After Yu Xiaogang finished speaking, silence settled over the Shrek Academy training ground for a while.
Flender frowned in thought for a moment, then suddenly slapped his thigh. "That's right! Xiaogang, your brain really does work better. Doesn't that mean that in the future shown on the sky screen, there won't even be any Soul Saints?"
"There won't," Yu Xiaogang said evenly. "The quality of their Soul Rings locks their upper limit in place. With nothing but white rings, Soul Elder is as far as they can go."
"What about Titled Douluo?"
"Don't even think about it."
Flender opened his mouth, but said nothing more.
Tang San also stepped forward and said, "Teacher is right. Soul Ring quality locks a Soul Master's upper limit in place. That's why there's such a thing as the optimal Soul Ring Configuration. In that future on the sky screen, even if the spiritual Qi of heaven and earth tripled and cultivation became faster, it would still be a castle in the air."
"Even for Titled Douluo, once their levels are reset to zero, it would be nearly impossible to cultivate back to where they were!"
"That's right. Xiao San is correct," Yu Xiaogang said with a gratified smile. Then he added with certainty, "Even if those gods cultivated all over again, the result wouldn't be much better!"
Beneath the sky screen, there were plenty of clever people who, like Yu Xiaogang, had realized that there would be no high-quality Soul Rings in the future.
"The spiritual Qi of heaven and earth tripled..."
"That sounds good. But what do Soul Masters rely on to make a living? Soul Rings. And Soul Rings come from Soul Beasts. With the Soul Beasts' cultivation reset to zero, the quality of Soul Rings can't improve."
"So what if cultivation is three times faster? If all your Soul Rings are white, Soul Elder is as far as you can cultivate. You can't even reach Soul Ancestor, so how can you talk about becoming a Titled Douluo?"
"Without high-age Soul Beasts, the Soul Rings they absorb again will all be white."
"So there's no need to envy that future on the sky screen."
"If all their Soul Rings are white, Soul Elder may be as far as they can cultivate."
"If the Soul Rings aren't good enough, their Soul Skills won't be powerful enough."
"And Martial Soul Evolution needs good Soul Rings too. A Soul Master with white rings can forget about evolving their Martial Soul in their lifetime."
After such words spread, everyone became less envious of the future time and space on the sky screen.
So what if spiritual Qi had tripled?
Without high-age Soul Beasts, there could be no good Soul Rings.
The image on the sky screen soon shifted away from Wu Wei as he cultivated and arrived within the Star Luo Empire.
A town called Qingyang City.
The entrance to the market in the east of the city was packed with people, three layers deep inside and out, so tightly crowded that not even water could have seeped through.
A man and a woman stood surrounded in the middle.
The man looked to be in his thirties, with a slender build and a handsome face. His long white robe was torn in several places. The woman was in her twenties, with delicate features and long, pale golden hair hanging disheveled over her shoulders.
Both had an unworldly bearing. Standing in the crowd, they were visibly different from the people around them at a glance, as though they did not belong to this mortal world.
But now, their faces were full of exhaustion and fear.
"Still putting on an act? What bullshit God of Food? What Nine-Colored Goddess?" A burly middle-aged Soul Master pointed in their faces and cursed. "You gods, give me back my cultivation!"
"That's right! I was stuck at Soul King for ten years and finally got close to a breakthrough, but it all vanished overnight!"
"Beat these bullshit gods to death!"
"Right! Beat them to death!"
The crowd's curses grew fiercer, and stones and rotten vegetable leaves flew at the pair.
The God of Food raised a hand to block a stone. It grazed his temple, and blood ran down his cheek. Shielding the Nine-Colored Goddess behind him, his expression darkened to the extreme.
At the same time, he was filled with regret. He had been too stupid; he should never have revealed that he and his wife were gods.
"Everyone, hear me out!" The God of Food tried to keep his voice calm. "My wife and I are victims of the divine punishment too. Our cultivation was reset to zero as well!"
"Bullshit! You gods brought the divine punishment down on us!"
"If you're not the culprits, who is?"
"That voice said it itself: the divine punishment came because the gods repeatedly interfered in the lower realm! Do you dare say you've never interfered?"
The God of Food's expression stiffened.
He and the Nine-Colored Goddess had indeed interfered.
After Tang San was killed, the two of them had responded to Oscar and Ning Rongrong's Martial Soul Fusion Skill and used Resurrection Divine Light to bring Tang San back to life.
"Nothing to say now, have you?" A one-eyed Soul Master with a face full of coarse flesh pushed out of the crowd, pointed at the God of Food, and roared, "I don't care what kind of god you used to be. Your level is zero now, and so is mine, but I've still got strength to spare!"
He drove a fist at the God of Food's face.
The God of Food sidestepped, caught his wrist, and twisted it. The one-eyed Soul Master went flying and crashed into several people behind him, knocking them over.
"Don't force me to fight back." The God of Food's face was ashen.
"You're a level-zero god. What gives you the right to act so high and mighty?" Another person charged forward.
Then came a second, a third, and a fifth.
The God of Food shielded the Nine-Colored Goddess as he fought and retreated. His cultivation was gone, but after so many years as a god, he still had his combat instincts and reflexes. Ordinary Soul Masters could not get close to him.
But there were too many of them.
More than a hundred people surged in from every direction, blocking every path of retreat.
"Husband..." The Nine-Colored Goddess clutched his sleeve, her voice tight.
"Don't be afraid. I'm here."
The God of Food blocked and dodged, knocking down seven or eight Soul Masters who rushed at him. But while he dealt with those in front, several people circled around from the back of the crowd. From behind and to the side, they grabbed the Nine-Colored Goddess by the hair and pulled her away.
"Ah...!" The Nine-Colored Goddess cried out in pain as she was dragged away.
"Wife!"
The God of Food turned and saw four or five men surrounding the Nine-Colored Goddess. Some pulled her hair, while others yanked at her arms. She struggled desperately, and Nine-Colored Divine Light flickered faintly in her palm, but she could not even unleash a single Soul Skill.
"Let her go!" The God of Food's eyes turned red. He suddenly summoned a burst of strength, knocking aside the people in front of him, and lunged toward the Nine-Colored Goddess.
But his back was left completely exposed.
A wooden club smashed into the back of his head.
Bang!
The God of Food's vision went black, and he fell face-first to the ground.
Clubs, fists, and feet rained down on him. He curled up and tried to rise, but a foot planted itself on his back, pinning him firmly to the ground.
"Husband! Husband..." The Nine-Colored Goddess screamed and struggled as several men held her.
"Tsk, this woman is really pretty..." One man gripped her chin and turned her face toward him for a look. He swallowed. "So what if she used to be a goddess? Isn't she just a mortal now?"
"You... what are you going to do?!" The Nine-Colored Goddess's face turned deathly pale as she desperately shrank back.
"What are we going to do?" Another man chuckled and reached for her collar. "You gods made us lose all our cultivation. You ought to pay back some of that debt, shouldn't you?"
"No! Let me go! Let go!"
The Nine-Colored Goddess struggled with all her might, scratching the face of the man in front of her. He let go in pain, and she broke free and ran toward the river.
But she had barely taken two steps when someone caught up, seized her hair, and dragged her to the ground.
"Running? Where do you think you're going?" The one-eyed Soul Master crouched down and gripped her face. "You're not going anywhere today."
"Let her go! You beasts...!" the God of Food roared from the ground, but he was held down so firmly that he could not even lift his head.
The Nine-Colored Goddess looked at her husband, his head covered in blood from the beating, at the vicious faces surrounding her, and at the hands reaching toward her.
She knew she could not escape.
Nor did she want to be humiliated.
"Husband..." She turned toward the God of Food, who was pinned to the ground, and pulled her lips into a resolute smile.
"Don't...!" As if sensing what was coming, the God of Food began to struggle wildly.
Using the last of her strength, the Nine-Colored Goddess wrenched herself free of the people holding her, turned, and rushed toward the nearby Qingyang River.
There was a splash as she hit the water.
The rushing river swallowed the pale golden figure in an instant, leaving only a whirlpool of churning waves. Then nothing more could be seen.
"Wife...!!"
The God of Food's roar seemed torn from his throat. He broke free of the people holding him down and rushed two steps toward the river, but before he had gone far, the people behind him tackled him to the ground.
"Don't run!" The one-eyed Soul Master kicked him in the waist. "Your wife jumped into the river, so you can take it for her!"
"Right! Beat this bullshit God of Food to death!"
"That woman got off easy by jumping into the river. Beat this man to death!"
The clubs came down again, harder and heavier than before.
The God of Food lay on the ground, clutching the dirt with both hands. He struggled to crawl toward the riverbank, but every time, he was dragged back.
Blood ran down his forehead and covered his eyes.
His consciousness began to blur.
He could no longer feel pain. He felt only cold, a cold that seeped out from his bones.
The Nine-Colored Goddess had jumped into the river.
Without her cultivation, swept away by such a swift current, she might very well die.
"Asura God... Sea God..." Lying on the ground, the God of Food began to curse indistinctly. "You two... bastards... it was all you... you brought down the divine punishment..."
"I... I won't let you go, even as a ghost...!"
"Asura God! Poseidon! You won't die a good death...!"
His voice grew weaker and weaker, until it was drowned out by the blows and curses.