After leaving the Sea God's Pavilion, Zhou Sicheng walked with Zhang Lexuan for a while before they parted ways. Zhang Lexuan, after all, wasn't just an ordinary student—she had her own responsibilities to handle.
They agreed on a time to meet again for more frequent exchanges in the future, then went about their respective duties.
Carrying the soul bone Elder Mu had given him, Zhou Sicheng went to find Ye Guyi, handing her the Lightbreaker Left Arm Bone. This ten-thousand-year soul bone would undoubtedly give her strength another significant boost.
Over the past few days, Ye Guyi had been absorbing and refining the spoils they obtained from slaying Evil Soul Masters. Her soul power had risen from rank 65 to the peak of rank 66, just a step away from reaching rank 67.
If she successfully absorbed this soul bone, it was quite possible that her soul power could directly surge to rank 68.
At present, even Ma Xiaotao had only just broken through to rank 68. Yet Ye Guyi, younger by several years, was already on the verge of catching up.
Ma Xiaotao was already eighteen years old, while Ye Guyi was only fifteen.
Talent truly mattered, but talent paired with extraordinary opportunities—that was truly exhilarating.
After handing the soul bone to Ye Guyi, Zhou Sicheng went straight to find Fan Yu.
He now had two disciples, and there was no need to mention He Caitou's natural talent—he was already preparing to break through to a Rank 4 Soul Engineer.
As for Huo Yuhao, he had been an even greater surprise. After all, not everyone could be as monstrous as Zhou Sicheng himself.
In just a few short months, Huo Yuhao had advanced from a complete novice to a certified Rank 1 Soul Engineer.
This was about the same speed as in the original timeline, clearly showing that this kid truly had high potential when it came to creating soul tools.
When He Caitou and Huo Yuhao saw Zhou Sicheng arrive, both of them beamed with pure joy—the admiration they felt toward him was genuine and heartfelt.
Zhou Sicheng looked at them and gave a warm smile.
"Caitou, Yuhao, I heard from Teacher Fan Yu that you two have made tremendous progress recently. You deserve praise."
Hearing this, the two scratched their heads a little sheepishly.
"Big Brother Zhou, it's all thanks to your encouragement!"
Zhou Sicheng chuckled. Such obvious flattery.
Casually, he retrieved two pieces of rare ore from his soul tool—spoils they had seized from Evil Soul Masters—and handed one to each of them.
"This is Yan Crystal Ore," Zhou Sicheng explained gently. "It's a primary material for constructing soul tool turrets. You two can use it to craft a soul tool suited for yourselves."
The two of them were stunned with delight as they accepted the ore. They knew exactly how precious Yan Crystal Ore was. With their current levels, they would have had no right to use such rare materials.
It was clear that Zhou Sicheng was giving them special treatment.
They quickly bowed in gratitude:
"Thank you, Big Brother Zhou! We'll work even harder on our cultivation!"
Zhou Sicheng waved his hand casually.
"You two focus on your work. I'm off to find Teacher Fan Yu."
With that, he left the workshop and headed to Fan Yu's personal lab.
When Fan Yu saw that it was Zhou Sicheng, he smiled warmly.
"How did your mission go? Everything smooth?"
Zhou Sicheng nodded.
"No major problems. Elder Xuan personally led the team. We juniors didn't have much to worry about."
Fan Yu nodded thoughtfully. He had heard about the Shrek Inspection Group's full mobilization, but hadn't gone himself. Hearing Zhou Sicheng's reassurance put his mind at ease.
Without wasting time, Zhou Sicheng brought out the disassembled Light Dragon Turtle shell from his soul tool.
Seeing the shell of a 50,000-year top-tier soul beast, Fan Yu's eyes lit up.
"Whoa! This is premium material! There's enough here to craft quite a few defensive soul tools."
Zhou Sicheng smiled.
"I came to trouble you with this, Teacher."
Fan Yu waved dismissively.
"No need to be so polite. Let me guess—you want to use this to craft a defensive soul tool for Ye Guyi?"
Zhou Sicheng nodded.
"There's a large quantity of shell here. I was hoping to use it to forge an eighth-grade defensive armor set for my sister. Do you think it's possible?"
Fan Yu paused for a moment, then responded seriously:
"If it's just a single eighth-grade defensive soul tool, I could manage."
However, he added with a hint of concern:
"But making a full armor set is very complicated. There's the chestplate, backplate, shoulder guards, arm guards, bracers, greaves… Crafting the individual components is doable, but our current technology can't perfectly synchronize the core formations across an entire set. Even if we manage to piece them together, it won't perform as perfectly as you might imagine."
Hearing this, Zhou Sicheng couldn't help but frown slightly. This was indeed a major limitation of the current Douluo Continent when it came to crafting high-level soul tools—they lacked sufficient expertise.
He nodded silently and after a moment said,
"In that case, forget about making full armor. Let's divide the shell into seven parts and make standard defensive soul tools instead. If there's any leftover material, please keep it as payment."
Fan Yu chuckled.
"There's no 'if' about it. With this much shell, even if we make all the soul tools at the sixth-grade level, we'll only use about two-thirds of the material. Even accounting for production loss, there'll still be at least a fifth left over for me."
This was top-tier material, after all. Zhou Sicheng was clearly offering him a generous gift.
Fan Yu nodded.
"No problem. The academy will cover the costs for supplementary materials. With all the rare resources Dean Qian and Dean Yan brought back from the last mission, we'll put them to good use for you, our deserving hero."
Fan Yu also knew exactly why Zhou Sicheng wanted seven defensive soul tools. Zhou Sicheng didn't really need them himself. He clearly intended to prepare them for the upcoming Continental Advanced Soul Master Academy Elite Tournament.
Zhou Sicheng himself cultivated both martial soul and soul tool paths. Although the top-tier geniuses like Ma Xiaotao usually looked down on soul tools, if Zhou Sicheng gave them the tools himself, they would never refuse.
Having the academy's top talents actually using soul tools made Fan Yu absolutely delighted.
Truthfully, since Zhou Sicheng had joined Shrek Academy, many things had quietly gotten better.
Even the constant bickering between Dean Yan and Dean Qian had lessened. Sometimes, unbelievably, the two would even sit down to discuss soul tools together.
Wasn't that ridiculous? Dean Yan had never cared about the Soul Tool Department before. Now he was actually taking an interest?
Fan Yu knew that all of this was thanks to Zhou Sicheng.
Being a dual cultivator of martial soul and soul tool, and with his prestigious position in the academy, Zhou Sicheng had naturally influenced the upper echelons, including Yan Shaozhe.
Yan Shaozhe was particularly intrigued—how could someone who cultivated his martial soul to such heights also be so skilled with soul tools?
Zhou Sicheng's simple but enlightening explanation back then had made Yan Shaozhe reflect deeply:
"The strongest Soul Engineers must also be powerful Soul Masters."
While "Soul Master" and "Soul Engineer" sounded like different roles, in truth, they complemented each other.
Neither could reach the absolute pinnacle without the other.
Although this wasn't a new concept, most of the academy's leadership had been too conservative to seriously consider it before.
Among the younger generation, there had been few who focused on soul tools—so there had been little reason to change.
But now, with a supreme talent like Zhou Sicheng openly championing soul tools, it was only natural for attitudes to begin shifting.
When Zhou Sicheng had been sparring with Inner Court students, it wasn't just relying on his contracted soul beasts.
With his soul power only in the forties and wielding a few sixth-grade soul tools, he had been able to suppress geniuses like Dai Yueheng—clearly showing how, in the hands of a true genius, soul tools were still top-tier weapons.
Some might argue that after rank seventy, a martial soul's power naturally outstripped soul tools.
So what if soul tools dominated before rank seventy?
Would a Soul Master really stay below rank seventy forever?
Yet Zhou Sicheng's example made it clear: even a future peak-level Soul Master could and should harness the strengths of both paths.
Of course, Zhou Sicheng didn't encourage everyone to dual cultivate. For most people, splitting focus would be detrimental.
Instead, his advice was simple:
Even if you can't create soul tools, a strong Soul Master should at least know how to use them properly.
By combining the power of one's martial soul with the right soul tool, the results could be truly extraordinary.
Weren't there plenty of examples of this in the original work?
With Zhou Sicheng taking the lead and guiding them, everyone gradually became less resistant to the use of soul tools — even though, to them, soul tools were external forces and not part of their own innate strength.
However, after being defeated multiple times by Zhou Sicheng using only soul tools, they slowly began to accept that mastering soul tools could indeed be considered part of their overall strength as well...
Ah, the sweet scent of acceptance!
After all, Zhou Sicheng's martial soul abilities were already so heaven-defying, yet he was able to defeat them without even using his martial soul, relying solely on soul tools and a soul power cultivation of just over the fortieth rank. With such overwhelming strength displayed right before their eyes, they really had no room left to object.
When a top-tier genius doesn't even need his martial soul and still demonstrates overwhelming power using only soul tools, it would be downright foolish to continue underestimating the role of soul tools.
Because of this, Shrek Academy was slowly beginning to change.
In the original timeline, the change during this stage wasn't nearly as obvious — perhaps precisely because Zhou Sicheng wasn't there.
A prodigy with overwhelming martial soul talent who also advocated for soul tools.
In the original work, Shrek Academy produced many geniuses with explosively strong martial souls, but none of them utilized soul tools, which is why the integration of soul tools never really caught on.
Now, Zhou Sicheng was almost single-handedly altering the situation, and Elder Mu couldn't have been happier.
He had initially thought it would take these students suffering several setbacks before they would be willing to truly change.
Yet now, Zhou Sicheng had managed to accomplish it all on his own, and Elder Mu was deeply gratified.
Even though this change was still only in its early stages, with a beginning established, the future promotion and acceptance of soul tools would be much smoother.
****
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