Chapter 67: Soul Bone

Xiu Ye plucked the sword out of the head of the Duskgold Dreadclaw Bear, making a slicking sound as blood and pieces of its brain fell off from the blade and out of the head.

Xiu Ye didn't batt an eye as he calmly flicks his sword to the side to clear off the filth onto the burnt ground. He looked down at his sword to check for any damages and saw that the tip of the blade was gone and there were cracks on the half top side of the blade.

'Poor thing was used beyond its limits; the absurd defense of the Duskgold Dreadclaw Bear, the earlier impact, and the destructive flames of Ryūjin Jakka had caused it to be damaged. Looks like I'm going to reforged it, probably do it with an alloy of three metals that is more durable to use the flames of Ryūjin Jakka and cut through even the defense of a ten thousand year old soul beast.' Xiu Ye let out a frustrated sigh as he had work to be done.

Throwing the broken sword into his storage ring, Xiu Ye jumped down from the Duskgold Dreadclaw Bear's body as it slowly disappeared into particles of dark-gold light, but in its place was a twinkling dark-gold light.

This is…

He stood up and quickly made his way over.

He was stunned by what he saw on the ground.

It was something he had never seen before. It resembled the bones of a human hand, but the dark-gold cloud pattern seemed to suggest it was forged from some alloy. Even more confusing was that this item was clearly not metal and felt like a living thing.

Xiu Ye stooped down to pick it up. Wow! This bone is heavy! He looked it all over, with widened eyes, he murmured, "This is... a soul bone?" Of course he knew what a soul bone was; it was one of the rarest items in the world of soul masters!

Soul bones and soul rings had their similarities and differences. Soul rings were tied to one's cultivation, and once one reached the limit, they would need another soul ring to continue cultivating.

Soul bones, on the other hand, were not essential to soul masters and wouldn't affect one's cultivation. Since ancient times, however, soul bones were the symbol of a powerful soul master as soul bones improved the soul master's body while also granting a soul skill related to it.

The bone in Xiu Ye's grip was clearly for the right hand. If it truly was a soul bone, then fusing with it would greatly boost the power of one's right hand and grant a soul skill related to one's right hand.

"If I remember correctly, from the books in the storage ring, the Duskgold Dreadclaw Bear should be the elementary spirit ascension platform guardian. Whether it is the elementary, intermediate, or advanced level, each possesses a guardian. The spirit ascension platform is actually one entity split into three sections with different entrances. To separate the levels and to prevent soul masters from crossing over to another section, the Spirit Pagoda designates a guardian per level. Only an extremely formidable soul beast can be given such a title."

"In theory, no one with less than five rings should be able to kill the Duskgold Dreadclaw Bear. They never expected it to die by my hands. Also, because the guardians are more powerful than normal beasts, they require much more energy as well as a soul bone to create. Basically, the true reward for killing it is its soul bone. I can't bring it outside of the spirit ascension platform, there's no other way than keep it. Heh, right. Like I can. My body would explode from the tyrannical energy inside of the damn thing. That's it. I really need to temper my body and be a fucking hulk so I can enjoy some nice stuff." Xiu Ye said the last bit with a pout and let out a sigh, before he twitched his right eye.

"Shit. I have little soul power and my body was injured a bit, I need to get to a safe place and recover–"

"Ye! Is that you? Holy shit–do you see this, man? Did you do this?! Thank god you gone easy with us in the tournament." A familiar voice was heard coming from the top of the crater.

Xiu Ye blinked his eyes and shifted his head towards to see Tang Wulin, Xie Xie and Gu Yue going down the crater he created with disbelieving expressions and started running towards him.

'Or get my friends to help defend me. That works, either way.' He shrugged with a nonchalant expression and tossed the soul bone towards Tang Wulin. "I did. Now, guard me while I recover. Here's my compensation. Don't absorb it though, not right now anyway, wait for me to fully recover then you can." Without waiting for the others to say something, he immediately flopped to the ground into a crosslegged position and started meditating to recover his soul power and heal his injuries with the help of the light energies controlled via his spiritual power.

The trio stared at him with speechless expressions, then looked at each other. They all had a lot of questions to ask but the guy who had the answers was ignoring them, so they just did what he told and started guarding him with only a grumble of dissatisfaction.

Though they did pass the time by playing around with the soul bone, trying to guess what it was and how it works.

An entire two hours had passed and Xiu Ye had finally recovered from his injuries and have almost at a hundred percent of soul power in his dantian. Not only that, but he felt as though he was about to breakthrough another rank, making him at the peak of rank 26.

Exhausting his entire soul power and pushing him over his normal limits had probably caused his cultivation to rise. Most people would have been surprised by his cultivation speed, but Xiu Ye saw it as typical for a cultivation world.

"Alright, I'm done. Wulin, are you in perfect condition?" After he was done recuperating, Xiu Ye stood up to ask Tang Wulin.

Tang Wulin nodded. "Yes. But, what is this exactly? You didn't really tell us on what it is."

"It's a soul bone."

Tang Wulin, Xie Xie and Gu Yue's eyes widened in shock and yelled, "Soul bone?!" As soul masters, of course they knew what a soul bone is.

Tang Wulin immediately shook his head around and handed the soul bone towards Xiu Ye. "Ye, this is too valuable and I wasn't the one who killed, whatever the soul beast this belongs to, you did. I..."

Xiu Ye rolled her eyes. "Just what are you thinking in that head of yours? Do you think my body is strong enough? Do you think fusing with the soul bone of a Duskgold Dreadclaw Bear is a walk in the park? We wouldn't have this kind of argument right if I'm not strong enough for it. None of us are compatible with it, so even if we tried, we'd be devoured. Maybe even killed. Then the soul bone would be wasted. You're the only one who can absorb it and furthermore, there's a chance it'll complement your golden dragon claw. Now chop chop. We don't have all day."

"But like you said, I already have my golden dragon claw. Wouldn't it be a waste to add on the Duskgold Dreadclaw?" Hesitation still gripped him, the uneasy and indecisive thoughts running circles in his mind.

Xiu Ye frowned. "Of course not. In fact, it'll strengthen your dragon claw even more. The Duskgold Dreadclaw Bear's strongest part is its right claw. What's more amazing is that its core is the right claw soul bone. What we have here should be an external soul bone and not one of the normal six."

Typically, soul masters could fuse with up to six soul bones: the skull, the torso, and the four limb bones.

However, there were some peculiar or variant soul bones outside of the typical six. These were the external soul bones, and they were far more precious.

Tang Wulin opened his mouth to argue but then closed it as he looked at Xiu Ye's stubborn eyes. He knew that he couldn't dissuade his cousin.

"Alright. I'll do it."

As Tang Wulin sat down and was preparing to preparing to absorb the soul bone, Xiu Ye walked towards Xie Xie and Gu Yue and asked about what they've been doing when they got into the Spirit Ascension Platform.

Xie Xie dryly chuckled and said, "Well, it's certainly not as destructive and terrifying as yours..."

Gu Yue nodded. "The only thing that comes close to this, was our encounter with a thousand year old bear type soul beast that we took down together. And when I say we, I meant Wulin and I, Xie Xie was useless for the entire fight."

Xie Xie raised his finger to rebuke but then lower it down seconds later with a flushed expression. What she said was true, he was useless during the fight against that thing and it was only because he didn't have the time to attack it before his two teammates just comes in and kills it!

Looking at Xie Xie's expression, Xiu Ye raised an eyebrow in curiosity but was also dumbstruck of what soul beast they fought. Seriously, is this entire forest mostly populated with powerful bears or something?

"How did you guys kill it?"

Gu Yue was the one who answered him. "Oh it was easy. See, the soul beast was chasing me for some time just when I arrived and that was when I spotted Wulin and ran towards him. With him, he quickly noticed me and immediately summoned his spear out and used his martial soul to bind the soul beast, momentarily stopping it. But that was enough time for me to add more restraints to it, by icing its entire lower body down to the ground and started conjuring elemental projectiles in the air for an attack."

"Wulin then uses that moment to cross the path towards the soul beast with a single high jump, his spear spinning around in his hands before he positioned it into vertical position, with the five sharp prongs lined up to pierced the beast, but it didn't hit anything. There was a loud soundwave that blasted us away, causing some injuries, mainly our ears, but the most troubling part was that the bear was free and was about to chomped down onto the ever useless Xie Xie."

"Oh, shut up. I was about to run away from it..." Xie Xie mumbled.

Gu Yue rolled her eyes at him. "But as always, this ever virtuous and kind girl, me, saved the pretty boy before he was killed. As I saved him, Wulin came behind the soul beast with his spear, and several icicles that I didn't conjure, and pierced it to its back. He then finishes it with his golden claw to crush the soul beast's skull. Hey, Ye, you made his spear right? How did you make it have hydrokinetic abilities?" She stared at Xiu Ye. Xie Xie also stared at him in curiosity as he, a young master of a prestigious clan, didn't even knew that blacksmiths are capable of making weapons like Atlanna.

Xiu Ye smiled and raised his index finger to his lips, "A craftsman never reveals his secrets."

A couple hours passes by, and although there was soul beasts that had came near them once in a while, they quickly disposed of them. Tang Wulin had finally finished absorbing the soul bone.

Although there was some difficulties with it at first, but they soon quickly found out that the soul bone had completely fused with Tang Wulin's golden dragon claw and could be used, with devastating results.

Soon after as well, he quickly found out that the energy inside of the soul bone was enough to rise his soul power by 2, making him rank 15.

"So, do you guys want to leave?" Xiu Ye asked them.

The three looked at each other for a brief moment, silently communicating with each other, before turning back towards Xiu Ye and shook their heads.

Tang Wulin said. "I want to explore the place some more and gain more combat experience."

Gu Yue nodded. "I also want to explore the place some more."

Xie Xie shrugged. "Same."

Xiu Ye looked at each of them and nodded. "Alright. Let's go and explore the place."

Tang Wulin blinked his eyes. "Wait. You're staying?"

"Well, of course. Someone has to get you troublemakers in check or else you would somehow end up being besieged by a herd of soul beasts. Come on. Let's go!" Xiu Ye swung his arm around Tang Wulin with a grin and pulled him along with him.

For several hours the group ventured around the spirit ascension platform, exploring its many wonders and the soul beasts that roam the forest. Killing some that attacked them but they mostly had fun exploring. When they battled the soul beasts, Xiu Ye found out that Gu Yue had brokethrough to the soul grandmaster realm and now had two yellow soul rings.

They only left when Tang Wulin, Xie Xie and Gu Yue started feeling full; meaning their spirit souls had reached the limits of what they can absorb, though that only applies to the former two.

When they got out of their chambers, they were met with the sharp disbelieving gazes of everyone in the control room.

The entire room went silent, with tension started rising in the air. It was only broken by the chilly familiar voice of Wu Zhangkong.

"Xiu Ye, Tang Wulin, Gu Yue, Xie Xie, Zhang Yangzi and Wang Jinxi, let's go."

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