Faced with Huo Yuhao's question, Wang Yan was stumped.
Yes, Su Ming's Martial Spirit should be a Body Martial Soul.
So how did he become a Star Tree Giant?
The first possibility that came to his mind was Twin Martial Souls.
This could not only explain Su Ming's Martial Spirit issue but also his Spirit Ring problem.
Because he had Twin Martial Souls, what seemed like three Spirit Rings could actually amount to eight.
He was a Spirit King!
No, that shouldn't be.
The next second, Wang Yan dismissed the idea himself.
Adding Spirit Rings to both Martial Souls simultaneously was a tremendous waste of the Twin Martial Souls potential.
Thinking of this, Wang Yan secretly glanced at Xiao Xiao.
Xiao Xiao was like that; who knew what she was thinking, insisting on adding a hundred-year Spirit Ring to her second Martial Soul.
Was Su Ming that kind of fool?
Leaving that aside, simultaneously adding Spirit Rings to two Martial Souls placed extremely high demands on the body. The pressure from the Spirit Rings of both Martial Souls was applied at the same time, and cultivating both simultaneously easily led to Martial Soul conflict, potentially causing the body to explode.
Historically, many Twin Martial Soul holders failed to mature because harmonizing Twin Martial Souls was too difficult.
So, how did Su Ming do it?
Was his Martial Spirit truly twin?
Wang Yan had reached a dead end.
He was overcomplicating things.
In contrast, Huo Yuhao wasn't thinking in the direction of Twin Martial Souls.
He, or more accurately, Tianmeng, was currently frantically exclaiming.
"Intelligent Spirit Rings! It's his Intelligent Spirit Ring, it must be! He also has an Intelligent Spirit Ring!"
Intelligent Spirit Ring?
Huo Yuhao inexplicably thought of the forging performance during the opening ceremony. The three master blacksmiths performed Spirit Infusion on the rare metals during forging, and Spirit Infusion relied on Spirit Souls.
"It's a Spirit Soul, right?"
He spoke, both addressing the Shrek team and responding to Tianmeng.
Spirit Soul?
Wang Yan's interest was piqued.
The others were also momentarily puzzled.
Clearly, the concept of a Spirit Soul had left too shallow an impression in their minds.
However, the concept of Spirit Souls hadn't appeared too long ago, and they quickly recalled the forging performance from a few days prior.
"Besides forging, can Spirit Souls also help Spirit Masters in combat? Like a Beast Martial Soul Possession?"
Wang Yan muttered to himself.
Clearly, he was astounded by Su Ming's performance.
If this were truly possible, then applying Spirit Souls to Spirit Master combat would be far too powerful.
The overall strength of the Spirit Master world would rise to a new level because of this.
The Blacksmith Association actually hadn't blocked this technology.
At this moment, a trace of admiration rose in Wang Yan's heart.
From this perspective, the Blacksmith Association had truly made a huge contribution to the Spirit Master world. Coupled with their open forging system and non-restrictive approach to technology, they seemed to adopt an attitude of freely sharing knowledge as long as the association grew.
The Body Sect...
The Body Sect behind them also seemed to understand the bigger picture.
Technology that could strengthen the entire Spirit Master world was offered up so readily, their only demand being to expand their own sect's foundation.
"Impossible!"
In Huo Yuhao's Sea of Consciousness, Tianmeng vetoed the idea again.
"That Spirit Soul is very similar to my Intelligent Spirit Ring. The only difference is that the requirements are lowered; it doesn't need Fierce Beasts with powerful spiritual origins like me or Bingbing, and can stabilize the spiritual origin of ordinary thousand-year Spirit Beasts."
"Regardless, a Spirit Soul absolutely cannot be this powerful."
As the pioneer of Intelligent Spirit Rings, Tianmeng was well aware of the drawbacks of his method.
"But, Brother Tianmeng, when you possessed me several times before, weren't you very powerful? I remember you even suppressed Sister Xiaotao's berserk evil fire when you controlled me," Huo Yuhao said weakly.
"Silly Yuhao, use your brain! Is that the same?" Tianmeng sounded exasperated.
"I am a million-year Spirit Beast. When I possess you, I use my spiritual origin to control my power. It's only because I have many seals of my spiritual origin within your body that I can be so powerful. Bingbing is the same; she also sealed a massive amount of energy. This power far exceeds your level. Of course, it's stronger than you when unsealed, but each unsealing is a permanent loss."
The Ice Empress joined the discussion.
"Tianmeng is right. Moreover, it's also because our origins are powerful. When merging with your Spirit Power, your Spirit Power becomes filled with our characteristics, allowing us to utilize your body."
"Spirit Power growth, every strand must derive its characteristics from the Martial Soul. Only with the imprint of the Martial Soul's characteristics does this Spirit Power belong to the Spirit Master. Spirit Rings certainly alter the characteristics of Spirit Power, but they are only a part of what the Martial Soul imparts."
"The characteristics imparted by the Spirit Master's own Martial Soul constitute the entirety of their Spirit Power. If one's own Martial Soul cannot erupt with corresponding power, how can a Spirit Soul, which only imparts a portion of characteristics, do so?"
Huo Yuhao felt as if he had been enlightened.
He understood.
"Ice Empress, you mean Big Brother Su's true strength hasn't been fully revealed yet."
"Uh... you could understand it that way too."
The Ice Empress stopped speaking.
What she meant to express was merely that a Spirit Soul's enhancement of a Spirit Master wouldn't be too great, especially replacing Martial Soul Possession with a Spirit Soul; it couldn't surpass the Spirit Master's own power.
But since Huo Yuhao applied it flexibly to Su Ming's situation and concluded that Su Ming was even stronger, she had nothing more to say.
"The root of what makes Su Ming's move most worthy of investigation is how he managed to condense that Star Tree," Tianmeng concluded.
What was strong wasn't the Star Tree Giant, but the Su Ming who could condense this giant.
Such a massive, nearly materialized body—the ability to condense it was the real skill.
While high-level principles were being discussed in Huo Yuhao's Sea of Consciousness, over in the Shrek team, Wang Yan and the others remained convinced of the power of Spirit Souls. The team members looked on with fervent eyes, ready to select a suitable Spirit Soul for themselves.
"Imperial Brother, I..."
Xu Jiujiu still couldn't let it go.
One minute. The team she led was swept away in just one minute, without any ability to resist.
This blow was too heavy for her.
"Jiu Jiu, you've already done very well. You forced the Sun Moon Royal Team to reveal one of their trump cards," Xu Jiawei could only comfort her. "The Sun Moon Royal Team might have other trump cards, but I'm seventy percent sure they don't have any more trump cards involving Spirit Metal."
The two disciples of the Body Sect already had so many Spirit Metal trump cards. If the others had them too, then the Body Sect would be showing clear favoritism.
"Their goal is obvious: they want to remain completely neutral across the entire continent, including the Sun Moon Empire, and are using the Blacksmith Association to achieve this step. Therefore, they cannot give the Sun Moon Empire too much, while giving us so little."
Xu Jiawei analyzed calmly.
His analysis was correct; the Body Sect would maintain a balance.
However, currently, the Sun Moon Empire was stronger in terms of national power. To be precise, it took the combined might of the three Douluo nations to compare with the Sun Moon Empire.
The reason Mingde Hall received little Spirit Metal wasn't for any other reason, but purely because the Blacksmith Association branch had only been established there for a few months.
As for giving Spirit Metal to competition participants, that was impossible within Mingde Hall.
Never mind a few pieces of Spirit Metal; even a dozen pieces wouldn't be enough to distribute among the many Level 9 Spirit Engineers within Mingde Hall, let alone be given to those lower down to use.
***
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(Chapter End)