After giving Gu Yuena his instructions, Huo Yuhao turned to look at Su Tong and Ye Guyi. Noticing Su Tong's slightly evasive gaze, he guessed that this girl was probably thinking about something inappropriate again. But lacking evidence, he didn't pursue it, only saying: "Su Tong, Guyi, I've already arranged accommodations for you. What are your plans now?"
Ye Guyi rose, smiling faintly. A rare curiosity appeared in her usually cool eyes: "I want to explore all the new and fascinating things of this era, while also recovering my strength."
She paused, counting on her fingers. "The Execution Department's and Dark Department's evil martial soul wielders, various new soul tools, and some descendant families of old acquaintances. There's quite a lot in this era that interests me."
Su Tong tapped her chin, her eyes narrowing.
"For me, it's similar to Guyi's. But before that, I want to find someone. Teacher, you should know where she is, right?"
Huo Yuhao looked at Su Tong's narrowed eyes and understood.
"Gu Ruiqiu is hiding in the cultivation chamber on the second floor."
His expression was flat. "She's been there since the meeting ended and hasn't come out."
Su Tong's eyes lit up, a malicious smile spreading across her face that she couldn't suppress. "Hiding in a cultivation chamber? How boring. I'll go keep her company right now,catch up on old times!"
The last few words were practically ground out through clenched teeth.
Huo Yuhao watched Su Tong rise and walk to the meeting room door, then said flatly, "Be careful not to push her too far. She's a Four-Word Battle Armor Master, a Super Douluo. In your current state, you're no match for her."
Su Tong: "..."
She froze mid-stride.
After a moment, she turned back to Ye Guyi with a composed smile: "Guyi, come with me. I'll help you seek justice."
Ye Guyi was bewildered, tilting her head in confusion.
Seek justice? What did that mean?
Su Tong paused, realizing that Ye Guyi still didn't know about those unofficial histories. She leaned close to Ye Guyi's ear, lowering her voice to whisper rapidly.
"Back then, Gu Ruiqiu wrote stories about you and Teacher..."
Su Tong vividly recounted their "exploits," conveniently pinning everything on Gu Ruiqiu, making her the scapegoat.
Ye Guyi's expression shifted from confusion to shock, then from shock to embarrassment, finally settling into a furious flush.
"How—how could she be so shameless!"
Ye Guyi shot a quick glance at Huo Yuhao, her face burning, then quickly looked away, her voice trembling slightly.
Su Tong nodded eagerly, her expression indignant: "Exactly! Guyi, you have no idea how far she went! What with the night—"
She was about to give examples when Ye Guyi clamped a hand over her mouth, gritting her teeth: "Enough. Let's go find her and settle this!"
If she let Su Tong continue, she'd be socially dead right in front of Huo Yuhao.
Su Tong rolled her eyes from being muffled and quickly nodded, signaling she'd stop.
Ye Guyi finally let out a breath and strode toward the door.
Su Tong hurried after her, her steps light as a fox ready to watch the show.
If she'd been alone, Gu Ruiqiu might have fought back. After all, they were in the same boat—if Su Tong went too far, Gu Ruiqiu would certainly argue, even resort to force. And in her current state, Su Tong was no match for her.
But now it was different. With Guyi—an unaware and innocent "victim"—present, Gu Ruiqiu would be too guilty to even think of fighting back. She could only stand there and take the scolding.
As for the fact that she herself was also one of the culprits and might be dragging trouble onto herself...
At least for now, she could hide behind Ye Guyi as the "informant." As for what happened later, that could wait.
After all, paper couldn't wrap fire—exposure was inevitable. At least Gu Ruiqiu would take the first hit!
Watching them leave, Huo Yuhao, Gu Yuena, and Snow Empress exchanged glances and smiled helplessly.
Today, the Spirit Transmission Tower would be anything but peaceful.
On the second floor, Gu Ruiqiu, trapped in the cultivation chamber, looked at the two dark figures before her and let out a despairing "cry."
"Don't come any closer!"
Ye Guyi ignored her protests, pinning her shoulders down. Su Tong didn't hesitate, raising her hand—smack, smack, smack—a few crisp sounds rang out. Gu Ruiqiu yelped in pain: "Su Tong, you traitor! You were in on it too—ow!"
Her response was a denser barrage of slaps, relentless and unforgiving.
At the same time, in Soul-Calming Douluo's home, Zhao Yao was cornered in the study by her father. The sound of a discipline ruler accompanied her cries for a long while.
"Dad! At least tell me why you're hitting me!"
"No reason needed. With your usual behavior, do I need to wait for a special occasion?"
"You can't break me like this—ow!" Her defiance shattered with the next strike of the ruler.
Today, two of the Spirit Transmission Tower's "outstanding talents" were both apprehended and ruthlessly suppressed!
But this had nothing to do with Huo Yuhao.
In fact, he welcomed it.
Leaving the meeting room, he glanced at the second floor and smiled, then bid farewell to Gu Yuena and Snow Empress before heading to his newly prepared Tower Master's office.
Having just returned to the Tower Master position, becoming an absentee leader immediately wouldn't look good. He might as well handle a few backlogged matters.
However, when he pushed open the door and turned back, he saw Gu Yuena following him in.
Huo Yuhao was briefly surprised. "Na'er, is there something else?"
"I've perfected the Light and Dark Divine Thunder recently and want to teach it to you, while also asking for your guidance on the seven-colored divine thunder. As for those matters..."
Gu Yuena closed the door behind her. With a thought, a divine consciousness projection identical to her appeared beside her. "We can let the projection handle those. Our true bodies should focus on cultivation."
Huo Yuhao: "..."
Was she now even squeezing her own divine consciousness for the sake of cultivation?
He felt that Na'er had also become obsessed with self-improvement.
Huo Yuhao shook his head with a laugh. "I was just going to handle some recent affairs—won't take much time. But since you've offered, I'll gladly accept."
He rose, watching Gu Yuena's projection take over those tasks, then came to her side. Instead of heading to the cultivation chamber, he casually created an isolated space.
With their strength, doing so was effortless—no need to worry about affecting the office's contents. They stepped into the isolated space and sat facing each other, beginning to cultivate their thunder techniques.
Gu Yuena watched Huo Yuhao quickly grasp the Light and Dark Divine Thunder, growing more proficient step by step, as she immersed herself in practicing the seven-colored divine thunder.
By the time Huo Yuhao had fully mastered the Light and Dark Divine Thunder, Gu Yuena opened her eyes at the right moment. After a moment of silence, she asked, "Yuhao, I roughly understand your concerns about keeping me away from the Dragon Valley, and about not having me absorb the Dragon God's Heart and Golden Dragon King's divine core too early—you're worried about triggering the Dragon God's divine seat. But I don't know the specific risks involved. Can you tell me? You must know the hidden details, right?"
His repeated warnings on this matter clearly stemmed from deep concern. If he didn't know the inside story, he wouldn't have looked that way.
Huo Yuhao put away the Light and Dark Divine Thunder and raised an eyebrow slightly. "What do you plan to do if you know?"
"If it's something that can be overcome in advance, I can prepare now." Gu Yuena's expression was serious. "If I truly can inherit the Dragon God's divine seat, it would ease a lot of burden for you in the future. Besides, I can't rely entirely on you to have my back—this is ultimately my problem to face."
She was one of the few who could keep up with Yuhao. She wanted to be his support as well.
Looking at her sparkling purple eyes, Huo Yuhao's gaze softened. He didn't speak, simply reaching out to gently draw her close, one hand around her waist, the other lifting her chin, and kissed her.
Gu Yuena was briefly surprised, then closed her eyes, returning the kiss gently.
His lips were warm and soft, carrying a faint sweetness. They both lost themselves in the moment.
After a long while, they parted, their breath mingling.
Huo Yuhao looked at Gu Yuena in his arms and smiled. "Today, you were full of authority—very charming."
Gu Yuena's cheeks flushed slightly as she cast him a sidelong glance. "Don't change the subject."
Even so, she leaned closer into his embrace, her silver hair brushing against his chin like a cat finally finding its nest.
Her words were sharp, but her body was honest—that lean dissolved the lingering intimacy into shared warmth.
"I wasn't trying to change the subject—I meant it."
Huo Yuhao smiled fondly, stroking her smooth hair as he spoke. "As for the dangers of inheriting the Dragon God's divine seat—I do know some, but they're not things we can handle now. Telling you would only cause unnecessary worry. But since you want to know, I'll give you a brief overview."
Seeing the determination in Gu Yuena's eyes, Huo Yuhao gave a general description of the dangers involved in the divine trials.
The main challenges in inheriting the Dragon God's divine seat were threefold.
First, the Dragon God's trial involved the Dragon God's perspective to save the Divine Dragon Realm and elevate the Divine Realm to a Divine Star. As an immersive, first-person experience of the Divine Star ceremony, the inheritor would feel the old Dragon God's pain of losing wife and children, and slaughtering the dragon race.
But this point wasn't too bad—the inheritor was ultimately an outsider and couldn't fully embody.
The real problem was that at the start of the trial, the inheritor didn't have the Dragon God's supreme God King power.
A non-supreme God King, bearing the pressure the original Dragon God had endured—carrying the weight of the entire Divine Dragon Realm's immortal energy and the faith power of its subordinate star regions—to achieve a Divine Star. Their body and divine consciousness would be subjected to endless pressure—it would be maddening.
Second, achieving Dragon God status required devouring vast amounts of energy to complete the breakthrough.
Simply becoming a God King was different from becoming the Dragon God. The various energies left by the Dragon God might be sufficient to create one or even several God Kings. But to inherit the Dragon God's divine seat, they weren't quite enough.
After all, the Dragon God's divine seat corresponded to a supreme God King—a level beyond ordinary God Kings. And the Dragon God himself had fallen. The total power left behind couldn't reach his peak state.
In the original story, when Lan Xuanyu first inherited the Dragon God's divine seat, he successively devoured the Dragon God's dragon marrow, the Dragon God's Heart, the Dragon Realm (Dragon Valley), and all other remnants except the Golden Dragon King and Silver Dragon King.
But this still wasn't enough to push him to the supreme God King level.
Since the Dragon God's remaining power couldn't push the inheritor to that level, what was the inheritor to do? Naturally, seek external sources to complete themselves.
Thus, in a semi-mad state during the trial, to complete himself, Lan Xuanyu devoured the Crimson Mother, who had already become a God King—though partly to save Bai Xiuxiu and the others, at least half the reason was to devour her energy.
Speaking of which, Long Tianyang might actually have to thank the Crimson Mother. If not for her, the Dragon Horse Twin Stars—a semi-divine realm—would likely have been doomed.
After all, Lan Xuanyu had been undergoing the trial in the Dragon Valley on Tianlong Star. Without the Crimson Mother, to fill the energy gap needed to become the Dragon God, a not-fully-rational Lan Xuanyu might have devoured the Dragon Horse Twin Stars, a semi-divine realm, to stabilize himself.
But even with the Crimson Mother—a God King-level existence—filling the gap, it still wasn't enough.
In his semi-mad state, Lan Xuanyu had set his sights on Bai Xiuxiu, the Tianlong race, and other super-divine and half-step God King experts revived by Long Tianyang—and the Dragon Horse Twin Stars ended up on his menu again.
In the end, it took the Great Divine Realm providing immortal energy, and the Golden Dragon King and Silver Dragon King's bloodlines being stripped and given to him to complete his bloodline, before his state stabilized.
Third, the attitude of the universe's laws.
In Soul Land IV, part of the reason the Divine Dragon Realm's Divine Star ascension failed, and the dragon and beast races were slaughtered, was blamed on the universe's laws, saying they influenced the Time Dragon King and others to make wrong decisions—almost using the laws as a scapegoat.
But the description of the universe's laws in the original did seem somewhat like fate.
According to the Crimson Mother herself, after she became a God King, Lan Xuanyu became the Dragon God to stop her—and that also seemed connected to the universe's laws, because the universe wouldn't allow an existence like her to become a God King, so it essentially triggered another God King to eliminate her.
Of course, according to Tang San, the punishment the universe's laws brought upon the Crimson Mother was actually the Great Divine Realm's God Kings—they just ultimately ended up dealing with the problem of Lan Xuanyu becoming the Dragon God.
Regardless of which explanation, it showed the universe's laws' dynamic balance toward "threats." It could conveniently bring an existence capable of eliminating a threat to the target needing elimination.
When the Crimson Mother and Lan Xuanyu's ascensions to God King might become disasters, the Great Divine Realm just happened to return.
If their situation were similar—if the universe's laws considered Gu Yuena becoming the Dragon God a disaster and brought the Great Divine Realm or other God Kings to deal with it, what then?
In the original, the universe's laws weren't exactly fond of the Dragon God. When Lan Xuanyu became the Dragon God, he faced the universe's rejection—just not as strongly as the Crimson Mother did.
So the universe's laws' attitude had to be considered.
After hearing Huo Yuhao's brief description, Gu Yuena immediately abandoned the idea of solving these problems on her own.
Three issues, none easy to resolve.
Becoming the Dragon God was truly difficult.
Three days passed in the blink of an eye.
During this time, as the Tower's higher-ups assembled Title-level combat power, news of the Tower Master's succession—Huo Yuhao taking over—spread within the Tower, stirring ripples.
Many were surprised and taken aback by the change of leadership.
And some who'd heard rumors were confused, puzzled, even indignant.
Why had this new Tower Master chosen "Spirit-Ice" as his title?
For the Spirit Transmission Tower, that title carried extraordinary significance.
***
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