Douluo Continent: Ink Bamboo as a Cauldron to Break Through Ten Thousand Heavens

Chen Cheng also stood up, walked to Huo Yuhao, patted him on the shoulder, and his eyes revealed his appreciation for him at this moment, like a general looking at a soldier who was about to go to war, or like an old friend who had finally been waiting for a long time.

"Everyone has seen your efforts, and I don't object to your diligent cultivation. But there's one thing: you must guard your true self! Don't let cultivation cause you to neglect your understanding and perception of emotions, goals, and human nature. These are the standards that can bind people and prevent them from straying from their true selves." At this point, Chen Cheng suddenly smiled strangely. "Oh, and one more thing, I've 'divinated' that your luck with romance is extremely strong, but the White Tiger Duke, whom you hate, made a mistake on this point. As his enemy, if you don't want to repeat his mistake, you should know what to do. Either don't love anyone, or choose the right person and hold your ground. Once you've established a relationship, don't touch anyone else! This is not only a responsibility to your lover, but also to yourself."

A strange expression shifted to Huo Yuhao's face. After traveling together for a while, the two parted ways.

"Now Huo Yuhao has been warned, but Wang Dong, you need to pay more attention! You keep going to other guys' dorms and acting like brothers with them. How are you going to develop a relationship? You're just letting opportunities slip by. Are you going to blame them for not loving you as a man? If you establish a relationship sooner, there won't be any more messy troubles like with Ju Zi and Qiu Er."

During his cultivation, Chen Cheng felt that he was becoming more and more adept at controlling and manipulating the bamboo, perhaps due to his recent enlightenment and the significant improvement in his mental strength.

Silent all night.

A glimmer of light appeared on the eastern horizon, its color indescribable. Chen Cheng opened his eyes, facing its direction, awaiting the sunrise. A wisp of golden-red quietly bloomed, slowly climbing towards the clouds. And beneath the golden-red, a faint wisp of purple aura—this was precisely what Chen Cheng needed daily to cultivate his Purple Demon Eyes, a habit he had already formed.

After finishing his training with the Purple Demon Eye, Chen Cheng began physical conditioning. Xiao Xiao, Huo Yuhao, and Wang Dong unexpectedly came over. Chen Cheng stared at Wang Dong with a half-smile, making Wang Dong feel a little embarrassed.

"Hey, what are you staring at me for? Is there something on your face?!"

"Maybe I haven't had a break in too long, because I actually dreamt that lazy dogs had time to get up and exercise?"

Wang Dong stopped arguing with Chen Cheng and turned to Huo Yuhao, joining the training. Xiao Xiao, standing to the side, grinned from ear to ear like a child who had just witnessed three consecutive jokes.

After dinner, some students went to class, and others went to do their research.

"Sigh, no wonder Tony Stark calls himself a top engineer. I can't even imagine how cool this thing would be!" He used up an entire tube of ink before finally finishing the draft. With a flick of his wrist, the pen flew out and nailed to the board beside him, now displaying itself as a pen. "Hmm, it's already taken this long to complete only a partial structural design. If I were to draw the entire soul tool design completely, this whole board would probably be covered with pens by now, wouldn't it?"

He shook his head, as if trying to shake off his mental exhaustion. He poured himself a glass of hot water and leaned back in his chair. His gaze fell on the design he had just completed on the table; its complexity and intricacy were astonishing.

"Sigh, to complete the design I conceived, I really need the help of mechanical technology! This entire design almost doesn't use any extra core magic arrays. It's all about using mechanisms to contract and expand, saving time and materials. The only drawback is that it's too complicated to design. However, I should be able to make up for that time when it's being manufactured."

"Speaking of which, if I really master this skill, even if I go back to the real world, I could probably handcraft something like Iron Man's armor, right? I could just take a briefcase, put it on the ground, step on it, and start disassembling and assembling it, unfolding a complete suit of armor onto my body. Mechanics are truly a man's romance! Who didn't dream of having their own armor, or their own Transformer, when they were a kid? [Whoosh!]"

After making himself laugh, Chen Cheng glanced at the time, then rushed back to the table, grabbed a pen, and prepared to try to finish the design of another component before dinner.

After lunch, Chen Cheng immediately returned to the experimental area to continue his design work. Those who had eaten with him exchanged a few jokes but didn't say much more. Inspired by his example, those around him began to show a willingness to be self-disciplined. Even the lazy Wang Dong had started meditating at night from time to time. Xu Sanshi also diligently followed Chen Cheng's suggestions, only occasionally visiting Jiang Nannan, spending the rest of his time cultivating. His entire demeanor had shed its previous sleazy appearance; he seemed reborn, finally showing some of the qualities of a sect's young master.

"He's starting to look like a human being," Chen Cheng said sincerely.

In the original story, Jiang Nannan was of average talent but very hardworking. Now, without Xu Sanshi's interference, she is even more focused and single-minded in her training. However, she occasionally feels a little unaccustomed to not having Xu Sanshi's harassment.

As for Bei Bei and Tang Ya, they weren't as inseparable as before. Tang Ya would occasionally study her Devouring Talent, Blue Silver Grass, hoping to find the opportunity for her Martial Soul evolution that Chen Cheng had mentioned as soon as possible. And Bei Bei supported Tang Ya wholeheartedly in whatever she did.

"This is what it means to be love-struck; there's no hope for it!"

In the experimental area, another pen flew towards the board, but this time Chen Cheng used a hidden weapon technique to show off.

"Although the Tang Clan specializes in hidden weapons and poisons, to be fair, it's quite cool to play with them. We've already completed the structural design of three parts, and we're not far from the overall main structure taking shape. Now we can relax a bit and find something else to do; we can't keep our minds constantly on edge."

Thinking this, Chen Cheng stopped spinning the new pen in his hand, took out another piece of paper, and began to scribble and write randomly.

  

"I remember in the original story, the old woman didn't explain the rules in detail, and she didn't say whether or not soul tools were allowed in the freshman assessment. But later, Wang Dong said they weren't allowed, and Bei Bei and Tang Ya gave Huo Yuhao a bunch of crafted hidden weapons for self-defense, specifically warning him not to hit vital points. Then Huo Yuhao immediately put them into his storage soul tool. Bei Bei and Tang Ya must have known the freshman assessment rules, and hidden weapons need to be taken out of the storage soul tool. So even if the rule 'soul tools cannot be used in the freshman assessment' exists, it shouldn't include storage soul tools? And hidden weapons are not soul tools and can be used. In that case, we could actually craft some other gadgets to arm Huo Yuhao."

As Chen Cheng pondered, his thoughts wandered, and he sketched a bunch of miscellaneous gadgets on the blueprints: Captain America's shield, Spider-Man's web-shooters, Hawkeye's crossbow, and so on. However, in the end, Chen Cheng focused his attention on Captain America's shield. After all, even with Huo Yuhao's mental detection abilities, ordinary arrows probably wouldn't do much damage to a Soul Master. The web-shooters were more for stat-boosting monsters like Spider-Man, granting them the ability to scale walls and leap across rooftops. Spider-Man could still "shatter the Green Goblin's dream with three punches, Peter I am Osborn!" without using webs. If Huo Yuhao had such stats, he wouldn't need these gadgets.

Chen Cheng boiled another kettle of water and began sketching out a design on paper. Although the forging talent path wasn't yet available in the world of Douluo Continent II, designing a shield capable of shock absorption and kinetic energy absorption using mechanical technology wasn't a problem. After all, he was only facing a group of Soul Masters with three rings or lower. With Wang Dong and Xiao Xiao on the front lines, Huo Yuhao only needed to have some self-defense capabilities. He needed to recognize his own position—Mental Detection Sharing Launcher!

After some time, Chen Cheng held a steaming cup of tea and looked at the design draft with great satisfaction.

"Combined with the technology of soul tools, maybe we can replicate all the equipment of superheroes. Although it won't be very useful against the strong soul masters, it would be fun! It would be interesting to show off with Iron Man's armor, hey! Mingde Hall is currently working on that top-secret experimental subject one project, the plan seems to be to research humanoid armor, right? Before the academy exchange, let's see if we can make a set to play with. I can't even imagine how interesting the expression of Jing Hongchen, the head of Mingde Hall, will be."

Afterwards, Chen Cheng went to Shrek Academy's Treasure Pavilion, intending to sell two soul tools to replenish his funds. He also planned to purchase another batch of rare metals for Huo Yuhao's soul tool learning and crafting. Of course, he also wanted to take a look to see if the ten-thousand-year-old whale glue that was sold cheaply as a thousand-year-old quality item from the original story had arrived.

This Treasure Pavilion is a property of Shrek Academy, and it's even managed by a Super Douluo from the Sea God Pavilion. Theoretically, their treasure appraisal abilities are top-notch. Finding a bargain in ten-thousand-year-old whale glue is an extremely rare occurrence. Chen Cheng himself had bought whale glue before; the difference between a hundred-year-old and a thousand-year-old is enormous, but the price of a ten-thousand-year-old one is simply outrageous. If he had the chance to find a bargain, he would definitely give it a try. Anyway, Huo Yuhao's luck might bring him other opportunities during the Treasure Appreciation Event. Besides, his roommate is a super-rich girl; whatever she wants, she'll buy it for her. A poor guy like him should just stick to finding bargains! A strange sense of sadness...

They were quite lucky; the piece of "ten-thousand-year-old whale glue" that Chen Cheng had been longing for was lying peacefully in a rather ordinary display case. It was completely black and dull, and without the description, one might mistake it for two or three pairs of smelly socks crumpled together, coated with glue, dried, and stored there. It didn't inspire any desire to stop and examine it.

After Chen Cheng explained his purchase intentions to the staff, he went to the front desk to collect the metal he had ordered, as well as the remaining profit from the sale of the soul tools after deducting the purchase costs.

"After we get back, we'll put it in the heating soul tool and heat it for an hour or two. The quality looks terrible, otherwise it wouldn't be sold so cheaply. We might even be misled, and it might take longer to heat up than expected. But it doesn't matter. After eating it, even Huo Yuhao, whose physique is so weak, was able to absorb a purple soul ring at the second ring level. If I eat it, I estimate that absorbing a fifth soul ring for 20,000 to 30,000 years shouldn't be a problem. So delicious, so delicious..."

"Hmm, it's lunchtime just in time. Time flies when something happy happens! Time to eat! Speaking of which, I'm really craving Huo Yuhao's cooking. When I get the chance, I'll definitely let that kid be the chef again!"