Chapter 4: Disturbing Style! Curse of Loathing!
——
[Increase Soul Ring Age]: 10 Emotion Points per year;
[Sword Hardening]: The hardness of the Martial Soul Li Jing's sword is increased by 50% for 5 seconds!
Tagline: The harder it gets, the stronger it becomes!
——
If the enemy could crush the Martial Soul Li Jing's sword, then the guaranteed bare-handed catch skill would become useless.
But…
'System, what is the base hardness of the Martial Soul Li Jing's sword?'
[The Martial Soul Li Jing's sword is a god-level Martial Soul. It cannot be destroyed by other god-level attack-type Martial Souls within 10 levels, nor by non-god-level attack-type Martial Souls within 20 levels!]
Got it.
Qian Renxue would need to be 20 levels higher and use an attack-type soul skill to break the Li Jing sword.
With the Sword Hardening skill activated, she'd need to be 30 levels higher.
As for regular Martial Souls, they'd better kneel if they aren't at least 40 levels higher.
'This is tailor-made for fighting opponents beyond my rank.'
'I'm currently level 35, so it would take someone at level 75 to damage the Li Jing sword.'
'Impressive!'
Ten emotion points per year, huh? I'll keep upgrading!
[10 Emotion Points consumed. Soul ring age increased to 101 years!]
[10 Emotion Points consumed. Soul ring age increased to 1,000 years!]
Now let's check the skill description.
——
[Increase Soul Ring Age]: 10 Emotion Points per year;**
[Sword Hardening]: The hardness of the Martial Soul Li Jing's sword is increased by 200% for 20 seconds!
- Unbreakable: During the duration of the skill, you can spend soul power to forcefully keep the sword from breaking!
Tagline: The harder it gets, the stronger it becomes!
——
Not bad!
Harder and longer-lasting, with an added Unbreakable feature. Totally worth it.
Zhuge Lan was a bit surprised to see that the cost to increase the soul ring age was still 10 Emotion Points per year.
But after thinking about it, it made sense. If the cost scaled with the age increase, the numbers would skyrocket exponentially.
Unlocking this thousand-year soul ring cost a total of 10,000 Emotion Points. He still had over 90,000 points left, enough to upgrade it to 10,000 years.
But he still had four soul rings left to activate, and each would need at least a thousand years, which would cost 40,000 Emotion Points.
'Let's unlock all the soul rings first.'
'The earlier I unlock them, the sooner I can enjoy the benefits.'
And how to explain this later?
Heh!
Let them deal with catching my sword first.
Zhuge Lan activated the third soul ring of Li Jing's sword and quickly upgraded it to 1,000 years.
——
[Increase Soul Ring Age]: 10 Emotion Points per year;
[Sword on Fire]: The Martial Soul Li Jing's sword gains a burning effect, lasting 20 seconds!**
Tagline: A barbecue lover's dream come true!
——
Zhuge Lan: "..."
How did I not notice this earlier?
What's up with these soul skill names?
Sword Hardening?
Sword on Fire?
And the first skill—**Guaranteed to be caught bare-handed**?
Well, at least the style is consistent.
Scratching his head, Zhuge Lan activated the first soul ring of his Thorn Armor Martial Soul and laughed when he saw the new skill.
——
[Increase Soul Ring Age]: 10 Emotion Points per year;
[Curse of Loathing]: After activating the soul skill and being attacked, the attacker is cursed with a harmless negative status effect for 1 second!
Tagline: If you want to hit me, you'll have to pay a small price first!
——
Just like the Li Jing sword skills, the style is completely bizarre!
It's like these skills were custom-made to farm emotion points.
But…
'System, what exactly do you mean by harmless negative status effects?'
[Runny nose, itching, dry eyes, difficulty breathing, and so on.]
Thousands of minor annoyances flashed before Zhuge Lan's eyes.
While none of these would affect combat directly, they sure were irritating.
But wait! This soul ring can also have its age increased!
With high hopes, Zhuge Lan began rapidly tapping the upgrade button.
——
[Increase Soul Ring Age]: 10 Emotion Points per year;
[Curse of Loathing]: After activating the soul skill and being attacked, a curse is placed on the attacker. They will always receive a harmless negative status effect, or rarely, a minor negative status effect, lasting 10 seconds!
Tagline: Want to hit me? Watch out for embarrassment!
——
It really changed!
'System, list the minor negative status effects.'
**[Diarrhea, hemorrhoids, blindness, menstrual cramps, appendicitis, wisdom tooth inflammation, bone spurs, etc.]**
"Hiss—"
Zhuge Lan leaned back, horrified at the thought of getting cursed by such things!
Any of these could ruin someone in the middle of a battle.
Imagine landing a punch and suddenly having diarrhea?
Or being forced to waddle because of a hemorrhoid flare-up?
A guy experiencing menstrual cramps, walking awkwardly with his legs clamped together?
And appendicitis—who could endure that without surgery?
Just thinking about it made him shiver in discomfort!
What a socially embarrassing way to lose!
Compared to that, blindness, deafness, and muteness seemed almost tame.
'A moment of silence for my future enemies,' he thought, grinning as he activated the second soul ring.
This time, it was unexpectedly normal.
He upgraded it straight to 1,000 years.
——
[Increase Soul Ring Age]: 10 Emotion Points per year;
[Light's Vengeance]: Absorb 10% of damage taken, store it, and release up to two bolts of light-based lightning that target random weak points of any opponent!
Tagline: The harder you hit me, the nastier my revenge!
——
A regular old defensive soul skill.
It seriously clashed with the rest of the bizarre skill set.
Just as he was pondering this…
"Knock, knock, knock—"
A knocking sound came from the door.
"Sir, your order has arrived. Please open the door."
Hearing this, Zhuge Lan got up and casually unlocked his third soul ring.
He glanced at it briefly…
And froze!
Oh boy, another fun one!
Two days later, at the entrance of Shrek Academy.
After another big meal, Zhuge Lan strolled over leisurely.
The admissions teacher, Li Yusong, was conducting the final check for the last applicant.
Zhuge Lan stopped and took a good look at this candidate.
Her face was cold and expressionless, with black hair cascading over her shoulders, which only made her fair skin look like it was glowing.
But what caught the most attention was her incredibly voluptuous figure!
Though she appeared to be only eleven or twelve, she was more developed than a ripe peach.
A cold demeanor paired with a fiery body.
The contrast was extreme, and of course, this could only be Zhu Zhuqing.
'Such an amazing girl, wasted on that scumbag Dai Mubai,' Zhuge Lan thought.
'System, any advice?'
[This system only provides exchange services and does not offer dating guides!]
'Tch~' Zhuge Lan mentally shrugged. 'Can you at least give me a Martial Soul Fusion Technique with Zhu Zhuqing? One stronger than the Hell White Tiger?'
[1 million emotion points to unlock a Martial Soul Fusion Technique with the "Martial Soul: Hell Civet."]
Oh wow!
It's actually possible?
But I definitely don't have 1 million emotion points right now.
'System, can I pay in installments?'
[You can unlock a resonance with the "Martial Soul: Hell Civet" for 20,000 emotion points. Afterward, each payment of 490,000 emotion points will unlock one Martial Soul Fusion Technique!]
So it's priced like twin Martial Souls.
Zhuge Lan glanced at the system interface.
[Emotion Points: 25,657;]
Previously, he had spent 50,000 emotion points to upgrade **Curse of Loathing** to 5,000 years, extending the duration of negative effects to 20 seconds.
After that, he only had about 10,000 left.
But over the past two days, Xiao Wu and Tang San hadn't stopped "talking" about Zhuge Lan.
So he had just enough now.
But...