Chapter Fourteen: The Ultimate Soul Technique—Venom Explosion!

But all the effort was worth it. Decades of time and hundreds of thousands of gold soul coins had successfully produced a jade scorpion whose age had just surpassed a thousand years, boasting as many as nine tail segments. Its essence was several times more potent than that of a typical jade scorpion of the same age, making it a rare and precious treasure.

If auctioned on the market, its price would not be lower than that of an average-quality millennium soul bone.

When Chen Shijie broke through to Soul Sovereign, he hadn’t dared to use this jade scorpion. Chen Tianyun also didn’t dare to use this treasure during his breakthrough. But when Chen Ming advanced to Great Soul Master, the golden-swallowing beast that had been nurtured for decades was finally put to use.

With Chen Ming’s martial soul manifesting, the scorpion’s tail quivered faintly, and the entire tail plunged directly into the jade scorpion’s head. Soul energy pulsed subtly, and after a slight tremor, a purple soul ring rose from the beast.

“What incredible penetration! It pierced through this rare jade scorpion’s head without using any toxins. If this were done to a human, any defensive soul master below level thirty—unless wielding top-tier beast martial souls like the Blue Electric Tyrannosaurus or Diamond Mammoth—would be instantly pierced, even if they activated two soul techniques,” Chen Tianyun applauded admiringly.

“Perhaps it’s because of my good physical constitution and high-quality martial soul,” Chen Ming replied casually, staring at the purple soul ring.

This jade scorpion had already been artificially bred into a rare variant, making it extremely valuable. Even after death, its materials could be used for various purposes, easily reclaiming over a hundred thousand gold soul coins.

Chen Ming was not short of money in this life, but he was far from wasteful.

Therefore, during this process, Chen Ming refrained from poisoning or contaminating it. He simply defeated it cleanly and even deliberately restrained the toxins inherent to the martial soul, fearing damage to the precious materials.

At the moment he saw the soul ring, Chen Ming felt a hunger within his martial soul, as if absorbing this soul ring would perfectly complete it.

Without hesitation, he held his breath, focused his mind, and after a brief adjustment, sat cross-legged before the scorpion, guiding the soul ring with his soul power.

The purple soul ring trembled slightly, then transformed into a stream of light that flowed into Chen Ming’s body. As the soul ring began to integrate, a scorching alien soul force surged through his meridians.

This blazing alien soul force was of extremely high quality. Typically, a level thirty soul master would struggle greatly to absorb it. Yet Chen Ming encountered this force from the jade scorpion, which, in both quality and quantity, was significantly inferior to his own soul power.

The scorpion king-level origin suppressed the vitality of the jade scorpion’s soul force, while abundant soul energy and spiritual power tightly restrained it, allowing it to flow orderly through Chen Ming’s broad meridians.

After several cycles, the jade scorpion’s soul ring resisted less and less. The once unified soul force gradually fragmented into wisps, which Chen Ming’s internal soul power slowly decomposed and crushed.

After more than a dozen cycles, the jade scorpion’s soul force and origin were completely digested by Chen Ming, beginning to blend into his body. At this moment, Chen Ming sensed his consciousness ascending once again to a new realm.

Because the jade scorpion he absorbed was the exact same species as his own martial soul, although its quality was far inferior to the Bi Lin Seven Flowers, it offered many more soul techniques for him to choose from.

From amplification to attack to control, all kinds of soul techniques were present, though their strengths varied widely. Most were mere fillers with unsatisfactory effects, so Chen Ming set them aside and sought out functional soul techniques. What he discovered truly shocked him.

Within the inheritance laws of the jade scorpion was an extraordinarily exceptional, arguably overpowered special skill.

The user of this skill, tens of thousands of years later, had once easily severely injured and killed several high-level soul emperors from Shrek Academy with only the cultivation level of a mere soul king. This user had even toyed with a super Douluo whose soul power reached level ninety-eight, and if not for an attack from a god-level remnant soul of a powerful otherworldly being, he might have escaped unscathed.

Yes, this skill’s wielder was the Death Messenger of the future, the strongest soul king in Douluo history—unparalleled.

However, due to differing martial souls, the skill Chen Ming saw in the jade scorpion was not the Corpse Explosion Technique, but a similar principle expressed differently: the Poison Explosion Technique. Its power was equal, but its applicability was broader and it was easier to use.

The Poison Explosion Technique, as its name implies, causes poisonous soul energy to explode. Its brilliance lies in the fact that one portion of soul power can unleash ten or even twenty times its force at the moment of explosion, with no upper limit—the more and stronger the poison, the more astonishing the explosive power and range.

The Corpse Explosion Technique requires both a corpse and intense poison, but the Poison Explosion Technique only requires one condition: being infused with strong poison. Regardless of whether the medium is a corpse, a living person, or even a rock, Chen Ming could turn it into a bomb with this skill.

To put it bluntly, despite this soul ring being only a millennium soul ring and the soul technique only a thousand-year skill, if you told Dugu Bo about it, he would want to remove his ninth soul ring just to replace it with this skill.

Not poisoned? No matter—you’re already marked by my poisonous soul power! I just trigger the explosion. If poison can’t kill you, I’ll blow you up!

Had Dugu Bo possessed this skill, he wouldn’t be the shame of the titled Douluo; he would be the most explosive and formidable titled Douluo.

The only drawback of this soul technique is similar to the Ice Explosion Technique of the ice scorpion clan: it must use its own poison attribute soul power to detonate. To harm an enemy, one must bring a medium imbued with their poison attribute soul power close to the target or infect the enemy with poison first.

Generally, this limitation is somewhat awkward. After all, if you’ve already poisoned the enemy, following up with this move might seem redundant. If the poison cannot be introduced into the opponent’s body, the intent can be easily spotted, and the effect partially avoided.

However, this flaw was hardly a limitation for Chen Ming.

After all, his first soul technique was called Poison Cloud Technique, which created a vast cloud of poison...

Although his spirit was in a special realm, Chen Ming could not conceal his excitement. He scrutinized the inheritance rules within the Bi Lin Scorpion bloodline that could become soul techniques again and again. Finding none comparable to the Poison Explosion Technique, he decisively inscribed its rules into his second soul ring, forming a soul technique.

At the same time, Chen Ming’s manifested martial soul seemed stimulated, trembling slightly. With the integration of the jade scorpion’s origin, he felt his martial soul beginning to change.

It didn’t become stronger per se, but it did become more complete.

If at the initial awakening Chen Ming’s jade scorpion martial soul was a large bucket leaking water, then after acquiring the Bi Lin Seven Flowers soul ring, the leaks had been patched, but the bucket still held only half its capacity.

Now, after acquiring this jade scorpion soul ring, the bucket hadn’t grown much larger, but it was filled to the brim. Originally it had half empty space inside, but now it was completely full—reaching its theoretical maximum capacity.

From this point onward, Chen Ming’s innate soul power should no longer be calculated as level five, but regarded as a truly innate full soul power.

This concoction by Qiandao Liukai had indeed perfectly cured the problem that had plagued their family for centuries.