Before its destruction, we paid our taxes, so Soul Hall...
Inside the Star Dou Great Forest, because Beibei and Tang Ya intended to help Huo Yuhao hunt for a century-old spirit ring rather than letting him do it alone, an unexpected incident occurred just as expected.
Due to a sudden turn of events, Huo Yuhao was separated from Beibei and Tang Ya. Fortunately, Huo Yuhao's good fortune kept him out of danger along the way, and he even managed to encounter a four-hundred-year-old Green-Eyed Bird that was already on the verge of death.
With a single slash from Huo Yuhao, a yellow spirit ring gradually drifted up from the Green-Eyed Bird. Huo Yuhao released his Soul Power, slowly guiding that century-old spirit ring into his own body.
Although his meridians had been cleared by Beibei, this spirit ring—whose age pushed right against the upper limit for absorbing a first spirit ring—still made him feel extremely uncomfortable. Fortunately, Huo Yuhao still had Yillix inside him.
Feeling a force enter Huo Yuhao's body and preparing to destroy it and perish together with him, a wisp of Yillix's divine consciousness instantly suppressed the violent part of it in a split second.
Once that violent part was gone, although Huo Yuhao's body still found it difficult to absorb, this spirit ring had ultimately reached a point where he had the capacity to absorb it.
After half an hour of absorption, Huo Yuhao slowly opened his eyes. He had been completely safe during this half hour, and no spirit beasts had suddenly run up to him to disturb him.
As soon as he finished absorbing the spirit ring, Beibei and Tang Ya finally tracked him down.
"Junior martial brother, I'm glad you're okay."
"Little Yuhao, you scared me to death! I thought I'd never get to eat your roasted fish again in this life."
Looking at the two people who cared about him, Huo Yuhao's eyes filled with emotion. "Don't worry, Senior Brother, Teacher Ya. Not only am I fine, but..."
As he spoke, Huo Yuhao released his spirit ring. A yellow century-old spirit ring surfaced around his body, proving that he had successfully stepped into the realm of a Spirit Master.
"Junior martial brother, you..."
Beibei was just about to feel happy for Huo Yuhao when he saw the dead Green-Eyed Bird beside him, and his expression changed drastically in an instant.
"Junior martial brother, are you alright?"
"Of course I'm alright. What's wrong, Senior Brother?"
"It's nothing, as long as you're fine." Seeing that Huo Yuhao's body was in a completely normal state, Beibei was relieved that he had been overthinking things.
The upper limit of the absorption age for a Spirit Master's first spirit ring was four hundred and twenty-three years. This was a theory formulated by the grandmaster, who was hailed as the foremost authority on martial soul theory.
It sounded fine on the surface, but as a direct descendant of the grandmaster, while outsiders had no idea what flaws might exist in this theory, Beibei knew very well just how many problems were hidden within it.
The grandmaster had written down the acceptable absorption age limits for the first through ninth spirit rings and published them in his theories, but within Shrek Academy, that theory served more as a matter of political correctness.
Going back as far as Tang San ten thousand years ago, down to Beibei's great-great-grandfather and Senior Sister Zhang Lexuan, none of them had absorbed spirit rings according to the grandmaster's so-called spirit ring age limits.
This completely and utterly demonstrated that the grandmaster's theory had massive flaws. Power assault systems, control systems, auxiliary systems—their physical constitutions all varied, so naturally they could not be evaluated by the same bodily absorption limit.
Earlier, when Beibei helped Huo Yuhao circulate the Mysterious Heaven Technique within his body, he discovered that Huo Yuhao's meridians were severely blocked. Due to long-term malnutrition, his physique was much weaker than that of a normal rank 10 spirit scholar.
Under these circumstances, he simply could not absorb a spirit ring according to normal Spirit Master standards. Based on Beibei's estimation for Huo Yuhao, he should have no problem absorbing a two-hundred-year spirit ring, and a three-hundred-year spirit ring shouldn't be too much trouble either, but a four-hundred-year spirit ring slightly exceeded Huo Yuhao's current upper absorption limit.
The moment he caught sight of the Green-Eyed Bird earlier, Beibei had genuinely feared that Huo Yuhao would kill himself by absorbing a spirit ring that exceeded his own limits. Fortunately, it seemed Huo Yuhao had made it through without incident.
"A Green-Eyed Bird! Little Yuhao, let's roast it to eat when we head out later." Having confirmed that Huo Yuhao was fine, Tang Ya picked up the Green-Eyed Bird from the ground, planning to have a barbecue once they got outside.
Suddenly, however, Tang Ya felt that the Green-Eyed Bird in her hands was a bit stiff. In a flash, something occurred to her. She parted the feathers of the dead Green-Eyed Bird and indeed discovered the very thing she had imagined.
"A Soul Bone! And it's an external soul bone!" Tang Ya cried out in astonishment. She couldn't believe that a spirit beast of merely four hundred years would yield an external soul bone.
"Quickly absorb it, Little Yuhao! Even though it's only four hundred years old, external soul bones can grow. This thing is second only to a hundred-thousand-year spirit ring."
Tang Ya handed the soul bone to Huo Yuhao, but he quickly raised his hand in refusal. "Teacher Ya, you or Big Brother Beibei should absorb this instead. Since the Tang Sect didn't disdain me and accepted me as a disciple, it is my duty to work for the sect. Offering a soul bone to the Tang Sect is only right."
As one of the only two factions that could extract high returns from Huo Yuhao for minimal investment, this external soul bone, yielded by the spirit beast Huo Yuhao had hunted, was eventually absorbed by Tang Ya as a matter of course after a round of polite refusals.
Given Beibei's personality, he would never have taken a soul bone that Huo Yuhao had hunted and dropped entirely on his own, but he could feel the daily anxiety Tang Ya suffered regarding her own strength.
For the sake of his girlfriend, Beibei ultimately failed to firmly refuse this item that shouldn't have belonged to him, unlike he usually would.
"Junior martial brother..."
"What is it, Big Brother Beibei?"
"It's nothing." Never mind, he would just find another way to compensate this junior martial brother in the future. As for right now...
Beibei looked at Tang Ya, who was in the middle of absorbing the soul bone, and silently felt happy for the enhancement of her strength.
After Tang Ya finished absorbing the soul bone, the three of them arrived at Shrek Academy. Beibei and Tang Ya introduced Huo Yuhao to the conditions of Shrek Academy just like in the original story.
"Oh, right, Little Yuhao, I'll take you to collect the Spirit Master stipend in a moment."
"Stipend?"
"Mhm. This is a special allowance exclusive to resident Spirit Masters of Shrek City and students of Shrek Academy. A one-ring Spirit Master receives a subsidy of one Soul Gold Coin per month, a two-ring Spirit Master gets ten Soul Gold Coins, and since I've become a Spirit Elder, I can already collect one hundred Soul Gold Coins every month."
"One hundred Soul Gold Coins! Is it really that much?" Huo Yuhao exclaimed in disbelief. He had never seen that much money in his entire life.
"It certainly is a lot. After all, this is one of the investments given to Shrek Academy by the three great empires every year, and precisely because of this, such a Soul Gold Coin subsidy policy exists exclusively within the city of Shrek," Beibei said slowly.
Back in Douluo I, Soul Hall used to distribute Soul Gold Coins to all grass-roots Spirit Masters. Those gold coins were allocated by the two great empires and issued through Soul Hall, so theoretically, those gold coins had nothing to do with Soul Hall.
However, just like Uncle Sam only exists because the Red Bear is around, once Soul Hall was destroyed and the threat of Soul Hall was gone, the two great empires naturally could no longer keep handing out money to ordinary spirit masters.
After all, those were real, tangible silver and gold coins. Besides, for the nobility, they had needed to spend money while Soul Hall still existed, and if they still had to spend extra money after Soul Hall was destroyed, wouldn't destroying Soul Hall have been a complete waste of time?