บท 43: Changes To The Spirit Eyes

Song Weihan silently sat in an office on the 84th floor of the Spirit Pagoda, reviewing and contemplating reports from his subordinates with a solemn expression. It has been 18 hours since Sheng Feilong has lost consciousness and he has yet to awaken again.

After the sudden rebound of the unknown spirit signature, that is still thought to be the remnant spirit of the Artificial Soul Bone, Sheng Feilong's spirit was broken and the backslash caused him to throw up a large amount of blood. The prior Spirit Power fluctuations had completely ceased while his brain activity had fallen to low levels; a clear sign of Sheng Feilong losing consciousness.

Sheng Feilong sat inside the chamber, his body slowly regenerating from his injuries while the energy still ravaged his body. No one dared to enter the chamber as he needed the high energy saturation inside the room to recuperate. Yelu Hanbing, the team leader of the researchers, is of the impression, that the unknown spirit signature had invaded Sheng Feilong's spiritual consciousness and that both of them were still desperately fighting for control. Any foreign intervention would most probably do more harm than good, possibly even leading to Sheng Feilong's immediate death.

Letting out a long sigh, Song Weihan put down the documents in his hand and laid back in his chair. None of the reports or theories Yelu Hanbing or he came up with were reliable and while Sheng Feilong's situation looked stable from the outside, he still showed no signs of waking up, causing Song Weihan to be constantly tense. He could only continue to search for a method to help Sheng Feilong while hoping that the latter can hold out until then.

Sheng Lingtian still stood inside the control room, staring at Sheng Feilong through the window. Sheng Feilong's skin colour had returned to normal, while his breathing was balanced and he had a peaceful expression. If it wasn't for Sheng Lingtian knowing that his son's body was still constantly ravaged by the energy of the Artificial Soul Bone and regenerating at the same speed with the help of the dense Soul Power and medicinal gas inside the chamber, he'd think that Sheng Feilong was just peacefully cultivating.

A few minutes later, Sheng Lingtian suddenly heard one of the researchers yelp in surprise. Turning around, he saw an disbelieving and excited expression of the researchers face. Sheng Lingtian furrowed his brows and looked at the latter.

"What's wrong? Why are so surprised? Did something happen?!"

The researcher seemed to snap out of his daze and looked at Sheng Lingtian with a serious expression.

"The Artificial Soul Bone's energy is slowly subsiding. It's stopping to ravage through Sheng Feilong's body. This means he... he might be winning the fight against the Soul Bone's remnant spirit." Sheng Lingtian's eyes widened and he snapped his head around, staring at Sheng Feilong again. The researcher stood up and walked towards the rooms exit.

"I will immediately inform Faculty Head Song about this matter."

---

Sheng Feilong absolutely shocked about what he heard just now. The humongous Golden Lion that had transformed into a human man and walked over to the edge of the cliff introduced himself as Sheng Wuyong?! The only Sheng Wuyong that Sheng Feilong knew about was the ancestor of his Sheng Clan, the strongest expert in their Clan's history and the only one who had reached the level of a Rank 96 Hyper Douluo! Could this man before him be the same Sheng Wuyong?!

'No, this is impossible! Our Old Ancestor is a Soul Beast? Then, doesn't that mean that all members of the Sheng Clan are part-Soul Beasts as well...? Soul Beasts that reach 100.000 years of age are able to transform into humans. But, the Old Ancestor's Spirit Essence was the Sun Swallowing Mountain Lion, not a Three-Eyed Golden Lion with three legs... And what was that other Three-Eyed Golden Lion in the forest? Why am I seeing all this?!' Sheng Feilong was distressed and his head was spinning. But before he could think about it any longer, he saw the man, Sheng Wuyong, jump down the cliff in front of him. Sheng Feilong unconsciously reached out with his hand, but failed to touch the man and the scenery in front of him vanished.

He now stood in an empty, vast expense of white, formless space. Sheng Feilong looked around, trying to find anything near him, but suddenly stopped due to shock after turning around. Behind him were 3 entities. Sheng Feilong saw a hollow human figure with two glowing, blue orbs where the eyes were supposed to be, a sleeping, 2 foot tall brownish toad and a translucent lion's skull coated in a golden aura. A strange strand of this golden aura was continuously flowing inside the hollow human figure's eyes, slowly causing them to take on a golden colour instead of the prior blue.

Sheng Feilong looked at the things in front of him with a frown. He recognised this white space as his spiritual consciousness; he's been here a few times to talk to the Ancient Hypnotic Toad after all, but he had never seen the lion's skull before.

"The skull... must be the Soul Bone. But why is that golden aura flowing inside the manifestation of my Spirit Eyes..? The colour is changing... could my Spirit Eyes be evolving..?"

Without noticing it, Sheng Feilong had focused on the change to the manifestation of his Spirit Soul. He sat down in meditation inside his spiritual consciousness and tried to perceive the changes to his own body and more importantly his Spirit Eyes.

When he tried focusing on his Spirit Eyes, Sheng Feilong noticed that he was unable to do so. Moreover, he was unable to exit his spiritual consciousness, no matter how hard he tried. Normally, he'd just have to think about leaving and he would instanly awaken from his meditation, but not this time. He opened his eyes again and looked at the manifestation of his Spirit Eyes and the lion's skull with a frown.

By now, the Spirit Eyes had already taken on a light golden hue and were still continuously absorbing the golden aura of the skull. With no other choice left, Sheng Feilong decided to wait for this transformation to finish and see what would happen.

---

Song Weihan heard the report from his subordinate and immediately returned to the control room to personally take a look. Only about a minute had passed, but by now, the energy ravaging through Sheng Feilong's body had completely disappeared. His body was slowly regenerating, but he was still unconscious. Song Weihan examined Sheng Feilong's status while remaining in the room.

A few minutes later, another researcher yelped in shock and Song Weihan's eyes widened after taking a look at the screen; Spirit Power fluctuations started to appear again. After nearly 19 hours, Sheng Feilong was slowly waking up! Song Weihan immediately turned to the window and looked at Sheng Feilong.

After what felt like days, Sheng Feilong was finally able to exit his spiritual consciousness. He eyelashes fluttered before he slowly opened his eyes. He didn't know how long he spent inside his spiritual consciousness, but his whole body was sore and aching. He looked around and saw Song Weihan and his father standing by the window, both of them looking incredibly excited but also shocked. Sheng Feilong smiled and stood up to go over to them; or he tried. Just after putting some strength in his legs, Sheng Feilong felt a searing pain all over his body and fell back to his prior position. Seeing this, Song Weihan immediately grabbed the microphone by his side and spoke into it.

"Feilong, don't move too much; remain seated! Your body is still injured from before. Focus on healing for now, no need to worry about anything else!"

Sheng Feilong nodded and closed his eyes again. Meditating to recuperate while absorbing the still dense Soul Power in the room, his injuries quickly healed in about an hour. The researchers where constantly observing his status with utmost focus, but everything was completely within the norm and nothing happened. After healing up, Sheng Feilong walked into the control room with a smile and was instantly greeted by Sheng Lingtian giving him a bear hug, startling Sheng Feilong as his father nearly never lost his composure like this.

Being startled for a second, Sheng Feilong then returned the hug with a smile.

"What's wrong father, calm down. We've seen each other just a few hours ago, haven't we?" Sheng Lingtian didn't answer and continued to silently hug his son, while Song Weihan looked at Sheng Feilong with a calm expression and slowly spoke to the latter.

"You've been absorbing the Artificial Soul Bone for about 4 hours before losing consciousness. Afterwards, you've been unconscious for about 19 hours, where we were unable to assert what happened to you. Adding in the recuperation just now, we've last seen you awake 24 hours ago. You were absorbing the Soul Bone for a whole day, Feilong."

Sheng Feilong flinched and looked at Song Weihan in disbelief, but said nothing. After a while, Sheng Lingtian let go of him, and they walked into Song Weihan's office on the 84th floor to talk about what happened in private. Coincidentally, Sheng Feilong saw his own reflection on some glass and stopped in his steps with a shocked expression while unconsciously speaking up in a loud voice.

"Huh? Wh-why have my eyes turned golden?!"