Jing Hongchen sat in his office, fuming as he went through the loss report from the Body Sect's attack on Mingde Hall. His teeth itched with frustration.
According to incomplete statistics, seventy-five percent of Mingde Hall's total area was now scrapped and in urgent need of reconstruction. That included research labs and the newest generation of soul tools. The total losses were estimated at two billion gold soul coins.
Mingde Hall's entire annual state funding barely reached ten billion gold soul coins.
But what pained Jing Hongchen more than the financial loss was the loss of talent.
"One eighth-level soul engineer dead, three seventh-level, ten sixth-level, fifteen fifth-level... Damn it, if the Body Sect hadn't already been wiped out, I'd have risked my life to take them down myself!"
Jing Hongchen furrowed his brow and set down the report. He began to think deeply.
Why had Xue Di shown such obvious favoritism toward the people of Mingde Hall?
She was a soul beast of Extreme Douluo level. By all logic, she should be a lone, untethered force. And Jing Hongchen knew well he'd personally provoked her, having spoken with arrogance and contempt at the God-bestowal Platform. Logically, Xue Di should've slaughtered all the humans in Mingde Hall, himself included.
Could it be that she feared the might of the Sun Moon Empire backing Mingde Hall? Impossible. Someone at her level had no need to be so cautious. Only gods could pressure someone of her strength.
If not fear, then...
"She has a favorable impression of Mingde Hall? Or the Sun Moon Empire? No... impossible. There's no connection between her and the empire, let alone Mingde Hall. I've never heard of any collaboration between the Extreme North and the Sun Moon Empire."
So it wasn't Mingde Hall she spared—but someone within Mingde Hall.
Jing Hongchen's brows knit tighter as he continued down this line of thought. That was the only possible answer. Someone at Mingde Hall had a connection deep enough with Xue Di to earn her mercy, even in her enraged, post-imprisonment state.
He suddenly froze. That person... must have been present during the attack, someone who came into contact with Xue Di right after she escaped the God-bestowal Platform.
Xue Di... the Extreme North... ice... the Ice Empress... Ice Jade Scorpion Emperor... Ice Jade Scorpion.
There was a rumor in the soul master world: that Xue Di and the Ice Empress, both part of the Extreme North's Three Great Kings, shared an unusually close bond. Their similar titles were said to reflect their closeness.
Following this line of reasoning, Jing Hongchen arrived at a conclusion he could scarcely believe: the mysterious individual... was Huo Yuhao.
Jing Hongchen had personally witnessed that Huo Yuhao was present during the Body Sect's attack. Among all those present, he was the only one who had visited the Extreme North. The only one whose martial soul was of the ice attribute. In fact, his martial soul was an Ice Jade Scorpion.
"But even so, that still shouldn't be enough... Unless..."
Jing Hongchen had long been puzzled about how Huo Yuhao's Ice Jade Scorpion martial soul could possess Ultimate Ice.
Thinking back to how he had once wanted to use that hundred-thousand-year soul beast embryo to give his grandson, Xiao Hongchen, a second martial soul, Jing Hongchen suddenly reached an even more shocking conclusion.
"Yuhao... He didn't just fuse with some ordinary near-hundred-thousand-year Ice Jade Scorpion—he fused with the Ice Jade Scorpion Emperor! The Ice Empress! His second martial soul... is the Ice Jade Scorpion Emperor!"
Jing Hongchen slammed his hands down on the desk, declaring this conclusion with absolute certainty.
And just like that, everything made sense. Huo Yuhao's Ultimate Ice, and his close connection with Xue Di.
As for why Huo Yuhao never told him the truth... what a joke! If he had fused with a four-hundred-thousand-year soul beast and had a soul bone of the same level, he wouldn't tell anyone either—not even the people closest to him. News like that would shake the entire continent.
Realizing this, cold sweat ran down Jing Hongchen's back. He forced himself to sit down again, mind spinning with disbelief, awe, and a creeping sense of fear.
He clasped his fingers together in front of him and seriously considered how he should treat this revelation.
But the more he thought about it, the more Jing Hongchen began to smile. He suddenly found his earlier panic laughable.
First of all, given his current relationship with Huo Yuhao, even if the boy had a million-year soul bone, there was no way Jing Hongchen would—or could—do anything about it.
Not to mention, Huo Yuhao was backed by two Extreme Douluo: his god-grandfather Kong Deming, and Xue Di—a seventy-thousand-year soul beast with ties to Huo Yuhao that likely ran deeper than Jing Hongchen dared to imagine. That kind of lineup? Jing Hongchen didn't dare mess with it.
In fact, he had every reason to be happy. Sure, his plan to give his grandson a second martial soul was ruined, but so what? Huo Yuhao was already his personal disciple and had a good relationship with Meng Hongchen. Weren't they all family now? Why be distant?
Huo Yuhao wasn't some ungrateful brat.
The reason Jing Hongchen had laughed earlier was because he realized something incredible.
The Hongchen family... was on its way to becoming invincible! With Kong Deming above, Xue Di in the wings, and below—Huo Yuhao, Meng Hongchen, and Xiao Hongchen—three of the most outstanding young talents in the Sun Moon Empire...
"So what you're saying is, the reason I avoided disaster this time was all thanks to Yuhao?"
Jing Hongchen chuckled to himself, thoroughly lost in this delightful vision. He could almost see golden fortune coalescing above the Hongchen family. His previous grievances about Mingde Hall's losses were completely forgotten.
As for whether to confirm the truth with Huo Yuhao directly? Jing Hongchen decided to let it go.
If Huo Yuhao didn't want to share, Jing Hongchen certainly wouldn't force it.
—
Meanwhile, Huo Yuhao walked through the wreckage of Mingde Hall, feeling a heavy weight on his heart.
Several diligent researchers he had spoken with before... were gone.
He picked up a shattered piece of a soul tool workstation from the ground, clenched it in his hand, then tucked it into his pocket and sighed.
"Body Sect... I swear, you won't get away with this."
Shaking off the grief, Huo Yuhao turned his thoughts to the future of Mingde Hall's reconstruction.
"This might be a good opportunity to completely overhaul the internal layout."
He'd always felt Mingde Hall's rows upon rows of neatly aligned workbenches lacked the presence befitting a national-level research institute. There were many things that could be improved.
Of course, soul tool research in this world was vastly different from scientific research on Earth. Huo Yuhao didn't intend to blindly apply knowledge from his previous life—but he had many ideas grounded in this world's reality that were more than worth trying.
(End of Chapter)
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