The wind kicked up in the small training grounds attached to the courtyard Xi Shen and the rest were given.
Lihua, Fang Chen, Fei Yin, and Yang Su were seated within a circle with closed eyes. Their expressions held concentration as they followed Xi Shen’s instructions for the umpteenth time, and perform the Heavenly Connection Soul Art.
But the outcome was no different than last time.
The link the group made with their soul became chaotic before it violently broke apart.
The backlash of the soul link’s destruction caused their faces to turn ashen and blood to seep from the corner of their lips.
Fei Yin who was seated cross-legged in front of the standing Xi Shen said, “Young Master this Soul Art isn’t working. Our Qi’s are too different from each other, it’s creating a disruption in the link causing it to break every time we try to connect our souls together. We can’t keep forcing this technique to work, it’s causing damage to our souls.”
Xi Shen who had on a frustrated expression said while scratching his slightly disheveled hair, “I know, I know. Sorry for forcing this on you guys, I just can’t understand why this technique is so flawed. I thought she said… ugh!”
Xi Shen groaned before he fell to the ground scratching at his head intensely. He almost resembled a dog with an insatiable itch.
Fed up with his hair tie, Xi Shen discarded it and allowed his hair to drape down his shoulders.
He then blew out a puff of air at the strands that were blocking his face, only to have them shifted temporarily before they fell back into place. Couldn’t even care less, Xi Shen let them stay before he fell back on his back which caused a puff of dirt to be kicked up from the cobble-stone ground dirtying his clothes, but he once again couldn’t care less.
Fei Yin and the others seeing Xi Shen like this was a first, and they realize the Soul Art not working was a huge blow to him.
Fei Yin released his Wood Qi and allowed the healing properties inside of it to alleviate the pain the others were feeling. All of them said thanks in response.
While Xi Shen was laying on his back, his gaze absentmindedly landed on Mu Fan who was sitting in the tree above eating a drum stick, despite it being rather early in the morning.
Seeing Xi Shen eyeing him, Mu Fan comically sent him a defensive look before saying, “Hey buddy, get your own I’m definitely not sharing.”
Xi Shen didn’t hear him as he wasn’t paying attention to him.
He was too deep in thought.
‘I thought I would be able to lead the link and connect everyone so I’ll be able to make their comprehension of techniques faster, but I had to immediately break the link or else my abnormal soul would have caused irreparable injuries to their soul. It’s likely because my soul is so different from normal that the Soul Art wasn’t created to accommodate it. That was a disappointing discovery, but what’s even worst, is that Fei Yin was right, the Soul Connection will only work with people who cultivate a similar Qi. That’s how sharing the link would allow them to help each other raise their comprehension. I totally didn’t take that fact into account, so now I have to find out the hard way that this Soul Art was completely useless to us! Then what was that all about it becoming one of the most powerful techniques on the Maple Continent in my hands?!! Was she pulling my leg? Wait…’
Xi Shen suddenly thought of something, and he immediately sat up. He then sent his perception into his storage ring and pull out the green jade slip Dongmei had given him.
‘ I have been so caught up in the Heavenly Connection Soul Art that I didn’t even consider the possibility that it might not actually be the technique she was talking about. Did I jump the gun and rush to think this was it?’
Xi Shen thought as he sent his disguised Divine Soul into the jade slip.
The numerous Soul Art Mantras appeared before his eyes.
He had received this jade slip four days ago, and in that time he had gone through some of them and selected a few he would like to learn. However, as powerful as some were, he chose to train in ones that match his current Qi Cultivation Level.
A mix between Sea Expansion Realm and Foundation Realm level Soul Arts. It was best he didn’t rush learning powerful Soul Arts just because he could, starting from the basics and moving up is always the right choice.
As Xi Shen was going through these Soul Arts, he was doing it at a faster pace than before. There was a small description for each Soul Art, instead of going through all of it he was reading the first lines of text at a bare minimum and if it didn’t look like a Soul Art that was weak but could become powerful in his hands he would immediately move on to the next.
Like this, a minute or two passed and Xi Shen had gone through 2/3 of the Soul Art remaining, but haven’t seen one that fit the criteria. But still, he had to marvel at the different types of Soul Arts he saw, although most of them were just a repeat of the other claiming that it was an upgraded version of the former.
Soul Arts diversity wasn’t a lot, since the path of a Soul Cultivation wasn’t explored as much as Qi Cultivation. Xi Shen was lucky, this jade slip seemed to contain the entire catalog of Soul Arts the Celestial Academy, or rather the Divine Music Academy had developed and obtain during their establishment.
With this jade slip, Xi Shen could create a Sect or Academy of his own. The most important thing for creating one was technique, and Xi Shen had plenty, all he would need to do was get disciples to enter.
After going through the 2/3 of the Soul Arts, Xi Shen took a breather before he went back at it again.
After another minute, Xi Shen finally reached the end of the list of Soul Arts, but he was frowning since until now he didn’t find the Soul Art.
‘Maybe I had rushed too quickly through them. I’ll start over again!’
Xi Shen was about to go through this tedious task again, but all of a sudden his eyes stopped on the second to last Soul Art.
‘Huh? Three Thousand Myriad Soul Creation Art?’
Xi Shen had a tingling feeling this was it, but then his eyes suddenly landed on the name of the last Soul Art, which was titled," Seven Carnal Sins Soul Manipulation."
Xi Shen’s heart let out a thumb, and he had to once again read the name to make sure he got it right.
‘This..this is too much of a coincidence, I haven’t read the description yet, but if it is what I think it is then... Wait, let me read the Myriad Soul Creation Art first.’
Xi Shen moved his perception to the Soul Art and its description was revealed to him.
‘Manipulating one’s Soul is difficult, but mastery of this technique will allow one to have free control of their Soul and form it into any suitable shape to carry out a powerful attack on the mind.’
Xi Shen thought for a bit after reading that.
‘My control over my Soul Attacks is perfect, I think if I practice a bit I could do that just fine without the need to learn this technique. However, I can see some benefits to this technique when combined with Sword Art. No, not only Swords Art, I might be able to mix Soul Cultivation with Qi cultivation and create a powerful technique from this. Let me see…’
Thinking up to here, Xi Shen closed his eyes and examined the Mantra for this Soul Art. After which he opened his eyes and lifted his palm, his disguised Soul Sense left from between his eyebrows and spread to about a meter from his body.
This drew the attention of Mu Fan and the others who were recovering.
Xi Shen concentrated and his Soul Sense trembled, the Spiritual Qi a meter around him trembled as well.
Mu Fan paused eating the drum stick and raise from his relaxed position. His eyes were glued onto Xi Shen.
After the Spiritual Qi in the surroundings trembled, Xi Shen willed his Soul Sense to gather it above his palm.
With a swooshing sound, the Spiritual Qi rushed towards his open palm and stop above it. The Spiritual Qi was transparent in its inactive state, but after Xi Shen started controlling it to spin above his palm it became slightly visible.
“Huh, that’s a cool trick he did with his Soul Sense. Not many people can use their Soul Sense to manipulate the Spiritual Qi outside of their body, but he seemed to be a natural at it.” Mu Fan mumbled under his breath before he went back to chewing on his drum stick, however, his eyes suddenly go wide in shock, and the half-eaten drum stick in his hand fell out.
Above Xi Shen’s palm, the Spiritual Qi suddenly took on a deep blue color and looking at it one would feel as if they were looking at a sword.
Soon the blue Sword Qi changed into a miniature long sword above Xi Shen’s palm. However, that wasn’t all, the Sword Qi suddenly collapsed and a tinge of blood red appeared in the blue Sword Qi, before it fully transformed into Blade Qi. The Blade Qi then took on the shape of a miniature blade.
This caused Mu Fan to also fall out of the tree in stupefaction.
After that, Xi Shen played around with the lump of Spiritual Qi and created the Qi of different weapons, such as halberd, spears, broadsword, and longswords.