Half a year passed. Apart from honoring his agreement by visiting Lou Gao at irregular intervals to give him massages, cupping treatments, and medicinal meals, Long Qianming led a fairly peaceful life.
Even after six months of research, Lou Gao had been unable to repair the damaged Storage Soul Tool purchased at the auction. He sent it over along with an entirely black, exceptionally tough spear measuring 2.3 meters long.
"Half a year. That old man kept putting it off, but the spear finally arrived."
Long Qianming ran his hand over the dragon-scale-like patterns on the shaft and looked at the sharp spearhead gleaming silver, feeling particularly pleased.
He gripped the shaft with one hand and swung the spear, following his body's muscle memory. The dragon-patterned spear seemed to become one with him. Its tremendous momentum swept up every fallen leaf in the courtyard. He suddenly thrust the tip forward, and a sharp whistle tore through the air before him as it pierced five leaves.
"Not bad. This spear is much sturdier."
Still not satisfied, Long Qianming continued swinging it for ten minutes. Only when his mind had become clearer than ever did he stop.
Afterward, Long Qianming took the damaged Storage Soul Tool and the structural breakdown atlas Lou Gao had compiled for it into his room and began trying to find a way to repair it.
"Lou Gao, just because you can't repair it doesn't mean I can't. I did learn some Soul Tool theories from later generations, after all. My knowledge might be incomplete, but if I don't even try, won't those thirty thousand or so Gold Soul Coins have gone to waste?"
Over the past half year, aside from following his daily plans, Long Qianming had dismantled quite a few Soul Tools, sought Lou Gao's guidance, and compiled what he had learned about them.
Although knowledge of Soul Tools was limited in this era, his dedicated research during this time had still helped him understand some Soul Tool casings and the Soul Power transmission pathways inside them.
He had yet to find the most crucial Core Arrays for Soul Tools, particularly some of the rare ores used to make them. Otherwise, he would have liked to imitate some low-level Soul Tool cores and manufacture a few Soul Tools himself.
Long Qianming carefully cradled the somewhat loose Storage Soul Tool in his palm. As he closely examined the Core Array exposed by the damaged casing, he became puzzled.
"Th-this corner of the gold-patterned Core Array looks so faint. Wait, shouldn't the stone engraved with the Core Array be a blue Crystal Core? Why is it a dull gray stone?"
Long Qianming did know something about Soul Tools from ten thousand years in the future. Under normal circumstances, Soul Tools from levels one through nine all had arrays engraved on blue crystals called Crystal Cores. The higher a Soul Tool's level, the more complex its engraved arrays became, and the more array cores it required.
At a cursory glance, there seemed to be nothing wrong with this Storage Soul Tool's array core.
But a closer look revealed that the array was incomplete. In other words, repairing this Soul Tool would require the personal presence of the Soul Engineer who had created it.
"This Storage Soul Tool's array core actually suffered severe wear! My poor thirty thousand Gold Soul Coins-all wasted."
At that moment, looking at the Storage Soul Tool cradled in his palm, Long Qianming felt his composure crumble a little. His hand unconsciously tightened around it. Though this would not fundamentally damage the Storage Soul Tool,
a sharp piece of metal on it cut open his right palm.
"Hiss-"
Long Qianming immediately felt a slight stinging itch. When he opened his right hand to examine the injury, he stared at the Storage Soul Tool in utter shock.
"Th-this Soul Tool is actually changing."
A drop of bright red blood ran along the transmission casing and dripped into the Crystal Core. In an instant, the dull gray crystal seemed to respond. Its gray coloring began to fade, revealing the original deep blue crystal's true appearance.
In addition, the gold-patterned Core Array on it, the Soul Tool's casing, and the Soul Power transmission pathways inside were rapidly repairing themselves at a speed visible to the naked eye.
In mere moments, a brand-new Storage Soul Tool appeared before Long Qianming. His face was filled with astonishment.
"This is ridiculous. Storage Soul Tools don't have any blood-binding ritual, do they? Reconstructing itself with a drop of blood makes no sense at all."
As Long Qianming poured a little Soul Power into it, he saw a bone shaped like two beast horns floating quietly inside, constantly releasing black Soul Power fluctuations. The black Soul Power was dissipating throughout the storage space.
"This is a Soul Bone! And an External Soul Bone at that!!!"
At that moment, Long Qianming could barely contain his joy. Never had he imagined that this damaged Soul Tool would contain a Soul Bone, much less the finest kind of Soul Bone-an External Soul Bone.
It was just that this Soul Bone looked as though it was about to dissipate.
Long Qianming's expression grew grave. Without knowing the age of this External Soul Bone that was on the verge of dissipating, should he blindly absorb it? What if it came from a Ten-Thousand-Year Soul Beast, or even a hundred-thousand-year Soul Beast?
If the energy contained within the Soul Ring proved too vast during absorption and burst his body apart, he would be in trouble.
Long Qianming struggled to choose whether to absorb it or not. Meanwhile, ever since the Soul Tool had been repaired, the horn-shaped Soul Bone's energy had begun dissipating faster.
Long Qianming steeled himself, his gaze turning exceptionally resolute.
"I'll risk it. An External Soul Bone can only be encountered, never sought. And now that it's rapidly dissipating, even if the energy inside was too powerful, most of it has already dispersed."
"If I don't absorb it now, when will I?"
Long Qianming took out the horn-shaped External Soul Bone and sat cross-legged, swiftly circulating his Soul Power to draw it above his head.
The dissipating Soul Bone energy seemed to find a direction to flow toward and surged continuously into Long Qianming's body. He gritted his teeth and endured the relatively gentle tide of energy.
Before long, a strand of special energy from the Soul Bone entered Long Qianming's spiritual sea of consciousness.
The black energy, bearing an icy presence, continued to condense. Eventually, it formed a nine-segmented silkworm with an entirely pale blue body, a pair of dragon-like horns on its head, short red legs, and two pairs of transparent wings.
"What? There's actually a Soul Beast's lingering will gathered here, and it's a Four-Winged Nether Silkworm!"
Long Qianming was not overly surprised that the Soul Bone contained traces of a Soul Beast's lingering will. After all, some Soul Beasts would pour part of their souls into their Soul Bones during their final counterattack before death, making one last struggle.
What he had never expected, however, was that the lingering will belonged to a Four-Winged Nether Silkworm. He had only seen Four-Winged Nether Silkworms in the Record of Ancient Soul Beast Anecdotes. These Soul Beasts could be considered the ancestors of the Ice Silkworm Clan in the Far North.
However, Four-Winged Nether Silkworms were far stronger than Ice Silkworms. They possessed both Ultimate Ice and darkness attributes. Not only could they fly, but they could also use the power of wind and snow to attack enemies and the power of darkness to conceal themselves. Beyond that, they possessed exceptionally strong spiritual power.
According to the book, the Four-Winged Nether Silkworm Clan had vanished tens of thousands of years ago. Perhaps one or two Four-Winged Nether Silkworms might appear among mutated Ice Silkworms. He had never expected the horn-shaped External Soul Bone he obtained to have come from their clan.