Chapter 324: An Unexpected Twist? (Second)

But when Jing Mingfeng moved to stroke the head of the wind squaller, something completely unexpected happened then....

Right at the very moment when Jing Mingfeng’s hand touched upon the wind squaller’s head, the soulbeast let loose a happy cry before its entire body began to glow a bright green light!!

“Whoosh!”

Under the amazed eyes of everyone there, a strong gust of elemental wind rolled through the area. As quickly as it appeared, the elemental wind began to form a tornado—with Jing Mingfeng at its center!

“This...this is....” Realizing that the elemental wind was borne from the soulbeast’s soulforce, Bai Yunfei snapped out from his shock very quickly. “Jing Mingfeng!” He cried out to his friend, “What are you doing standing around! This is the sign of a soul contract! Focus and make the soul contract!!”

This very same situation happened once before with Tang Xinyun and the quickshade bird before. Bai Yunfei himself had a ‘half-experience’ of a soul contract before back in Gaoyi City, so he was somewhat familiar with the process. Everything that was happening right now pointed exactly towards the sign of a soul contract ready to be signed between soulbeast and soul cultivator!!

Being no sluggard, Jing Mingfeng was quick to digest what Bai Yunfei said and snapped out from his thoughts. Honing his mind onto the task at hand, Jing Mingfeng stared at the wind squaller in front of him and allowed for the elemental wind around them to envelop him.

......

The happenings that were going on in this courtyard was now attracting the attention of several others. Chu Qingxue and Zhao Mancha were the first to come hurrying out from their rooms while Tang Jing came rushing into the courtyard a moment later, only to have Bai Yunfei explain the whole story to him.

Time slowly ticked by under the watch of everyone in the courtyard. Nearly half an hour had gone past when the previously calm ball of light started to expand outwards n size. A great deal of soulforce could be felt spilling forth to form waves of energy, and in an instant, the typhoon of elemental wind around the center was absorbed into Jing Mingfeng’s body.

The amount of soulforce that exploded out from Jing Mingfeng was already starting to abate away so that only a calm remained, but everyone in the courtyard could tell from it Jing Mingfeng’s strength now.

He was an early-stage Soul Ancestor now!!

Somehow in this moment, a breakthrough was achieved for him to go from a late-stage Soul Sprite to a Soul Ancestor!!

“Whew....” A drawn out sigh escaped from Jing Mingfeng’s lips. Now that all of the elemental wind was absorbed into him, the typhoon in the courtyard was gone.

He looked at his fist first in excitement before looking back to the now-sleeping wind squaller in his chest with glee.

“Hahaha! Who knew it’d be this easy to form a soul contract? I, Jing Mingfeng, am now a person with a soulbeast! Haha, sweet!!”

The sight of Jing Mingfeng like this was enough to make Bai Yunfei speechless; the soul contract had been initiated far too easily—what soul contract only required three pieces of meat to be fed for one to happen?!

Would he have to try out this method himself if he ever wanted to make a soul contract with a soulbeast??

......

With a sigh to top off his feelings, Jing Mingfeng allowed everyone to congratulate him and make small talk before deciding to call it a day there. It was getting late, and he wanted to return to his own room to rest.

With Bai Yunfei back in his own room, the first thing he did was take out Jing Mingfeng’s ‘Blackwind’ Dagger. Though he failed in upgrading it several times, he was able to bring it to +10 in given time.

Equipment Grade: Low Heaven

Elemental Affinity: Wind, Darkness

Upgrade Level: +10

Attack: 2300

Additional Attack: 1200

Equipment Effect: After a successful strike, inflict a curse onto the foe and drop all attributes by 5% for a duration of one minute.

Effect cannot be stacked.

Soul Compatibility: 10%

+10 Additional Effect: With each successive strike, inflict a 3% speed decrease on the enemy for a total of one minute.

May stack up to ten times.

Upgrade Requirement: 140 Soulpoints

Weighing the dagger in his hand, Bai Yunfei thought to himself,

“Another effect I’ve never seen before, it can slow someone down after a strike? It’s a bit similar to some of the other effects, but it has the effect of a ‘darkness type’ too...

“But this doesn’t require a clear cut to be made for activation, the effect would trigger even if it hits another weapon! That means if the effect stacks all ten times, the enemy will lose up to 30% of their speed!!”

Memories of Hong Yin’s upgraded Bloodhowl Fang surged back to mind:

+10 Additional Effect: When attacking, there is a 30% chance to inflict ’Intimidation’, forcing the opponent’s overall attributes to drop 20% for 10 seconds.

Compared to the Bloodhowl Fang, the Blackwind Dagger held an advantage in its ability to be activated without fail and in its time duration. The Bloodhowl Fang had the advantage on how its effect was greater in scale despite it having only a chance to activate.

The way Jing Mingfeng fought wasn’t unknown to Bai Yunfei.

Jing Mingfeng favored sneak attacks and making use of his superior speed to overcome his foes. The effect on the Blackwind Dagger essentially made the enemy slower, which indirectly made Jing Mingfeng even faster. As such, its effect was very suitable to his fighting style.

Looking over the Blackwind Dagger for only a moment longer, Bai Yunfei put the dagger away. He was prepared to hold onto it for a little longer since his excuse of the Crafting School’s ‘secret refining method’ was said to require more than one day to pull off successfully.

Ever since he became a student of the Crafting School and disciple of the previous headmaster, Bai Yunfei had gained a very convenient excuse for upgrading. It could ‘trick’ any outsider should he need it, making Bai Yunfei’s secret a lot easier to keep secret.

Taking out the scroll with the Soul Concealment Art, Bai Yunfei began to study the inner contents of it without distraction. What was important wasn’t understanding the concepts, but memorizing them. Comprehension of what he memorized would come later.

And so, the night went on without any further incident.

Morning came soon with the sun rising up from beyond the horizon. Pushing open the doors of his room, Bai Yunfei strode outside only to discover everyone else was already awake.

Tang Xinyun, Kou Tingting, and even Jing Mingfeng were all gathered there in the courtyards.

“Xinyun, why are you all....”

“Haha, we only just came out ourselves.” Kou Tingting laughed, “Xinyun knows that you’d want to give her the fireseed spirit mushroom as soon as possible, so we decided to wake up early for it. Heehee, you’re just giving her the mushroom, so why does it look like you’re even more impatient than she is?”

Rather than grace her mocking question with an answer, Bai Yunfei gave two short embarrassed coughs before looking over to Jing Mingfeng.

As if to respond to him, Jing Mingfeng brought his hands up in a defensive manner, “I’m not here to wait for you. I just want my stuff back. Ol’Bai, if you didn’t manage to memorize it all last night, that’s not my problem, hehe....”

“You could at least be polite about it....” Bai Yunfei chuckled before tossing a scroll over to Jing Mingfeng, “So? Where’s your wind squaller? How do you feel now after the soul contract?”

“Hehe, I feel great actually. I’ve never felt so powerful before...Xiao Feng is asleep right now. Just this morning though, I realized that it’s a lot bigger than yesterday, and a lot stronger too! Seeing how strong its getting, I wonder when it’ll become a fifth-class soulbeast, haha!!”

“Xiao Feng.....is that the name you gave it? Sounds like a name you would have....” Bai Yunfei muttered, though he was surprised to hear that the wind squaller was already improving in strength so quickly. Was it because of the fact that it was at its weakest yesterday, and then the soul contract with Jing Mingfeng influenced its growth?

TL Note: Feng is the word for wind, which is in both the wind squaller and Jing Mingfeng’s name.

The four continued to converse for a moment longer as they walked out from the courtyard. Zhao Xiluo hadn’t returned since yesterday, so he was probably with Zhong Liyan and Yang Lin somewhere else still.

As the auction house said yesterday, the men from the house of Wu would transport the fireseed spirit mushroom to the inn where the Wu were staying in as soon as it reached Mo City, and then it’d be transported to the house of Tang where Bai Yunfei was. But since Bai Yunfei and the others were feeling a bit impatient, they all decided to head straight for the inn to wait.

Laughing and chatting as they went, the group walked at a brisk pace that got them at the inn where the Wu were staying in.

But before they could get close to the inn, a group of people came rushing out from the inn with such haste that they nearly slammed into Bai Yunfei as they passed each other.

And at the very head of the group was the one who met with Bai Yunfei before, Wu Gang.

Noticing the man, Bai Yunfei called out to him in confusion, “Brother Wu, what’s the matter?”

From the worried look on Wu Gang’s face, a feeling of dread was starting to well up in Bai Yunfei’s stomach....