Chapter 63 — Fire Sickle Ghost Claw

Jing Hao was somewhat taken aback. He might be a newcomer, but a newcomer of Guangming Yan—how could he not even know about awakening a martial soul?

"Once a secret treasure's martial soul begins to awaken, it gains its own consciousness, and it will cultivate itself the way a person does. An awakened martial soul will keep growing stronger, right up to its limit."

"That sounds pretty impressive." Tang Tang's eyes lit up. "So how do you make a martial soul awaken?"

"I don't know," Jing Hao said, shaking his head.

"Something that good—if I could get it to work, how impressive would that be?" Tang Tang's face was full of regret; it sounded so high-class. Just thinking about how, if his knuckle-dusters and his little flying boots could both cultivate and strengthen their own martial souls, Tang Xuan drooled a river.

Jing Hao shot him a glance and said flatly, "Stop daydreaming."

Tang Tang said carelessly, "We have to be full of dreams." Having said that, he began looking this way and that, searching for other things.

"Don't bother looking. There aren't any more," Jing Hao said flatly. "You should know that summoned soul generals all have time limits. Senior Nong's martial soul guards this place, so naturally it must pay no small price."

"That does make sense." Tang Tang scratched his head.

Unless it was a special soul general, soul generals summoned from soul general cards lasted different lengths of time depending on rank. A bronze soul general could be maintained for a month, a silver soul general for a year, and a golden soul general for as long as ten years.

"If not for the vast stretch of time and the severe weakening of the senior's soul general, your strength would not be enough to inherit Senior Nong's legacy," Jing Hao said, his face expressionless.

"You know quite a lot." Tang Yi looked surprised. "Why do you know so much?"

Jing Hao said flatly, "Senior Nong had some connection with my elders."

Only then did Tang Tang understand.

"But now it seems I still underestimated Senior Nong." Jing Hao stared at the peacock blue on Tang Tang and said flatly, "Call out the Peacock Blue's martial soul."

Tang Tang closed his eyes, as if savoring and studying it, then suddenly opened them, and a strange look surfaced on his face. But all at once Tang Tang gave a soft cry: "Peacock's Blue!"

The peacock blue on his body suddenly lit with a faint blue glow, and a blue peacock drifted silently and slowly out of the equipment, crouching without a sound on Tang Duo's shoulder.

The peacock's plumage was like blue gold, cascading down in rich profusion; a few thread-fine red feathers quivered on its brow, and its bearing was extraordinarily vivid. It stood quietly on Yan's shoulder, elegant and composed, its expression cold and noble.

"Just as I thought." Jing Hao studied the peacock and said flatly, "Before Senior Nong died, he likely split his martial soul in two—one part poured into the Peacock Blue, the other transformed into a soul general to guard this place. If you want to practice claw techniques, you need only converse with the peacock. The Peacock Blue must have already drawn in the senior's martial soul; no wonder it awakened."

"You're saying the peacock knows the senior's claw technique?" Tang Tang's eyes went wide, his face full of delight.

"Suffering as he did, I fear Senior Nong was unwilling to let his supreme art simply vanish." Jing Hao sounded moved, but he quickly returned to normal. "Senior Nong was most famous for his Fire Sickle Ghost Claw, which you have just experienced. However, what you fought just now was not even a tenth of the senior's strength. Among the fifth-rank claw techniques of the Martial Assembly, the Fire Sickle Ghost Claw ranks third. Before he was exiled here, the senior had already begun raising its rank—whether he succeeded in the end, I do not know."

"A fifth-rank claw technique?" Tang Tang scratched his head, his face troubled. "But I only know third-rank claw techniques."

"Third-rank claw techniques..." Jing Hao's expression turned exceedingly strange. When Tang Tang clashed with the bald man, he had been watching in secret. Tang Tang was strange through and through; clearly only third-rank in strength, yet he could easily defeat the bald man and his soul general, who were fourth-rank.

Especially Tang Tang's victory over Senior Nong's soul general.

True, Senior Nong's soul general had been eroded and weakened by the years until it had only fourth-rank strength. But a master-level Fire Sickle Ghost Claw still made it fearsomely powerful. Even if Jing Hao himself fought, it would cost him considerable effort.

Yet Tang Tang had won as if without effort.

Especially in the final stage, when Tang Duo's eagle-claw technique had clearly climbed to a new level.

Such formidable eagle-claw technique—Jing Hao had never seen its like. Now, hearing Tang Tang say he only knew third-rank claw techniques, no wonder a sense of absurdity rose in his heart.

What an unfathomable fellow!

Still, since he too had been banished here...

At that thought, Jing Hao sighed inwardly and felt a measure of fellow feeling. "I still have a few cards over there. Go see if any of them suit you."

"Wow, great!" Tang Tang raised his arms and cheered. "You're a good man!"

"A good man?" Jing Hao sneered. "I simply don't want to see the Fire Sickle Ghost Claw, which Senior Nong labored over with all his heart's blood, lost to the world."

With that, Jing Hao turned and left.

"A fellow who says one thing and means another," Tang Tang muttered. But he was beaming the next moment, stroking the peacock blue on his body fondly, and swaggered off down the corridor.

When Bald Biao and his group saw the Peacock Blue on Tang Tang, so splendid it was almost absurd, they stared blankly for a long while.

Tang Jin magnanimously untied everyone's ropes.

"Where's my room? I want to rest!"

Tang, the schoolyard bully, indisputably claimed the best room for himself.

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Tang Tang stared blankly at the soul general beside Bing. After a moment he rubbed his eyes—was he seeing things?

The soul general floating beside Bing was none other than the very Senior Nong he had met in the corridor.

"Bing... Uncle Bing, wh-what's going on here?" Tang Tang asked, stammering.

"I told you not to call me uncle!" A dark line twitched on Bing's forehead. He forced himself calm. "The recruit training camp serves one purpose: martial soul projection."

"Martial soul projection?" It was the first time Tang Tang had heard the term.

"With even a trace of a martial soul, the camp can project it perfectly. At first we intended to use it to make up for our shortage of instructors. But later we found its uses went far beyond that." Bing's blank whiteboard of a face still showed not the slightest expression; even his voice was as flat as a whiteboard, without the least rise or fall.

Just as Tang Yi was listening eagerly, full of expectation, Uncle Bing switched topics.

"However, that has nothing to do with you as you are now," Bing said flatly. "Even the Fire Sickle Ghost Claw is beyond you for the time being. I have already looked at it—it is a claw technique of terrifying lethality."

Tang Tang had long been mentally prepared that he could not practice the Fire Sickle Ghost Claw, so he went on to ask, "Then what do we practice now?"

"You need to pay attention to your crane body," Bing said woodenly. "Your crane body has drawn in several hundred streams of force. If you have not digested them within ten hours, they will burst forth completely. You will burst open like a ripe pomegranate."

Tang Yu turned pale with fright. "Such an important matter—and you never warned me!"

"That is common knowledge," Bing said woodenly. "I also did not expect you to use crane-body force in such a dangerous way."

"Then how do I digest them now?" Tang Lun asked hurriedly.

"Repeated striking!" Bing said coldly.