Chapter 400: Terrifying Soul Storm

Cao Ying secretly observed Xiao Yan with her soul power and discovered that he remained like a rock, not affected in the slightest. She raised an eyebrow and directly split off a wisp of soul power to blast toward Xiao Yan. She was determined to make him take a step back, even if it meant her own test score would be lower. After all, launching a soul attack at this moment would clearly affect her Soul Value.

Sheng Zhanglao frowned slightly after noticing Cao Ying's actions, but he did not intervene. As long as the assessment was not disrupted, he would not interfere.

Xiao Yan sensed a soul attack coming toward him and the corner of his mouth curled into a cold sneer. This was truly self-inflicted!

The soul attack dissipated the moment it touched Xiao Yan. The sudden disappearance of the soul power caused Cao Ying to feel a tightness in her chest and a wave of dizziness to strike. Her hand, which had been pressed against the stone stele, dropped away.

Because Cao Ying's jade hand left the stele, the numbers on it stopped, finally resting at 1011.

The dizziness came and went quickly; it was only a small loss of soul power, which did not affect Cao Ying much. However, when the sobered Cao Ying saw the blood-red numbers on the stele, she was stunned. The score on it was clearly a far cry from her true performance.

Cao Ying turned to look at Xiao Yan beside her and found him looking at her with a half-smile. Since she had been the one to initiate the attack, she could only accept her bad luck. Although the score was not good, as long as she passed the assessment, it was fine. What she wanted to know most now was Xiao Yan's Soul Value.

Seeing Cao Ying step aside with no intention of re-testing, Xiao Yan did not pay much attention and walked directly to the stone stele, pressing his hand against it.

At this moment, everyone in the great hall shifted their gaze to Xiao Yan. After all, Xiao Yan's background was mysterious, and almost all the major events that had occurred recently were related to him. But hearing is believing; today, they would finally know whether Xiao Yan was a mule or a horse.

Xiao Yan closed his eyes slightly, and the soul power within his body surged out like a flood, flowing through his arm into the stone stele.

The frantic surging of soul power caused a terrifying soul storm to quickly form around Xiao Yan, pressing the space until it distorted, and the hard floor shattered with a bang.

The terrifying soul storm rapidly expanded outward, blowing the people in the square away. Cao Ying and Dan Chen knew Xiao Yan was extraordinary and were prepared, but they only managed to hold on for a moment before being directly blown away by the powerful soul storm.

"Damn it!" Cao Ying was pushed back several dozen steps before she could barely stop. She had originally wanted to remain motionless like Xiao Yan; after all, her pride did not allow her to be weaker than others. But today, suffering setbacks in front of Xiao Yan, she felt a bitter taste in her heart.

However, when Cao Ying looked at Dan Chen, who had also been pushed back, she found that Dan Chen was staring at the stone stele in the center of the square with a blank expression.

Cao Ying followed Dan Chen's gaze to the stone stele, and upon seeing the blood-red characters, her heart felt as if it had been struck hard by a hammer.

"1999!"

This terrifying number was almost double Cao Ying's. Although Cao Ying's test had suffered an accident, this was still too scary.

Not only was Cao Ying shocked, but everyone in the great hall fell into a dead silence. Everyone knew clearly what this terrifying number meant.

"Even I cannot reach this Soul Value! I didn't expect Xiao Yan to have already reached the level of an eighth-grade intermediate alchemist at such a young age, only a step away from the advanced level. Truly terrifying!" Sheng Zhanglao Yao looked at the blood-red characters on the stone stele, his heart filled with emotion.

Ye Zhong looked at the blood-red characters on the stone stele, his face beaming with joy. This meant the Ye clan's position among the five great clans was secure.

"Hehe, not bad! Not bad! In this soul test, the Ye clan's representative, Xiao Yan, ranks first. And I think this record will be held for a long time," Sheng Zhanglao Yao stroked his beard and laughed loudly.

Just as Sheng Zhanglao's voice fell, the entire hall erupted into a commotion. They secretly sighed at the Ye clan's good fortune; at such a critical juncture, they had actually managed to invite such a formidable young man.

"The soul test has ended. The next assessment is called Soul Manipulation." Sheng Zhanglao Yao looked at Xiao Yan and the others with a smile, then took a pitch-black iron bead from his storage ring.

The surface of the iron bead was extremely smooth, pitch-black as if it could swallow a person's soul, and it gave people a feeling of being extremely heavy.

"This is a bead made of Soul Steel, called a Soul-Testing Bead. It feels very light in the hand, but if you try to pick it up using soul power, it feels like a thousand-jin object. Later, many Soul-Testing Beads will be sprinkled from the ceiling. Whoever catches the most will have the best score," Sheng Zhanglao Yao introduced with a smile.

At this point, Sheng Zhanglao Yao looked at Cao Ying and then at Xiao Yan. He knew these two were constantly competing. In the last assessment, Cao Ying had taken first place by catching 89 beads at once. This record had been held ever since, and now, two years later, the scores would likely advance further.

"By the way, a reminder: do not think about catching them all at once. That is the most foolish behavior." Sheng Zhanglao Yao looked at Xiao Yan and the others with a kind reminder, then flashed and retreated.

Just as Sheng Zhanglao Yao retreated, many dense, pitch-black holes appeared on the ceiling above the hall. Black iron beads continuously fell from these holes, pouring down like a rainstorm.

Facing the iron beads falling from the ceiling, Bai Ying and Qiu Ji chose to act first, dodging the beads to prevent them from hitting their bodies. If these beads hit the body, the body would be fine, but the soul would suffer; the pain was indescribable.

Xiao Yan did not act like Bai Ying and Qiu Ji. He stood directly in place, using his soul power to condense two massive dragon claws—one claw to catch the steel balls falling from the ceiling, and the other to hold the iron beads.

Seeing that Xiao Yan did not dodge or evade, Cao Ying and Dan Chen felt their fighting spirit ignited. Cao Ying was already at odds with Xiao Yan, thinking of opposing him at every turn.

As for Dan Chen, although she appeared weak on the surface, once she encountered something related to alchemy, she immediately became spirited.

The five people continuously caught the iron beads falling from the sky. As time passed, Bai Ying and Qiu Ji's soul power eventually proved inferior, their faces turning beet red. After persisting to catch one or two more beads, their bodies began to tremble. Knowing they had reached their limits, the two did not continue to persist; after all, their scores were already enough to pass the assessment, and there was no need to forcibly compete with monsters like Xiao Yan.

If they were careless and overspent their soul power, causing all the beads they had caught to fall to the ground, it would be a disaster.

(End of chapter) ===== CHAPTER 401 =====