Thunder split the sky as storm clouds gathered ominously above the Evil Demon Forest. Jiang Shengyu opened his eyes—only to find his vision… oddly distorted.
How could he even describe it?
It was as if his vision had been split in two. Each half displayed its own independent scene, awkwardly stitched together in a jarring, unnatural way.
The sensation of having another perspective forcibly crammed into his field of view was deeply uncomfortable.
"…What the?"
Jiang Shengyu spoke instinctively—only to hear two young voices, one male and one female, echo out at the same time. He froze and quickly turned his head to the side.
No one was there.
But in the other half of his vision, he saw the back of a young boy.
Startled, Jiang Shengyu turned again—this time behind him. The boy vanished from view, replaced by a young girl in what had previously been an empty landscape.
"No way…"
Again, the same two voices—his voices—spoke at once. Jiang Shengyu's expression turned to disbelief.
He stood up. The figure in the other half of his vision stood up at the same time, mirroring his movements perfectly.
After a brief moment of confusion, Jiang Shengyu finally understood what was happening.
He had… split? His body had separated, but his soul and consciousness were still one?
One soul, two bodies?
No matter how absurd it sounded, all evidence pointed to a single explanation.
After a long, difficult period of trial and error, Jiang Shengyu managed to gain basic control over both bodies, turning each half toward the other. Two young, nearly identical faces appeared in his split vision—one male, one female.
Aside from the difference in hair length, their features were virtually the same.
Jiang Shengyu let out a sigh of relief. At least both versions of himself were good-looking. But at the same time, he couldn't help grumbling,
"Am I a guy with a girly face, or a girl with a guy's soul?"
He shook his head, forcing the thought aside.
The priority now was figuring out where he was—and why he'd ended up like this. More importantly, he had to keep his abnormality hidden. If someone discovered his condition, he could easily end up dissected in some lab!
"From now on, we'll pose as siblings. The brother is Jiang Shengyu, the sister is Jiang Qingtong." With a firm nod, he assigned them new identities.
Listening to the overlapping male and female voices, he muttered,
"Better start practicing speaking separately... otherwise, I'll blow my cover the moment I open my mouth."
Neither Jiang Shengyu nor Jiang Qingtong noticed it—but not far away, a soul beast resembling a green unicorn was watching them intently. It crept forward cautiously… then suddenly pounced.
The Green-Striped Unicorn burst into Jiang Shengyu's field of view.
Jiang Qingtong reacted instantly, leaping to the side—but the unicorn was faster. In the blink of an eye, it appeared behind her. Its sharp horn pierced straight through her heart.
The excruciating pain sent shockwaves through their shared nervous system, locking both bodies in paralyzing agony.
Seizing the opportunity, the unicorn lunged again—its horn tearing through Jiang Shengyu's chest this time, skewering them both like candied fruit on a stick.
He blacked out instantly.
The beast tossed its head, flinging their limp bodies off its horn. Just as it was about to feast, the sharp sound of something slicing through the air approached from the distance.
Startled, the unicorn immediately gave up its meal and fled into the depths of the forest.
Moments later, two figures flew in from afar and landed beside Jiang Shengyu and Jiang Qingtong.
They were Kong Deming, and his disciple Xuan Ziwen, who happened to be testing soul devices in the Evil Demon Forest.
"Teacher… they…"
Xuan Ziwen stared at the two children lying in a pool of blood, then turned to the middle-aged man beside him.
Kong Deming extended his soul power to examine their condition. He quickly shook his head and said,
"Ziwen, both their hearts are shattered. Even a healing-type Title Douluo couldn't save them now."
Xuan Ziwen frowned deeply. "What were such young children doing here? Judging by their age, they must have just awakened their martial souls. Were they trying to hunt soul rings?"
"For children who've just awakened to come soul ring hunting in the Evil Demon Forest… the only explanation is innate full soul power."
Kong Deming looked at the siblings and sighed.
"If they really were born with full soul power, what a waste! Our Sun-Moon Empire has always been at a disadvantage in soul master talent compared to the other three nations. We just don't have enough strong martial souls."
A powerful soul engineer must also be a powerful soul master—Kong Deming had always believed this.
If he could break through to Super Douluo, he was certain he'd become a legendary Level 10 Soul Engineer! Not just remain stuck at Level 9, unable to complete his ultimate soul device.
He looked up at the sky and said,
"Ziwen, it's getting late. The soul device test still isn't done. Let's go."
"Teacher, I'd like to bury them," Xuan Ziwen replied. "We can't just leave them to be eaten by soul beasts."
Kong Deming knew his disciple's temperament. He nodded slightly. "Very well."
Just as Xuan Ziwen dug a shallow grave and prepared to lay the siblings inside, a silver-white light began to rise from their bodies.
"Teacher! Look!" Xuan Ziwen cried out in shock.
Kong Deming furrowed his brows and moved to stand beside him, closely observing the changes.
The silver light wove like threads, drawn from the siblings' bodies and gathering between them. The threads twisted and danced into the shape of a crescent moon, and at its center, a multi-layered crystalline lotus—like mirrored glass—floated in midair.
Then, the crescent moon and lotus separated, descending onto Jiang Shengyu and Jiang Qingtong respectively.
As soon as the symbols touched them, two purple soul rings emerged—floating slowly around them with rhythmic pulses.
"Purple! Thousand-year soul rings!" Xuan Ziwen was stunned.
Even in the strongest nations, very few soul masters could obtain a thousand-year soul ring as their first soul ring—let alone in the Sun-Moon Empire.
But soul rings came from soul beasts…
Xuan Ziwen looked around. No soul beast corpses.
Where had the rings come from?
Within a few breaths, the gaping wounds on their chests completely healed. Aside from the bloodstained earth and clothes, no trace remained—not even a scar.
Their soul rings and martial souls withdrew into their bodies, but they remained unconscious.
"This kind of martial soul and soul ring manifestation… I've never heard of anything like it! Ziwen, we're postponing today's experiment. Bring them back to Mingdu immediately!"
Kong Deming didn't hesitate to make the call.