Xu Qing wasn’t paying attention to the patriarch’s performance. He just continued suppressing the shadow while still looking off at the horizon.

He was thinking back to the time when he acquired the shadow. It was back in the jungle forbidden region when he and Squad Thunderbolt had fought a pack of black-scaled wolves. The shadow had come out of one of those wolves, almost as if it were a parasite. [1]

That was the first time the violet crystal within him had done anything different from before, as it had sealed the shadow. From that point on, his shadow had changed. More precisely, it seemed like his own shadow became the host for the black-scaled wolf’s shadow. The two had become one.

From then on, his shadow could absorb mutagen, which made his practice of cultivation go much more smoothly. Of course, as the shadow absorbed mutagen, its battle prowess increased. Other than helping him, the shadow hadn’t done much or changed. And after Xu Qing figured out how to control it, it became one of his trump cards.

It was when he killed that young merman that his shadow first showed some signs of intelligence. Later, the Mute warned him about the shadow. And then...