Chapter 974: An Alternative Function of the Golden Dragon Spear

Tang Wulin didn't think that Xu Weitao would be so easy-going. Weren't all soldiers supposed to be quite strict and dogmatic? Xu Weitao's appearance epitomized that of the ideal soldier. He was extremely tall and broad, towering above even Tang Wulin, and he had a set of wide shoulders, as well as a set of hard facial features that looked as if they'd been chiseled out of stone. No matter how one looked at him, he didn't seem to be an easy-going man. His Blood Division consisted entirely of melee combat soldiers, and one only had to look at Jiang Wuyue's first battalion to get an indication of just how powerful this division was.

"I'm not sure that's appropriate, Superior," Tang Wulin said in a hesitant voice.

Xu Weitao chuckled, "There's nothing inappropriate about it. All of the people from the Blood God Battalion call me Old Man Xu; you can go and ask them if you don't believe me. Oh, actually, that's not true; only Blood Seven, Blood Eight, and Blood Nine call me Old Man Xu; everyone else calls me Little Xu."

Tang Wulin was rendered completely speechless. He was only a fringe member of the Blood God Battalion; how could he be compared with the actual Blood Gods?

Long Yuxue interjected, "Don't get hung up on the little details, Wulin; you can call him Uncle Xu just like I do. Open the door so we can go in."

She didn't have the key to the workshop, so she could only wait for Tang Wulin to open the door for them.

Tang Wulin hurriedly invited the two of them into the room.

Xu Weitao looked around at the forging room with a smile, and said, "I heard from Yuxue that you're a Saint Blacksmith; your skills would undoubtedly be extremely valuable to the entire legion. The vice-legion commander prohibited you from using your forging accolades for promotions in order to avoid envious reactions from everyone else in the legion, and I hope you can understand that. If you have any requirements or requests, feel free to tell me, and we'll do our best to satisfy you."

The higher-ups of the legion were feeling rather apologetic about their decision to prohibit Tang Wulin from earning promotions using his forging accolades. Furthermore, he was the only Saint Blacksmith in the entire legion, so even the highest-ranking officials in the legion would most likely require his services at one point or another.

Tang Wulin shook his head, and said, "It's alright, Uncle Xu, I understand why this rule was introduced. All of the other soldiers in the legion are earning accolades by putting their lives on the line during battles, so it's only right that they deserve promotions. In contrast, my forging is completely insignificant."

Despite what he was saying, there was a clear undertone of displeasure in his words.

He had honed his forging skills through countless hours of toil and hardships! He'd been forging ever since he was six years old, so he'd been a blacksmith for 15 years. Furthermore, he was also the youngest Saint Blacksmith on the entire continent.

Xu Weitao smiled, and said, "I know that this is a bitter pill to swallow, but you've already joined the Blood God Battalion, so you'll definitely be shooting up the ranks in no time. The legion will also supply you more resources, and you can state some requests for us as well as long as they're within reason."

A faint smile appeared on Tang Wulin's face, and he said, "Alright, then I'll go right ahead; I would like a larger workshop, preferably connected to a warehouse that's large enough to house mechas. That'll be very beneficial to my work, and that's the only request that I have."

Xu Weitao faltered slightly upon hearing this. He had visited Tang Wulin today not just to have his battle armor repaired, but also to extend an olive branch. After all, he had to offer Tang Wulin some reconciliation after the new rule that was introduced specifically to target him. The decision not to allow Tang Wulin to use his forging accolades for promotions was quite a controversial one among the higher-ups of the legion. 

Tang Wulin came from Shrek Academy and was one of the current Shrek’s Seven Monsters, so the Blood God Legion didn't have to be concerned that he would bring any trouble to the legion. On top of that, earning accolades through forging was a legitimate source of income.

However, it was still decided in the end that the original decision wouldn't be revoked. Even so, they still had to do their best to appease this Saint Blacksmith.

In a sense, the Blood God Battalion was almost a separate entity from the Blood God Legion, and the fact that Blood One had made Tang Wulin a fringe member of the Blood God Battalion after only such a short time suggested that he was perhaps displeased with the legion's treatment of Tang Wulin.

This was a man who was most likely going to stand at the pinnacle of the entire legion someday, so Xu Weitao had visited him with the intention of exercising a policy of appeasement. He was willing to accept any demands from Tang Wulin as long as they weren't too unreasonable, but who would've thought that Tang Wulin would only state such a basic requirement?

Tang Wulin was indeed quite a cheapskate, but he was also very smart. He was naturally aware that he could take advantage of this opportunity to essentially extort the legion for a lot of resources. However, he didn't know just how much the legion would be willing to give him, and any resources that were given to him certainly wouldn't be provided with no strings attached. If he were to take too much from the legion, then he would owe them a favor, and he wouldn't be able to turn down the future forging jobs that the legion asked him to complete.

He wanted to dedicate more of his time to cultivation, and he also had to participate in the upcoming competition. Furthermore, he would definitely have to leave the Blood God Legion someday, so it would be best if he didn't owe the legion any favors.

As such, Tang Wulin's thought process was very clear, and he only stated a very basic request.

"That's simple; there's a perfect place right behind our legion's mecha warehouse, and I can get that arranged for you. During the abyssal tide a few days ago, there's one part of my battle armor that was damaged quite severely, and it may need to be reforged. Can you take a look at it for me?"

Light flashed from Xu Weitao's right shoulder as he spoke, and he grabbed onto his shoulder with his left hand before a dark silver pauldron appeared in his grasp.

Tang Wulin had already noticed that his right shoulder seemed to be rather stiff, which indicated that he had most likely been injured during the abyssal tide.

Tang Wulin accepted the pauldron before taking a look at it, and he couldn't help but draw a sharp breath in response to what he was seeing. Generally speaking, suits of three-word battle armor were constructed from soul refined metals, and there was a massive qualitative improvement from two-word battle armor to three-word battle armor. With so few Saint Blacksmiths on the continent, the number of three-word battle armor masters was also less than 10% that of two-word battle armor masters.

Soul refined metals already possessed life force and intelligence, so they possessed extremely potent self-regenerative abilities. As such, normal damage could easily be self-repaired by soul refined metals, but the damage sustained by this pauldron was far from normal.

There was only one gash that had been inflicted onto the pauldron, but that gash was straight down the middle. What was even more terrifying was that there were wisps of energy that were constantly eroding the area around the gash, thereby preventing the pauldron from repairing itself.

These wisps of energy were like countless tiny greyish-white worms, and they presented an extremely harrowing sight to behold.

Just what kind of power could've resulted in this kind of damage? The abyssal plane really was filled with powerful beings.

Tang Wulin was quite astonished by what he saw, but at the same time, he was pondering a viable course of action to repair this pauldron. The pauldron was clearly unable to repair itself, and if recovery couldn't be facilitated even following injections of soul power, then the piece of armor could simply be beyond repair.

He was a blacksmith, not a battle armor maker, so if he wanted to repair this piece of battle armor rather than re-forge it from scratch, then there was only one way; he had to somehow make the pauldron's self-repair ability more potent than that strange energy's destructive ability. Only then would the piece of battle armor be able to recover.

After pondering the issue for a moment, Tang Wulin's eyes suddenly lit up as an idea occurred to him.

He carried the pauldron over to his forging bench before placing it down, but he didn't bring out his forging hammers. Instead, he brushed a hand over his glabella to release his Golden Dragon Spear.

Xu Weitao's eyes immediately lit up at the sight of the Golden Dragon Spear. "That's a fine weapon!"

He had seen Tang Wulin's Golden Dragon Spear in pieces of video footage in the past, but the spear seemed to have become different since then. The innate aura of sharpness emanating from the spear was quite fearsome to behold.

Tang Wulin gave him a smile before gently tapping the tip of the spear against the pauldron.

A peculiar turn of events then unfolded. Golden light flashed from the Golden Dragon Spear, and the wisps of energy on the pauldron immediately shuddered before flowing into the spear.

Tang Wulin also shuddered slightly as a burst of rich energy was injected into his body through the Golden Dragon Spear. The influx of energy had completely reinvigorated him and his dragon core abruptly lit up.

There didn't seem to be much energy eroding the pauldron, but it was extremely rich and dense. Tang Wulin felt as if he'd just absorbed around the same amount of energy that he'd receive from killing a Ba'an, and a pleased smile appeared on his face.