"One hundred thousand gold soul coins! Sold!"
As the auction hammer fell, the Soul-Eating Carving Knife was successfully sold.
Seeing that the Soul-Eating Carving Knife hadn't gone unsold, the professional smile on the cheongsam-clad auctioneer's face gained a touch of genuine relief.
Inwardly, she thought happily, "Thank goodness someone bid on it in the last five seconds! Otherwise, my performance rating would have suffered. That was close, really close."
As an auctioneer, her salary was directly tied to auction results—the higher the sale price, the higher her commission. If an item went unsold, she'd even be penalized.
Therefore, the last thing she wanted was a failed auction.
While the auctioneer celebrated her narrow escape, the soul engineers attending the event were all rather surprised.
Some exclaimed,
"Someone actually dared to buy that cursed thing, the Soul-Eating Carving Knife? He must not value his life."
Another sneered,
"Probably another hotheaded fool who thinks he can tame it. Doesn't even know the height of the heavens or the depth of the earth."
Others laughed from within their private boxes, joking with their companions:
"I'll bet that this new owner of the Soul-Eating Carving Knife won't survive long under its curse."
While the crowd buzzed with discussion, the auctioneer maintained her sweet smile and announced:
"Congratulations to the honored guest who purchased the Soul-Eating Carving Knife. Now, let us welcome the next item—a Level 7 Soul Tool, the Storm Roar Cannon!"
..................…
As the auction continued in an orderly fashion—
Inside his private box, Wang Chen couldn't help feeling surprised at how easily he had won the Soul-Eating Carving Knife.
He had thought there would be competition for it.
Fearing he wouldn't have enough money, he had even "eaten soft rice" and borrowed one million gold soul coins from the little rich girl Meng Hongchen.
Yet in the end, the whole thing was settled for just one hundred thousand gold soul coins.
It felt like using a cannon to shoot a mosquito.
Still, Wang Chen never believed that being over-prepared was a bad thing, nor that bringing a million gold soul coins was unnecessary.
That was just his way—he always gave his all, leaving no room for regret.
If he had only prepared one hundred thousand and someone else had joined the bidding, he would have missed the knife entirely.
Crying about it afterward would have been too late.
After successfully acquiring the Soul-Eating Carving Knife, Wang Chen let out a long sigh of relief. His mission for the night was complete.
All he had to do now was wait for the auction to end, finalize the transaction, and return to his family.
He thought to himself,
"Once I'm back, I'll repay Meng Hongchen that one million gold soul coins. I didn't expect the Soul-Eating Carving Knife to be so unpopular in the Sun Moon Empire—no soul engineer even bothered to bid. What a steal!"
Indeed, there were reasons no one in the Sun Moon Empire wanted it.
Soul engineers weak enough to need such a knife didn't have the strength to suppress it.
And those powerful enough to resist its backlash already owned far better carving knives—they had no need for a weapon that could turn on its master.
Thus, the Soul-Eating Carving Knife had gradually become ignored and forgotten throughout the Sun Moon Empire.
Otherwise, with its power, there was no way its starting price would be as low as one hundred thousand gold soul coins.
Soon, the auction concluded.
Before long, a staff member from the auction house politely knocked on Wang Chen's box door, carefully presenting a beautiful case containing the Soul-Eating Carving Knife.
The staff member said,
"Honored guest, this is the item you purchased—the Soul-Eating Carving Knife. Please inspect it.
Once you've confirmed everything, you may complete the payment, and the knife will officially belong to you.
There are a few precautions regarding this item that we must inform you of:
First, as long as you do not inject soul power or spiritual power into it, there will be no backlash.
Second, when using it for the first time, it is advisable to have someone stand guard…"
After listening carefully, Wang Chen accepted the box, examined it thoroughly, and, finding no issues, took out a 100,000 gold soul coin card from his storage soul tool and handed it over.
The transaction completed, the staff member smiled and said,
"Congratulations, honored guest. From this moment, the Soul-Eating Carving Knife is officially yours.
For your safety, we recommend you leave the Sun Moon Auction Hall via the private exit from your box. It will best ensure your personal security."
Clearly, the Sun Moon Auction Hall took guest protection very seriously.
After delivering the warning, the staff member respectfully withdrew, closing the door behind him.
Wang Chen stored the Soul-Eating Carving Knife into his storage soul tool and waited in the box a while longer.
About fifteen minutes later, the two guards he had sent away returned with the items they'd been asked to buy.
"Young master, everything's been purchased," they reported cheerfully.
Wang Chen nodded, stood up, and left the auction through the private passage with his guards.
Then, they boarded the soul-guided car and drove toward the Wang Family estate.
On the way, Wang Chen gazed at the nightscape of Mingdu, thinking silently about how to erase the evil intent and curse within the Soul-Eating Carving Knife.
Although a soul-guided car wasn't as fast as a flying soul tool, its speed wasn't slow either.
As for why he didn't fly—naturally, flight was prohibited in central Mingdu.
Anyone daring to fly over the capital, where countless nobles and dignitaries lived, would immediately be arrested by the city's defense corps of soul engineers.
Of course, if you were a Level 9 Soul Engineer or some extremely high-ranking powerhouse, you could fly wherever you pleased. Otherwise, it was best to keep a low profile.
Soon, Wang Chen and his party returned to the Wang estate.
After dismissing his guards, Wang Chen went home alone.
He greeted his father and mother briefly, then went upstairs to his bedroom.
Once inside, he quickly shut the door, took the Soul-Eating Carving Knife from his storage soul tool, placed it on the table, and began examining it intently.
Of course, he followed the staff's instructions carefully and did not inject any soul or spiritual power into it.
Even so, Wang Chen could clearly feel the cold malice hidden within the knife—it was as if it couldn't wait to kill him.
From the original work, Wang Chen knew that the Soul-Eating Carving Knife's backlash came from a curse and evil will left by its first owner three thousand years ago.
That first owner had been no ordinary person—he was both an extremely powerful evil soul master and a Level 9 Soul Engineer.
Because of that man's curse and malice sealed inside, anyone who used the knife afterward was attacked by it.
To remove the curse, Wang Chen had two ideas.
The first was to find a soul master with a holy-attribute martial soul, using the holy power's natural restraint over evil to purify the knife and restore its original form.
The second was to use the Black Book's crystal mark to deduce and perfect a purification-type skill or technique, allowing him to personally erase the knife's evil and curse.
Having a plan meant taking action.
Wang Chen decided to test the second idea first. If that failed, he would pursue the first.
The Black Book's crystal mark function was simple—by injecting spiritual power and feeding it a recorded skill, it could deduce or perfect that skill.
How far it could refine it depended on the skill's potential, its level of incompleteness, and the strength of the spiritual power injected.
However, Wang Chen had no purification skills to feed it.
To his knowledge, the entire Douluo Continent had no general purification-type abilities at all.
Therefore, he planned to first create a nonsensical, trash purification skill of his own, then feed it into the crystal mark to see if it could perfect it.
Whether it would work or not depended on whether the Black Book recognized his improvised nonsense as an actual "skill."
If it didn't, it wouldn't record it—and the crystal mark couldn't activate—forcing Wang Chen to abandon his second plan.
To Wang Chen, the essence of purification was simply removing unwanted energy.
But how exactly to do that… he had no idea.
After all, he was only a two-ring Grand Soul Master. Something this profound was far beyond his current reach.
If creating techniques and skills were that easy, the Xuanzhi Tang Sect's Xuan Tian Record wouldn't have remained unrivaled for so many years.
Wang Chen sat cross-legged on his bed, thinking the entire night—but gained nothing.
The Black Book completely ignored his "nonsense skill," refusing to record it. It didn't even acknowledge it as a skill at all.
As sunlight streamed through his window the next morning, Wang Chen opened his tired eyes, sighing.
"I knew it. I'm no prodigy. Creating a skill in one night that even the Black Book would acknowledge—that's impossible."
He exhaled helplessly, then turned his gaze toward the Soul-Eating Carving Knife on the table, radiating its cold, sinister aura.
He would never give up on it.
The knife was made of Life Gold, one of the rarest and most precious materials in existence—useful even to gods.
The Silver Dragon King Gu Yue Na had used Life Gold to heal her wounds. The Undead Holy Magus Electrolux, known as the Calamity of the Undead, had used it to stabilize his divine consciousness.
If Life Gold could aid gods, then for ordinary soul masters, its benefits were unimaginable.
A soul master who absorbed it would be reborn—transformed from mediocrity into a genius with the potential to become a god.
Their body would strengthen, vitality would surge, lifespan would lengthen—the benefits were endless.
Wang Chen was confident that if he could absorb the Life Gold, his essence, energy, and spirit would all undergo a complete metamorphosis.
His cultivation speed would soar, he'd be able to absorb higher-year soul rings, his energy would be abundant, and… well, "seven times a night" would hardly be a challenge…
Faced with such immense benefits, a little frustration was nothing. Nothing could shake Wang Chen's determination to absorb the Life Gold.
Since the second idea had failed, he would proceed with the first.
He would find a soul master with a holy-attribute martial soul to purify the Soul-Eating Carving Knife.
After all, no one on the continent even recognized Life Gold, so he had nothing to fear.
Wang Chen walked over, placed the knife back into its box, then stored it in his soul tool.
Touching his chin, his eyes narrowed thoughtfully.
He remembered clearly that in the original novel, within Mingdu of the Sun Moon Empire, there was indeed a soul master possessing a holy-attribute martial soul.
And that martial soul was none other than the Angel.
The Angel was without question a top-tier martial soul among top-tier martial souls—its potential was immense. It could grow stronger by killing evil soul masters, even achieving rapid breakthroughs through sufficient slaughter.
Simply put: the more evil soul masters you kill, the stronger you get.
Wang Chen massaged his temples, trying to recall the details.
After a moment, his eyes lit up with clarity as he sorted his thoughts.
Ye Guyi. Martial Soul: Angel.
In the original story, she first appeared during the Soul Engineer Tournament.
Ye Guyi had joined the tournament at the invitation of Shangguan Wei'er, the leader of the Ordinary Alliance, one of the three major underground forces in Mingdu.
She had been invited to help the alliance win the championship.
Wang Chen stroked his chin again. Since the leader of the Ordinary Alliance knew Ye Guyi, then that was where he needed to go.
He was well aware of the underground powers in Mingdu.
The underworld had three major forces: the largest, Evening Water Alliance; the Ordinary Alliance; and the Odu Chamber of Commerce.
The Ordinary Alliance controlled the entire city's sex industry—it was the most publicly visible of the three.
The Odu Chamber of Commerce dealt in assassins, thieves, and black-market trades, profiting from protection fees, assassinations, and other shady work.
The Evening Water Alliance handled the most profitable underground businesses—drugs, arms, and human trafficking.
Each of the three had powerful backers.
The Ordinary Alliance was supported by royal nobles—the aristocracy.
The Odu Chamber of Commerce was backed by the military.
The Evening Water Alliance, the strongest of all, was secretly backed by the Holy Spirit Cult.
The Ordinary Alliance and the Odu Chamber of Commerce had a close relationship, faintly allied against the Evening Water Alliance.
The Wang Family, being a marquis family, was naturally part of the noble faction—the same background as the Ordinary Alliance.
Though they had no direct ties, they could easily establish indirect contact.
Especially now that the Wang Family supported the Second Prince, Wang Chen would have no trouble connecting with them.
He immediately decided to use his family connections to locate Ye Guyi's whereabouts.
"Ye Guyi," Wang Chen thought with a sharp gleam in his eyes,
"It's decided—it's you!"