Speaking of Tang San's right hand, as he circulated his soul power, a glove-like layer, closely fitting like skin, appeared on his right hand — a bluish-green color with a hint of blue:
"I don't really know what this is exactly. It feels like something that actively merged into my hand when I absorbed the soul ring."
"Try injecting more soul power," Zhou Qing suggested.
"Alright."
Tang San injected more soul power into his right hand. Immediately, the bluish-green glove began to emit tiny white specks of light, about the size of sesame seeds, scattering in all directions. Some even stuck to Zhou Qing's body.
"Huh?"
Upon seeing these white sesame-like specks, Tang San realized he seemed to be able to control them and tentatively manipulated them.
On the ground, at a visible speed, blue silver grass (Lan Yin Cao) began to sprout one stalk after another. Blue silver grass also grew rapidly on Zhou Qing's body.
"Is this blue silver grass absorbing my soul power?"
Zhou Qing could sense that his soul power was being quickly absorbed by the blue silver grass growing on his body. However, as long as his innate meridian diagram was actively circulating, the blue silver grass couldn't absorb any soul power at all — then it withered and collapsed, turning into specks of starlight before dissipating into nothingness.
These plants were merely borrowing his soul power to maintain their form.
They were by no means real blue silver grass, but energy formations—similar to Tang San's blue silver grass martial soul's clone.
This skill somewhat resembles Tang San's second soul skill in the original story: Parasitism.
Looking down, crouching, Zhou Qing touched one of the blue silver grass stalks sprouting from the ground. He felt a strange force actively entering his body, protecting his meridians.
"This is...!"
Zhou Qing told Tang San what had happened and let him sense the power inside him.
"This is the same protective force formed by my first soul skill that guards the heart meridian!" Tang San was surprised. He hadn't expected the white light specks released by his right hand to be seeds of blue silver grass, which could even carry the effect of his first soul skill.
Only, he felt the effect was slightly weaker.
His soul skill provided about a 50% enhancement effect, but the blue silver grass grown from the seeds seemed to provide only around 40% of that energy.
"Now I can confirm it—what's happening with your right hand is definitely the effect of absorbing a soul bone."
External soul bones — Zhou Qing naturally knew about these but couldn't openly say it now, since the Noding Academy library had no information on them.
"Soul bone?" Tang San was puzzled. "Is it really a soul bone? Aren't soul bones only found on the four limbs, torso, plus the skull—six pieces in total? Why is mine on the palm?"
"Nonsense. Isn't there bone in the palm?" Zhou Qing retorted.
"Uh..." Tang San was speechless but thought about it carefully. Since soul bones correspond to the human skeleton, it stands to reason there should be soul bones corresponding to the palm bones, foot bones, and so forth.
"Soul bones, these treasures, have little data in the Noding City library, but like soul rings, they inherit the abilities of soul beasts—sometimes even more fundamental abilities."
Zhou Qing began his analysis: "You know, I have a theory. While soul ring skills originate from soul beasts, their abilities usually rely on the martial soul's form for activation, which causes some adaptations in the skill's release—altered slightly to suit the soul master's martial soul appearance. In other words, the skill changes somewhat depending on the martial soul, but remains essentially the same skill."
"However, soul bones are different. They can release the soul beast's original skills completely, without adapting to the martial soul's form, because the soul bone fuses directly into the human body rather than being equipped on the martial soul."
"But your right palm bone is unique. The ability it grants is like another function of wolf-bristle grass—dispersing seeds. In theory, it should disperse wolf-bristle grass seeds, but instead, it scatters seeds that grow into blue silver grass... Do you know what that means?"
Tang San's expression changed. He guessed, "My blue silver grass martial soul has a deep connection with this soul bone. Could it be that my martial soul even influences this soul bone?"
"Exactly!"
Zhou Qing suspected that since both were plant-based, Tang San's hidden Blue Silver Emperor bloodline directly influenced this plant-type external soul bone, tightly linking it with Tang San's martial soul.
"This soul bone's emergence is also different. Other soul bones are usually dug from the corpse of a soul beast, but yours fused directly into your right palm when you absorbed the soul ring. Perhaps it has characteristics other soul bones lack... Have you noticed any other effects from this soul bone?"
Tang San shook his head. "No, other than releasing seeds, it doesn't seem to have other skills. It seems like it's gradually strengthening during my usual training."
"That's it!" Zhou Qing said excitedly. "This means this soul bone can strengthen as your soul power grows, potentially reaching a level of a hundred thousand years in the future!"
"Isn't that exaggerated?" Tang San was skeptical, but the soul bone on his right palm did seem to improve gradually with his soul power, and at least he couldn't detect any limit to its enhancement.
"This function might serve as a perfect reference for us to graft future absorbed soul rings onto existing ones."
External soul bones like these can increase their years and enhance their power as the soul master's cultivation rises because they perfectly integrate with the soul master's soul power meridian circulation. Their soul power circulation path is "grafted" onto the soul master's own soul power cycle.
Other soul bones resemble the relationship between soul rings and martial souls: they're simply placed inside the soul master's body without perfectly integrating with the soul power's circulation meridians.
This is also reflected in the original story: when Tang San underwent the Sea God's Nine Trials and the Seven Emotions Trial, soul bones were stripped to form divine armor. The last soul bone removed was the Eight Spider soul bone.
According to the original story, this external soul bone was the hardest to remove, almost completely connected to Tang San's own bones and meridians.
Human body — Soul bone / Special soul bone — Special soul bone's years can increase with the soul master's cultivation, but soul bones can't.
Martial soul — Soul ring — Soul rings cannot increase their years or strengthen power with the growth of the martial soul.
Seeing these two contrasts, Tang San pondered: "So, there should be a kind of 'special soul ring' as well? Such a soul ring could grow together with the soul master's cultivation and martial soul, actively increasing its years and enhancing its power."
No doubt about it!
Tang San's imagination was still quite rich...