Douluo Continent: On Becoming a God Through Science

Chapter 157 Soul Sacrifice

Thousands of miles away, You Chen's clone easily defeated Li Ya and Li Jing. To prevent a repeat of the previous rescue soul skill situation, You Chen directly knocked them unconscious.

Some may wonder why the two little mermaid princesses didn't get some distance away before using their rescue soul skills to bring their mother back.

Actually, it's not that I don't want to, but... I can't.

First of all, this is a talent-based soul skill possessed only by mermaids with golden bloodlines.

Only the sea princess and Lia possess it.

It also has a cooldown period once a month.

Besides forcibly pulling people, you can also teleport yourself to the target's side.

Liya has already used it once, and now only the Sea Princess is available.

But what would the sea princess do with this? Would she drag her daughter, whom she had finally managed to send away, back to her death?

As for teleporting there myself?

The entire area, spanning a thousand miles, was completely enveloped by You Chen's spiritual power.

With You Chen's speed, and without the Sea Princess's restraint, he could catch up with the Crystal Palace very quickly.

Not to mention that You Chen's clone is also here, and without the help of the legion, the Sea Princess has no way to defeat You Chen's clone and save her two daughters.

Therefore, no matter what, this is an unsolvable situation.

The Sea Princess's spiritual power remained on her two daughters, and they reacted immediately when You Chen's clone attacked them.

Seeing the sea princess's ferocious appearance, You Chen knew that there was no need to explain or prove anything.

"Ultimately, people have to make choices in life."

You Chen smiled and said, "So, Princess Sea, will you choose your own life, or will you entrust your hopes to the future?"

The sea princess's face darkened: "How can I guarantee you'll keep your promise? You despicable human!"

Although they voiced their opposition, the Sea Princess's loyal subordinates sensed that she did indeed intend to make a sacrifice, and immediately began to dissuade her through their spiritual connection.

"Your Highness, you mustn't!"

"This human is so cunning; he certainly won't keep his promise!"

"He just wants to force you to die in vain!"

"Soul sacrifice, Your Highness, is a fate worse than death!"

The officials offered their advice one by one in an urgent tone.

But the Sea Princess is actually the Queen of the North Sea. As a queen, how could she be swayed by the opinions of her subordinates?

At this moment, it had already decided to sacrifice all its subordinates who were staying here to ensure the safety of its two daughters and to allow its bloodline to continue.

You Chen's smile faded, and he said calmly, "I am willing to swear on my martial spirit that as long as they do not take the initiative to become my enemies in the future, I will not attack them."

This is the truth.

From the moment the assassination attempt failed, You Chen knew that he could no longer hide the fact that he had hunted down the Sea Princess.

Therefore, he didn't mind having two mermaids deliver the message.

"A Martial Soul Oath?"

The sea princess frowned.

In this world where faith exists, swearing an oath to one's martial spirit is considered the most solemn oath, and it does indeed have a certain binding force.

Many people believe that once you break your oath to your Martial Soul, you will suffer a backlash from the Martial Soul, and there is even a risk of your Martial Soul shattering and you dying directly.

but……

The sea princess glanced at You Chen: "Can this man's vows be trusted?"

It's easy to imagine that someone who has just threatened to abduct another person's offspring has very low credibility.

Most importantly... the sea princess doesn't want to die!

This is only natural; unless there are truly no other options, no intelligent life would willingly choose to die!

So, is it now at its wit's end?

If she really chooses to abandon these subordinates and her two daughters, can she escape from this man?

The chances are very slim.

Princess Hai was unaware that You Chen was able to display such terrifying suppressive power because he used the secret technique of Spiritual Realm Burst, which would leave him weakened once he left this state.

Therefore, in the eyes of the sea princess, the man in front of her seemed to have been injured in the previous battle, but in fact he had been in complete control all along. She couldn't see through his strength at all, and she couldn't judge whether he had any other trump cards he hadn't revealed yet.

The sea princess had to admit... even if she abandoned everything, she had no chance of escaping from the other side.

"You only have the option of trusting me," You Chen said calmly, as if he had seen through the Sea Princess's thoughts.

The sea princess wavered.

Yes, either way we're going to die, so we might as well trust each other. That way, there's still a glimmer of hope to continue our bloodline.

But... it was really unwilling to accept it.

Why, when they were simply living a peaceful life in the North Sea, never fighting with the world, did they have to experience such a tragic fate?

The sea princess silently clenched her fists.

Just then, You Chen, seeing the struggle on the Sea Princess's face, deliberately added more weight to the challenge, saying calmly, "Soul sacrifice is not true death. I can promise you that if I become a god one day, I can reshape your body, and then you will be able to be resurrected."

"Become a god!?"

The sea princess looked up in astonishment, incredulous.

The other spirit beasts were also all astonished.

You Chen wore a matter-of-fact expression and said in a flat tone, "Is that so strange? I still need your soul to be sacrificed as my soul ring, and before that, I already had the strength to defeat you. Even so, you still haven't realized anything?"

The Sea Princess's pupils constricted, her lips trembled, and she said, "You...you're not a Title Douluo yet?"

He wasn't a Title Douluo, yet he could defeat her and her subordinates with overwhelming force!?

If someone like this can't become a god, then it really can't imagine what kind of person could become a god.

"So, as I said, is that strange?"

You Chen looked at the Sea Princess with a deep gaze and said, "The sea god you worship was once just a human soul master. As for me, I can achieve feats far surpassing Poseidon's. Becoming a god? For you mortals and beasts, it is an unattainable dream, but for me, it is merely a stepping stone on the road."

"How dare you address the Sea God by his given name!?"

The strong belief in her mind made the sea princess blurt out these words, and she glared angrily at You Chen.

"It seems you really enjoy being a servant?"

You Chen crossed his arms lazily and nodded: "Since that's the case, when you become my great divine beast, I won't need to think of a divine name or find a divine position for you anymore. Since you like being subordinate to others so much, I will grant your wish. From now on, you can simply be my mount."

Even the Sea Princess was somewhat stunned as she looked at Youchen, who had already planned out its future.

Hearing him talk about becoming a god and divine beasts, the sea princess inexplicably felt that her faith was becoming somewhat nonsensical.

It's like... I inexplicably and completely lost to the other person in some way.

Yes, although she had already considered the idea of ​​sacrifice, in such a short time, the sea princess could not possibly give in; she was naturally unwilling to submit to humans.

However, You Chen's words shattered the Sea Princess's illusions about gods.

It pursed its pink lips and said with a questioning tone, "Even if you could truly become a god, do you know what soul sacrifice is? What do you, a human, know about soul sacrifice?! It's a sacrifice that completely gives up one's soul, causing it to be completely annihilated. How could it possibly lead to resurrection!"

"What do I know about soul sacrifice?"

You Chen looked at the Sea Princess with disdain and sneered, "I know more than you do. After a soul sacrifice, it doesn't just scatter; it resides within my soul ring, just like a normal sacrifice. As long as my spiritual power is strong enough, I can completely revive. Divine power is an omnipotent force. With sufficient divine power, I can completely reshape my body. Then I can extract your soul from the soul ring and place it into your new body, naturally reviving you! Moreover, during my ascension to godhood, the soul ring, being part of me, and you, being part of my soul ring, can also enjoy the sublimation of divinity and directly become a divine beast."

The sea princess was stunned.

In fact, You Chen was not lying.

In the original story, Xiao Wu still needs a process of soul revival, but with the Sea Princess's cultivation and spiritual power, she can naturally complete the soul revival after the sacrifice.

As for using immortal herbs and inner cores to reshape the body, and offering up soul rings and soul bones...

To be honest, that's because Tang San was still a human Soul Master at that time, which is why it required so much trouble.

You Chen has not yet truly mastered divine power, but in the past six months, through some analysis of immortal spiritual energy and recalling and analyzing the original content, he has come up with many speculations.

One of the reasons is that divine power is omnipotent.

The divine rewards in the Divine Trial, such as the bestowed soul rings, the increased lifespan of the soul rings, and the increased soul power, are most likely the result of using divine power.

So if one has enough divine power, it is not difficult to create a physical body.

Princess Sea-Watching was still in a daze when You Chen snorted and said, "Judging from how eager you are to understand soul sacrifice, you're already mentally prepared? Then hurry up and sacrifice yourself for me! I'll wake up your two daughters and send them away sooner!"

Upon hearing this, the sea princess's eyes flickered. She gritted her teeth and finally lowered her head, saying, "I can offer myself to you, even my soul! But I have one more request!"

The sea princess paused, looked up, and seeing that You Chen didn't directly object but silently watched her, she swallowed and said, "If I can truly preserve my soul, let me see Liya and Lijing again, my two daughters! Then... you will protect them!"

Meeting the sea princess's hopeful gaze, You Chen's mood suddenly became somewhat strange.

There's always this strange feeling, like a single mother entrusting her daughter to her remarried husband.

"OK."

You Chen said, "But I won't let them or them do anything for free. Since they've followed me, they have to do things for me."

Two 100,000-year-old soul beasts are equivalent to two Title Douluo in terms of combat power, and they are even support-type Title Douluo like mermaids.

It's hard to say who lost and who gained.

You Chen looked at the Sea Princess, his eyes slightly narrowed.

His original plan was simply to trick the sea princess into offering herself as a sacrifice. As for the subsequent resurrection and body reconstruction, he would ignore the trouble later; it was all just empty talk.

But now, if the Sea Princess's two daughters join his cause and become his good employees, and do their best to serve him in the future... then it really wouldn't be right not to resurrect the Sea Princess.

So—was this also part of your plan, Sea Princess?

Unfortunately, in order to maintain his high-class image, You Chen did not directly say such inexplicable words.

He simply asked, "By the way, since we'll be spending a lot of time together in the future, it's not quite right to just call you Princess Sea. What's your name?"

"Lina."

Seeing You Chen's expression, Princess Lina breathed a sigh of relief. Since he specifically asked for his name, it could be assumed that the two sides had truly reached a consensus.

She bowed slightly and smiled, "Master, my name is Lina."

Then, the two dismissed their attendants, and with a burst of red light, the irreversible sacrifice officially began.

Even though she had heard You Chen's confident words beforehand and had prepared herself mentally, Princess Hai still couldn't help feeling uneasy and fearful now.

Unlike Xiao Wu's feelings for Tang San, she didn't have any feelings for You Chen. No matter how much she tried to embellish it, she was essentially coerced and forced to die by You Chen.

However, once the sacrifice begins, it is irreversible, and she has no choice but to grit her teeth and continue.

In fact, You Chen did not initially insist on any sacrifice.

It all came to this because of a sudden inspiration after seeing Liya and the other person escape, and they just did it on a whim.

The sacrifice is entirely the soul beast's active cooperation with the soul master, making the absorption process smoother, with less energy loss, and reducing the burden of the soul ring on the soul master.

In particular, soul sacrifice not only greatly increases the compatibility, but also allows for absorption with almost no burden, even if the limit of the endurance period is far from the age of the soul ring.

However, sacrifice is a talent skill of 100,000-year-old soul beasts, and to make a 100,000-year-old soul beast sacrifice itself, especially its soul... is just a pipe dream for most soul masters.

A terrifying surge of soul power erupted, and the special barrier formed by the sacrifice under the rules of heaven and earth pushed away all the soul beasts that had not yet completely escaped its range. The sea princess Lina also collapsed to the ground, her soul and soul power all flowing towards You Chen, while her three-meter-long mermaid body began to gradually turn into a childlike form.

"Lina, send me a list of the soul skills you can generate."

Seeing this, You Chen mercilessly demanded Lina's cooperation in his mind.

"Huh? Oh, okay."

Lina naturally obeyed her master's orders. Her tone was indescribably obedient.

As if in their own private world without their subordinates, Lina completely shed the dignity and guardedness she had to maintain as an empress.

Through a spiritual connection, even words that Lina had never heard of before were clearly conveyed in this mind-to-mind communication.

As You Chen browsed through the list of soul skills provided by Lina, he became increasingly convinced of his initial goal.

Both of his target soul skills were within the range of options.

However, Lina listed only the spirit skills that did not develop You Chen's martial spirit power and were entirely based on the Sea Princess.

Theoretically, with such a high degree of compatibility, relying on the human race's inherent suitability for spiritual attributes, plus the energy of 590,000 years—no, with the blessing of the Wandering Dust Soul Ring Age Card, which is already 600,000 cultivation points—it would be enough to forcibly add a certain amount of spiritual attributes to the Stardust Dragon.

A moment of hesitation crossed You Chen's mind.

Should we develop the Stardust Dragon's spiritual attribute, or leave it unchanged?

The necessary condition for evolving into a Meteor Dragon is a heart of clear and still water. Perhaps, choosing this development path is precisely the groundwork that Stardust Dragon needs for its evolution?

However, recalling the perfect Stardust Dragon form he saw when he illuminated the Origin, You Chen gritted his teeth and ultimately decided not to make any changes.

The Stardust Power, formed by the fusion of the three elemental powers, is now the most perfect power. If we add the mental attribute, it may seem fine at first glance, but it could also become a form of pollution like the evil energy before!

With Lina's soul sacrificed, coupled with the terrifying timeframe of 600,000 years, the resulting change was absolutely irreversible!

If things go wrong, the path that already possesses the power of stardust will be completely abandoned!

This is a huge loss that You Chen cannot accept!

Anyway, Lina's agreement to perform the soul sacrifice was a pleasant surprise; I had never imagined such a situation.

You Chen decided to stick to the original plan and choose two soul skills centered around the Sea Princess!

This is absolutely correct!

After informing Lina of his goal and asking her to help him improve the final strength of his soul skill, You Chen transmitted his thoughts to her: "Lina, choose the head soul bone from the soul bone you dropped! As for soul bone skills, is there a difference between the generated soul bone skill list and the soul ring skill list?"

At this moment, Lina was quite bewildered.

Because she had discovered that her spirit ring wasn't absorbed as a Soul Douluo breaking through to the Title Douluo level, but rather... her sixth spirit ring!?

"So, Master isn't even a Contra Master?"

Still in shock, she felt a strange power surge into her spirit ring, and then the spirit ring, along with her cultivation years within it, easily broke through 600,000!

With a series of events occurring that could shake one's worldview, it's perfectly normal for Lina to be bewildered. Who wouldn't be bewildered in that situation?

"Lina?" You Chen asked again, sounding puzzled.

"I am here!"

Princess Lina, standing at attention within the spirit ring, snapped back to reality. This wasn't the time to be distracted. Recalling You Chen's question, she quickly explained, "Depending on the location of the spirit bone, the spirit skills that can be attached will differ. The head spirit bone is particularly special; it's basically equipped with mental skills. However, spirit bones have fewer restrictions on spirit skills than spirit rings, so the range of choices is correspondingly wider. Master, this is the list of selectable spirit skills for the head spirit bone."

A long speech might seem like it would take a minute or two to finish, but through this kind of close spiritual connection, it's just a matter of a moment.

You Chen looked through the list of Soul Bone Skills and soon his eyes lit up.

He even found the rescue skill "Mermaid's Guardian" among them.

Not only can you bring people to your side, but you can also teleport to the person you are rescuing to carry out the rescue.

Looking at the skill's description, You Chen belatedly realized the skill's limitations, and that Lina at the time, just as he had guessed, indeed had no way out, and that this factor might have been the reason she so easily agreed to the sacrifice.

The functionality of this soul skill goes without saying.

The original Mermaid's Guardian skill required members of the same race and bloodline to use intentionally. However, if it were transformed into a Soul Bone Skill, it would only require establishing a mental anchor point beforehand, allowing You Chen to summon the target to his side at any time.

If there is a target that you want to protect, the value of this soul skill is self-evident.

For people like Luo Feng, the protagonist of Swallowing the Stars, who is protective of his family, or Xiao Yan, the protagonist of Battle Through the Heavens, who values ​​loyalty and righteousness, this is definitely an essential skill.

Even if they lose one ultimate skill, they probably wouldn't hesitate and would choose this skill directly.

However... You Chen doesn't have such a person in mind.

Even for close friends like Grace, Ignis, Qian Renxue, and Yan, there was no value in You Chen's heart in making room for a Soul Bone Skill for them.

Aside from forcibly protecting people, this soul skill isn't very useful.

If an anchor point can be forcibly left in the enemy's mind, it can indeed achieve the effect of a close-range surprise attack.

However, if You Chen could forcibly leave a mental anchor point for the enemy during battle, he could simply crush the opponent with his own mental power, so it was somewhat redundant.

No, that's not right!

A flash of inspiration struck You Chen.

You Chen hadn't considered using this soul skill for a surprise attack because the targets he needed to attack couldn't be forcibly implanted with mental anchors.

Even if it's set up for the people around them, how could someone who frequently walks in front of them possibly bring this mental anchor to their side?

Once they sensed something was wrong, anyone with a modicum of intelligence would know something was amiss and would report it immediately. This negates the crucial prerequisite for a surprise attack: the target being "unprepared."

But now You Chen suddenly remembered someone, someone who wouldn't give such a report, and who could often be close to the person You Chen regarded as a target—Hu Liena!

Several years have passed since You Chen planted the seed of fear in her with his Soul-Suppressing Technique. Now, Hu Liena's fear of You Chen is no longer so great that every time they meet, it triggers a reaction like an epileptic seizure.

However, if You Chen does anything to her again, the protection mechanism will be triggered again, causing her to "forget" what happened.

Thus, a perfect nail was successfully made.

As for wasting a soul skill slot for Bibi Dong?

Basically, the vast majority of soul ring skills and soul bone skills become much less effective at the level of gods, and are not as good as the gods' own self-created divine skills.

Although You Chen has not yet become a god, he is already considering the enemies he will face after becoming a god, which is why he tries to choose functional and mechanical soul skills.

Even these two soul skills are greatly weakened after becoming a god.

For the sake of someone before becoming a god, or to put it in a slightly worse light... is it really worth it to occupy a soul skill slot for one of the main enemies in the early stages of becoming a god?

Even if it is not ultimately used, You Chen will not feel that it is a waste.

Unfortunately, apart from this soul skill, You Chen didn't see any other skills involving space.

Finally, after confirming with Lina whether the soul rings and soul bones could have duplicate soul skills, and receiving a positive answer, You Chen's choice of four soul skills was finally finalized.

Soul Ring Skills: Curse of Stardust Heart, also known as Ocean Heart, the Sea Princess's innate skill; Light of Despair, which is a move that forcibly imprisoned You Chen and sealed his soul power.

Soul Bone Skills: Curse of the Heart of the Ocean, which is the Sea Princess's innate skill, Heart of the Ocean; Mermaid's Protection, which is a two-way rescue skill.

(End of this chapter)