Ever since obtaining the [Inspiration] skill, Lin Jun had never stopped exploring his own soul.
The entire soul sea was roughly divided into three layers.
The sea surface illuminated by the light of the sky—this was where Lin Jun's will resided. Everything was under control, and the Mushroom Race was also within this scope.
In the middle layer, where the light of the sky couldn't reach, lay Lin Jun's subconscious.
Lin Jun could exert influence over it, but couldn't control it in fine detail.
The Puchis controlled by the Puchi Masters all fell into this category.
As for the deeper trenches, Lin Jun himself couldn't control them either, let alone apply them to anything.
This feeling was like the brain being unable to be one hundred percent activated.
And right now, in the middle layer region of the spirit sea, a blob of slime quietly floated in this dark seawater.
After all its senses were sealed, the portion left behind by the Demon King reverted to its most primitive state: a blob.
Beside it, the mushroom cap of a mushroom man lit up, becoming the sole light source in this darkness.
Looking at the [Envy] in front of him, Lin Jun pondered the new abilities the Demon King had displayed.
The Demon King's soul itself couldn't be considered special. Lin Jun could tell that the soul sand he manipulated originated from other people, likely through methods like sacrifice.
That final soul-splitting, however, exceeded Lin Jun's expectations; after all, the Demon King didn't have the Sun Stone.
However, the fact that the Demon King left [Envy] behind naturally couldn't be because he lost the fight and voluntarily dropped loot, but because he was forced to do so.
From this, one could infer that this method of soul-splitting most likely needed to be executed based on Virtues, Deadly Sins, or unranked skills.
Then, if the Demon King initially split into six parts, did that also mean the Demon King originally had at least six special abilities?
As for [Honesty], the effect when the Demon King used it looked similar to a power word.
However, that first door of light was still crushed by him even after being strengthened. Clearly, it wasn't a case of whatever he said became true, but rather it had a certain upper limit.
Furthermore, this skill definitely had restrictions on its use.
If there were no restrictions, if it were Lin Jun, he would have definitely been yapping non-stop from the moment they met, instead of having to wait until a critical juncture to use it to reinforce the door of light and hide his tracks.
He just didn't know if this restriction meant it needed to charge up to be used, or if a price needed to be paid after using it.
But no matter what, this was a good skill that could be pulled out as a surprise move at a critical moment.
It was just that that bastard Demon King came a few hundred years earlier and occupied the spot ahead of time, otherwise, no matter how one thought about it, this [Honesty] should have been his.
Lin Jun originally planned to write down another grudge, but quickly realized that the Demon King was right in front of him, so there was no need to write it down—even if it was only an unknown fraction of him.
Look at this blob, still claiming he wasn't a slime; even his soul was in the shape of a slime.
The problem now was, how should he handle this small blob of soul?
Based on Lin Jun's rich experience of splitting his soul into countless fragments scattered across the world every day, the absolute last thing he should do was directly crush this mass of soul.
Souls possessed a self-healing attribute; this wasn't just true for Lin Jun, it was the same for everyone.
It was just that ordinary people's souls were too small, so if they suffered slightly more mental damage, they would completely shatter, naturally making healing out of the question.
Moreover, the healing of a soul wasn't about growing a new soul from scratch. Instead, those shattered soul fragments would, through some unobservable manner, find their way back to merge with the main soul. This was the conclusion Lin Jun drew from observing his own soul's regeneration.
According to Lin Jun's speculation, even if he completely pulverized someone's entire soul, that person merely lost their main body and would no longer merge within their physical flesh.
Their soul would most likely blend into the world and then condense again somewhere else.
Therefore, if Lin Jun directly annihilated this portion of the soul, since it was only a small fraction of the Demon King's soul, it would fall far short of the standard needed to annihilate the Demon King. Most likely, it would only heavily injure the Demon King, but he could slowly recover later on, and even [Envy] would still remain with him.
Thus, direct annihilation was merely the inferior plan. Perhaps it could be used at the critical moment of the decisive battle atop the Forbidden City, but he'd pass for now.
The middle plan was to continue sealing it, just like right now. Unless the Demon King had the ability to fight his way into the spirit sea to rescue this portion of the soul, he would permanently lose a portion of his strength.
As for the superior plan, it was to figure out a way to take the [Envy] on it, and then keep the remaining blob of the Demon King's soul to humiliate him ruthlessly!
Unfortunately, the idea was great, but reality was difficult.
Lin Jun could see this [Envy] now, but he couldn't eat it.
His [Greed] decomposition was based on decomposing corpses to seize things. This blob of the Demon King in front of him was a pure soul with no physical part, so naturally, it couldn't be decomposed and seized.
According to the previous transfer characteristics of the Deadly Sins, perhaps beating him to death directly could also yield it. However, if he gambled wrong, all his efforts would be in vain.
He wondered if he could figure out a way to stuff it into some physical body first and then decompose it?
Thinking about it, he felt he had to look for a method within Abyss magic.
However, the middle plan was still usable, and Lin Jun hadn't said he absolutely had to seize [Envy].
For one, that riddler Grim Reaper seemed to want him to collect the Deadly Sins, for an unknown purpose.
What if he was a piece of fat meat, the Deadly Sins and Virtues were scallions, ginger, and garlic, and the Grim Reaper was just waiting for him to gather all the seasonings to be served on the table?
Another point was that, although the [Envy] ability was quite handy, even if he got it, he might not necessarily be able to use it.
Just like [Wrath], which was still lying in his status panel in a gray state to this day.
The [Envy] on the Demon King's status panel was also gray. Lin Jun guessed that it was precisely because the Demon King couldn't use it that he actively chose to give it up; otherwise, why didn't the Demon King leave Lin Jun's [Honesty] behind?
As for how to use it? Perhaps one needed to be sufficiently prone to jealousy to activate [Envy]?
Then it would likely be extremely difficult for an upright person like him to activate it.
Therefore, Lin Jun ultimately placed the importance of seizing [Envy] from the Demon King in the second tier, deciding to research it when there were no important events going on.
Finally, regarding the soul, the Demon King had said a sentence that Lin Jun was very interested in.
His own soul—was not created by the gods?
Lin Jun couldn't be clearer about the anomaly of his own soul.
When he first experienced the soul tug-of-war with the Yellow-Covered Book, Lin Jun still thought his soul was just a bit special.
But now, after exploring more than half the continent, Lin Jun hadn't seen any existence that could compare with him on a soul level.
Other people indeed had disparities in their souls as well, but even if the largest soul was compared with the smallest soul, the gap wouldn't exceed a hundred times.
And in Lin Jun's eyes, this bit of disparity truly made no difference.
Lin Jun had considered the possibility that he was an existence modified by the gods, and that even his vague memories from before he crossed over were fabricated.
Although Lin Jun didn't care too much about whether he was a real living person before or some experimental subject, knowing more would make it easier to guess the gods' intentions. Therefore, Lin Jun naturally wouldn't let go of this opportunity to understand.
The seawater receded from around the slime, forming a hollow sphere in the sea.
The oppression from the mental energy subsequently vanished. A short while later, facial features slowly emerged on that small blob of slime.
(End of Chapter)
Comments