He Yuan stared in silence as they all followed the officers out. The image of Zhang Di's face as he threatened him kept playing in repeat in his head. That wasn't a child!
He took the ring out of his pocket and examined it closely, there was nothing remarkable about it. "888, what's up with the ring?"
888 materialized and observed the ring. "I'm not sure but when the ring had hit the ground earlier, something felt off. There was this weird pull."
He Yuan notched a brow. Whatever that pull was, it didn't seem good and so he threw the ring to the ground again.
888's eyes widened behind his glasses. "It happened again."
"Really?" He Yuan looked at the ring. If this had anything to do with the strangeness in this realm, then he had to destroy it. He rushed to the garage to grab a hammer.
When he returned, 888 was staring at the ring with intense focus. He raised the hammer and brought it down on the ring.
CRACK!
The ring broke to pieces and a swirling mass of dark energy seeped out. He Yuan stepped back but it was too late, the dark mass shot straight to his heart and the entire surroundings came to a pause.
888 also dematerialized and returned to He Yuan's mindspace. He Yuan felt a strong pull on his soul.
"Interesting," A scratchy voice said. "A body with two soul threads, how did that happen?" He Yuan's soul was actually the real deal but since his soul was very thin, the stranger had assumed he was a soul thread.
He Yuan looked around him, he was in a void. This was actually the soul core, the residing place of every human soul in the human body.
Across from him was a young man in black robes. He Yuan had never met a cultivator, but he'd read enough books to know that he was looking at one.
Before he could speak, the black robed man rushed over to the leaser's soul thread. 888's eyes widened and he urged He Yuan to go over and protect the soul thread.
If the leaser's soul thread should be destroyed, He Yuan would be forcefully pulled out of the leaser's body but instead of returning to the system space, he would become a wandering ghost with no memories in this realm whilst Li Yexi's soul would be forever trapped in the contract space as he would no longer be able to find his way back to his body.
This would only benefit the cultivator as he would have a free body to use and widen the rift in the realm.
The black robbed man paused when He Yuan appeared in front of him. "So eager to die? I shall grant your wish." And then he rushed over and attached himself to He Yuan's soul.
He Yuan felt immense pain. And his soul was diminishing at an alarming rate. How on earth did he become so unlucky as to encounter such a foe in his second task realm? His soul energy was still so low and if this continued, his soul would dissipate and he would completely disappear, like he never existed in the first place.
888 extended his energy into He Yuan's soul from the mindspace. This did not count as interfering with his host's task as the cultivator was not from this realm in the first place.
He Yuan mobilized his meagre soul energy and the energy from his system against the dark tendrils that was the cultivator's soul. It was so hard to overpower the cultivator and his soul was flickering.
He gasped in pain. "888, aren't you supposed to be strong? Why is there no progress?"
888 tsked in annoyance as he focused on sending more energy to his host. [If I were so strong do you think I would be bound to a newbie? You better shut up.] He looked over to Li Yexi's soul thread. [We have to use Li Yexi's soul thread.]
He Yuan's eyes widened. "Have you gone mad?! What if something happens to the soul thread?"
[We'll be careful to make sure it doesn't get destroyed. Our energy combined is not enough and if we don't take the risk, we're all doomed.]
He Yuan's soul trembled as he extended his hand to Li Yexi's soul thread. If this doesn't work out then he was doomed, 888 was doomed and Li Yexi was also doomed. What ill luck, should he have chosen reincarnation in the first place?
Even reincarnating as a goat did not seem so scary anymore.
As soon as He Yuan connected with Li Yexi's soul thread, there was a surge of soul power and he started pushing against the cultivator more fiercely.
The cultivator's eyes shook. "No!" He was still restricted by the bindings in this realm so even if he was a cultivator with half a foot in the realm of ghost immortals, he couldn't do much. It didn't help that he was an evil cultivator in his origin realm that was hated by the heavens.
He had been cultivating in seclusion after a punishment by the dao of heaven when he discovered this rift. After gaining entrance to this realm, he went about absorbing the souls of people and gaining their memories.
He would have continued if it weren't for the fact that the realm was beginning to reject his existence. He stumbled upon those rings and was surprised to find that they contained sparse qi and so, he split his soul in two and inhabited the rings. It was even better when he was worn by the kids so he inhabited their bodies instead.
Even then, he had to remain partly dormant because if he had destroyed their souls and inhabited their bodies, their little bodies would've combusted and he would've gone back to square one.
He Yuan put more pressure on the cultivator's soul and when it began to weaken, 888 guided him on how to absorb the soul.
The cultivator stared at He Yuan with pure hatred. "This is not over," He said before the last of his soul was absorbed.
He Yuan regained full control of Li Yexi's body and plopped to the ground. He didn't even pay attention when he landed on the broken ring pieces and cut his skin. He was so tired.
888 quickly urged him. [Don't rest just yet, you haven't fully absorbed the cultivator's soul. If you don't hurry, the soul energy would seep out and such a good opportunity would be wasted.]
He Yuan nodded and sat cross legged and tried to absorb the soul. He wasn't really clear on what to do so he just calmly breathe in and out and felt the energy spread throughout his soul.
An hour later, he felt energized and even stronger. 888 was right, it was really a good opportunity! He ached to check his stats but he knew he couldn't do that until he returned to the system space.
"888," He called out in his mind. "How on earth did someone from the cultivation realm end up in a realm without qi?"
[The drain on this realm's luck by the special ones had created a rift in this realm that probably gave entrance to the cultivator. This realm is well on its way to destruction. He had attached his soul to the kids knowing fully well that children had the purest soul energy.]
"Wait, kids?"
[Of course. You didn't possibly think that was his complete soul did you? If that was the case, we would've been destroyed before we even had the chance to blink.]
He Yuan groaned. He had been thinking the combination of his soul power, 888's energy and Li Yexi's soul thread had turned him into a super tasker. It turned out the enemy was not in his peak state. He'd never felt so weak in his entire life.
888 materialized and twisted his long, silky hair into a bun and then, lifted his arms to stretch his well proportioned figure. He could already guess what his host had been thinking so he rolled his eyes.
"If the cultivator had continued to nurture his soul without detection then he would've become powerful enough to break free from the realm's restrictions. This would in turn, cause the rift to became larger, letting in all kinds of untold horrors into this realm."
He Yuan gulped. It was a good thing they detected him in the early stages. Thinking of the fact that he still had to subdue the other half of the cultivator's soul, he groaned.
Reincarnation was truly looking more appealing by the minute.
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