Post Spirit Ascension
The evolution had taken a long time and left Gloxinia exhausted.
'That was some great sleep!' Gloxinia woke up the next day feeling incredible.
It felt as if his body was bloated before and he had just passed some gas, leaving behind a pleasent feeling.
Feeling his newfound power, Gloxinia quickly checked his status screen.
[{Status}
Name: Gloxinia
Age: 9 Years old
Bloodline: Fairy King
Martial Soul: Basquias (3/9 Forms unlocked), Fairy King's Wings
Soul Power: 34
Spiritual Power: Spirit connection, 400
Vitality: 90 (Grows with age / soul power. Average 9 year old has 9 vitality.)
Strength: 19 (Physical Ability, average 9 year old is 15 while average adult is 40.)
Intelligence: 400 (Spiritual Power, overall brain functions. Average adult has about 30.)
Skills: (Click to expand)]
Seeing all his attributes but Vitality had gained an explosive increase, Gloxinia couldn't help but remember a line that he had read in a book before, "When a farmer ascends, his dogs and cats ascend aswell."
In Gloxinia's case though, he is the dog and his spirit souls are the farmers.
So from the changes he felt, Gloxinia can confidently say that the evolution of a spirit soul would lead to many changes both in the martial soul and the Soul Master. An improvement in one's martial soul also led to gains for the Soul Master as a whole. Whether it be in terms of strength, speed, soul power, reaction speed, or the tenacity of one's body; all of them would be increased.
Going out of his dorm to head to class, he saw Wu Zhangkong coming out of Tang Wulin's room right after he opened his door.
"Sorry for being unable to watch over you, Tang Wulin needed it more." Harshly saying this, Wu Zhangkong prepared to leave. But, not without leaving a final remark, "Don't stay complacent just because of your evolution, it will happen to everyone else eventually. Work hard."
Watching Wu Zhangkong walk away, Gloxinia couldn't help but compare his behavior towards him to the behavior he showed Tang Wulin in the novels.
From the comparison, it's quite obvious that Wu Zhangkong is a bit biased towards Tang Wulin, though he is trying to be unbiased as he at least left behind some words thaat could "teach" Gloxinia something..
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In class
"Tell me about your thoughts on your experiences in the spirit ascension platform yesterday." Wu Zhangkong stood at the lectern and unenthusiastically told his four students.
Xie Xie's eyes were puffy and dark. Clearly, he hadn't had a good night's rest. Xie Xie couldn't forget that sensation of death and despair, which reached all the way down to his soul, chilling him whenever he tried to sleep.
Contrary to Xie Xie, Gu Yue was just the same as usual.
As for Gloxinia and Tang Wulin, they were both in high spirits, mostly due to the nourishment from the Spirit Soul Evolution.
"We'll go in order of yesterday's eliminations. Gloxinia, you first!" Seeing that no one wanted to be the first to speak, Wu Zhangkong singled out Gloxinia by name.
"Yes!" Gloxinia responded simply, "I was careless and died, which was wrong of me!"
Wu Zhangkong rebuked him with a wave of his hand. "I don't need you to tell me you were wrong, it's your own life after all. What you can do, however, is use this chance to acknowledge your errors and improve yourself. If you had really been in a soul beast forest yesterday, then all that would have remained of you would be a corpse. In fact, your skeleton might also have been destroyed. So tell me then, what do you think of your experience and of yourself in the spirit ascension platform yesterday?"
Gloxinia's face twitched awkwardly. "The world of the spirit ascension platform is too realistic. I couldn't feel anything unauthentic about it at all! I was really curious about the world when I first entered, so I rested against a tree for a bit."
"After that, I went up in the sky to lure out soul beasts and then killed hundreds of them, making my spirit rings gain a lot of years!"
"From all this, I didn't do anything wrong. My mistake was getting careless afterwards, thinking I was safe because I had just killed hundreds of soul beasts!"
"The next time I enter the spirit ascension platform, I will be far more careful and place preserving my life as the number one priority. That way, I'll be able to survive even longer."
Finished with his summary, Gloxinia sat back down.
Without any words of criticism or praise for Gloxinia's assessment of himself, Wu Zhangkong simply moved on to Gu Yue. "How about you?"
Gu Yue was prepared and quickly gave her analysis. "The spirit ascension platform is an exceedingly realistic world and I felt that I was truly in an ancient forest during my stay there. I really like it in there. It's great. Battles with soul beasts are really realistic, I can't see a single difference from real combat."
"Is that it?" Wu Zhangkong made a slight frown when he saw Gu Yue sitting down so quickly.
Gu Yue nodded.
Wu Zhangkong prodded her on. "Then explain to me, how were you able to find Tang Wulin?'
Gu Yue was stunned. "It was just by chance."
"Chance?" Wu Zhangkong's eyes narrowed suspiciously. "Xie Xie running into Tang Wulin can be considered chance since they weren't too far from each other in the beginning and Xie Xie had only encountered Tang Wulin after running around chaotically. But you, you were quite far from Tang Wulin, yet as soon as you encountered the Crystal Bear, you immediately chose a direction to flee in; and this was precisely in the direction of Tang Wulin. Furthermore, the direction you fled would continuously adjust for Tang Wulin's position when he moved elsewhere. How could you have encountered him by chance? It's simply impossible to be that lucky."
Gu Yue remained silent while Tang Wulin looked at her in shock.
"I'll admit it. I have a way of tracking him by controlling the elements. I can place a marker on the bodies of my comrades by manipulating the elements. This marker let's me find them easily. I thought that being with Tang Wulin would be the safest decision, so I prioritized finding him first." Gu Yue finally gave a seemingly far-fetched explanation.
"I see." Wu Zhangkong didn't pry too deeply and simply moved on to Xie Xie. "It's your turn."
Xie Xie began going over his experience. "I really like it in there too. The feeling of hunting soul beasts in the forest is so invigorating. That sort of forest environment is really suitable for us Agility System Soul Masters, and my ability to survive increases with the improvement of my speed. My final battle against those Green Wolves felt amazing too. I had to carefully avoid any fatal injuries while fighting a battle of attrition. I learned the theory of such battles before, but that was the first time I had actually experienced the bitterness of such a bloody fight. I gained a lot of combat experience this time, and I learned the importance of avoiding injuries to vital parts."
The very last person to go was Tang Wulin.
Tang Wulin muttered a few words under his breath, before he began voicing his thoughts. "We were actually really lucky to be able to kill a thousand-year Crystal Bear this time. If we made even the slightest mistake, we would have died. Although I knew that the forest is virtual, it was so realistic that I was no longer able to differentiate it from reality. I subconsciously began treating everything like it were real. Especially the injuries; I could feel all the pains and aches of the injuries I had sustained in there.
The sensation of battling with an actual soul beast is also very helpful to improving my combat abilities. I think that if we could continue to cultivate in such an environment, we will be able to become true Soul Masters. Furthermore, I feel that we need to strengthen our cooperation as a team, so that we'll be able to face even stronger soul beasts in the future."
Wu Zhangkong nodded in approval after hearing their evaluations.
"If I were to score your performances in the spirit ascension platform this time, then: Gloxinia, 5 points. Gu Yue, 5 points. Xie Xie, 5 points. And Tang Wulin, 4 points."
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Words: 1479
Author's Note: The scores are outta 5 btw. Also, I tried to like summarise their experiences instead of making a whole chapter for them so.. yeah.
Next chapter comes out today too, tomorrow is a free day!
ALSO, im getting a bunch of ppl asking if he'll join the Tang Sect.. the answer is no....
Thank you for so many collections and powerstones!