The silence that followed Tang San's failed attempt to find his mother's ancestral home was heavy and profound. Tang Hao stood for a long time, his gaze fixed on the empty space where a hidden valley should have been, his face a mask of stone. But beneath that stony exterior, his mind was a raging, chaotic sea.
'Gone,' the thought was a cold, sharp blade in his heart. 'The entire forest. Moved. Not just a simple migration. This was deliberate. The illusion, the very essence of the place… it has been uprooted and taken.'
His thoughts immediately, inevitably, turned to the mocking message left in the cave. The thief who had stolen his wife's body, her spirit bone… that same individual, that same terrifyingly powerful and unknown faction, must be responsible for this as well. They had not just taken her; they had taken her entire clan.
A fresh wave of black, murderous rage washed over him, but he ruthlessly suppressed it. He could not afford to lose control now. Not in front of his son. He could not let the boy see the depth of his own despair, his own powerlessness.
He turned to Tang San, his expression carefully wiped clean of all emotion. "It seems the forest has migrated," he said, his voice a low, gravelly rumble that betrayed none of the turmoil in his soul. "It is a strange phenomenon, but not unheard of for plant clans of such ancient power. No matter. We will find another path for your first spirit. For now, your hammer takes priority. We will hunt for your fourth spirit ring."
Tang San looked at his father, a flicker of concern in his eyes. He had seen the brief, almost imperceptible flicker of pain in his father's expression. But he did not press the issue. He trusted his father. "Yes, Father," he said, his voice firm, his own disappointment pushed aside.
"What kind of beast do you seek for your fourth ring?" Tang Hao asked, his tone shifting to that of a mentor. "Your spirit has mutated. Its nature is now one of poison. I am not an expert in this field. Your own judgment will be crucial."
Tang San's mind, which had been a whirlwind of confusion and disappointment, immediately sharpened. His eyes lit up with a competitive, almost greedy, fire. This was his chance. His chance to close the gap.
"Father," he began, his voice filled with a new, ambitious energy, "I want a spirit beast of at least ten thousand years."
Tang Hao's brow furrowed slightly.
"I have heard the rumors," Tang San continued, his voice taking on a hard, resentful edge. "That bitch, Zhu Zhuqing, from Zhang Tian's team… she absorbed a ten-thousand-year-old ring as her fourth. If she can do it, so can I. My body has been tempered by a year of your training. And I have absorbed two spirit bones, both of them over fifty thousand years old. My physical strength, my resilience… it is surely greater than hers. I can withstand the backlash."
A rare, almost pitying sigh escaped Tang Hao's lips. He shook his head slowly. "You must give up on that idea, Xiao San."
He looked at his son, and his voice was not one of anger, but of a deep, weary wisdom. "Your teacher, Yu Xiaogang… he is a man of great theoretical knowledge. I respect that. But his practical experience is… lacking. He has never broken past the twenty-ninth rank. He has never absorbed a ten-thousand-year-old ring himself. There are things he cannot possibly know."
He paused, letting the weight of his words sink in. "To absorb a spirit ring of ten thousand years or more is not just a matter of physical endurance, my son. There is another, far more dangerous trial. The Soul Shock."
"When a spirit beast of that age dies," he explained, his voice a low, somber murmur, "a remnant of its soul, its will, remains within the spirit ring. When you absorb the ring, you are not just absorbing its power. You are doing battle with that remnant soul. It will invade your mind, your spiritual sea. It will try to destroy your consciousness, to take over your body. If your own mental force is not strong enough to withstand that shock, to crush that remnant will… you will be turned into a drooling, mindless idiot. Or you will die."
He looked at his son, his gaze direct and unwavering. "Your physical body is strong, yes. Perhaps even strong enough. But your mental force, while impressive for your age, is not yet at the level required to withstand the soul shock of a ten-thousand-year-old beast. That girl, Zhu Zhuqing… she must possess some secret method, some unique treasure, that has allowed her to temper her mental force to an unnatural degree. It is not a path you can simply follow."
Tang San's initial, fiery excitement was extinguished, replaced by a cold, hard knot of disappointment. He had been so sure. He had wanted that black ring, not just for the power, but for the prestige. To prove that he was her equal in talent and the fact that he could also absorb a spirit ring far beyond his own capacity.
"Then… what about a beast just below that threshold?" he asked, his voice tight with a barely concealed frustration. "Nine thousand years? Or more?"
Tang Hao considered this for a moment. He could feel the new, powerful resilience in his son's body. "Yes," he said finally, a note of pride in his voice. "That, you can handle. A ring of nine thousand years, perhaps even ninety-five hundred… your body is strong enough to endure the energy."
He placed a heavy hand on his son's shoulder. "We will go to the Star Dou Great Forest. Only there can we find a beast worthy of you."
The journey was a swift, silent affair. A week later, they stood in the deep, humid, and dangerously silent heart of the great forest. They had been searching, their senses on high alert, for a creature that was both powerful and a perfect match for Tang San's new, poisonous spirit.
And then, they found it.
It was a creature of pure, arachnid nightmare. It was over four meters in diameter, its eight long, spindly legs covered in a thick, black, and chitinous armor. Its body was a deep, menacing purple, and its eight multifaceted eyes glowed with a cold, malevolent intelligence. It was a nine-thousand-year-old Death Spider King.
The battle was brief and brutal. Tang Hao did not play with his food. He was a force of nature. He descended upon the spider, his Clear Sky Hammer a black, destructive comet. He shattered two of its legs, cracked its carapace, and left it a hissing, wounded, and utterly enraged mess.
"The final blow is yours now. Be quick," he said, his voice a calm command.
Tang San moved in, his Godly Zhuge Crossbow in his hands. A storm of forty-eight black-fletched bolts tore through the air, piercing the spider's wounded carapace, its multifaceted eyes, its vulnerable joints.
The great beast let out a final, agonized shriek and collapsed, its life force extinguished.
A deep, majestic purple spirit ring rose from its corpse, pulsing with a power that was almost, but not quite, black.
Tang San sat down and began the absorption. The process was an ordeal. The nine-thousand-year-old energy was a violent, chaotic torrent that raged through his newly re-opened meridians.
But he was Tang San. His will was iron. He endured. He conquered.
When he opened his eyes an hour later, he was different. A new, fourth spirit ring, a deep, beautiful purple, pulsed around him. And in his mind, a new, terrifyingly powerful ability had taken root.
"Father," he said, his voice filled with a new, confident power. "My new ability… it is called the Purple Silk Bind."
He stood and demonstrated. He raised a hand, and a spray of deep purple, almost black, silk shot from his fingertips. It was not a simple web. It was a cluster of living, sentient strands that seemed to seek out their targets with a hungry intelligence. They struck a nearby cluster of three ancient trees.
The effect was instantaneous. The silk did not just wrap around the trunks. It seemed to phase through the bark, anchoring itself to the very life force of the trees. The strands then pulsed, and a visible, adaptive web of shimmering purple energy formed between them. Tang San pulled, and the three massive trees groaned, their trunks bending towards each other as if in a forced, unnatural embrace.
He began to explain the ability to his father, his voice filled with a professional tone but with pride. He described how the silk targeted an opponent's spirit flow, how its binding strength was amplified by his own power, how it injected a debilitating, paralytic neurotoxin.
He explained its versatility, his ability to use it as a puppeteer's strings, to pull, to hold, to reposition his enemies. He described its adaptive durability, its ability to reconfigure and resist attempts to break it.
Tang Hao listened, his expression a mask of stone. But internally, he was profoundly, deeply impressed. 'A perfect control ability,' he thought, a flicker of pride in his burning eyes. 'Versatile, powerful, and with a potent poison effect. It is a perfect match for his spirit. He has chosen well.'
"It is a fine ability," he said, his voice a low, approving rumble. "Now, it is time for you to return."
Their journey back to Heaven Dou City was a silent, purposeful one. But as they approached the towering, familiar walls of the capital, they began to notice… changes.
The first thing they saw was the carriages. They were not the familiar, horse-drawn contraptions of before. They were sleek, metallic vehicles that moved with a strange, silent grace, a faint, almost imperceptible hum of spirit power emanating from them.
Then they saw the street lamps. As it was the dusk time and as the sun set, these street lamps did not need to be lit by hand. They simply flared to life, a series of soft, glowing orbs that bathed the streets in a clean, white light.
And then they saw the people. A young nobleman pulled a small, black, box-like object from his pocket, spoke into it, and then put it back, a satisfied look on his face.
Tang Hao and Tang San stared, their faces a mask of pure, unadulterated bewilderment. They felt like two men who had stepped out into a different, more advanced era.
"What… what is all this?" Tang San asked, his voice a low, confused murmur.
They stopped a passing commoner, a friendly-looking man with a round, cheerful face. "Excuse me, sir," Tang San began, his voice polite. "We have been away for some time. Could you tell us what these… new things are?"
The man looked at them as if they had just crawled out from under a rock. "You've been away, have you? A long way away, by the looks of it." He gestured to one of the silent, gliding carriages. "That's a Spirit-Driven Vehicle. Runs on a low-grade spirit tool core. Faster and cleaner than any horse."
He then pointed to a pair of city guards who were speaking into small, handheld devices. "And those are Pagers. Long-range communication spirit tools. You can send a simple message to anyone in the city in an instant."
He shook his head, a look of profound awe on his face. "It's a new age, my friends. An age of spirit tool technology. It all started about four months ago. The Seven Treasure Glaze Tile Sect… they unveiled it all at a grand event. They're selling these things like hotcakes. Changed the whole city, they have."
Tang San and Tang Hao just stared, their minds reeling. 'The Seven Treasure Glaze Tile Sect,' Tang San thought, a familiar, bitter taste in his mouth. 'Of course. It all comes back to them.'
They made their way to the new Shrek Academy, a quiet, tense silence hanging between them. They met Dean Flender and Yu Xiaogang after entering the Shrek Academy.
When Tang Hao asked information regarding the Seven Treasure Glaze Tile Sect.
The response he received in the Dean's office was a series of devastating, hammer-like blows.
They were told of the Seven Treasure Glaze Tile Sect's new, terrifying power.
"Ning Fengzhi… he is a Titled Douluo now," Yu Xiaogang stated, his voice a flat, clinical monotone, though a flicker of deep, professional jealousy burned in his eyes. "He broke through about a month ago. And his Nine Treasure Glaze Tile Pagoda… the reports say its buffs are now at one hundred percent."
He continued, his voice a relentless, logical dissection of their new, terrifying reality. "And he is not alone. In the past year, two of the sect's most powerful Spirit Douluos, Elder Zhi and Elder Gao, have also broken through. With the Sword Douluo and the Bone Douluo, the Seven Treasure Glaze Tile Sect now has five Titled Douluos. They are, without a doubt, the most powerful sect in the world."
Tang San felt a cold, sick feeling coiling in the pit of his stomach.
But the news was not all bad. Yu Xiaogang then recounted the progress of their own team. "Dai Mubai and my nephew, Yu Tianheng, have both broken through to the fortieth rank. They have reached Four Ringed Spirit Ancestors at level 44 Spirit Power. Xiao Wu is at the peak of Level 39, just a step away from her own breakthrough. Ma Hongjun is at Level 34, and Oscar is at Level 35. They have all grown strong."
He then told them of Liu Erlong. Of her breakthrough to Level 85. Of the evolution of her Fire Dragon into a Sacred Fire Dragon. Of its new, terrifying Ultimate Fire attribute. He told them of her new external spirit bone, the Solar Dragon Wings.
"But she is usually in seclusion ever since she absorbed her Eighth Spirit Ring and External Spirit Bone," he concluded, a flicker of something, a hint of a deep, personal frustration, in his voice. "Apparently, her External Spirit Bone is a type that can enhance her cultivation speed so she is trying her best to advance to the Titled Douluo level as quickly as possible. She no longer even trains our nephew Tianheng."
Finally, he looked at his disciple. "And you, Xiao San? Your journey with His Excellency… how was it? What is your rank now?"
Tang San's pride, which had been a small, flickering candle in a hurricane of bad news, now roared back to life. He stood up, his posture straight, his expression one of profound, unwavering confidence.
"I am a Level 43 Spirit Ancestor," he declared, his voice ringing with a new, powerful authority.
Flender and Yu Xiaogang stared, their jaws slack. Eight levels in a single year? It was a miracle.
"My father provided me with two spirit bones," Tang San explained, a note of pride in his voice. "Both of them over fifty thousand years old."
Tang Hao, who had been a silent, imposing presence throughout the entire exchange, just let out a soft, dismissive snort.
"Spirit bones below fifty thousand years," he said, his voice a low, rumbling sound of pure, unadulterated arrogance, "are just trash."
~~
A/N: Check out my other novels like "Harem Master: Seduction System" and the "Villain: Manipulating the Heroines into hating the Protagonist" and I hope you like this story and those stories as well.
Check out more chapters on my P.atreon. The P.atreon will have 20+ Chapters ahead for this story. I hope you like it.
The link of p.atreon is: bit.ly/evildragon