Douluo Continent: On Becoming a God Through Science

Chapter 97 You Chen's Choice (Part 1)

After Ignis successfully absorbed the spirit ring, You Chen's purpose for this trip can be said to have been basically achieved.

This verifies the feasibility of using the "Borrowing Soul Power Technique" to absorb a ten-thousand-year-old soul ring;

Ensuring that Ignis possesses at least the combat power of a Soul King will allow her to escort the Soul Beasts in obtaining the Ten Thousand Year Soul Stones – this can be considered an overachievement.

It tested the group strength of the Soul Fighting Beasts and their experience in activities in the Star Dou Great Forest;

The lethality of the Blackfire Crossbow was tested.

The four goals can be said to have been successfully achieved.

However, after witnessing Ignis absorb a soul ring using the "Soul Power Borrowing Technique," You Chen recalled his own dilemma.

I'm torn about whether to equip my alt character with spirit rings right now.

You Chen calculated that the maximum lifespan of the second spirit ring was 3 years, and correspondingly, the maximum lifespan of the third spirit ring was 5 years.

After a year of reflection, he is now fully capable of hunting down these two levels of spirit beasts on his own and escaping unscathed.

Because he couldn't explain to Devan and his friends why he was absorbing a new spirit ring so quickly... or rather, he didn't trust Devan and the others enough to reveal this card right now.

Therefore, a large part of the problem in acquiring subsequent soul rings for himself was that You Chen's own strength was insufficient.

But now, he already possesses that strength.

Or rather, because he had mastered the "Concealing Breath Technique," he no longer needed to acquire power far exceeding the strength required to hunt soul beasts of the corresponding age.

Even if it might provoke the bigwigs behind the target, he can use the Concealing Breath Technique to escape the scene unnoticed.

Therefore, he can now hunt for the second and third spirit rings of the smaller character, and then hunt for the sixth spirit ring of the larger character, directly ascending to the level of Spirit Emperor.

It's more likely that the alt account will reach the level 60 bottleneck once it absorbs the second soul ring.

As for absorbing the fourth, fifth, and sixth rings of the smaller one, and then hunting the seventh ring of the larger one to directly ascend to Soul Saint?

No, You Chen's target for the seventh ring is a soul beast whose strength is no less than that of a 100,000-year-old soul beast, which means that its strength has reached the level of a Title Douluo.

He is not able to complete the hunt at this stage.

However, if he only advances to the Soul Emperor level and further cultivates the "Divine Elephant Suppressing Prison Technique," he will definitely be able to possess the combat power of a Soul Douluo.

Even when facing Tang Hao, who is not yet fully recovered, she still has the power to struggle.

This sense of security is simply unparalleled.

In addition, with greater strength, You Chen will naturally find it easier and faster to complete the first quest line!

However... You Chen's ambitions don't stop there.

By using the "Soul Power Borrowing Method," one can forcibly borrow up to ten levels of soul power, thereby increasing the optimal age of the soul ring without requiring any other additional resources.

Such an invention is unprecedented in the Douluo Continent.

In the past, this was a realm that only gods could enter...

You Chen's soul power borrowed from the law, without any trace of using divine power. It was a divine feat of stepping into the realm of gods with the power of a mortal!

In some ways, this might be even more advantageous than the increase in the age of the soul rings obtained through the Divine Examination.

Because You Chen had already tested it with several "Soul Ring Age Enhancement Cards", he found that after using the Age Enhancement Card to increase the age of a solidified Soul Ring, the attribute boost and Soul Skill power of the Soul Ring were enhanced.

but……

The origin of the martial spirit will not be improved in any way.

For example, the essence of the spirit ring in this process is just a catalyst, while the reason why the martial soul will undergo a change after absorbing the spirit ring is actually the sublimation brought about by the martial soul itself breaking the shackles of the rules during that period.

This is a gift from the rules of this world, a benefit that allows Soul Masters to get closer to the gods, and an underlying law that even the gods cannot tamper with.

Of course, this only refers to the evolution of the martial soul during the process of absorbing a soul ring. Using other means to enhance the origin of the martial soul is another topic.

Therefore, the value of the years a martial soul absorbs a spirit ring is greater than the years added later.

The higher the value, especially the values ​​for the key components, the better.

So, is there a way to go even higher?

The answer is, of course, yes.

Because the Soul Power Borrowing Technique can bypass the first-level restriction and borrow 10 years of Soul Power, which is the limit for other Soul Masters due to the constraints of the world, not You Chen's limit!

The actual maximum Soul Power level that a low-level character can receive is 57-20=37!

However, the soul power borrowing method has only been studied for a year, and it can only be borrowed up to level 10.

This is largely due to a lack of experimental samples.

Leveling up two or three levels is already considered quite a lot; no one has ever actually reached level 10, let alone a higher level!

This naturally leads to a sharp increase in the difficulty of research and development!

The current quota is the result of You Chen's hard work over the past year, plus two flashes of inspiration.

Even if you only advance one level, it essentially means breaking through the limit of another ring and breaking through the second layer of rules of the world. It means advancing from "borrowing the law in the first ring" to "borrowing the law in the second ring".

It is foreseeable that the difficulty increases exponentially as you go higher.

Therefore… You Chen set limits for himself. Even if he were to pursue this path, he would only research up to two more rings of borrowing techniques at most!

Even if countless flashes of inspiration were used to strike through the Three Rings method, the ideal timeframe would still be more than ten years!

Instead of taking advantage of the smaller size's development, why wait another ten years? By then, it'll be too late!

In short, there are two options and two paths.

The first path is to reach the Soul Emperor realm right now. The advantage is increased safety and significantly improved mission efficiency. The disadvantage is a reduction in potential and ceiling.

The second option is to wait it out for a while longer. Its advantages and disadvantages are the opposite of the first option.

Given the Chinese people's fondness for development and land reclamation, You Chen naturally preferred routes with greater potential.

But in reality, there is a paradox here.

That is... the previous mission rewards have already proven that system missions can also enhance potential.

The so-called potential enhancement in this second path is actually just "the method of enhancing potential in the original local soul master system by developing and innovating it", or "the potential enhancement of the martial soul origin and the three-element cultivation system of essence, qi and spirit that You Chen figured out for himself before obtaining the system".

Is it necessarily superior to the rewards given by the system, such as "seeing the origin" or "changing tendons and marrow" ten or a hundred times?

Not necessarily, it's impossible to say.

The most direct example is the "Divine Elephant Suppressing Prison Technique". Even without considering You Chen's balance of essence, qi and spirit, this technique has a characteristic: "The higher the basic physical quality and the higher the level of life, the faster the cultivation speed."

You Chen could have chosen the "pure physical body" path, completely disregarding martial soul and the balance of essence, energy, and spirit, and absorbed soul rings as much as possible to improve his soul power level and physical attributes.

(End of this chapter)