Earth gives birth to metal, spirit forges life

When Gu Lie began his first forging attempt and felt the recoil from the forging hammer, the earth elemental power within him began to activate.

Despite his confusion, driven by the thought that "doing this should have a good effect," Gu Lie channeled his earth-attribute soul power through his left arm, soaking the forging hammer in his left hand before smashing it onto the piece of heavy silver.

Then, something happened that made Gu Lie overjoyed, made Na'er's eyes light up, made Zhen Hua extremely shocked, and left Leng Yaozhu completely bewildered.

The piece of sunken silver appeared to have only been hit once, but then it underwent some changes, as if it were actively adjusting its internal structure.

Moreover, the earth-attribute soul skill of the ancient hunter, which was originally soaked in the forging hammer, was not transferred to the piece of sunken silver in the slightest, thus preventing any metal contamination.

"One hammer blow can achieve the effect that would normally require four or five blows, and that's not even a stacked hammer blow?!"

"Even stacking hammers doesn't have such an incredible effect."

"Could it be that this is related to his earth-attribute soul power? But my soul power is also earth-attribute, so why didn't such a wonderful thing happen to me?"

"Leng Yaozhu is worried that this kid's body can't handle it? Give me this skill, and I can create ten times the number of four-word battle armors without worrying about the backlash from the heavenly tribulation!"

Zhenhua tried to understand what Gu Lie had done, but in the end he could only come to a deceptive conclusion.

However, this also made him even less understanding of Leng Yaozhu's previous concerns.

This kid is already so outstanding, how much more do you want him to be?

What if we keep pushing this child and drive him to mental illness?

Gu Lie had no idea what Zhen Hua was thinking; he was simply happy because he had discovered a suitable and efficient forging method for him.

"I see. Earth produces metal, and the quality of my Garchomp martial spirit's earth attribute is also quite high, basically only slightly inferior to divine beasts with the ground attribute."

"Therefore, if I infuse my earth-attribute soul power into the forging hammer and hammer the metal, it will be like a mother disciplining her children, and the metal being hammered will also improve on its own."

"If the metal is unruly, then beat it repeatedly, and adjust the way you beat it, until you crush all its rebellious spirit..."

"Well, in that case, forging metal is much easier than teaching and educating people."

"However, my current spirit is only Gible form. Not to mention compared to Groudon, even compared to Garchomp, the earth-type power is not that strong."

"Furthermore, my current soul power is not abundant, so it is obviously impossible to start with spirit forging, soul forging, and heaven forging."

"Besides, if I insist on pursuing better forging results, Mom... Teacher will definitely use this as an excuse to postpone my forging studies."

"For Na'er's sake, and for my own, I can't waste any more time."

With that in mind, Gu Lie continued at his current pace, steadily taking turns striking the piece of dark silver with his two forging hammers, making his first forging attempt in a solid and methodical manner.

As the forging process progressed, the piece of silver became smaller and smaller, with fewer and fewer impurities, and even surface textures began to appear.

Not long after, a particularly melodious sound rang out, and the dark silver itself suddenly burst forth with brilliance, as if a silver earth dragon had soared into the sky.

"A thousand-fold forging possesses a spirit?! Is this the result of his first forging attempt?"

"That's true. Although I don't know how he did it, he's already able to use his martial soul as a bridge to communicate with metal, so it's not surprising that he could complete something like a thousand forgings so quickly."

Zhenhua was surprised to forget the rules of the forging world, and made the forger who had completed the first thousand forgings perform a blood sacrifice on that piece of metal.

However, with Leng Yaozhu around, if he dared to bleed Gu Lie, Leng Yaozhu could slap him away.

Moreover, the forging of the ancient hunters was not yet over.

"Still plenty of energy? Then let's continue!"

Gu Lie did not stop, but continued to swing the forging hammer to forge.

Although the silver provided by Zhenhua was not top-tier, it was not inferior metal either. The crickets, having been forged a thousand times, possessed a spirit, and this was not the limit of the metal's potential.

Continuing to educate Chen Yin using earth-attribute power, Gu Lie did not feel the threshold between thousand forging and spirit forging that seemed to be mentioned in the original work.

He originally used the power of his martial soul to educate Shen Yin, and automatically accomplished what many Soul Masters found difficult: using the martial soul as a bridge to communicate with metal.

Rather, it's more accurate to say that, apart from the first hammer blow, the Ancient Hunter has been doing this all along.

"Why isn't he stopping? Isn't he already at the first rank of the Thousand Refinements stage? Could it be that he's trying to break through to the Spirit Refinement stage? But isn't that extremely dangerous?"

Seeing that Gu Lie hadn't stopped, Leng Yaozhu started to panic.

Unlike the useless students at Shrek Academy, although she didn't personally swing the sledgehammer, she was very familiar with the theory of swinging the sledgehammer and the characteristics of each stage.

Therefore, she was well aware of just how difficult spirit forging was.

Gu Lie hadn't stopped forging even after completing the first grade of the thousand-fold forging, or even higher, which startled her.

Although the master craftsman Zhenhua had already appointed Gu Lie, who had already mastered the forging method of using martial spirit as a bridge to communicate with metal, the amount of soul power consumed by spirit forging was far greater than that of thousand forging.

However, Leng Yaozhu did not know how to interrupt Gu Lie's forging process in order to minimize the backlash he would suffer.

Therefore, she could only look to Zhenhua, hoping that this experienced master craftsman could intervene and prevent the ancient hunter from encountering the worst possible situation.

"Because his forging method is different from that of any other blacksmith before him."

"And his soul power consumption rate is also completely within an acceptable range."

"Your Majesty, you have taken on a fine disciple!"

Zhenhua naturally understood Leng Yaozhu's meaning, but he understood Gu Lie's current state better than Leng Yaozhu did.

His soul power consumption rate was not as high as that of an ordinary blacksmith, and his rhythm was very steady.

With Zhenhua's perception as a titled Douluo, he could naturally calculate that, based on Gu Lie's current rate of soul power consumption, completing the spirit forging was more than enough, but going any further would be insufficient.

Given Gu Lie's current stable mental state and rhythm, he is definitely not someone who is overly ambitious.

Therefore, Zhenhua naturally had no reason to interrupt.

He was also eager to confirm what kind of unusual phenomena would occur during the Ancient Hunter's Spirit Forging.

Gu Lie's forging continued, and as the forging progressed, he could feel a life force emerging within the piece of sunken silver, gradually taking shape.

What surprised Gu Lie was that the shape formed by those few signs of life was actually a long, thin, rhomboid fragment.

"Z-Crystal? Or a Mega Evolution Fragment?"

"But never mind that for now, let's keep forging!"

Gu Lie continued to maintain a steady pace, calmly hammering the piece of heavy silver with a forging hammer infused with his earth-attribute soul power.