The iron ball was pitch black; even under the illumination of sunlight, it gave off no sheen whatsoever. Yet a bone-chilling aura quietly radiated from within the iron ball.
There were sixteen more identical iron balls in the room behind him. If any of the other Shrek Seven Devils knew that over these two full months, the vast majority of his effort had gone into producing only these eighteen iron balls, he wondered what they would think.
Tang San picked up one of the iron balls and muttered to himself, "The only thing missing now is poison. I really want to craft another Buddha's Fury Tang Lotus, and the unfinished Rainstorm Pear Needles as well. Unfortunately, in this world, the limitations on materials are simply too great."
With a slight flick of his wrist, two iron balls shot through the air, one to the left and one to the right, equally silent. They traced two strange arcs through the sky before flying back into Tang San's grasp, spinning ceaselessly in his palm. Yet from beginning to end, they never collided.
After completing his customary cultivation of the Purple Extreme Demon Eye, Tang San walked back into the forge. The metals in the room had all vanished, including the ones he had later purchased from the blacksmith shop.
His right hand swept across the surface of the table, and all eighteen iron balls — including the two in his hand — disappeared into the Twenty-Four Bridges Moonlit Night.
His gaze fell on the corner of the room, where the only reasonably clean chair sat with a set of fresh clothes and trousers laid out neatly upon them. Xiao Wu had brought them yesterday. Looking at them, a hint of irrepressible tenderness surfaced in Tang San's eyes.
What Tang San admired most about Xiao Wu was that she always knew what to do and when. Normally, she was cheerful and lively, but whenever he needed quiet, she would not disturb him in the slightest. She would simply do the seemingly insignificant things for him in silence — the kind of things you could never forget.
It was still early. According to the usual routine, no one at Shrek Academy would be awake at this hour.
Tang San fetched clean water and took a cold bath, washing himself thoroughly from top to bottom. Only after he had changed into the clean clothes Xiao Wu had brought the day before did he feel a wave of refreshing coolness wash over his entire body.
With everything tidied up and that pleasant sensation spreading through him, Tang San raised his right hand before him. A faint blue light welled from his palm, and a stalk of Blue Silver Grass silently sprouted, swaying gracefully in the center of his hand.
"It seems I've improved again." A smile of quiet delight appeared on Tang San's face.
For Tang San, the forty-nine days of forging had tested his physical endurance and mental fortitude just as harshly as the two phases of training the Great Master had previously led them through.
Every day was spent forging without rest and thinking ceaselessly. The strain on his body was no lighter than running under a heavy load. If his body hadn't possessed sufficient resilience and stamina, supported by his internal energy, he would have long since collapsed.
But it was precisely this daily tempering of his body that had tightened every muscle more than before. The most obvious change was in his arms — they had thickened by a full circumference, without a trace of excess flesh. The muscles were sharply defined, his shoulders had grown broader, and every casual movement revealed the rhythmic contraction and relaxation of the muscles along his arms.
Yet Tang San's hands remained as slender as ever, without a single callus on his palms. What had improved was not just his physical strength and Soul Power, but his Mysterious Jade Hand as well.
By Tang San's own estimation, these forty-nine days of near-obsessive forging had pushed his Soul Power up another level, all the way to rank thirty-three. Of course, this wasn't solely the result of these two months of effort — it was also closely related to the two months of training that had come before.
In less than four months, his Soul Power had advanced another full rank. Such speed could only be described as terrifying. Even though he had already broken through the bottleneck of rank thirty, the amount of accumulated energy needed for each subsequent rank would require an ordinary person to cultivate for at least half a year. Those with lesser talent might need a full year to make any progress at all.
When Tang San walked into the dining hall, he was surprised to find that everyone was already there, eating breakfast. In truth, they had not started waking up this early only today — it was just that Tang San had been so consumed by his forging these past days that he had simply never noticed.
"Our Iron Man has arrived. Well now, how come the Iron Man is so clean today?" The speaker was Dai Mubai, who looked at Tang San with a smile.
Dai Mubai had always been quite proud, and he had every reason to be. Yet in front of Tang San, he could never quite bring himself to be arrogant.
Although Tang San's Soul Power still lagged far behind his own, Dai Mubai knew that if it truly came to a fight to the death, there was almost no question — he would not be able to defeat Tang San. Among the entire Shrek Seven Devils, Tang San had undeniably become the most important member. But Dai Mubai also knew that Tang San's achievements were not simply a matter of talent. During these forty-nine days, no one knew what Tang San had been doing, but every single person had been able to hear the almost unceasing sound of hammering. What kind of willpower did that require?
Spurred on by Tang San's example, not only Dai Mubai but even the laziest among them, Oscar, had been diligently cultivating their Soul Power over these past days.
The Great Master had introduced a sleepless cultivation method for them, having everyone use Soul Power cultivation in place of sleep. Apart from some essential Soul Skill training and physical activity each day, all remaining time was devoted to cultivating Soul Power. The process was tedious, but it undoubtedly brought great benefits to their strength.
During this period, Xiao Wu's Soul Power had risen to rank thirty-two, and the others had all seen considerable increases in their own levels as well.
Now, the Soul Power ranks of the Shrek Seven Devils were as follows: