"Go up."
Zhou Qing was the first to climb the retractable ladder.
Tang San followed closely behind.
Once they reached the second floor, the lighting was dim, but the area near the windowsill was bright. There was a desk with four wooden chairs.
Other than that, the entire second floor was filled with various books, most of them storybooks. A small portion was related to martial spirits, soul tools, and soul beasts.
There was also one book on cultivation: "Basic Meditation Techniques of the Spirit Hall."
However, in Zhou Qing's view, this book might be more accurately called a "Soul Master Cultivation Guide."
The reason there were so many books here was naturally because Zhou Qing had asked the villagers who went to Notting City or Luoxing City to help buy them.
After all, he had some spare money!
By the way, Luoxing City was the nearest city to Holy Soul Village in the Star Luo Empire, where the village's grain would be sold. It was a small city, similar in scale to Notting City.
Zhou Qing bought so many books because he wanted to learn more about the real Douluo Continent and think about his future cultivation.
After all, without any special advantages or the ability to become an invincible main character in a cultivation novel, he had to keep improving himself and prepare for the future.
Even if he couldn't cultivate after awakening his martial soul due to a lack of innate soul power, or if cultivation was nearly impossible, he could still become a master of martial soul theory!
Among the books was one titled "The Ten Core Theories of Martial Souls."
It was signed by: Yu Xiaogang.
At first, Zhou Qing intended to objectively assess Yu Xiaogang's theories.
However!
He couldn't ignore that, just based on the small number of martial soul books he had purchased, there were plenty of examples that proved many of the "Ten Theories" to be incorrect.
So, even though Zhou Qing had never met Yu Xiaogang in person, he had already somewhat prematurely defined him: someone who had memorized a large amount of martial soul and soul beast data but had no idea how to analyze, summarize, or draw conclusions — someone with high aspirations but low abilities!
Considering the challenges Yu Xiaogang faced in the original story, unable to break through level 30, Zhou Qing could roughly understand that Yu Xiaogang probably never intended to become a martial soul theory master at first. He was likely just trying to break through soul power levels. It wasn't until he was over thirty and realized he couldn't break through that he began thinking about proving himself in a different way.
Why thirty?
Because if a soul master cannot break through level 30 by the age of thirty, without special circumstances, it is nearly impossible to break through any further.
Though according to the original story, soul masters didn't seem to live much longer than ordinary people before reaching level 99, they could still reach the ideal human lifespan limit.
However, Zhou Qing, with his memories of his past life, clearly knew that the human lifespan limit was indeed similar, but most people couldn't reach that limit due to various internal and external factors.
And for soul masters, their cultivation not only nourished their body with soul power, but also brought great martial strength, which could help extend their lifespan by minimizing the impact of unpredictable internal and external factors—unless they were severely injured or killed.
Yu Xiaogang, unable to break through level 30 at thirty, chose to find fame in another way. By then, his thinking had already become rigid.
While ambition doesn't necessarily fade with age, theory is something that a person whose primary goal is fame can't properly handle.
As a transmigrator, Zhou Qing knew that to become famous, one must not focus solely on fame. It must be a byproduct of a bigger goal.
Yu Xiaogang, after thirty, had already shifted his primary goal from breaking through to Soul King to seeking fame. Even though he had continued his cultivation all these years, it couldn't change the fact that he had already abandoned true cultivation.
Without the drive to progress, even if he kept up the habit of cultivation, there would be no significant breakthroughs, especially since Yu Xiaogang was solely focused on fame...
Zhou Qing walked over to a chair, handed Tang San a notebook, and said, "Today we're learning new characters."
That's right.
Zhou Qing was teaching Tang San how to read.
Since the age of two, Zhou Qing had started learning characters using the elementary books brought back by the villagers from Holy Soul Village.
If it were just books, Zhou Qing wouldn't have known the Douluo Continent's writing system. But luckily, Old Jack knew over two hundred common characters.
This was normal.
After all, he was the village chief, and he had once casually mentioned to the other elders that one of the necessary qualifications for being a village chief in rural areas was knowing how to read.
After learning the pronunciation and writing of over two hundred common characters of the Douluo Continent, Zhou Qing began teaching Tang San. He even found a long-lost form of writing resembling English letters in some historical records of the Douluo Continent and processed it to create the twenty-six English letters, which helped him in teaching Tang San.
When Tang San learned that Zhou Qing had improved the ancient characters into English letters, he was amazed.
He didn't think about Zhou Qing being a transmigrator but instead thought Zhou Qing must be extremely talented, believing he had to recruit him into Tang Sect in the future.
"These are the common characters. I've already learned them all."
Tang San learned quickly. In just half a year, he had mastered all the common characters.
In fact, if not for Tang San having to care for his messy old father, he would have learned even faster.
"Alright, now go check out those storybooks." Zhou Qing pointed to the bookshelf full of local Douluo Continent fairy tales.
"I'm not a child."
Tang San was speechless.
"Children often say they're not children," Zhou Qing said, while carrying the books on martial souls, soul tools, and soul beasts to the desk. He picked up a pen and started planning for the future.
Most of the books the villagers bought were circulating books, but even so, Zhou Qing believed that, coming from another world, he could deduce patterns that the people here hadn't discovered or had overlooked in these books.
Seeing that Zhou Qing had already gotten into a productive state, Tang San didn't disturb him and instead took down a fairy tale book from the shelf titled "Pulling Up the Seedlings to Help Them Grow."
The term "Pulling Up the Seedlings" made Tang San quite nostalgic. If it weren't for the existence of martial souls in this world, he might have thought he had just reincarnated in a different era of his previous world.
The book told the story of a farmer's son who awakened a rice plant martial soul with first-level soul power. He embarked on the cultivation path, breaking through to level 10 by the age of twenty. His first soul ring came not from a plant-type soul beast but from a ten-year-old sharp-horned lizard. Using the soul skill from this soul ring, his rice plant martial soul gained sharp characteristics on its leaves, enhancing its attack power.
This farmer's son thought that absorbing a soul ring from an animal soul beast could strengthen his plant martial soul, but compared to other attack-type martial souls, after obtaining the sharp-horned lizard's soul ring, his first soul skill's attack power was negligible, not even comparable to a non-soul master's kitchen knife martial soul.
Compared to other rice plant martial soul owners, his martial soul's ability to help the rice seedlings grow better wasn't much stronger than when he first awakened the martial soul. It only slightly improved...
In the end, after turning thirty, the soul master, unable to receive more assistance from Spirit Hall, fell into poverty and eventually became a fallen soul master, consuming others' lives before being captured and exiled by Spirit Hall's soul masters.
Tang San was very curious about martial soul cultivation, but since he wouldn't awaken his own martial soul until he was six, he couldn't experience its magic firsthand. However, through these storybooks, he could get a general idea of martial soul cultivation—soul rings were needed.
Moreover, for plant martial souls, it was best to absorb soul rings from plant-type soul beasts. Otherwise, the martial soul's original advantages would be compromised for the sake of a slightly stronger attack skill, which was ultimately not worth it.
This was also Zhou Qing's intention.
Though these were mostly storybooks, with significant artistic elements, exposing Tang San to them from a young age would at least help him recognize the "gold content" of Master Yu Xiaogang's theories in the future.