Chapter 164 Obtaining the Snow Empress! Seizing the Wisdom Crystal of Mingde Hall!
The alloy door of the core chamber groaned and twisted under the overwhelming force of the Overlord level, finally collapsing with a crash, scattering ice shards and metal fragments all over the ground.
Liu Yuan walked in with heavy steps, his gaze instantly locking onto the center of the secret chamber.
On the platform forged from millennia-old cold iron, a spherical object emitting a ghostly blue light floated silently—this was the Conferred God Platform.
Through the transparent barrier, one can clearly see a baby curled up inside, pure white in color, as if formed from a ball of pure energy.
Although its eyes were closed, the arrogant aura emanating from the ice and snow overlord of the far north, even though it was heavily sealed by the soul-guiding array, still caused the surrounding air to exhibit a terrifyingly low temperature.
From the shadows a hundred meters away, Huo Yuhao could see this scene clearly thanks to his shared mental detection.
"Yuhao! Hurry! It's Xue'er! She's right there!"
Ice Emperor's voice screamed wildly in Huo Yuhao's mind, filled with an almost desperate urgency.
As the Heavenly King of the far north, she had been by the side of the Snow Emperor for many years. Now, watching the Snow Emperor fall into the hands of others, the pain of feeling her pain was so intense that she almost burst out of Huo Yuhao's body.
"He's putting away the Conferred God Platform right now; this is when his defenses are weakest! Move quickly!"
However, despite Hyotei's almost hysterical urging, Huo Yuhao remained frozen in the shadows of the ventilation duct, like a stone statue that had lost its soul.
His hands gripped the metal edge tightly, his knuckles turning a ghastly white from the excessive force.
"Hyotei... what am I supposed to use to compete with them?"
Huo Yuhao asked in a low voice in his mind, his tone filled with an unprecedented sense of powerlessness.
His gaze pierced through the darkness, fixed on the black figure bathed in the light of the blood-red fifth spirit ring.
"You saw it just now, he instantly killed two Soul Douluos. Those were eight-ring Soul Douluos!"
"With my current strength, even with the combined power of you and Brother Tianmeng, can I withstand the soul skill unleashed by his red soul ring?"
"Going up there wouldn't be to steal it, it would be to die. I'm no match for him at all."
Hyotei's originally intense shouts came to an abrupt halt.
She fell into a long silence.
As a ferocious beast that has lived for over 300,000 years, she understands the gap between Huo Yuhao and Liu Yuan better than Huo Yuhao does.
The moment that dark purple space opened up, even her soul felt a tremor.
This power has completely transcended the scope of the younger generation.
She felt helpless, she felt upset, and she felt an unprecedented sense of frustration.
The pride of the Ice Jade Emperor Scorpion was crushed in the face of absolute power.
Huo Yuhao was also upset.
His heart felt as if it were being soaked in bitter water.
He had been chasing that figure, from his first encounter in the Star Dou Great Forest to his crushing defeat in the Continental Soul Master Tournament. He had thought that learning about soul tools in the Sun Moon Empire would give him hope of surpassing his former self, but reality gave him the loudest slap in the face.
"Is he really Liu Yuan? If so... how can he be so ridiculously strong?"
Huo Yuhao lowered his head, letting the shadows obscure his eyes, which were filled with frustration.
Deep within the sea of consciousness, the Heavenly Dream Ice Silkworm, who had remained silent until now, was the one suffering the most.
Its enormous golden body was curled up in the sea of consciousness, and its eyes, which were usually always laughing and joking, were now filled with deathly stillness.
"Why didn't I choose him back then?"
Deep within her heart, Tianmeng Bingcan repeatedly questioned herself.
Back in the outer reaches of the Star Dou Great Forest, it sensed two extremely faint but highly promising auras. It ultimately chose Huo Yuhao, who seemed more "controllable" and "docile".
Although Tianmeng Ice Silkworm had already begun to regret its actions when Liu Yuan swept Shrek Academy in the Soul Master Competition, it could still forcefully suppress that regret by saying that "Yuhao also has room for growth."
But today, when it witnessed Liu Yuan, with his five-ring cultivation, defeat a Soul Douluo, forcibly bear a 100,000-year Soul Ring, and display the eye technique that dominates space, the regret was like a flood that burst its banks, instantly overwhelming its consciousness.
"This is the most regrettable decision I've ever made in my life... without a doubt."
The Heavenly Dream Ice Silkworm silently thought that if it had chosen Liu Yuan back then, then its current pair of eye techniques that dominate space, combined with its million-year-old spiritual essence, would be enough to create a true "god".
Now, it can only hide in the shadows, watching as the host that might have originally belonged to it easily takes away the treasure that was enough to change the fate of the far north.
From Liu Yuan's perspective.
He never let his guard down.
Although he seemed focused on dealing with the Conferred God Platform, his peripheral vision was always locked on the location where Huo Yuhao was hiding behind him.
Electrolux's powerful divine sense was like an invisible net, covering an area of a hundred meters. As long as Huo Yuhao showed the slightest abnormality in the mobilization of soul power, Liu Yuan would instantly activate the "Forbidden Domain" to imprison him.
However, Liu Yuan noticed that there was still no movement in that direction.
"It seems he has finally learned what it means to act within one's means."
A cold smile curled at the corner of Liu Yuan's mouth.
Without further hesitation, he covered his right hand with a layer of dark blue Qilin scales, and directly plunged into the dark blue light, firmly grasping the base of the Conferred God Platform.
Feeling the extreme cold emanating from his palm and the faint yet tenacious pulse of life, Liu Yuan murmured to himself, "Snow Empress, in this life, I will rewrite your destiny. Come back to the Body Sect with me; there, you will see a different Douluo Continent."
As the light faded, Liu Yuan directly stored the Conferred God Platform into his storage soul tool.
He didn't linger in the reservoir area. The mission objective had been achieved, but he still had to fulfill his duty of cooperating with the Undying Poison to wreak havoc.
Liu Yuan's figure flickered as he moved through the intricate passages of Mingde Hall.
"Boom! Boom! Boom!"
With the combined force of the Qilin and the mental beam, wherever he went, all the high-level precision experimental platforms, the unfinished parts of the level nine soul tools, and the energy cores that could provide the Sun Moon Empire with the power to wage war were completely destroyed by him in the most violent way.
Just as he had almost finished destroying everything and was about to head to the rendezvous point on the outskirts of the northern city to meet up with Du Busi and the others, his double pupils discovered an extremely peculiar area behind a semi-transparent alloy partition.
It was an extremely spacious circular library.
Liu Yuan pushed open the door and entered, where he saw countless metal scrolls and special books with special guiding force neatly stacked on the towering alloy bookshelves.
He casually pulled out a scroll, his gaze sweeping over its contents, his expression instantly becoming serious and focused.
"This is... the core array concept of a high-level soul tool? And the material ratio scheme for fixed-mount soul-guided projectiles?"
Liu Yuan quickly flipped through the pages.
The books here record a large amount of research concepts about level eight and even level nine soul tools, physical and chemical reaction data of rare materials, and the most core design blueprints.
These items were absolutely top secret within Mingde Hall. Even in the original novel, the loss of such items caused Jing Hongchen so much heartache that he almost vomited blood.
Liu Yuantai was well aware of the value of these paper documents and force data.
"The reason why the Sun Moon Empire was able to suppress the original three kingdoms of Douluo lies in its reserves of these ideas and technologies."
Liu Yuan sighed softly.
He knew that with the development of the times, soul tools were an inevitable trend. Not to mention the Battle of Douluo Continent III thousands of years later, where battle armor and mechs became the only standard for measuring strength, even in the current era, soul tools had already begun to play a role on the battlefield.
In the later part of the original story, even someone as powerful as Du Busi admitted how foolish he was to have looked down on soul tools in the early stages, which was one of the reasons that led to the decline of the Body Sect.
"The Body Sect may not value these things now, but they must have them."
Without the slightest hesitation, Liu Yuan directly activated the storage device's largest containment space. With a wave of his hand, he devoured all the documents, blueprints, and research materials in the library like a whale swallowing its prey.
"Since we've already robbed Xue Di, let's take all these things with us."
Liu Yuan sneered, took one last look at the now empty library, and transformed into a dark purple streak of light, smashing through the ventilation shaft above and disappearing into the night outside Mingdu.
(End of chapter)