt as though every bone in both hands had been ground to pieces.

But that was merely an illusion born of the agonizing pain. The Tang Sect he belonged to placed great emphasis on hand techniques, and among its many supreme arts was one called Instant Strike.

As its name suggested, Instant Strike meant striking in an instant. It could be performed barehanded with knife-hand strikes or aided by weapons, delivering as many attacks as possible within a short time with uniform force and astonishing frequency. Practiced well enough, it could even turn someone into a hornet's nest with bare hands.

The purpose of this move was to win through sheer volume and confuse the enemy's senses. If the dense, steady attacks could not kill the enemy, the practitioner would exploit the enemy's gradual adjustment to their frequency to deliver a final strike aimed precisely at a vital point.

Once someone had grown accustomed to an enemy's attacks, and could even vaguely guess where the next blow would land, a sudden change from that enemy would naturally catch them off guard.

The advanced form of Instant Strike was called Thousand Strikes in an Instant. As its name suggested, it involved delivering thousands of attacks within a short time. Even simple knife-hand swings could whip up high-speed wind pressure powerful enough to punch through concrete with ease.

To practice this close-combat art, Tang Mo had spent no small amount of time training his hands and soaking them in special medicinal herbs.

His hands could therefore be called the toughest part of his body. Even when directly subjected to the Dark Gold Dreadclaws, their bones and meridians would not be torn apart immediately.

Moreover, he had absorbed the Dark Gold Terrorclaw Bear's Soul Ring. Sharing the same origin, the Soul Ring could alleviate some of the pressure from the External Soul Bones, the Dark Gold Dreadclaws.

But the pain did not vanish simply because his hands were tough enough and some of the pressure had been shared. He clenched his teeth, faint traces of blood even seeping from his gums.

Under the agonizing pain, he raised his head and slammed it against the ground, trying to lessen his suffering.

Thud, thud, thud...

Beneath those dull impacts lay excruciating pain and the determination to endure it all.

Under the torment of that intense pain, his life even began flashing before his eyes.

The first time he had held a horse stance beneath the blazing sun until he fainted, the first time he had cultivated Qi, the first time he had tested poison...

Countless scenes flashed before his eyes, pain and beauty converging in his heart.

Mere Dark Gold Dreadclaws dared to block my path? Be refined!

He roared inwardly, then poured all his Soul Power into his hands, forcibly completing the final step and temporarily refining the pair of External Soul Bones.

"Hahaha..."

Having finished refining them, Tang Mo lay on the ground and chuckled as he looked at the Thousand-Year Dark Gold Terrorclaw Bear's corpse.

He could feel that he had only barely refined the pair of External Soul Bones. To deepen his connection with them, he would need to refine them day and night, or undergo the baptism of a high-ranking Soul Master's pressure, as Tang San had when refining the Eight Spider Lances.

He staggered to his feet. He felt no discomfort at all; instead, he felt refreshed and clearheaded, his Soul Power circulating freely within him. Only, he once again felt a bottleneck.

Even without obtaining a Soul Ring, a Soul Master's Soul Power could still increase; it simply could not manifest.

After obtaining a Soul Ring and breaking through the bottleneck, those previous accumulations would reveal themselves.

He could feel that his Soul Power seemed to have broken through to rank twenty. It might even be a little higher-perhaps it had reached rank twenty-one.

All of this was thanks to the Dark Gold Terrorclaw Bear's Soul Ring and External Soul Bones. Otherwise, he would never have leaped six ranks, from rank fifteen to rank twenty-one.

After standing up, he cautiously looked toward Tang Hao and the Dark Gold Terrorclaw Bear, who were still locked in a stalemate.

However, the Dark Gold Terrorclaw Bear had already been injured. After fighting Tang Hao for some time, it likely could no longer suppress its injuries.

Sure enough, after Tang Hao brought his hammer down, the Dark Gold Terrorclaw Bear shuddered, then actually stumbled backward uncontrollably.

Thud, thud, thud...

Heavy footsteps rang out one after another, and the ground shook. Once the Dark Gold Terrorclaw Bear had barely steadied itself, Tang Hao, unwilling to continue fighting the Soul Beast before him, immediately approached Tang San and Yu Xiaogang, intending to take them away.

At that very moment, Tang Mo cut a piece of flesh from the Thousand-Year Dark Gold Terrorclaw Bear. He then wrapped the bear meat in Soul Power, quietly approached within a certain range of Tang San, and threw it onto him.

As though sensing something, Tang Hao looked in the direction where Tang Mo had vanished. His perception told him that someone had been standing there just now.

He was about to drag that person out, but he soon sensed the absolute killing intent emanating from the Dark Gold Terrorclaw Bear.

That killing intent was extraordinarily pure and immense. Clearly, the Ten-Thousand-Year Dark Gold Terrorclaw Bear had now sensed the Thousand-Year Dark Gold Terrorclaw Bear's death. Combined with the bear meat appearing on Tang San, that was enough to send the dying Ten-Thousand-Year Dark Gold Terrorclaw Bear into a frenzy.

Moreover, Tang Mo had examined the Thousand-Year Dark Gold Terrorclaw Bear's wounds earlier. He had found that they looked somewhat like tiger claw wounds, and the sinister power lingering in them was constantly eroding its body.

Otherwise, given the exceptionally powerful physique Dark Gold Terrorclaw Bears possessed from birth, wounds like these could not have left it weakened and unable to resist.