"And as for Sisi…"
Mentioning Sisi, Su Yuntao sighed before speaking in a low voice, "She never truly joined the Spirit Hall. Back when you saw her in the branch hall, it just so happened she was there to collect her Spirit Master subsidy."
"Master Su Yuntao, why are you so devoted to a woman who doesn't even respect herself?"
Xiao Wu added that during her time at the Adventurer's Guild, she'd heard adventurers discussing relationships between men and women. They all acted carefree, saying things like, "Once unfaithful, never again."
She thought it made a lot of sense.
"But have you considered," Zhou Qing interjected, "that maybe those adventurers can talk so easily because none of them are actually married?"
He had good reason to suspect this. The only reason those adventurers could speak so nonchalantly was because they were still single and thus able to remain clear-headed.
But once you've truly fallen in love, Su Yuntao's reaction was actually the more normal one.
Yes, betrayal is certainly contemptible.
But staying rational—
That's only possible from the perspective of an outsider. The one who was betrayed, the one emotionally invested, is already too deep in to think clearly.
And if those "rational observers" were to experience it themselves and still stay so detached, then what they felt wasn't really love or affection at all. To them, dating was just a game, or at best, a transaction.
The only people who can stay emotionally detached after falling in love… are usually those who have already had their hearts broken.
"Huh? They're all single? But some of them look like they're pushing thirty," Xiao Wu exclaimed.
"If they were really married, would they still have so much time to drink at the guild? Spending whole mornings or afternoons just hanging around? They'd be eager to take on more missions, earn more money, and give their wives and kids a better life."
Zhou Qing knew full well just how much pressure came with starting a family.
Especially for most civilian Spirit Masters in the Adventurer's Guild. Completing a single mission could earn more than what a normal family made in a year.
But the expenses for cultivating as a Spirit Master were just as steep.
Tang San also agreed with Zhou Qing's assessment.
Su Yuntao, meanwhile, opened his mouth, unsure how the conversation had veered off into whether adventurers were married. Still, he had to admit, chatting with these three kids made it easy to lose focus—and his heart felt lighter for it.
"Sisi and I came from the same village. That's how we met, and I just wanted to look out for her more… Forget it. Let's not talk about this. What's your current spirit power level?"
Su Yuntao asked Zhou Qing, Tang San, and Xiao Wu for their spirit power levels.
"Fifteen."
"Fourteen."
"Thirteen."
Hearing the numbers, Su Yuntao's eyes widened in shock. He rubbed his ears, wondering if he'd misheard.
After confirming several times, he finally muttered, "This is… really… I don't even know what to say."
Just after obtaining their first spirit rings, and their spirit power had already increased so much…
Had he misjudged them?
Su Yuntao pounded his chest in frustration!
If only he had brought Zhou Qing and Tang San back to Nuoding City back then, he might've saved himself three years of effort and secured a spot as the next branch hall master-in-training. Maybe even Sisi would've looked at him differently—and wouldn't have gotten involved with the City Lord. Perhaps then, he wouldn't be so heartbroken now.
If Zhou Qing had known what Su Yuntao was thinking, he would've nodded in full agreement. Because had Su Yuntao actually tried that, Tang Hao would've smashed him into meat paste on the spot with a single hammer blow—and, well, Su Yuntao certainly wouldn't be sad anymore after that.
"But we were just lucky. We all got spirit rings that suit us very well," Zhou Qing said modestly.
"Exactly."
Tang San nodded firmly. He was very satisfied with his first soul skill, Life Accumulation.
As for Xiao Wu…
She felt her soul skill Waist Bow was quite good. As a Soft-Boned Rabbit, this skill let her maximize her racial advantages. With continued training in flexible combat techniques, her human body's skeletal structure would gradually resemble that of her true form. It was, in a way, a method of enhancing the soul skill's power without needing to increase the ring's age.
"A hundred-year ring for the first one… Truly amazing. When I graduated from Nuoding Academy, the instructor chose a 60-year-old lone wolf for my first soul ring. Honestly, I felt I could've handled a century-old ring even then.
But there were no century-old wolves left in Nuoding Forest. Too many Spirit Masters before me had used wolf-type martial spirits, so the older wolf-type soul beasts were already hunted to extinction.
And other beasts—like tigers and leopards—were just too fierce. The instructors wouldn't risk it…"
Su Yuntao was reminiscing.
Zhou Qing could understand that.
In the original novel, even Yu Xiaogang didn't dare confront a 400-year-old Mandala Snake head-on. He had to run.
Even though his martial spirit had mutated into something resembling a wild boar, he still came from the Blue Lightning Tyrant Dragon Clan. He surely learned some martial techniques, and had traveled with Liu Erlong and Flender—he should've had far more experience than the average Spirit Master.
No matter how much his combat strength is criticized, he was still a level 29 Grandmaster.
Poor combat skills or not, his spirit power was legitimate.
But without Tang San's Ghost Shadow Perplexing Step and hidden weapon expertise, Yu Xiaogang would've ended up as Mandala Snake food sooner or later.
And that snake wasn't even considered a top-tier soul beast—it was just venomous with tough scales.
The same applied to tiger-type beasts.
So it's not hard to see why most civilian Spirit Masters end up with white soul rings for their first one.
Not only are weaker beasts safer to absorb, they're also easier for instructors to help hunt down.
Especially in primary academies, where most teachers rarely engage in real combat and mostly pass on foundational knowledge of the Spirit Master world.
So when they take students to hunt for soul beasts, they aren't about to exhaust themselves looking for century-old ones.
Even the fact that Xiao Chenyu, the City Lord's son, had a white first soul ring proved this point—no matter how arrogant he was, he was still the son of a city lord. By rights, the Nuoding Academy instructor should've given him special treatment. But the truth was, the risks of hunting a century-old soul beast were just too high. Even a Grandmaster could get killed. Survival matters more than saving face.
So—
Even if you're the City Lord's son?
You still get a ten-year-old soul beast as your first ring.
"We're here."
They arrived at the City Lord's Mansion. Zhou Qing looked up at the five-meter-high front gate, marveling at the extravagance of the wealthy. He took out the mission slip and handed it to the gate guard, saying:
"We're adventurers from Nuoding Guild. We accepted a task to act as sparring partners for the young master of your house."
The guard took the slip, examined it carefully, and then glanced at Su Yuntao with his dark eye circles. "Please wait here while I report inside."