Dou Luo: This Tang San is Different

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"Why are you looking at me like that?" 

Tang San, though experienced in countless perilous situations, couldn't help but feel a little uneasy when Gu Yuena stared at him as if she wanted to devour him whole.

"It's nothing, really. I just have something to tell you," Gu Yuena quickly retracted her gaze, composed herself, and spoke with a steady tone. "I plan to return to the Star Dou Forest. As the ruler of the soul beasts, I might not care much about them personally, but since they revere me as their 'master' and offer their faith, it's my responsibility to take care of them."

Tang San nodded. "That's only natural."

Over the past eight years, Tang San had successfully deciphered the process of creating artificial soul rings and had shared his findings with the researchers of Spirit Hall to facilitate the future acquisition of soul rings for human soul masters.

Although these researchers had thoroughly understood the principles behind artificial soul rings during this time, achieving industrialized mass production remained elusive. Currently, only Soul Douluo-level or higher soul masters could process them by channeling both soul power and spiritual energy. Moreover, due to the lack of proficiency and precision, the age of the artificial soul rings was fixed at the moment of creation. Unlike natural soul rings, they couldn't draw on the energy of heaven and earth or resonate with the soul master's will to increase their age after absorption. Furthermore, the skills they granted couldn't perfectly align with the soul master's martial spirit.

However, during an accidental experiment, these Spirit Hall researchers inadvertently infused the bloodline aura of a soul beast into an artificial soul ring. This resulted in artificial soul rings that were indistinguishable from those dropped by real soul beasts.

This breakthrough implied that, in the future, acquiring a desired soul ring might no longer require hunting soul beasts. Instead, obtaining their hair, blood, or other materials to extract the corresponding bloodline factors could suffice.

Based on current research, it had been discovered that every life form on the continent possesses a unique bloodline factor. Whether extracted from blood, hair, or scales, these factors carry the essence of the life form. However, hair and scales provide incomplete bloodline information, so it is best to use blood or skin for extraction.

Some researchers in Spirit Hall had even begun speculating whether it might be possible to use these bloodline factors to replicate an entire life form. 

Tang San, however, had put a stop to this project. 

It was wise, he thought, to maintain a sense of reverence for life. 

The fourth soul skill of the Blue Silver Emperor, Nine Deaths Rebirth, could theoretically replicate a complete life form using a fragment of its bloodline information. Tang San had used this ability to resurrect Xiao Wu's mother and to experiment on a heinous, irredeemable criminal. Beyond those instances, he refrained from using this power.

Upon learning that others could now produce artificial soul rings through specific methods, Gu Yuena realized that in the distant future, soul masters might stop hunting soul beasts entirely. Instead, they would shift to collecting hair, scales, or blood to create the desired soul rings. Consequently, the struggle between soul beasts, soul masters, and ordinary humans would gradually evolve from one of "cultivation" to one of "survival."

Tragically, soul beasts were not a cohesive race in the truest sense. Their differing life forms made cooperation among them fleeting and often dictated by submission to greater power.

Therefore, after abandoning the idea of giving up entirely, Gu Yuena came to believe that the definition of "human" could be broader. As long as one possesses human-like intelligence, they can be considered human. 

Over the years, Gu Yuena also noticed something: humanity's inclusiveness is, in fact, quite strong. As long as a being has a humanoid form, humans generally don't mind whether they are purely human. 

Of course, humans are also narrow-minded. Anything perceived as a threat—even their own kind or those with blood ties—can be rejected or even eliminated. 

What a complex and contradictory species! 

This was Gu Yuena's view of humanity. Yet, she also recognized that it was precisely this complexity and contradiction that made the human world so colorful and vibrant. 

When it comes to the continuation of bloodlines, humans are inferior to creatures like mosquitoes and flies. Perhaps one day, if humanity were to go extinct, these instinct-driven beings, controlled solely by their bloodline factors, would continue to thrive. 

Living a life that revolves solely around eating, sleeping, mating, and reproducing—existing only to pass on one's bloodline factors—what meaning does that hold? 

The emergence of intelligence, however, grants life the right to think. 

Once soul beasts attain intelligence, they should no longer focus merely on eating, drinking, sleeping, mating, or reproducing. Instead, they should use their hard-earned wisdom to grow stronger, advance their species, or ponder the meaning of intelligence itself. Otherwise, achieving a cultivation level of 100,000 years and gaining intelligence comparable to that of humans, only to continue doing what requires no intelligence to begin with, would be utterly meaningless. 

On the contrary, without intelligence, soul beasts might live more carefree lives. Unable to see the future, they would naturally not sense the despair it might hold. 

As for the extinction of soul beasts… Gu Yuena felt that even without Tang San, human soul masters would eventually realize the importance of soul beasts. In the distant future, even if humanity couldn't create artificial soul rings, they might establish something akin to "soul beast sanctuaries." 

After all, the current Soul Hunting Forests under human management on the Douluo Continent function like natural reserves. Entry for hunting is only allowed with Spirit Hall-issued permits, and even then, indiscriminate killing is strictly prohibited. 

Admittedly, enforcement of these rules was poor before the invention of the Sub-Soul Guidance Imaging Spheres. Due to insufficient monitoring, some soul masters killed large numbers of low-level soul beasts merely to use them as examples during training sessions. 

However, in recent years, such behavior has significantly declined. Spirit Hall has installed numerous soul-guided surveillance devices disguised within the forests. If a soul master is caught engaging in unnecessary slaughter, enforcement teams are dispatched to arrest and fine them. 

With more soul masters joining Spirit Hall, its workforce has grown considerably. In fact, some Soul Hunting Forests within the Tian Dou Empire now have soul beast patrol teams regularly conducting inspections. 

Gu Yuena planned to engage in ideological discussions with the ferocious soul beasts after returning to the Star Dou Forest. If the survival competition could not be avoided, then perhaps the intelligent soul beasts could abandon their identity as soul beasts and become a branch of "humanity." After all, 100,000-year-old soul beasts could transform into humans, and ferocious beasts could switch between human and beast forms at will. 

This transformation was not dictated by the Divine Realm, nor by the Dragon God, but was instead a manifestation of the rules of the vast cosmos itself. 

However, while subduing the ferocious soul beasts would be easy, convincing them would be exceedingly difficult. Their thought patterns, shaped over tens of thousands of years, would be nearly impossible to change unless they underwent a complete transformation and genuinely integrated into the human community. 

After all, humanity is by no means a narrow-minded race! 

(End of Chapter)