Douluo Continent: Long Live the Spirit Hall

If you cultivate step by step using the ring system, it would take five years for a level 11 Soul Master to level 20. However, if you suppress your Soul Power and cultivate every day for five years at the level of a level 10 Soul Master, you might not even accumulate enough Soul Power to reach level 5.

Even if you manage to absorb a spirit ring that's over 500 years old in the future, it still won't make up for the gap in spirit power between you and others at the same level. One step behind means you'll always be behind.

This method of suppressing soul power for cultivation is too ineffective. Unless you are entering a place like the City of Slaughter where you have no other choice but to suppress your soul power, it is best to cultivate and advance step by step.

Chapter 18 Golden Flame Orb

"Dawn, scan my body data."

After stabilizing his condition, Yan tried to scan his entire body with the AI ​​Dawn. Compared to his previous self, he found that his physical fitness, soul power, and mental strength had all improved significantly. However, the most obvious change was in his martial soul.

"Although the Flame Commander Martial Soul has not evolved into a top-tier Martial Soul, it has still improved significantly and accumulated a lot of energy. With one or two more soul rings of such perfect harmony, it may be possible to complete another transformation of the Martial Soul."

Comparing the changes in his own martial soul before and after, Yan had some realizations, which proved that some of his previous speculations were completely correct.

For spirit rings, especially for beast spirits and plant spirits that can find similar or related biological sources within the Douluo world, choosing a spirit ring that matches one's own affinity is extremely important.

Yan's current absorption of the Hundred-Year-Old Blazing Lion Soul Ring, which shares the same fire attribute as the Flame Commander, grants him significant benefits. Similarly, other beast spirits can choose this path, using the power of soul rings to modify and evolve their talents.

As long as one chooses to absorb the correct soul ring that is compatible with their nature, even an ordinary commoner soul master can gradually transform and make up for their innate talent through hard work. In the end, they will be no weaker than those aristocratic scions with top-tier innate martial souls.

In the world of Soul Masters today, the ancestors of those Soul Master families also went through this transformation, evolving their own Martial Soul step by step, passing on stronger bloodlines to their descendants, and ultimately creating powerful Soul Master families.

Based on his own data analysis, Yan deduced that even ordinary commoner Soul Masters, through this step-by-step absorption and transformation, would likely be able to upgrade their Martial Soul to a higher level after reaching the Soul Saint realm. And if one could become a Title Douluo, they should be able to transform into a top-tier Martial Soul.

As for the most top-tier spirits like the Clear Sky Hammer and the Blue Lightning Tyrannosaurus Rex, these are the ultimate spirits obtained by countless powerful members of their families after countless generations of transformation. It is almost impossible for a commoner spirit master to catch up in one generation.

Yan secretly compared the data and made deductions. After a long time, he raised his head. At this time, the dense forest on the edge of the Golden Lion Plain was no longer in chaos. The corpses of many soul beasts lay scattered in all directions. These were the many soul beasts that had died in the melee.

"Uncle Lin, did you find anything?"

Yan walked to Feng Lin's side, who was dissecting the Flaming Lion on the ground with a small knife, trying to find any possible soul bones.

Soul bones are an extremely special treasure in the Douluo world. They are the most desired item in the dreams of all soul masters. Similar to soul rings, soul bones also come from soul beasts.

However, soul bones and soul rings are vastly different. Soul rings are formed after every soul beast dies, while soul bones, except for those that are guaranteed to drop after 100,000 years, have a chance of appearing in the form of soul bones for soul beasts younger than 100,000 years old, is only one in a thousand or even less. Therefore, soul bones are extremely rare and precious.

Generally speaking, soul beasts that are extremely powerful and experience special circumstances at the time of their death may produce soul bones after death.

This latter statement was then accepted as truth by a certain master, who proposed an extremely bizarre theory: the more unwilling and angry a soul beast is at the moment of death, the better the effect of the soul ring it produces, and the more likely it is to drop a precious soul bone.

This completely absurd theory led Tang San to later slaughter a group of high-level soul beasts over 50,000 years old in the Sunset Forest, obtaining several soul bones. This spread the story widely, and who knows how much more evil he caused afterward.

As far as Yan knows, the creation of soul bones has absolutely nothing to do with the slaughter of soul beasts; rather, it is closely related to the potential and strength of the soul beasts. In other words, the first part of this theory is indeed true: stronger soul beasts are indeed more likely to produce soul bones.

In the later stages of the Douluo Continent world, research on martial souls and soul beasts reached an extremely high level. After soul bones could be artificially created, the essence of soul bones became known. The so-called soul bone is the soul core of a soul beast, which becomes the most characteristic thing it had in life after death.

A soul core, to be precise, is not a specific substance. It is a special energy body that soul masters and soul beasts can condense after breaking through 100,000 years or reaching the title of Douluo level. It can enhance the speed at which a soul master's soul power increases and recovers.

In the early stages of Douluo Continent, Soul Masters cultivated step by step, making it virtually impossible for them to condense a Soul Core before becoming Title Douluo. However, Soul Beasts are indeed different.

For soul beasts, soul cores represent special potential. The current mainstream view in the soul master world is to classify the level and age of soul beasts based on the years of soul power, believing that a soul beast of a certain level must be of a certain age. This statement is actually incorrect.

Ordinary soul beasts, such as the Soft Bone Rabbit, Blue Silver Grass, and Netherworld Wolf, which originally lacked intelligence and were essentially wild beasts, would most likely need to undergo 100,000 years of cultivation to gradually develop intelligence and eventually advance to become 100,000-year soul beasts.

However, there are also special mutated soul beasts and rare races among soul beasts. For example, some extremely precious top-tier bloodline soul beasts are born with extremely powerful strength and extremely high intelligence. They can accumulate energy more easily and naturally do not need 100,000 years of cultivation.

These special beings among the soul beasts possess talent and potential far exceeding that of ordinary soul beasts. It is not surprising that they condense soul cores ahead of time. In fact, top-tier soul beasts such as the Titan Giant Ape, Azure Bull Python, and Dark Gold Terror Claw Bear condense soul cores almost 100% of the time after death, regardless of the year.

Of course, apart from these top-tier soul beast bloodlines, special mutated soul beasts and soul beasts with high intelligence that are over ten thousand years old are all likely to produce soul bones, and the probability is not small.

The Flaming Demon Lion that Yan hunted was considered a king among soul beasts. Although it was still somewhat inferior to the top soul beasts, its potential was still considerable, and the possibility of it producing soul bones was quite high, so he was quite looking forward to it.

"Young Master, we haven't found the Soul Bone."

Upon hearing Yan's question, Feng Lin looked up and stepped aside slightly. At this moment, the Flaming Lion had been completely dissected. Its body lay supine with its fur torn open, and its head, limbs, spine, and even tailbone had been cut open, but not a single bone showed any soul power reaction.

Yan's eyes showed some disappointment. He squatted down and stretched out his palm to circulate his soul power. His palm brushed over the bones of the Fiery Demon Lion inch by inch, just as Feng Lin had said, there was no reaction.

"what!"

As he was about to stop, he patted the lion's head and suddenly felt that the temperature of his palm was a little off. He had a strange intuition and quickly summoned a ball of golden and red flames. The golden and red flames flickered, and he kept testing them. Finally, the flames suddenly became active on the back of the lion's head.

"Uncle Lin, split its head open."

Yan's eyes lit up. After hearing his words, Feng Lin raised the knife and circulated his wind attribute soul power. The wind blade was extremely sharp and successfully cut open the lion's head, revealing the lion's brain with golden patterns.

Yan looked down and saw a bead about half the size of a fist, radiating golden light, lying quietly in the center of the lion's brain.

Yan bent down and picked up the precious pearl. As he caressed and played with it, a bright smile appeared on his lips. "What a wonderful Golden Flame Pearl. Although it's not a soul bone, it's even more useful to me."

Chapter 19 Martial Soul City

"Uncle Lin, let's take this Flaming Lion and go back."

Beside the Flaming Lion's body, Yan stroked the Golden Flame Pearl with his fingers, feeling the activity and growth of the flame power within his body. A smile appeared on his lips as he then instructed Feng Lin to take the Flaming Lion away.

Compared to ordinary wild beasts, soul beasts inherently possess abundant energy, not to mention this nearly four-hundred-year-old Flame Demon Lion. Even excluding the soul ring and the Golden Flame Pearl, its lion body is of great value. Yan is currently in the stage of growth and needs nutrition.

Feng Lin silently nodded at Yan's instructions. He had already fully embraced the role of a follower. He reached out and touched the mane of the Flaming Lion, and the enormous Flaming Lion vanished from the spot.

"Soul tools, huh? I could take some time to research them."

Yan glanced at a bracelet on Feng Lin's wrist. It was a valuable storage soul tool with a small capacity of about five cubic meters. It was the most valuable possession Feng Lin owned, a trophy from a hunt for an evil soul master.

After the Flaming Lion was captured, Yan collected some more materials on the battlefield. Quite a few soul beasts died in this chaotic battle, which were all good materials to enrich his AI database. The AI ​​Dawn's deductions rely on real-world data, so daily data collection is extremely important.

After collecting the data and confirming that there were no omissions, Yan left the place with Feng Lin and Li Ya, who had finished cleaning up the battlefield. As the three figures disappeared into the distance, the Golden Lion Plain returned to its noisy state. Tentative roars of beasts came from afar, and one after another, soul beasts were attracted to this chaotic place by the smell of blood.

……

Spirit City, located at the border of two great empires, is a young city that belongs entirely to the Spirit Hall. In fact, just six months ago, this city did not even exist.

A year ago, a major event occurred on the Douluo Continent: Qian Xunji, the then Pope of the Spirit Hall, was assassinated by Tang Hao, the new Clear Sky Douluo of the Clear Sky Sect. Bibi Dong succeeded to the throne as the new Pope, and the entire situation on the Douluo Continent underwent tremendous changes.

The new Pope, Bibi Dong, is a disciple of the former Pope, Qian Xunji. She was established as the Holy Maiden of the Spirit Hall very early on and is the first successor to the papacy. After the death of the former Pope, she naturally and smoothly completed the handover of the papacy.

Of course, some controversies arose during this process, such as the sudden emergence of Qian Daoliu, the former judge of the Spirit Hall and father of the former pope, and his seemingly not-so-close relationship with the current pope.

These situations all evoke different associations, and some of the actions taken by the new pope after his accession to the throne do indeed easily lead to such associations, such as... relocating the Papal Palace and building the Martial Soul City.

The Papal Palace is one of the most revered main halls within the Spirit Hall, a sacred place in the hearts of countless spirit masters. Along with other important main halls such as the Douluo Hall, the Elder Hall, and the Hall of Offerings, it enjoys a supreme status.

The original Papal Palace and the Hall of Worship existed together and were known as the two most revered halls of the Spirit Hall. However, after the new pope took office, he announced the construction of Spirit City and the building of a brand new Papal Palace, citing years of disrepair.

This brand-new Papal Palace is hailed as the most magnificent building in the entire Douluo Continent. The young city of Wuhun City has also become extremely famous because of the Papal Palace, and it is showing signs of becoming a holy land for Soul Masters.

……

"This is Wuhun City, it is truly magnificent."

On the official road outside Wuhun City, a procession of carriages slowly came to a stop. Yan, in the second carriage, slowly lifted the curtain and saw a magnificent city. Even though he came from the mortal world, he couldn't help but sigh when he saw the city for the first time.

The area of ​​Wuhun City is not very large. It is naturally large compared to ordinary cities, but compared to some more famous cities, such as Silves City, the capital of the Silves Kingdom, which Yan and his group once passed through, Wuhun City is much smaller.

Although Wuhun City is small in area, its city walls are far more magnificent than those of ordinary large cities. The city walls, which are eighty meters high, are extremely majestic from the outside and are more than thirty meters thick. They are made entirely of granite.

This also reflects how powerful the Spirit Hall is today. You should know that this city did not exist originally. It was built entirely with the funds of the Spirit Hall, and it only took about half a year to build such a magnificent Spirit City. It is truly incredible.

Unlike typical square cities, Wuhun City is hexagonal, with six walls, each topped with a large relief symbolizing six powerful martial spirits.

Yan looked up and saw the figures patrolling the city wall. They were all Soul Masters, wearing special armor from the Spirit Hall.

Feng Lin, being a Soul King, still held some influence within the Spirit Hall, and Yan and his group quickly completed the inspection and entered the city.

The first impression of Wuhun City is its emptiness; there are few pedestrians on the streets, and even fewer shops. The shops that are there mostly sell items needed by Soul Masters. Yan hadn't encountered a single non-Soul Master along his journey.

The Spirit Hall is a special city that does not allow people without spirit power to enter, not even nobles. It is a sacred place for spirit masters.

The hexagonal Martial Soul City is built around a hill, and on this hill stand two very eye-catching buildings.

The most magnificent building is located halfway up the mountain; it can be clearly seen even from this distance—that is the Papal Palace.

The Papal Palace is entirely a columned structure, with its dome and exterior facade covered in gold material that glitters in the sunlight, giving it an imposing appearance.

The other building is located at the top of the hill. It is much smaller than the Papal Palace, about one-third the size. The building structure is somewhat similar, but its exterior is as white as jade and is far less eye-catching than the Papal Palace.

This much smaller building is also quite special; it's the highest-ranking building in the Spirit Hall, the Douluo Hall. Only deceased Title Douluos can reside there; it can also be considered the burial ground for Title Douluos.

The reason why this newly built city of Spirit City has a pious atmosphere is not because of the Papal Palace, but because of the Douluo Palace. No matter where the Papal Palace is built, the Douluo Palace will be built alongside it, and the Douluo Palace will always be located at a higher position than the Papal Palace.

During major festivals, the Pope would personally go to the Douluo Palace to offer sacrifices. However, even the Pope, before his death, had no right to enter the Douluo Palace. This was the rule, a rule that no one could violate; otherwise, they would be attacked by all the Soul Masters.

Chapter 20 Soul Master Academy

As the new headquarters of the Spirit Hall, Spirit City enjoys independent governance by the Spirit Hall and is exempt from paying taxes to any country. This alone reflects the Spirit Hall's formidable strength.

The hexagonal Spirit City was built around the hill where the Papal Palace was located. As the capital of the Spirit Hall, the Papal Palace held a very special position.

On the Douluo Continent, even the smallest cities have a Spirit Hall. Small cities like Nar City and Notting City can only have the lowest-level Spirit Hall.

Above the Martial Soul Branch Hall are the Martial Soul Sub-Halls, and one level higher is the Martial Soul Main Hall. Only truly large cities can possess a Martial Soul Main Hall, such as the capital of an empire's province, the capital of a kingdom, or the most important core city.

Above the Spirit Main Hall is the Spirit Holy Hall. There are only two such halls on the entire Douluo Continent, located in the capitals of the two great empires. The Platinum Bishops who oversee these two Holy Halls may not be the strongest, but their abilities are certainly remarkable.

Above the Spirit Hall is the Pope, also known as the Spirit Hall, the core of the Spirit Hall's power. Although there are also the Elder Hall, the Douluo Hall, and the Hall of Worship, the Pope's Hall always holds the reins of the Spirit Hall's overall direction.

The Spirit Hall's influence covers every city on the Douluo Continent, and through these cities it influences surrounding towns and villages. For example, the work of Spirit Awakening was something that nobles and sects certainly wanted to monopolize, but the Spirit Hall broke this monopoly after it appeared.

The Spirit Hall offers free Spirit Awakening to all eligible children in the Douluo Continent at the age of six. This is a great achievement of the Spirit Hall, and no one can deny it.

In the original novel, Tang San destroyed the Spirit Hall and developed the Tang Sect and Shrek Academy. Both of these sects and academies had their own selfish motives and would never have offered free Spirit Awakening across the entire continent like the Spirit Hall did.

After the Spirit Hall became history, it was not difficult for nobles, who were the exploiting class, to awaken their spirits. But for commoners, if they wanted to awaken their spirits, they had to pay money to hire a spirit master, which was an expense.

Moreover, without the Spirit Hall, the subsidies for low-level spirit masters are gone. As beneficiaries, the nobles would not want so many commoner spirit masters to appear and challenge their authority, so they would naturally suppress commoner spirit masters.

In reality, from the destruction of the Spirit Hall until the emergence of the Douluo Federation, it was a dark age for commoner spirit masters. It wasn't until the establishment of the Douluo Federation, the awakening of public awareness, and the gradual weakening of the influence of the aristocratic class that commoner spirit masters finally saw the light of day.

However, for Yan, compared to the chaotic era after Douluo Continent I, when evil spirit masters rose again and various forces fought each other, this era in which the Spirit Hall held absolute power in the spirit world was actually the best of times.

Located between the two great empires, Wuhun City boasts excellent transportation links. As the capital of the Wuhun Hall, it naturally has no security issues, at least not outwardly.

The population of Wuhun City is not very large. Most of them are family members of Wuhun Hall staff, as well as commoner soul masters from various places. There are many shops on both sides of the street. It is not prosperous but still lively.

"Uncle Lin, let's go straight to the Soul Master Academy!"

Yan glanced around the city streets a few times but quickly lost interest. Apart from the presence of Soul Masters everywhere, the city was no different from any other city, and it wasn't even particularly lively, which left him with little interest.

The carriage moved slowly along the street. Yan tilted his head and kept looking at the scenery along the way. After passing the bustling streets of the outer city, they arrived at the city's central ring, where they could see tall buildings standing in rows. These were the teaching buildings of various colleges.

As the most powerful soul master organization on the continent, the Spirit Hall not only recruits and absorbs graduates from various soul master academies year-round, but also has its own institution for training soul masters.