Book 3: Fusion of Martial Souls

Chapter 16.4: Freshman Examination

When Xu Sanshi had first seen the red-clothed girl, he had clearly been somewhat distressed. He wasn’t even as passionate as he normally was whilst eating his roasted fish. On the other hand, the red-clothed girl slowly raised her veil, revealing her absolutely beautiful face, as she slowly began to eat the roasted fish.

Her movements were extremely graceful as she carefully ate the fish. However, Huo Yuhao and Wang Dong were stunned by the mysterious disappearance of the fish bones from her hand after she’d finished eating the fish. She’d clearly used her hands to eat the fish, yet there weren’t any oil stains on her hand at all.

Just what power was this? Huo Yuhao and Wang Dong glanced at each other, both seeing the shock reflected in each other’s eyes.

The two pieces of roasted fish were quickly finished by her. When she finished, the red-clothed girl nodded at Huo Yuhao and said, “Your roasted fish are very tasty. They seem to have been seriously made. Now then, let me see your martial soul.”

Her words had an irrefusable tone to them. Ever since the evil fire in her body had been suppressed by that mysterious ice element, she hadn’t disturbed by her martial soul’s overbearing demonism for a full three months. However, that icy aura had gradually been refined by her martial soul’s phoenix flames as time passed, causing a backlash to gradually appear. The reason that she was looking for Xu Sanshi was because of his Mysterious Underworld Turtle, which was currently the best water-type martial soul in the academy. If she borrowed a certain amount of his strength, she could suppress the evil fire in her body. To Xu Sanshi, this process was just like tempering iron into steel—it only brought benefits. However, it was extremely painful. That was why Xu Sanshi had immediately had a bitter expression when he saw her. Furthermore, this wasn’t the first time that she’d tormented him like this.

Huo Yuhao eyebrows furrowed slightly, while Wang Dong had an indignant look on his face. However, he was stopped by Huo Yuhao’s raised hand. He slowly raised his head and looked towards the red-clothed girl. After that, a faint golden light emerged in his eyes. As that happened, a sheen of purple rippled through his deep blue eyes.

Of all the secret techniques he’d learned from the Tang Sect, Huo Yuhao’s greatest improvement lay in the Purple Demon Eyes. Whenever he absorbed the purple qi that rose from the east every morning, his Spirit Eyes would naturally generate a siphoning effect. For him, a single day’s worth of cultivating the Purple Demon Eyes was better than ten days worth of cultivation for Bei Bei and Tang Ya. Because of this, his Purple Demon Eyes had improved extremely quick.

The red-clothed girl raised her long eyebrows slightly when she sensed Huo Yuhao’s mysterious Spiritual Detection Sharing.

Following the increase in his cultivation, the strength of Huo Yuhao’s soul ring had gradually begun to increase, as per the Skydream Iceworm’s words. The strength of his tolerance would determine how much strength his first soul ring could manifest.

In the beginning, although his first soul ring contained four soul skills within it, their effects had only been equivalent to that of a four hundred year soul ring. However, his first soul ring now possessed the power of a soul ring that was around six hundred years, with the maximum range of his Spiritual Detection and his Spiritual Interference now reaching a diameter of fifty metres. Furthermore, the effects of these skills were even more detailed than they had previously been.

Part of the first seal that the Skydream Iceworm's had made within Huo Yuhao’s body had already been unlocked. As long as Huo Yuhao continued to make breakthroughs in his cultivation, the Skydream Iceworm's powerful origin energy would automatically increase the strength of his first soul ring. This was something that other soul masters couldn't even dare to dream about. His first soul ring would only continue to grow more terrifying as his cultivation level rose.

The Skydream Iceworm couldn’t give Huo Yuhao an instant power boost, but it had given him an astonishingly bright future.

Huo Yuhao kept his Spiritual Detection Sharing active for about ten seconds, before withdrawing it. After a few moments of what seemed to be shock, the red-clothed girl nodded towards Huo Yuhao. She then gazed deeply at the single white soul ring that rose up from his feet and said, “That’s the strongest ten year soul ring I’ve ever seen.”

Huo Yuhao replied in a very natural manner, “It’s still only a ten year soul ring.”

The red-clothed girl laughed softly and said, “I’m Ma Xiaotao, nice to meet you. If I have the chance, I’ll come back again to eat your roasted fish. Little Xu, let’s go.”

Xu Sanshi had a pained expression as he said, “Sister Xiaotao, can you please be a bit more gentle today?”

Ma Xiaotao gave him an indifferent glance, causing him to immediately correct himself, “I don’t have any problems, none at all.” As he spoke, he hurriedly walked in front of Ma Xiaotao and gestured for her to continue.

Only after the two had entered the academy did Wang Dong mutter, “Her name’s really tacky....”

Huo Yuhao said in response, “Can a name prove anything? Don’t you think that she seemed a bit familiar?”

Wang Dong was suddenly startled. “She couldn’t be that person we met at the lake last time, could she? She was also wearing red clothes… could she be a disciple of the inner courtyard?”

Huo Yuhao shrugged his shoulders in response, expressing his doubt.

A group of people came rushing back and queued at his stall as soon as Ma Xiaotao and Xu Sanshi had left. The person in front, who happened to be a fourth year student, overheard the conversation between the two. He immediately whispered, “Junior classmen, you need to quiet down a bit. You can’t just talk about disciples from the inner courtyard like that, especially senior Xiaotao.”

Huo Yuhao asked in astonishment, “She’s really from the inner courtyard?”

The upperclassman replied, “Obviously. Within Shrek Academy, red-clothed students are all seniors from the inner courtyard. I don’t know how many people there are in the inner courtyard, but seniors from the inner courtyard rarely come out. There’s also a ranking system in the inner courtyard, causing the competition there to be extremely intense. Despite how intense it is, senior Xiaotao is one of the top ten ranked students inside of the inner courtyard. Her strength is definitely not something that we can compare to. Senior Xu Sanshi seems to have a very good relationship with senior Xiaotao, thus he might get a recommendation from senior Xiaotao to the inner courtyard in the future, if he’s lucky.”

Wang Dong asked with curiousity, “You need a recommendation to enter the inner courtyard?”

The upperclassman replied, “That’s obvious! Well, I’m not entirely clear about the specific procedures one must follow to enter the inner courtyard. Supposedly, every single student from the outer courtyard that wants to enter the inner courtyard must obtain a recommendation from a student from the inner courtyard.”

Huo Yuhao was able to finish selling the rest of his fish without a hitch. By the time he was about to sell the last of them, Bei Bei and Tang Ya arrived side-by-side. Huo Yuhao took out the fish that he’d saved for them beforehand to treat them to a few roasted fish.

“Junior brother, the freshman assessment is about to start. I’ve just got obtained accurate info: You’ll be registering in the morning, while the assessment will start in the afternoon. You have to prepare well.” Bei Bei’s demeanor was still as gentle as before.

Huo Yuhao nodded and said, “I’ll definitely work hard to pass the assessment.”

Bei Bei laughed, while Tang Ya said, “Little Yuhao, even if I’m your teacher, I can’t just eat this many of your roasted fish for free. I’ll give you something nice. You can use it when the time arises.” As she spoke, she handed something that resembled a pouch to Huo Yuhao. “When you get back back to your dorm room, store what’s inside in your Twenty Four Moonlit Bridges. Make sure to be careful when you’re using it. Don’t hit any vital points. Also, you’ll need to start learning how to refine soul tools after the assessment. At that time, I’ll teach you a few more secret techniques.”

“Thank you, Teacher Xiao Ya.” Huo Yuhao received the pouch, roughly able to guess what was inside.

Wang Dong had a curious look on his face. He proceeded to ask, “Teacher Xiao Ya, I don’t think that you can use soul tools during the freshman assessment, right?”

Tang Ya unhappily replied, “What soul tools? Don’t you know what the Tang Sect is famous for?”

When Huo Yuhao and Wang Dong returned to their dorm room and opened the pouch, they were shocked. It was filled with hidden weapons. There were throwing knives, throwing needles, Bone Piercing Needles, as well as a dozen plus other types of hidden weapons. Furthermore, there were over a hundred of each of them. It was basically a warehouse for hidden weapons.

It was extremely obvious that Tang Ya had prepared these hidden weapons for Huo Yuhao since his martial soul had no way to attack. During these past three months, Huo Yuhao had slightly improved in his understanding of the secret techniques of the Tang Sect, and had even started to skim through the Hidden Weapon Hundred Separations. He was extremely bright and studious, which resulted in him mastering a few techniques. He didn’t have any problems using hidden weapons in a basic fashion. To these new students with only one or two soul rings, these hidden weapons were still a large threat.

As Wang Dong gazed at Huo Yuhao’s hidden weapons, he couldn’t help but curl his lips and say, “Your Teacher Xiao Ya is clearly looking down on me. With me there, there won’t even be a need for you to make a move.”