Chapter 138: Spirit Bone Skill: Spatial Banishment! Elder Xuan and Huo Yuhao Arrive
The hollow had returned to a deathly, suffocating silence. Dust settled over the shattered earth, coating the uprooted trees in a fine gray powder. Liu Yuan and Du Busi stood amidst the devastation. Though the violent spatial fluctuations that had previously torn the air apart were gradually subsiding, the residual, oppressive aura of a fallen hundred-thousand-year Spirit Beast still lingered heavily. It hung in the atmosphere like a physical weight, ensuring that no ordinary ten-thousand-year Spirit Beast dared to take even half a step toward their location.
Having just witnessed Liu Yuan's heaven-defying fifth Spirit Ability, Du Busi's appetite was far from sated. His emerald-green eyes, gleaming with intense curiosity, swept toward Liu Yuan's forehead. While no physical Spirit Bone was visible on the youth's brow, a faint trace of ambient warmth still radiated from the starlight generated during the absorption process.
"What about the Spirit Bone?" Du Busi asked, his deep voice rumbling with eager anticipation. "What ability did that hundred-thousand-year head Spirit Bone grant you?"
As an absolute top-tier treasure guaranteed to drop from a hundred-thousand-year Spirit Beast, a head Spirit Bone traditionally bestowed overwhelmingly powerful mental or domain-type abilities. Given that the fallen creature was a darling of the spatial attribute, the head Spirit Bone it produced was bound to be extraordinary.
Liu Yuan closed his eyes for a brief moment, sinking his consciousness into his mind to feel the newly integrated bone resting against his skull. A subtle heat flared within his Double Pupils. When he opened his eyes again, a deep calmness anchored his gaze.
"Spirit Bone Skill: Spatial Banishment," he replied, his voice low and steady.
He paused, allowing the weight of the name to settle, before detailing the specific mechanics to his master. "This ability can only be activated once a day. It targets an object or a person within close range. Upon activation, it completely ignores all physical defenses and spatial locks, forcibly transferring the target to any designated area within a ten-thousand-meter radius."
Hearing this, Du Busi's already wide eyes erupted with a brilliant, predatory light. He slapped his hands together, the sheer force of the clap sending a shockwave through the stagnant air.
"Good! Excellent!" Du Busi shouted, his booming laughter echoing across the ruined hollow. "Although it is restricted to a single use per day, this is nothing short of a supreme, divine-tier skill for both life-saving escapes and lethal surprise attacks!"
He took a heavy step forward, his massive frame radiating pride. "A ten-thousand-meter range is more than enough for you to instantly break away from any enemy's pursuit. Alternatively, you can directly banish an enemy leader into a desperate, inescapable death trap. Liu Yuan, the harvest you have reaped today has utterly shattered this old man's expectations."
Liu Yuan slowly raised his hands, clenching his fingers into fists. He could feel the surging, torrential Spirit Power coursing through his meridians, feeling as vast and inexhaustible as an ocean. While the theoretical descriptions of his newly acquired Spirit Ability and Spirit Bone were overwhelmingly powerful, his pragmatic nature kept his mind grounded. Until these abilities were baptized in the crucible of real blood and fire, he would maintain a cautious reserve.
"I just do not know what level my actual combat strength has reached..." Liu Yuan muttered, his tone analytical.
He knew his foundation had undergone a qualitative leap. He even possessed the cold, calculated confidence to challenge a high-level Spirit Saint head-on. Yet, actual combat remained the sole, unforgiving metric for measuring true strength. He was a man accustomed to defining his combat power through concrete data, broken bones, and absolute victories, rather than relying on flowery skill descriptions.
Unconsciously, his gaze drifted toward the dense, shadowed tree line deep within the hollow. His Double Pupils narrowed slightly, scanning the perimeter as if searching for an unlucky ten-thousand-year Spirit Beast to serve as a live test subject.
However, this time, Du Busi did not indulge his disciple's usual habit of hunting local wildlife for combat testing. The towering old man restrained his boisterous smile. His expression hardened as he lifted his chin, staring toward the innermost core of the Star Dou Great Forest—the dreaded Fierce Beast Region.
"If you want to test your limits, wait until we return to the Sect," Du Busi warned, his deep voice carrying a rare, solemn weight. "Once we are back, you can spar with Ao Tian, or I and the other Elders will personally test your measure. Here... it is not appropriate."
Du Busi shifted his gaze to the massive, mangled corpse of the Spatial Beast lying on the cratered earth. "This Spatial Beast was, after all, a hundred-thousand-year existence. A Spirit Beast with this level of cultivation holds significant status within the hierarchy of the Star Dou Great Forest."
He crossed his thick arms over his chest. "The commotion we caused during the hunt was simply too massive. If the residual energy draws the attention of other hundred-thousand-year Spirit Beasts, or worse, those ancient Vicious Beasts slumbering in the Fierce Beast Region, it will inevitably drag us into unnecessary trouble."
While Du Busi possessed absolute confidence in his own tyrannical strength and feared no individual challenger, his primary objective had shifted. Protecting Liu Yuan's safety and ensuring his safe return to the Body Sect was now his absolute priority. Lingering in the core area of the Star Dou Great Forest, especially while standing over the freshly slaughtered corpse of a local overlord, was a fool's gamble.
"It is better to leave immediately," Du Busi decided, his tone leaving no room for argument.
Liu Yuan did not push the issue. His rational mind perfectly understood their current situation. He had just achieved a monumental breakthrough. Although his Spirit Power was vigorous, his meridians still required time to adapt and stabilize. Additionally, the fusion of his new head Spirit Bone demanded deeper, quiet alignment to fully integrate with his Double Pupils.
He gave a crisp nod. "Then let us go, Master."
Hearing his disciple's obedient and pragmatic response, a deeply gratified smile returned to Du Busi's weathered face. With a casual wave of his large hand, a gentle yet unbreakable layer of emerald-green Spirit Power enveloped Liu Yuan, lifting him off the ground.
"Let us go! I am certain the other disciples and those anxious old fogies back at the Sect are currently pacing holes into the floorboards," Du Busi laughed, his voice booming as he carried Liu Yuan up into the sky. "After all, they watched with their own eyes when this old man took you away."
The wind howled past them as they ascended. "Everyone must be dying of curiosity, wondering if you actually managed to succeed. Absorbing a hundred-thousand-year Spirit Ring at level fifty... such a feat is something they have never even heard of in myths! Hurry back to the Sect and show them. I guarantee that when you manifest that blood-red ring, it will scare them half to death!"
With a thunderous sonic boom, the two figures transformed into twin streaks of brilliant light. They pierced through the cloud layer, rapidly exiting the airspace of the Star Dou Great Forest and racing toward the borders of the Heavenly Soul Empire.
Not long after Liu Yuan and Du Busi vacated the ruined hollow, the heavy silence of the forest was broken once again.
The rustling of leaves signaled the arrival of newcomers. Several figures clad in the distinct, deep green uniforms of Shrek Academy carefully handled through the dense, splintered bushes, finally stepping into the messy, cratered battlefield.
The group consisted of Huo Yuhao, Xiaoxiao, Wang Dong, and their chaperone, Elder Xuan, who had traveled all the way from Shrek City.
Elder Xuan's primary objective for leading this small team deep into the Star Dou Great Forest was to help Huo Yuhao hunt for his crucial third Spirit Ring. However, since Xiaoxiao's Spirit Power had also reached a bottleneck requiring a new ring, the old man had simply brought her along. As for Wang Dong, the youth had tagged along purely to keep his friends company and join in the excitement.
Originally, Elder Xuan had been guiding the children along the safer edges of the core area, searching for suitable prey. But the terrifying spatial tremors that had violently shaken the region, followed by the mournful, heaven-shaking death cry of a hundred-thousand-year Spirit Beast, had reached them even from a great distance. The sheer intensity of that dying shockwave had caused even a Super Douluo like Elder Xuan to feel his heart skip a beat.
Driven by a mix of cautious duty and intense curiosity regarding such a powerful entity, Elder Xuan had decided to alter their course and bring the group over to investigate the epicenter.
When the Shrek Academy group finally stepped past the tree line and into the ruin-like hollow, even the highly experienced and well-traveled Elder Xuan could not stop himself from sucking in a sharp breath of cold air.
The ground for hundreds of meters in every direction had been violently plowed open, exposing deep trenches of raw earth. Countless ancient, giant trees had been pulverized into fine sawdust. A lingering trace of an extremely domineering, emerald-green Spirit Power aura still hung in the air, radiating a suffocating pressure that made the students' chests tighten.
"Look! That is... the corpse of a Spatial Beast!"
Huo Yuhao already had his Spirit Eyes activated. A faint golden light shimmered in his pupils as his gaze instantly locked onto the massive carcass slumped in the center of the deepest crater. Even in death, the creature's scales emitted a faint, eerie purple glow.
Unable to contain his shock, Huo Yuhao let out a sharp cry and quickly ran toward the edge of the pit.
"What a massive Spatial Beast!" Xiaoxiao followed closely behind him, her delicate face pale and filled with absolute shock.
Wang Dong crouched down near the edge of the crater, his eyes wide with amazement as he studied the beast's remains. "A Spatial Beast with this kind of physical appearance must have an incredibly high cultivation age, right?"
He pointed a trembling finger at the complex patterns covering the creature's hide. "I read in a textbook once that for a Spirit Beast like the Spatial Beast, every single one of these distinct marks on its body represents a thousand years of cultivation. This Spatial Beast has these marks densely packed all over its entire body... my trypophobia is acting up just looking at it."
Wang Dong swallowed hard, looking up at his companions. "Just how many years of cultivation must this thing have had?"
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