There wasn’t really a reason for Bai Yunfei and the others to stay behind in Crushed Stone River. Now that their business had concluded there, the group took off for Black Cloud Valley. The younger generation was slightly tired due to their fights and attempts to absorb the Extreme King Pill fragrance, so the three Soul Kings enveloped them in a bubble of energy and took care of their flight back towards the Underworld School.
Likewise, there wasn’t much to do or talk about at the Underworld School. After a few words were exchanged between the two parties, the people from the Crafting School returned to their rooms to rest.
Bai Yunfei hadn’t said much on their way back to the Underworld School. He appeared to be thinking about something and so hardly said anything even when they got back. The most he said was just a few words of goodbye to Zheng Kai and the others before he shut himself up in his own room to rest.
Lian Lingmin looked a little concerned at how Bai Yunfei had been in such a rush to leave. “Does…Yunfei feel a little strange to you? He was so absent-minded earlier, do you think…he’s disappointed with him not being able to take in the Extreme King Pill fragrance?”
“Yunfei not participating in the final bout for the Extreme King Pills is a great shame. His talent is much better than ours. If he had taken in some of the Extreme King Pill fragrance, he definitely would’ve become a Soul King soon. Feeling disappointed is only natural…” Song Lin sighed, “We should try to avoid mentioning anything about the Extreme King Pills whenever he’s around just in case.”
……
Everyone was worrying for the wrong reasons. Bai Yunfei was absent-minded not because of disappointment. It was the exact opposite in fact. He was extremely impatient and excited for something in particular.
He branched off with Long Lan to head into his own room with Xiao Qi.
“Yunfei, what’s going on? You look like you’ve a big secret.”
Xiao Qi was, of course, able to sense the emotions Bai Yunfei was having all in thanks to the bond they had.
“Hehe…it’s a good one.” Bai Yunfei smiled excitedly, “I hadn’t the chance to look at it until now and its been killing me.”
“A good one?” Xiao Qi chirped, “What good one? Did you find something good in the pocket?”
“Take a look!”
Bai Yunfei nodded before fishing an object out from his robes for the bird to look at.
“Um…a rock?!” Chirped Xiao Qi. He stared at the rock incredulously, “Yunfei, you’re telling me this ‘good one’ is a rock? Are you crazy?”
“Hehe, this isn’t an ordinary rock…”
“Oh? What’s special about it?”
“It…” Bai Yunfei wavered off, “well, I’ll find out in a moment.”
“……”
Still confused, Xiao Qi gave Bai Yunfei one final look before allowing him to sit at the center table and study the ‘stone’ in his hand.
The stone was a gray-brownish one. About the size of a chicken egg and the shape of a small stamp, it could easily fit in Bai Yunfei’s hand. It was sleek and glossy on the surface without even a single marking, just like a stone eroded over the years by a running stream of water. There wasn’t even much to be noted about the stone when soulsense was used to look at it.
Bai Yunfei heaved a sigh as he studied the stone. Bai Yunfei’s eyes flashed with light as he grasped the stone, allowing for a wave of information to spread into his mind…
Equipment Grade: Mid Divine
Elemental Affinity: Space, Earth
Upgrade Requirement: 700 Soulpoints
It was just a few short lines of information, but Bai Yunfei’s eyes glistened like none other after looking at it. But after a moment, he frowned as if puzzled by something.
“It’s divine alright…it’s definitely a regalia like the Soul Sentinel Scarf!!” Bai Yunfei declared to himself. His special powers had allowed him to confirm to the stone to be what it was, but his eyes were still unable to see just what made the stone a ‘regalia’.
But the Upgrade Technique never lied. If it said this stone was a divine-tier equipment, then it was without a doubt a divine-tier equipment. He himself might not be able to understand, but that was only because he hadn’t grasped it yet.
“But this is still too strange. It only has a grade, element, and upgrade requirement. Where are the attack, defense, or even effect values?”
That was the real quandary on his mind. The only thing he knew about this was that it was a regalia. What kind of magical power or special use did it have?
“There’s most likely something else that’s stopping me from being able to see the stats…” Bai Yunfei furrowed his eyebrows. He remembered once before—the first time he had used the upgrade stone and furnace—there had been something similar. At that time, the special effects of the upgrade stone hadn’t shown itself to Bai Yunfei. It wasn’t after he managed to upgrade the Cataclysmic Seal that he was able to figure out the effects of both objects. He hadn’t even really figured out why the change in elemental affinity happened, and if it was because of the upgrade or of its elevation in tier.
He thought back to the matter with the Soul Sentinel Scarf, “The stats of the Soul Sentinel Scarf wasn’t hidden to me back then. It was just ‘sealed’, but that went away after I upgraded it. Both items are divine-tier, so is this an issue with the item itself? But this isn’t showing that it’s sealed…
“The Soul Sentinel Scarf isn’t reacting either, why is that?” He touched at the Soul Sentinel Scarf on his forehead. There was definitely a ‘resonance’ with the stone before, so why wasn’t it reacting now? It was as if one side of the connection wasn’t sending a signal at all anymore.
Bai Yunfei tried to send some soulforce into the stone. When he got no reaction, he tried to do the same with the Soul Sentinel Scarf, but there was still nothing to be felt.
“Then…I’ll have to try one last thing to see if there’s any change…”
After a series of experiments failed to net anything, Bai Yunfei decided on one last approach.
“Upgrade.”
He stared at the rock in his hand one more time. Focusing, he allowed a sliver of soulforce to escape him.
Equipment Grade: Mid Divine
Elemental Affinity: Space, Earth
Upgrade Level: +1
Soul Compatibility: 2%
Upgrade Requirement: 700 Soulpoints
Bai Yunfei paused, a hint of disappointment lied noticeably in his eyes. “Only thing that increased was the soul compatibility and nothing else…
“Will it get an additional effect if I get it to +10?”
With that thought in mind, Bai Yunfei tried to cheer himself up. “Upgrade!”
……
Time passed slowly before the stone in Bai Yunfei’s hand reached +5. Aside from the increase in soul compatibility, there still hadn’t been any change in the stats. With how Bai Yunfei already failing thrice to get the stone to +5, he was duly reminded of how hard it was to upgrade a divine-tier equipment.
“Whew…it’s even harder to upgrade than the Soul Sentinel Scarf.” Bai Yunfei grimaced. He was only at +5 with the stone and it had already taken half of his soulforce—how ridiculous.
Every upgrade took 700 soulpoints, and each failure saw to the equipment lowering in upgrade level. So in other words, it took a total of 7700 soulpoints to get the stone to where it was now; a sum even greater than what was needed for the Dual Dragon Burst.
If accounting for his equipment, Bai Yunfei had well over ten thousand points of soulforce, so this wasn’t a negligible sum of soulforce consumption. Luckily, he had Tang Xinyun’s Yun’s Soul Ring with him, and his own soulforce recovery was quite decent. So it wouldn’t take him long to regain his energy.
“Upgrade.”
Equipment Grade: Mid Divine
Elemental Affinity: Space, Earth
Upgrade Level: +6
Soul Compatibility: 15%
Upgrade Requirement: 700 Soulpoints
Once again, there was nothing new to see after a successful upgrade. Without anything to show for his troubles, Bai Yunfei sighed and continued.
But at that moment…
There was a faint voice.
A faint voice that was speaking in the room!
“Ah…how comfortable…”