Winter fades, spring arrives, and three months pass in the blink of an eye.
It's the early spring of another year.
The rain increases, and the sound of "Jingzhe" (the awakening of insects) rings through the air.
On a spring night eight years ago, Lin Rong was born into this world.
In the blink of an eye, eight spring and autumn seasons have passed.
In the depths of the manor, in front of an old wooden house.
Lin Rong looks up at the new buds sprouting from the branches of the banyan tree. He stretches out his hand, plucks a green branch, and inserts it into the soil.
Pure life force surges from Lin Rong's body into the green branch, causing it to root and sprout, transforming from a simple branch into a young banyan tree sapling.
Looking down at his creation, Lin Rong admires it for a moment before withdrawing the life force from the branch, causing it to revert to its original form as a green twig.
He then uses his spiritual power to control the green branch, placing it back in its original position.
The branch and the banyan tree merge seamlessly, as if everything that just happened had never occurred.
"Two years have passed since my martial soul awakened," Lin Rong mutters to himself. "I am no longer the helpless child I was two years ago."
As he speaks, the Nine-Twisting Vines Dragon silently appears behind him, its many banyan tree roots digging deep into the void.
Yellow, yellow, and purple.
Three soul rings appear beneath Lin Rong, rotating in sequence, indicating his cultivation as a three-ring Soul King.
The first soul ring comes from a 525-year-old Thousand-Leaf Banyan.
The second soul ring is from a 981-year-old Sky Blue Bamboo.
As for the third soul ring, which plays a connecting role, it is from a 3,333-year-old Heavenly Blue Vine.
The Nine-Twisting Vines Dragon martial soul was formed through the fusion and mutation of the Dragon Soul Vine and Thousand-Leaf Banyan.
After absorbing the soul rings from the Thousand-Leaf Banyan and the mutated Heavenly Blue Vine, the Nine-Twisting Vines Dragon has finally fully awakened!
Thanks to the absorption of the Sky Blue Bamboo's soul ring, the Nine-Twisting Vines Dragon has gained spatial properties.
The sub-saplings of the banyan tree disappear into the void, leaving only the main banyan tree visible to the outside world.
Looking at the banyan tree, its bark and leaf veins shimmer with a faint golden light.
Upon closer inspection, one can see golden threads subtly flowing within the bark's texture and leaf veins.
These golden threads weave through every part of the banyan tree's trunk and branches, subtly adding an air of nobility and sanctity.
The main banyan root, which once appeared as a lifeless twist around the tree trunk, now seems to have awakened from slumber. Its dragon-like eyes open and begin to move, scanning the surroundings.
The dragon's eyes gleam with life and intelligence, mirroring the essence in Lin Rong's own eyes.
This is the independent new consciousness born from the Nine-Twisting Vines Dragon martial soul, shaped by Lin Rong's awareness.
Because it is born from Lin Rong, this new consciousness is fully under his control.
It is like an external avatar with its thoughts, but Lin Rong can take control of it at any time if he wishes.
At the same time, due to the complete awakening of the Nine-Twisting Vines Dragon, the martial soul's innate domain has evolved to the second stage.
Within the Vines Dragon domain, all attributes of allies are enhanced by 20%, while all attributes of enemies are reduced by 20%.
The domain's unique effect, "Life Dragon Soul," has been enhanced, greatly speeding up the transformation of attacks into pure life energy. The conversion speed is now more than ten times faster than before.
Additionally, a new domain soul skill—Break Evil Dragon Roar—has awakened:
This is an area-of-effect soul skill that targets the soul and spirit of those within range.
Upon activation, it immediately removes all negative effects on targets within the area, while delivering a soul shock and spiritual impact to a designated target.
The strength of the soul shock and spiritual impact depends on the strength of Lin Rong's own soul and spirit power, as well as the strength of the soul and spirit of the affected target.
Lin Rong feels a slight dissatisfaction with the Break Evil Dragon Roar domain skill.
It would be perfect if, upon activation, it could specifically target and remove negative effects from the enemies instead of indiscriminately clearing all effects, whether friend or foe.
Compared to the slightly flawed domain soul skill, the third soul skill tied to his third soul ring is flawless.
Lin Rong's third soul skill is called Blue River Shining Blue Sky—a full-attribute enhancement soul skill.
It increases all attributes by 30%, and with each additional soul ring, the enhancement increases by 10%.
With three soul rings, after activating Blue River Shining Blue Sky, Lin Rong's attributes will be boosted by 60%.
Once he reaches the Title Douluo level with nine soul rings, this enhancement will reach an astounding 120%.
In terms of soul power consumption, although not as negligible as the first soul skill, Dragon Soul Awakening, it is still within a range that Lin Rong can easily accept.
The third soul skill, Blue River Shining Blue Sky, consumes 10% of soul power per minute of activation.
Taking all factors into account, in a fully restored state, Lin Rong can maintain the activation of this soul skill for about 10 minutes.
After retracting his martial soul, Lin Rong takes out a jade bottle. The Dragon's Essence Immortal Spirit Pill, originally with twelve pills, now only has nine left.
The missing three have, of course, been consumed by Lin Rong.
Due to his strong soul power, the amount of soul power required for each level increase is much greater than that of an average soul master.
Furthermore, the Dragon's Essence Immortal Spirit Pill has a resistance to repeated use, so each additional pill consumed loses half its potency.
Even after consuming three pills in a row, the effect is only equivalent to 1.75 pills of the Dragon's Essence Immortal Spirit Pill.
Three months ago, Lin Rong's soul power was at level 27.
In these three months of training, his soul power has increased by a little more than one level.
Therefore, after absorbing the soul ring of the 3,333-year-old Heavenly Blue Vine, Lin Rong's soul power has directly reached level 34.
At the age of eight, being a level 34 Soul King, this record can likely only be broken by other transmigrators from parallel worlds.
Now, there are still nine Dragon's Essence Immortal Spirit Pills remaining.
Three of these will certainly be given to Ma Hongjun, but they cannot be given directly or too early.
"Gratitude for a grain of rice, enmity for a grain of rice."
Ma Hongjun is still under nine years old and has not yet formed many habits.
If he receives everything directly, it would be easy for him to develop an attitude of expecting everything to be given to him, a mentality of entitlement.
These qualities are not suitable for someone wielding a powerful weapon.
The previous Phoenix Sunflower was an exception; it was best consumed early, so it was given to him.
But the Dragon's Essence Immortal Spirit Pill is different. It will still be effective for Ma Hongjun until he reaches level 50.
Thus, Lin Rong plans to wait until Ma Hongjun completes a task before rewarding him with these three pills.
And that task is crucial to Lin Rong's success in claiming the throne of the Heavenly Dou Empire. There is no room for failure.
Ma Hongjun is the chief executor of this task, and Xu Pan is his assistant.
With Xu Pan, the loyal captain of the Lin Clan's guards, accompanying Ma Hongjun and continuously reinforcing his loyalty to the Lin Clan, Lin Rong can rest easy.