"Monitor, what's wrong with you? Shouldn't you be the most confident among us?" Xu Xiaoyan noticed Tang Wulin's expression, crossed her arms in front of her chest, and said discontentedly.
Tang Wulin took a deep breath and shook his head.
"It's hard to say."
He had long predicted the Tianhai Alliance Grand Competition and signed up early for the forging competition in this grand event. Precisely because of this, he had long been aware of an opponent who would definitely appear: Su Ming.
If he was participating in the forging competition, would Su Ming also participate in the Junior Group's Spirit Fight competition?
Most likely yes.
Although he had only met Su Ming once, Su Ming was already capable of Thousand Refinements, One Peak a year ago!
According to Mu Chen, Thousand Refinements, One Peak could generally only be completed by Spirit Elders. To achieve it early, one needed to possess Spirit Elder-level attributes by surpassing their level.
Not surpassing a Spirit Elder in combat, but having Spirit Power and various aspects of strength reach Spirit Elder level!
After a year, would Su Ming have made no progress?
A year is short, but also long.
For someone like Su Ming, who possessed Spirit Elder-level strength at nine years old, an extra year of growth equated to adding one-third of his lifetime cultivation.
Tang Wulin himself had spent a year under Wu Zhangkong and deeply felt the changes a year could bring.
Seeing Tang Wulin so lacking in ambition, Xu Xiaoyan immediately looked at Gu Yue.
"Sister Gu Yue, isn't that right?"
Gu Yue glanced at Xu Xiaoyan, her face unusually grave.
She had more contact with Su Ming and understood better what a dimensionality reduction strike Su Ming was for Tang Wulin and the others at their current stage.
It was even a bit overpowered for her.
Because she felt pressure from Su Ming, she had repeatedly pushed herself, performing even more exaggeratedly than originally planned.
Precisely because of Gu Yue's performance, Xu Xiaoyan gained a strange confidence, feeling that Class Zero had hope of taking first place.
"Sister Gu Yue, you're not lacking confidence too, are you?"
Xu Xiaoyan looked at Gu Yue's expression and realized something was wrong.
"Hard to say."
Tianhai City.
"Hmm, the status is definitely there. I can feel the Faith Power from forging, but this Faith Power doesn't belong to me..."
Su Ming, who had tried again to absorb faith, opened his eyes and looked up at the sky.
"The guess was correct. Tang Hao could digest the status of Lord of the Plane by relying on the faith from the forging system."
He pondered whether he could seize faith from Tang Hao.
He definitely could, but whether he should...
"I'll secretly absorb a little. With his level of control, he probably won't notice," Su Ming thought to himself. "Especially faith generated from opening new sources; he shouldn't be able to detect that."
Naturally generated forging faith would definitely cause a big commotion if Su Ming forcibly snatched it from Tang Hao. But what if he manufactured the emotions himself, created the faith himself?
"Forging competition, don't let me down."
Su Ming took a deep breath, immersing his mind into his Sea of Consciousness.
He condensed his spiritual body, walked up to a glowing mass, reached out to knead it, and then knocked on it.
"Stop being greedy. I need more Faith Power for my research now. You have to leave more Spirit Soul Faith for me every day."
"Grow..."
The light mass emitted emotions, expressing grievance.
Su Ming curled his lips.
"You don't need that much faith to grow. The excess is just you being greedy. Do I have to expose you?"
The light mass flickered and then fell silent.
Su Ming pulled at the light mass a few more times.
"Hurry up, I really need it for research this time. You definitely still have undigested Faith Power."
The light mass lit up and reluctantly spat out a small, golden, bean-like particle.
Su Ming was stunned, staring at the golden bean, his breathing becoming rapid.
He turned sharply to look at the light mass, kneading it and pressing for answers: "You can purify and compress Faith Power too?"
In Su Ming's hands, the light mass visibly trembled, transmitting some intermittent thoughts.
"Store..."
Su Ming laughed.
"If you had said you had these abilities earlier, would I have stopped you from absorbing?"
He placed the little gold bean, smaller than half a mung bean, on his palm and observed it.
"Can you concentrate ordinary faith into something like this?"
Su Ming studied it while asking the light mass beside him.
"Not clear."
"Like this, I'll attract some power that hasn't condensed into Faith Power yet. See if you can use it."
Su Ming withdrew from his Sea of Consciousness, left the dormitory, and headed towards the Spirit Transmission Pagoda.
Arriving at a cultivation room inside the Spirit Transmission Pagoda, he spread out his mental power, fishing for the faint faith he could sense.
This faith hadn't been refined yet; it couldn't even be considered Faith Power. If someone specifically refined it, it could be turned into Faith Power and absorbed. Alternatively, after time passed, the faith would naturally precipitate and condense into Faith Power.
Without a doubt, the latter method had significant losses, but it was also Su Ming's main source of Faith Power income over the past year. He absorbed the Faith Power that had precipitated within the Spirit Transmission Pagoda.
This time, he gathered the unprecipitated faith into his Sea of Consciousness for the light mass to absorb.
The light mass reluctantly absorbed this faith, its entire form swelling significantly.
"Full..."
Su Ming didn't even need the light mass's intent to know it was overstuffed.
"No wonder you never mentioned absorbing this unrefined faith. This faith isn't nutritious enough."
Su Ming could roughly feel the difference. The amount of faith that overstuffed the light mass, if converted into refined Faith Power, wouldn't even amount to one-tenth of what the light mass usually ate.
The light mass emitted a sense of grievance.
"Alright, quickly take the initiative to compress this faith. Let me see the results. Do a good job, and I'll give you refined Faith Power to eat."
You little thing, thinking you can just eat without working in my Su Ming's Sea of Consciousness?
Seeing the light mass's efficiency in refining Faith Power was truly not high, Su Ming withdrew from his Sea of Consciousness and began to meditate.
After about an hour, he felt the light mass's intent and once again condensed his spiritual body within his Sea of Consciousness.
"Tsk, the judgment was a bit off. If you didn't embezzle any, this Faith Power would only be enough for 0.5 times your daily food intake."
The light mass noticeably shrank.
"Mm, good, there can be a surplus." Su Ming said: "There are twenty-four hours in a day. If spent entirely on refining Faith Power, you could condense 1.2 times your food intake."
"Gonna die~"
The light mass instantly dimmed, as if dead.
Su Ming shook it awake.
"Stop pretending to be dead. If you can refine 1.2 times your food intake in Faith Power, then you'll get that much to eat every day. Any excess Faith Power, whether you store it as these little gold beans or eat it, I won't care either."
The light mass clearly improved significantly.
"You refining Faith Power is entirely for your own benefit." Su Ming continued: "Anyway, you are my Spirit Soul. I don't need the Faith Power related to Spirit Souls myself; it's definitely all yours. The more you refine, the more you'll definitely eat."
"The Faith Power accumulated over ten thousand years in the Spirit Transmission Pagoda is ultimately finite. You need to practice your methods of refining Faith Power from a young age. I'm being farsighted, laying the foundation for you."
Su Ming was proceeding with practiced ease.
...
Read 50 advance at patreon.com/CNBLUE
(End of Chapter)