Inside his bedroom, Chu Chengzhou stared unblinkingly at the progress bar on the golden screen.
Though the cheat system hadn't fully activated yet, he had already figured out a few things.
With just a thought, the golden screen would appear in his field of vision—even with his eyes closed—and could be dismissed just as easily.
Moreover, since neither Grandpa Su Nan nor Grandma Li Wan had shown any signs of noticing it earlier, Chu Chengzhou guessed that only he could see this cheat system. Others likely couldn't.
This conclusion was further supported by the fact that no golden screen appeared in front of him when he looked into the bedroom mirror.
[98%... 99%... 100%]
After a long while, the progress bar finally reached completion.
Instantly, the progress bar vanished from the golden screen, replaced by a sleek attribute panel.
[Attribute Panel]
- Host: Chu Chengzhou
- Soul Power: Level 1 Soul Trainee
- Martial Soul: ???
- Skills: Radio Calisthenics (Gray), Eye-Preservation Exercises (Gray), Running (Gray), Meditation (Gray)
At the same time, Chu Chengzhou noticed two small golden squares below the attribute panel.
"Huh? I'm a Level 1 Soul Trainee?"
Chu Chengzhou was momentarily stunned. Did the cheat system just bump his pitiful talent up by half a level?
While half a level might not seem like much, for someone like him, it was effectively a doubling of his potential!
However, after staring at the soul power section for three seconds, Chu Chengzhou realized the truth. The cheat system hadn't actually increased his innate soul power level—it simply rounded up the displayed value to at least 1, hiding any decimal points. He'd been "rounded up"!
Aside from the skills section, the attribute panel was remarkably simple. After some experimentation, Chu Chengzhou quickly grasped how to use his cheat system properly.
The attribute panel only displayed his current stats. The real functionality lay in the two golden squares below. By focusing his thoughts, he could drag his martial soul or skills into the golden squares. After a set amount of idle time, these could break through their current limits. Furthermore, once he acquired spirit rings or spirit bones in the future, he could place them in the squares for idle upgrades as well.
According to the panel's categorization:
- Martial soul quality was divided into Ordinary, Advanced, Top-tier, and God-tier.
- Spirit rings and spirit bones were classified as: White (10 years), Yellow (100 years), Purple (1,000 years), Black (10,000 years), Red (100,000 years), and Gold (1,000,000 years).
- Skill levels corresponded to spirit ring colors but added an additional tier beyond gold, though Chu Chengzhou had yet to discover it.
For now, none of this mattered to Chu Chengzhou. His skills were all at the lowest gray level, and his martial soul—displayed as a question mark—was a mere ordinary-quality martial soul.
The reason for the question mark was simple: his gray flag martial soul was a mutated one, never before seen on the continent, so it lacked a specific name.
However, Chu Chengzhou discovered another advantage of the attribute panel.
Unknown martial souls without obvious visual traits were typically impossible to analyze without spirit rings. But by focusing on the martial soul section for three seconds, Chu Chengzhou instantly understood the abilities of his mutated gray flag martial soul.
Until today, martial souls on the continent were categorized into six main types: Control, Power Attack, Agility Attack, Defense, Support, and Healing. But starting today, there was a new category: Summoning.
That's right—given that his martial soul didn't fit neatly into the existing classifications, Chu Chengzhou had "created" a new type: the Summoning System.
As the name implied, once his gray flag martial soul was augmented with spirit rings, it could summon a spirit beast corresponding to the ring's power.
For example, if he reached Level 10 and attached a 400-year Datura Snake spirit ring, he could summon a 400-year Datura Snake spirit beast to fight for him.
In theory, attaching a 100,000-year spirit ring would allow him to summon a 100,000-year spirit beast.
Of course, theory was one thing. A mutated martial soul of ordinary quality like his gray flag was likely on par with the so-called "trash martial soul," Blue Silver Grass—or perhaps even worse. Naturally, it came with significant flaws.
Perhaps due to his abysmal innate talent, his mutated gray flag martial soul wasn't a perfect mutation. It shared a similar defect with the Seven Treasures Glazed Pagoda martial soul.
While Seven Treasures Glazed Pagoda users could attach up to seven spirit rings, his mutated gray flag could only handle two.
In other words, barring unforeseen circumstances, he would max out at Level 29 as a Soul Grandmaster.
According to optimal spirit ring configurations, a Level 29 user could summon two spirit beasts—one around 400 years old, the other around 700 years old.
At the same level, few soul masters could match a spirit beast of equal rank. Given that most soul masters' martial souls were weak and their spirit ring setups subpar, a 700-year spirit beast could probably take on a low-level three-ring Soul Elder with a white-yellow-yellow configuration without much trouble.
With a cap of Level 29, he should—at the very least—be able to hold his own against a bottom-tier three-ring Soul Elder, right?
"Pfft, pfft, pfft~! I'm destined to become a god!"
Chu Chengzhou spat inwardly. With a cheat system in hand, how could he settle for the modest goal of being a three-ring Soul Elder?
With a flicker of thought, the previously question-marked martial soul section updated.
[Martial Soul: Soul Summoning Flag]
The name itself wouldn't affect the martial soul's functionality. Given his limited cultural knowledge, Chu Chengzhou opted for a humble title.
Names like "Primordial Chaos True Spirit Flag," "Nine Heavens and Ten Continents Annihilation Flag," or "Heaven and Earth Mystic Emperor Flag" were far too ostentatious for a mere ordinary-quality martial soul like his.
Though his mutated martial soul had severe flaws, Chu Chengzhou wasn't concerned—not with his cheat system.
A flawed martial soul? Just AFK-train it to improve its quality. Even a trash martial soul could reach god-tier status with innate domain abilities!
Low-level summoning beasts early on and limited combat potential later? No problem—AFK-train the spirit rings to increase their age. Even the lowest-tier 10-year spirit ring could eventually summon a million-year spirit beast!
Without hesitation, Chu Chengzhou slotted his Soul Summoning Flag martial soul into one of the AFK-training squares.
What about the second square?
After some thought, he placed the "Meditation" skill into it.
Aside from Tang San from another world, Douluo Continent lacked specialized cultivation techniques for increasing soul power levels. Other than consuming rare treasures or attaching spirit rings and bones, meditation was the only way to cultivate soul power.
And meditation was something every soul master instinctively knew after awakening their martial soul, much like breathing—it was just a matter of proficiency.
Though he hadn't tested it yet, Chu Chengzhou assumed that upgrading the Meditation skill would likely boost his soul power cultivation speed.
As a "super-trash" soul master with only half a level of innate soul power, Chu Chengzhou was eager to accelerate his growth.
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