"Blue Lightning Tyrant Dragon? Could our family's martial soul be of such high quality?"
Although the Blue Lightning Tyrant Dragon sect was used as a backdrop to prop up Spirit Hall, their martial soul is incredibly powerful. As the story progressed, the Blue Lightning Tyrant Dragon was increasingly praised, eventually being hyped to a level comparable to the Golden-Eyed Black Dragon King, Di Tian, by the time of Soul Land IV.
This martial soul is a pure-blooded true dragon. Its strength, speed, and attributes are all impressive enough to earn recognition from the Silver Dragon King. Even if it isn't classified as a super martial soul, it's at the pinnacle of top-tier martial souls.
Chen Ming couldn't believe that their martial soul could theoretically reach such a level.
Let's put it this way—if their martial soul could achieve 70% of this potential, the Chen family would at least produce a Soul Douluo in every generation. With a bit of luck, the continent's first poison-type Title Douluo wouldn't have been Dugu Bo but someone from their family. They wouldn't be stuck in a backwater city like Biluochen City; even settling in Heaven Dou City would be feasible.
Chen Ming seriously suspected that this was either an exaggeration by their ancestors or outright deception.
"Ahem, theoretical results and practical ones always have a slight gap... Anyway, let me finish," Chen Shijie said, his expression unwavering as he explained. In truth, when he was Chen Ming's age, he had the same doubts and understood what Chen Ming was thinking.
"Jade Phosphorous Flower of the Seven Absolutes is a type of plant that rarely transforms into soul beasts. When they do, they're typically at the ten-thousand-year level. However, that's far too long for humans, so our ancestors came up with a method."
"Biluochen City was built hundreds of years ago by our ancestors, relying on their granted territory. The reason they chose this location as their fief was the nearby Biluoxia canyon."
"You should know, Biluochen City is too close to Biluoxia. Strictly speaking, it's not a suitable place for ordinary humans to live. When the city was first built centuries ago, it was even more inhospitable than it is now—crops couldn't grow, and anything that managed to sprout was often poisonous."
"Our ancestor chose Biluoxia because a ten-thousand-year poison-type soul beast once appeared there. This soul beast ultimately fell under heavenly tribulation, its body exploded, and its toxins contaminated the land. By sheer luck, this transformed Biluoxia into one of the rare gathering places for poison-type soul beasts on the continent."
"Our ancestor built the city here to capitalize on the remnants of the ten-thousand-year poison-type soul beast. Near the core of Biluoxia, they established a cultivation area for Jade Phosphorous Flower of the Seven Absolutes, relying on the unique terrain and a large number of poison-type soul beasts as resources to nurture the flowers."
"However, even though the area is special, cultivating the Jade Phosphorous Flower of the Seven Absolutes wasn't easy. Before the first Jade Phosphorous Flower of the Seven Absolutes soul beast appeared, generations of our ancestors trained near the flowers—partly to use their soul power to nurture the plants, and to benefit from mimicry cultivation."
"But trouble was brewing from the start..."
"Our ancestors' martial soul was born from mutation, fundamentally lacking in quality. Training in Biluoxia imbued with the power left by a fallen ten-thousand-year soul beast and enhanced by cultivating Jade Phosphorous Flower of the Seven Absolutes, began to influence our martial souls."
"At first, the quality of our family's inherited martial soul improved. Everyone thought this was a good thing, so they intensified their training. Over time, as generations passed, the martial soul's quality kept rising, but the awakened soul power began to show issues."
"Initially, the decline was minimal, within the range of normal fluctuations. But as it became a significant problem, no one could pinpoint the cause."
"When talent failed, we simply trained harder..."
Chen Shijie trailed off for a moment, looking a bit exasperated, before continuing.
"When the first Jade Phosphorous Flower of the Seven Absolutes soul beast appeared, the problem exploded. The family experienced extreme polarization: some members saw their martial soul quality drastically improve, while others couldn't awaken soul power at all. By then, someone in the family noticed the issue, but there was no way to fix it."
"In the world of Douluo, lacking strength is a serious disadvantage. Even knowing the problem, the family couldn't resist the immense cultivation benefits brought by the Jade Phosphorous Flower of the Seven Absolutes. So, they continued training while searching for a solution."
"As more Jade Phosphorous Flower of the Seven Absolutes bloomed, the problem worsened. Eventually, by chance, one of our ancestors met a descendant of the Qian family who was traveling incognito—later known as Qian Daoliu, the unrivaled expert of the skies. With the Qian family's help, we finally discovered the true problem and the solution."
"Our martial soul has been contaminated by the Jade Phosphorous Flower of the Seven Absolutes and the remnants of the ten-thousand-year soul beast, causing its quality to forcibly improve. However, the essence of our family's martial soul is not inherently strong. This forced improvement drains innate soul power as nourishment. The low innate soul power, in turn, causes the martial soul to degrade to some extent and negatively impacts the talent of future generations."
"To describe it more concretely, it's like a fire. This fire forcibly burns our innate soul power to fuel a higher-quality martial soul. But as the firewood diminishes, the flames will eventually weaken and even go out."
"If other families' martial souls are like buckets of roughly equal size, then our Chen family has buckets that grow larger with each generation, but the water in them decreases, and every bucket has a hole at the bottom."
"This type of evolution cannot be interrupted by ordinary means. Unless a god intervenes, it's impossible to break this cycle through external forces. Furthermore, because of our extreme dependence on the Jade Phosphorous Flower of the Seven Absolutes, if our family is separated from it, future generations may not even awaken soul power. Our Emerald Scorpion martial soul has essentially become a subspecies reliant on the Jade Phosphorous Flower of the Seven Absolutes for survival."
"A tenth-level innate full soul power will be drained to nine, then eight, seven, or even lower. This has led to the theoretically impossible phenomenon where higher-quality martial souls are accompanied by lower levels of soul power."
"If innate soul power is below level five, it becomes impossible to awaken it in our family line. During the process of forming the martial soul, this portion of soul power is consumed. Without soul power, the martial soul that should have been of higher quality ends up regressing instead."
"Our lineage is now the last inheritor of the Chen family's martial soul. Theoretically, innate soul power levels are halved or more."
"My innate soul power was level four. Theoretically, even though I didn't reach full innate soul power, I should have been at least level nine or above. Your father's was two and a half, held back by the martial soul. Otherwise, even with a regular Emerald Scorpion, he would have had innate soul power of at least level seven."
"I thought your second uncle's innate soul power of three and a half was the Chen family's last hope. But unexpectedly, your soul power level is higher than mine..."
"Wait, really?!"
At first, when Chen Ming heard about some kind of treasure, he thought it was good news. But it turned out to be quite the opposite—a grim revelation. However, it did solve his previous doubts.
Logically, with all his training, his innate soul power shouldn't have been limited to level five. Now he understood it was consumed by the forced evolution of his martial soul.
"Don't worry. Theoretically, we still have ways to solve this problem..."
"The Qian family provided us with three solutions. The first is for the family to produce a Title Douluo or high-level Soul Douluo, who could improve the bloodline and forcibly reverse the situation. The second is for the Angel God to intervene directly, using divine power to restore the essence of our martial soul. The third..."
"Our family's problem was caused by the Jade Phosphorous Flower of the Seven Absolutes, and only the Jade Phosphorous Flower of the Seven Absolutes can cure it."
"If someone in the family could complete the evolution of their martial soul by absorbing the soul ring of a Jade Phosphorous Flower of the Seven Absolutes and a high-quality Emerald Scorpion before the third ring, their martial soul would undergo a significant transformation. Moreover, because our martial soul has been altered by the Jade Phosphorous Flower of the Seven Absolutes, we have an exceptionally high adaptability to it. After evolution, the martial soul could rival or even surpass the Blue Lightning Tyrant Dragon, and the bloodline of future generations would improve as well."
"But the biggest problem is that by the time we discovered this solution, our family had very few opportunities left to implement it."
"High-quality Emerald Scorpions are rare but still obtainable. However, Jade Phosphorous Flower of the Seven Absolutes is an entirely different matter."
"The number of Jade Phosphorous Flower of the Seven Absolutes that become soul beasts is exceedingly small. Our family members are also few in number. In the past, several talented ancestors attempted this and perished, their bodies entirely dissolved by the Jade Phosphorous Flower of the Seven Absolutes's poison during the process."
"Even absorbing a century-old Jade Phosphorous Flower of the Seven Absolutes soul ring for the third ring is nearly impossible."
"My uncle, who had innate soul power of level four, tried to absorb a Jade Phosphorous Flower of the Seven Absolutes that had barely surpassed a hundred years for his fourth soul ring. He barely survived, and although he successfully absorbed it, gaining partial evolution and greatly advancing his strength, the process damaged his essence. He passed away just a few years later."