C14:-DD2_Diary_System (Patreon)

14. The 100th Day Rewards.

│3rd Person POV │

[Douluo Continent, Heavenly Soul Empire, Nine Treasure Glazed Tile Sect…]

“So… were you serious?” Ning Tian asked.

Ye Chen glanced her way briefly before turning his attention back to the chessboard. “Serious about what, exactly?”

“That you want to become a Soul Engineer in addition to being a Soul Master,” Ning Tian clarified, tilting her head with genuine curiosity.

Ye Chen let out a soft chuckle, moving one of his pieces. “If I weren’t serious, I wouldn’t have asked Sect Master Ning to find a qualified Soul Engineer from the Sun Moon Empire to teach me, now would I?”

Across from him, Wu Feng sat with a deep frown. She was growing increasingly frustrated. Ye Chen, while holding a conversation with Ning Tian, was still managing to beat her.

“But, isn’t it risky to focus on trying to master both disciplines like this?”

Ye Chen waved his hand dismissively and replied, “Don’t worry about it. I know what I am doing.”

Ning Tian tried to get Ye Chen to elaborate; however, it was a futile effort.

It was not like Ye Chen didn’t want to answer. It was just that Ye Chen himself couldn’t come up with a reasonable explanation. After all, he couldn’t exactly say that his confidence to excel in both fields was due to his Diary System, right?

Just by writing in the Diary daily, he could get various rewards. The lowest reward he gained daily increased his Soul Power by a very small amount without doing any training, not to mention the cultivation technique he created, Heavenly God Technique, which had various benefits that basically made his Soul Power cultivation effortless.

Even if he cultivated only half as long as other Full Innate Soul Power geniuses, he absolutely wouldn’t fall behind.

Additionally, he had been making full use of his 64x Gale Force Reading Glasses in the last three months to devour knowledge stored in the sect’s library over thousands of years, including knowledge about Soul Tools and Soul Engineering. Even while being just a Rank 16 Soul Master, his theoretical knowledge was on par with a Rank 3 Soul Engineer.

He was just lacking the practical experience to craft Soul Tools.

If he wanted, he could’ve tried to start creating Soul Tools on his own. However, creating Soul Tools was a delicate art, not an easy craft to learn just by reading a lot of theoretical knowledge. At the very least, the basics need to be taught to beginners by an experienced Soul Engineer.

Knowing this, Ye Chen reasoned that if he had to learn Soul Tool crafting from someone eventually, it would be far better for his teacher to come from the Sun Moon Empire. After all, the Soul Engineers of the three original Douluo Continent empires were far behind in standards and technology compared to those of the Sun Moon Empire.

On the other hand, Ning Tian, being a Diary Copy Holder, knew perfectly well that Ye Chen was more than capable of reaching the peak as a Soul Master and a Soul Engineer. She was only pretending to persuade Ye Chen to focus on just being a Soul Master because her father had asked her to.

When Ye Chen made his request, Ning Hao strongly disagreed at first. But after facing Ye Chen’s stubborn insistence and assuming it was merely a child’s fleeting interest, he reluctantly agreed.

Although Ning Hao had already made arrangements to find a suitable Soul Engineer to poach from the Sun Moon Empire, he still tried to have his daughter subtly dissuade Ye Chen from fully committing to being a Soul Engineer.

Although Ning Hao had already begun making arrangements to recruit a suitable Soul Engineer from the Sun Moon Empire, he still hoped his daughter could gently steer Ye Chen away from fully committing to Soul Engineering.

This resulted in Ning Tian putting on a show of trying to dissuade him… but without actually putting any real effort into it.

While Ning Tian and Ye Chen were talking, Wu Feng made a move with a smirk on her face, “Check!”

However, Ye Chen’s next move wiped the smirk off her face as he used his Rook to block the check, while also opening a diagonal line for his Bishop, putting her King in check instead.

Wu Feng stiffened. “W–What? How—?”

She frantically looked around the board, any move she could make to salvage her blunder. But there was no escape. She had to move her King to escape from the check, leaving her own Rook defenseless.

Sure enough, once she moved her King, Ye Chen captured her Rook with his own. From that point onward, the match was practically decided. With an extra rook at his disposal, Ye Chen dismantled her defenses and controlled the board, eventually securing an easy victory.

Ning Tian didn’t miss the opportunity to tease her, “Well, if I’m not wrong, that makes the score 7-0 in Ye Chen’s favor, right?”

Wu Feng let out a frustrated huff, a stubborn expression on her face as she declared, “That doesn’t matter. I will beat him next time for sure.”

Ye Chen replied with an amused expression, “We’ll see.”

“Ugh, whatever. I’m hungry. Let’s go, Ning Tian.”

His unbothered tone only annoyed her further. Wu Feng sprang to her feet and stomped toward the door, grabbing Ning Tian by the wrist and dragging her along as she left Ye Chen’s house.

“Come on, Ye Chen. We can have lunch together.” Ning Tian invited him with a small smile on her face, not resisting even as Wu Feng continued dragging her out the door.

Apart from fulfilling her father’s request, she and Wu Feng had been doing their best these last few days to accompany Ye Chen whenever he wasn’t training, so that he wouldn’t be alone. After all, his Diary Entries these past few days had been slightly worrying.

“Alright.” Ye Chen agreed, thinking that the last few days had been bearable only because of these two new friends he had made.

He paused at that realization, ‘Friends, huh?’

Of all things, he hadn’t expected to be friends with six-year-old children in this new life. He shook his head and quickly caught up with the girls, a relaxed smile appearing on his face for the first time in days.

=+=+=+=+=< Scene Change >=+=+=+=+=

Later that day, as Ye Chen waited for midnight to arrive, his thoughts drifted to his parents.

Almost two weeks ago, Ye Chen’s parents, along with Elder Zhang and three Soul Saints, went on a journey to hunt for his mother’s, Bai Xinlian’s, Sixth Soul Ring.

Initially, Ye Chen didn’t think much about how long it would take for them to find and hunt a suitable Soul Beast. However, as time passed, he started to get worried that something might have happened to them.

Even though the Sect Master had said it was normal for Soul Ring hunts to go from anywhere between a day to months, especially for rare or higher age Soul Beasts, Ye Chen still feared for his parents' safety.

Whenever he wasn’t training or spending time with Ning Tian and Wu Feng, his thoughts would inevitably drift to his parents, wondering how they were doing, where they were, etc.

These thoughts also echoed in his Diary entries in the past few days.

{Ding~! Congratulations to the Host for completing today’s Diary. As this is your 100th consecutive day of writing in the Diary, you have received better rewards: 1 Rank increase in Soul Power, 1x Soul Ring Age Increase Card (Purple), 3x Experience Boost Card.}

The Diary System’s sudden notification precisely at midnight shook Ye Chen out of his depressing thoughts.

His eyes widened in surprise once he took in the contents of the notification.

‘Oh! Today’s the 100th day since I awakened my Martial Soul. I totally forgot about this.’ Ye Chen thought to himself.

Then, he focused his attention on the rewards he gained.

First was the Soul Power increase. That part was easy enough to understand. The moment the System issued the reward, Ye Chen clearly felt his Soul Power rise from Rank 16 to Rank 17. Since he had already been halfway through Rank 16, the reward pushed him to the halfway point of Rank 17 in one go.

At this pace, he would definitely reach Rank 18 within a month or so, perhaps even sooner, considering the minimum reward of a slight Soul Power increase granted by the System every day.

Next, he nudged his System to give an explanation regarding the second and third rewards.

{Soul Ring Age Increase Card

Type: Item (Consumable)

Effect: Users can increase the age of their own or others’ Soul Ring, the age increase depending on the rank of the card. The card ranks are:-

1. Yellow- Upgrades any White Soul Ring to a 100-year-old Yellow Soul Ring, or increases the age of Yellow or above Soul Rings’ age by 100 years.

2. Purple- Upgrades any White or Yellow Soul Ring to a 1,000-year-old Purple Soul Ring, or increases the age of Purple or above Soul Rings’ age by 1,000 years.

3. Black- Upgrades any White, Yellow, or Purple Soul Ring to a 10,000-year-old Black Soul Ring, or increases the age of Black or above Soul Rings’ age by 10,000 years.

4. Red- Upgrades any White, Yellow, Purple, or Black Soul Ring to a 100,000-year-old Red Soul Ring, or increases the age of Red or above Soul Rings’ age by 100,000 years.

5. Gold- Upgrades any White, Yellow, Purple, Black, or Red Soul Ring to a 1,000,000-year-old Gold Soul Ring, or increases the age of Gold or above Soul Rings’ age by 1,000,000 years.}

Reading the description given by the System, Ye Chen was happy to say the least. Especially about the fact that the Soul Ring Age Increase reward came in the form of a card. This meant that he could find an opportune moment to use it to increase the age of his Soul Rings after coming up with a proper explanation for it. Otherwise, it would be difficult to explain his Soul Rings suddenly changing color.

Additionally, Ye Chen could also use this card to increase the age of the Soul Rings of his parents and friends, or allies, in the future if a suitable opportunity arose. It was good to have numerous ways through which he could empower his close ones. If possible, he didn’t want to lose his family or friends, whether to old age or them dying due to insufficient strength.

Shaking his head, Ye Chen focused on reading the description of the third reward, not willing to let his mind wander toward depressing thoughts.

{Experience Boost Card

Type: Item (Consumable)

Effect: After using this, users can learn and understand anything 5 times faster for the next 8 hours.}

‘This will come in handy, whether while learning to create Soul Tools or trying to find ways to overcome the limitations of my First Soul Skill. So far, my efforts to overcome the time limit of my First Soul Skill hasn’t borne any fruit.’ Ye Chen thought to himself, happy to receive this card and three of them at that.

Then, he didn’t forget to write in his Diary about the rewards he received, filling up words for the new day’s Diary entry.

Once he was done with that, he forced himself to go to sleep, burying his concern for his parents deep in his heart. For the last few days, he didn’t have the mood or mindset to substitute sleep with meditation using the Heavenly God Technique.