Douluo Continent: I, an evil soul master, work nine-to-five in the Tang Sect.

Chapter 77 Gap

"Not bad, but Lao Tai, you haven't gone all out yet, have you? Don't hold back, just go all out."

Feeling the terrifying power that Tai'an suddenly unleashed in front of him, Luo Chen nodded silently and spoke to him.

Although Tai'an is currently very strong, so strong that few in the entire outer academy can rival him, it is still somewhat unrealistic to expect him to fight against Luo Chen, whose physical and mental strength has reached the level of a five-ring Soul King.

Facing Tai'an, who had already unleashed his martial spirit and was going all out, Luo Chen didn't even blink. He just stood there, seemingly waiting for Tai'an to make a move.

Upon seeing this, Tai'an did not hesitate. The two soul rings surrounding him lit up at the same time, and his already humanoid soul beast-like body expanded again, reaching more than two meters in length, more than a head taller than Luo Chen in front of him!

As its body expanded rapidly, the oppressive aura emanating from it, originating from a savage behemoth, became fully apparent, causing the middle-aged man standing at the edge of the arena to show a look of surprise and doubt.

Even though the middle-aged man had been a referee in this arena for a long time and had witnessed countless genius students from Shrek Academy, this was the first time he had encountered a student who could put pressure on him at the second-ring cultivation level.

This oppressive feeling, as if he were being watched by some ferocious beast, even made this seven-ring Soul Saint feel a little uneasy. His soul power couldn't help but surge out. This level of power was completely beyond what one could expect from a two-ring Great Soul Master.

At least in the middle-aged man's eyes, this was not the kind of power that a first-year student from the Second Ring Road should possess.

"Second Soul Skill, Titan's Grip!"

As Tai'an unleashed his full soul power, the purple millennium soul ring floating beside him suddenly began to flicker.

The moment the faint purple light appeared, its enormous form changed again. However, this time it was not its size that changed, but rather a new pair of arms that stretched out from beneath its thick arms!

"Um?"

Seeing that Tai'an's thousand-year soul skill had actually extended a pair of arms from his own ribs, Luo Chen couldn't help but feel puzzled.

It's just that it has an extra pair of arms. Can this really be considered a thousand-year soul skill?

However, the next moment, as Tai'an's newly appeared arms swayed slightly, an invisible energy fluctuation suddenly emerged in front of him, causing the surrounding airflow to change at that moment.

"A charged-up skill?"

With his extremely keen senses, Luo Chen was naturally able to sense the increasingly powerful energy fluctuations gathering in front of Tai An. However, it was more like the energy that had gathered the surrounding aura together, creating an air vortex.

In Luo Chen's perception, the aura around Tai An, who was gathering his strength, was constantly converging towards him within a five-meter radius, causing the air in this enclosed battle arena to become slightly thinner.

"Hey, Chenzi, you'd better watch out. I don't even know how powerful this attack is myself, but I doubt a mere three-ring Soul Master could withstand it head-on!"

After about three seconds, Tai'an finally managed to push the power of this attack to its peak. He struggled to control the terrifying airflow in front of him, which was about to escape his control, with his four arms.

However, Luo Chen smiled calmly in response to Tai An's words. To be honest, the power of Tai An's move did surprise him. It could change the aura and compress the surrounding air to a great extent, thus condensing it into an air cannon similar to a trigger-type projectile.

Even a Soul Master specializing in offensive attacks might find it difficult to withstand such power. Moreover, even if they managed to dodge it using their own speed, they would still inevitably be affected by the burst of airflow.

However, in Luo Chen's eyes, although the air cannon was very powerful and could cause effective damage to most Soul Venerables, it was nothing more than a tickle to him, whose attributes in all aspects had reached the Soul King level.

Out of respect for Tai'an's thousand-year-old soul skill, Luo Chen abandoned his initial nonchalance and instead released his own martial soul.

However, the moment the blood-red scythe appeared in Luo Chen's palm, the surrounding aura changed again. The airflow that should have gathered in front of Tai An showed signs of breaking away.

Suddenly, an attraction even stronger than Tai'an's thousand-year soul skill appeared, and the source of this attraction was Luo Chen, who had maximized his ability to absorb life!

The moment Luo Chen released his martial soul, the death aura emanating from the Death Scythe soared into the sky, purging everything on the field, and even the surrounding temperature gradually turned cold.

However, this was not the end. On that blood-red scythe, three spirit rings, also radiating an aura of death, were emerging one by one, each one exceptionally dazzling in color.

The first two to appear were purple, the same color as the spirit ring in front of Tai'an, and the one that followed closely behind was a deep black spirit ring with streaks of blood-red stripes!

A truly ten-thousand-year-old soul ring!

The moment Luo Chen released his martial spirit, not only Tai An in front of him, but even the middle-aged man on the sidelines who was ready to make a move at any moment, stood there dumbfounded, their eyes filled with blankness and confusion.

If he could understand Tai'an's second spirit ring being at the thousand-year level at the beginning, he couldn't find any reasonable explanation for Luo Chen's spirit ring configuration, which was completely illogical.

"Two thousand-year soul rings and... one ten-thousand-year soul ring?"

Looking at the three soul rings swirling around Luo Chen, the middle-aged man's eyes were filled with nothing but confusion and bewilderment.

As a referee in the Soul Arena, he still had some impression of Luo Chen's original soul ring configuration. It should have been two yellow hundred-year soul rings, but only one day later, it had become two thousand-year soul rings and one ten-thousand-year soul ring.

Even if he racked his brains, he couldn't imagine how Luo Chen managed to do it. He had only broken through to the third-ring Soul Master realm, yet he was able to directly cross two major realms and absorb the ten-thousand-year Soul Ring that only the fifth-ring Soul King could possess!

Furthermore, he upgraded his initial two hundred-year soul rings to the current thousand-year level, and even started with thousand-year soul rings!

Having come from Shrek Academy himself, he was well aware that there were many monstrous students in Shrek Academy whose talents surpassed the world's understanding, and he had already seen quite a few of them.

However, no one can change the age of a spirit ring they have absorbed after breaking through a realm. Once a spirit ring has been absorbed, its age cannot be changed. This is common knowledge that every spirit master knows.

However, right before him now stood a monster powerful enough to overturn the entire world of Soul Masters!

Before the middle-aged man could react, Tai'an in front of him came to his senses first. He knew from the beginning that Luo Chen's soul ring age was very high. The reason he was stunned at the moment was simply because the aura of the ten-thousand-year soul ring was beyond his imagination.

"Oh!"

Seeing that Luo Chen was ready, Tai An stopped maintaining the air cannon he had already condensed. With a soft shout, he mobilized his soul power in an instant, and his four strong arms pushed the air cannon, which had been condensed to its maximum, out in an instant!

In an instant, the air projectile, which had already been condensed, slammed into Luo Chen at an extremely fast speed, like an iron hammer. The air, compressed to its limit, was as hard as steel at this moment, and it cut through the surrounding space with a sound of tearing through the air.

After a deafening roar, the air cannon struck Luo Chen, who was already prepared, directly, and then unleashed an extremely strong airflow, causing the middle-aged men standing on the periphery of the arena to be stunned and unable to react in time, thus taking a step back!

The aftershocks of that air cannon alone were enough to force a seventh-ring Soul Saint to retreat, which alone is enough to show how powerful this attack was.

Although this attack was not enough to break through the defense of a seven-ring Soul Saint, its speed was enough to catch even a seven-ring Soul Saint off guard, which was enough to defeat most Soul Venerable level experts.

In particular, this air cannon can be used as both a charged skill and an instant-cast skill, and it can also be released continuously. The only difference between the two is the power of the skill.

In order to test the full power of this move, Tai'an chose the former and used it as his trump card, a charged attack skill. After the full charge was completed, he was indeed very satisfied with the power of this skill.

It was just an ordinary thousand-year soul ring that could unleash such a powerful soul skill. What's more, this soul skill could be controlled by him, changing and being used according to his will, and was not limited to just an "air cannon".

With his top-tier beast spirit, his own strength is his strongest attack method. However, if he encounters a speed-attack type spirit master with a flying spirit, he will obviously be countered by the opponent.

However, now there is an additional ranged attack skill with decent power and extremely fast attack speed, so even if we encounter agility-type Soul Masters in the future, we will have some way to deal with them.

Moreover, this soul skill, which can control the surrounding aura and gather airflow, can even be used as a flying soul skill when his own soul power is sufficient in the future. It is definitely a very practical soul skill!

However, after understanding the specific power of this soul skill, Tai'an did not show the slightest joy on his face.

Because in front of him, Luo Chen, who had taken the full force of the blow head-on, had no change in aura except for his hair being messed up by the violent airflow; he remained as steady as ever.

Not only did it not unleash any corresponding soul skills to deal with the attack, it didn't even change its movements at all, remaining standing straight in place as if it hadn't just taken an attack, but was enjoying the breeze.

"Huh? That's it?"

After sensing that the surrounding airflow had calmed down, Luo Chen first reached out to tidy his wind-blown hair and clothes, and then looked at Tai An in front of him, asking with a smile.

Clearly, the air cannon that even a powerful, three-ring Soul Master couldn't withstand just now didn't cause Luo Chen any harm, and its effect on him was negligible.

Upon hearing these words, the excitement that had just appeared on Tai'an's face vanished completely, and he could only shake his head with a wry smile.

He had considered that Luo Chen could block this charged attack, but he hadn't expected that this full-force strike, which was enough to instantly kill any hundred-year-old soul beast or even severely injure a thousand-year-old soul beast, wouldn't even be able to cause Luo Chen any damage.

For a moment, Tai'an felt a strong sense of defeat. He had thought that after breaking through to the second-ring Great Soul Master and absorbing the thousand-year soul ring, he would be able to close the gap with Luo Chen. But he did not expect that reality would be so cruel.

The gap in strength between the two did not narrow; on the contrary, it widened further with each breakthrough in their cultivation.

Even the full power of the thousand-year soul skill could not cause any damage to Luo Chen, who was only a three-ring soul master at the moment. It could not even make the opponent take action to defend. Such a disparity reminded Tai An of the scene when he first sparred with Luo Chen.

At that time, he was also full of enthusiasm and wanted to defeat Luo Chen with his strongest power, but he was easily defeated without even lasting a single move.

"I give up, I'm truly convinced this time. I'll never spar with a monster like you again. This was just asking for trouble..."

Looking at Luo Chen, who seemed to want to continue sparring, Tai An couldn't help but sigh. He released his martial spirit possession and said wearily.

Although he still had some strength left after unleashing a thousand-year soul skill, Tai'an did not intend to continue. Even his full-force attack was so easily withstood by Luo Chen, so his other attack methods would probably be useless.

After realizing the gap between the two, Tai'an lost the confidence to continue fighting. He was afraid that his Dao heart would shatter if he could hold on for even a second longer.

Seeing Tai'an admit defeat so readily, Luo Chen also withdrew his martial spirit. He had originally planned to use Tai'an to test his current strength, but now it seemed that the gap in strength between the two was perhaps "a little" too large...

(End of this chapter)