"You?"
Lin Mu glanced casually at the Ice Empress, abruptly stopping dead in his tracks. His expression was completely indifferent as he said, "Whether it's sheer soul power or total years of cultivation, in what possible way can you even compare to her?"
Hearing this blunt, humiliating truth, the Ice Empress was absolutely furious, yet completely unable to refute him.
After all, it was the absolute, undeniable truth.
Moreover, this mysterious person's strength was truly terrifying; even the Snow Empress was absolutely no match for him, let alone her.
Even if she and the Snow Empress desperately joined forces, they still wouldn't be a match.
At this terrible moment, a massive wave of deep guilt washed over the Ice Empress. If Xue'er hadn't bravely tried to save her, she wouldn't currently be in such an incredibly dangerous situation.
Just then, the Snow Empress surprisingly proposed a direct condition: "I'm fully willing to become your soul spirit, strictly on the condition that you immediately release Bing'er."
Although Lin Mu had only used one single, casual move, it had already clearly demonstrated combat strength perfectly comparable to a true god.
Therefore, although the Snow Empress still possessed two even stronger, ultimate techniques, she knew she absolutely couldn't effectively deal with an enemy of this terrifying level.
Since she couldn't successfully resist, she could only try her absolute best to actively protect Bing'er's safety.
Seeing the Snow Empress selflessly sacrifice herself entirely for her, the Ice Empress tightly embraced her delicate body, her beautiful face completely resolute as she said, "Xue'er, we'll die together!"
She felt not only deep, sisterly affection for Xue'er, but also a complex, indescribable emotion.
Seeing this dramatic scene of deep sisterly devotion play out, Lin Mu shook his head helplessly and said irritably, "Exactly when did I ever say I was actively going to take your lives?"
Upon finally hearing this, both the Snow Empress and the Ice Empress were completely stunned.
In their logical view, since Lin Mu had traveled thousands of difficult miles all the way to the desolate Extreme North, he certainly wouldn't just return completely empty-handed.
Moreover, Lin Mu had been incredibly ruthless, violently knocking the powerful Snow Empress hard to the snowy ground with a single, casual move; how could he possibly just easily let them go?
Even if their soul ring configurations were already completely full, they assumed he would still violently fight for their precious soul bones.
But desperately grasping for a tiny glimmer of hope, the Ice Empress tentatively asked, "You're actually going to just let us go?"
"I literally just said, I want the Snow Empress to willingly be my soul spirit, and as for you... you will actively become the soul spirit of my personal disciple."
After a brief, detailed explanation of the process, Lin Mu noticed the lingering confusion in Xue Di and Bing Di's beautiful eyes and patiently explained, "Soul spirits are fundamentally different from traditional soul rings; they can fully preserve the original soul and complete consciousness of the soul beast."
"After we successfully complete the upcoming divine trials, you can also freely enter the God Realm, physically transform into true gods yourselves, and comfortably enjoy endless lifespan."
Hearing Lin Mu's incredibly detailed, unbelievable explanation, the Snow Empress and Ice Empress were instantly filled with absolute shock and total disbelief, heavily mixed with an uncontrollable, rising excitement.
If what this mysterious person said was actually true, then it was indeed an incredibly good choice for their future.
Although 100,000-year-old soul beasts naturally have extremely long lifespans, they critically need to undergo a terrifying, deadly Heavenly Tribulation every 100,000 years, and the sheer destructive power of the Heavenly Tribulation exponentially increases with each successive iteration.
For the Ice Empress, who had already miraculously experienced and survived six massive Heavenly Tribulations, the impending seventh Heavenly Tribulation was exactly like a terrifying Damocles' sword constantly hanging directly over her head.
Judging precisely from her current, massive cultivation level, she was still only about 10,000 short years away from facing the seventh Heavenly Tribulation.
10,000 years is an incredibly long time for mere humans, but in the long-lived Snow Empress's experienced eyes, it was practically nothing.
That's exactly why she desperately wanted to find a reliable, safe way to completely avoid the deadly seventh Heavenly Tribulation, and Lin Mu's unique Soul Spirit method could perfectly meet her urgent needs.
Not only would they absolutely no longer have to constantly worry about deadly heavenly tribulations, but they could also miraculously become true, immortal gods.
Even so, the naturally cautious Snow Empress didn't completely, blindly believe these grand words. She slowly raised her ethereal eyes to look deeply at Lin Mu and coldly asked, "Exactly why should we blindly believe you?"
"Your fragile lives are currently completely in my hands. Do you actually have a better choice?"
Lin Mu's purple eyes flickered slightly, his deep voice carrying a highly subtle but clearly palpable threat, acting exactly as if leaving them absolutely no room for any other choice.
Hearing this blunt truth, a highly bitter smile slowly appeared on the Snow Empress's stunningly beautiful face.
Things had completely come to this desperate point; they truly had absolutely no better choice but to desperately hope that Lin Mu was actually telling the truth. Given his terrifying, god-like strength, it honestly seemed highly unlikely he would actually need to resort to deceiving them.
After some brief internal struggle, the Snow Empress's clear gaze fell precisely upon the glowing mark resting on Lin Mu's forehead.
If absolutely all went as she expected, this unique mark should definitely represent a true god, and clearly someone of highly considerable status in the god realm; otherwise, Lin Mu's terrifying, overwhelming strength would be completely inexplicable.
Next, Lin Mu smoothly absorbed the Snow Empress as his eighth soul spirit, securely attaching her directly to his first soul ring slot.
Besides this incredible addition, there was also a perfectly formed right leg soul bone, well over 600,000 years old.
As a massive, 700,000-year-old ferocious beast, the Snow Empress would naturally produce a highly valuable soul bone.
Even the Ice Empress was absolutely no exception; after all, even the far weaker Dark Demon Evil God Tiger could easily produce a high-quality right leg soul bone.
The specific reason the Snow Empress tragically didn't produce a soul bone in the original Douluo Continent II timeline was largely due to the massive, permanent damage to her delicate soul core, causing her to almost completely lose her vital essence.
Now, with 10,000 safe years still remaining until the deadly seventh Heavenly Tribulation, Xue Di's pristine soul core was completely undamaged, naturally allowing her to easily produce a flawless soul bone.
"This unique form is a soul spirit?"
The Snow Empress highly carefully examined her new, translucent body. Compared to her previous, dense ice elemental body, she was now completely in a pure soul state, though her stunning physical appearance honestly hadn't changed much at all.
Seeing that Xue Di was clearly not in any danger, the Ice Empress finally breathed a massive, highly relieved sigh of relief.
It had all originally started because of her. She absolutely didn't want to see absolutely anything terrible happen to the Snow Empress.
Fortunately, Lin Mu absolutely hadn't lied to them; at least for now, willingly becoming a soul spirit was indeed highly beneficial to their survival.
Immediately afterward, the Ice Empress smoothly became Lin Mu's ninth soul spirit.
Meanwhile, Tang San successfully absorbed the massive energy of the Ice Devil Titan, his already immense cultivation officially breaking through to exactly Level 99, successfully, completely finishing the Sea God's eighth trial.
Under Lin Mu's highly specific instructions, the valuable soul bone that the Ice Empress intentionally dropped was specifically from her left leg, exactly the specific part Ye Lingling still desperately lacked.
After carefully absorbing the Ice Empress's powerful, over 300,000-year-old soul bone, Ye Lingling's soul power successfully broke through to Level 97.
She now only needed to successfully fuse with one single, final soul bone to completely finish the Goddess of Life's sixth trial.
Immediately afterwards, Ye Lingling carefully absorbed the Snow Empress's incredibly powerful right leg soul bone, her rapidly growing soul power directly breaking through to exactly Level 98.
[The God of Destruction's highly challenging sixth trial completely finished. Reward: 10% massive increase in overall affinity with the God of Destruction, bringing the total affinity to 60%.]
Hearing this highly expected system notification, Lin Mu honestly felt very little emotion.
His first six difficult tests were absolutely all entirely about actively helping Ye Lingling quickly pass her own divine assessments.
With his help, Ye Lingling successfully completed the highly difficult assessments extremely smoothly.
[God of Destruction's Seventh Trial: Actively obtain the absolute recognition of the Ultra Divine Artifact, the Destruction Scepter. Strict time limit: exactly one year.]
"The Destruction Scepter?"
Before Lin Mu could fully react to the prompt, a massive, terrifying purplish-black lightning bolt violently ripped right through the freezing sky, immediately followed by a massive scepter planted directly, deeply into the ice right in front of him.
Perfectly shaped like a violently condensed lightning bolt, its entire, metallic body was a deep, menacing purplish-black, yet it constantly radiated a highly dazzling, blinding purple light.
The sheer, overwhelming destructive aura it constantly released far, far surpassed even that of the Super Divine Artifact, Sea God Trident.
"Is it absolutely really necessary to be so incredibly direct? Casually giving away a priceless ultra divine artifact exactly like that?"
Looking carefully at the Destruction Scepter standing right before him, Lin Mu was genuinely shocked.
He absolutely hadn't expected the notoriously grumpy God of Destruction to be so incredibly generous, directly offering him an ultra divine artifact.
Compared to the other two stingy God Kings, this was incredible and unbelievably generous.
"This massive weapon is actually Master's divine artifact? It feels so incredibly powerful!" Tang San said, his face completely full of deep, genuine reverence.
Although this specific artifact was definitely much stronger than the Sea God Trident, compared to his master's overwhelming, terrifying strength, it was honestly only barely worthy of him.
Just as Lin Mu confidently reached out and firmly grasped the Destruction Scepter, he was violently forced back several heavy steps by the sheer, overwhelming destructive power violently emanating from it.
After finally, awkwardly regaining his footing, Lin Mu decisively summoned his most powerful Thunder Atlas Armor, and securely placed it right at his waist.
"Thunder Atlas Armor, perfectly representing the absolute power of true justice in the world!"
"Combine!"