Chapter 5: Soul Weapon

The sound of a bell ringing inside a house could be heard. A boy who was holding a lamp-like Soul Device immediately got up from his seat and hurriedly ran toward the front door. When he opened the door, he could see a middle-aged man looking at him with a warm smile.

"Helping with your father's job again? You sure are diligent, Randi"

"Hehe, it's nothing, Grandpa Nino. Here I bring you your Soul Device, it has been fixed"

Grandpa Nino was a bit stunned when he heard what Randi said, "Are you sure it's fixed already? I came just to check so this is quite a surprise for me."

"Of course it is, you can check if you want," Randi laughed.

Grandpa Nino gave a slightly disbelieving look toward Randi and started trying the Soul Device. After filling the Core Compartment with his own Soul Stone, the circuit inside immediately lit up and the Soul Device started levitating around him.

"Try lighting it up, Grandpa."

Grandpa Nino controlled the Soul Device by using his voice. After receiving the command, the device immediately emitted a bright light. It also started circling around him, similar to a satellite.

"Whoa, you are right. This Satelite Lamp is already fixed." Grandpa Nino laughed, "Sorry for not believing you earlier. Your father sure works really fast. Please tell him that I'm grateful for his help and just put the bill on my son's account"

"Alright, is there anything else?"

Grandpa Nino was about to leave but he turned around and said, "Ah and please remind him to not overwork himself. He's been taking a lot of work these days. We can't let our best engineer in this town suffer from exhaustion, right?"

Randi only smiled. There was a feeling of satisfaction hidden inside his heart.

...

"Randi, why don't you just tell everyone that you're the one fixing it?" Tania asked while pouting.

"Father didn't allow me to do that. He said, before reaching 2nd Rank, there's no point in bragging that sort of insignificant thing. I also agree with him, compared to those elites of my age in the capital, I still have a long way to go." Randi calmly answered, but there was a hint of fiery determination in his eyes.

Tania wasn't satisfied yet with the answer, "But why do you even need to compare to them?"

"You know my dream, I want to contribute to the humanity. Because of my Soul Talent, fighting in the frontline as a Soul Bearer is a no go. That's why I'm trying my best to advance on the path of Soul Engineer. Also..."

"What?"

Randi didn't answer. He just messed with Tania's silver hair before immediately running away.

'It's because of you, dummy'

He didn't want to lose sight of his friends.

...

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Inside the workshop.

Randi was holding a Soul Stone in his left hand. He was closing his eyes, trying to feel the Soul Energy emitted by the stone. In front of him was his father, staring at him with a helpless expression.

"It's been thirty minutes, Randi. Stop now if you still can't feel the Soul Energy," his father spoke.

"No, Dad, wait! Five more minutes. I think I can feel it after five more minutes..."

"You remember your promise right? We'll only spare not more than thirty minutes in this training each day. Come on, there's still a lot for you to learn in order to reach 2nd Rank. You can't get distracted," his father reprimanded.

Randi reluctantly let the Soul Stone in his left hand go. He knew that this training seemed useless, but he still wanted to do it nevertheless.

'Ah if I knew this would happen, I won't show him that day'

Dana was regretting his past action. Originally, he only wanted to show that unawakened Soul Engineers can compete to the awakened ones as long as they were willing to put their effort into it, despite the inefficiency and impracticality. He wanted to convey that as long as Randi worked hard enough, he'd have a chance to reach the same height as them.

However, deep inside his heart was a part of him that didn't regret his action. The method to use External Soul Energy for Soul Engineering was his proudest creation. By following the method, even normal people could infuse Soul Energy to a Soul Weapon just by using their body alone. Unfortunately, to sense the ephemeral Soul Energy without the required talent was too hard. It took Dana years of hard work before reaching the level he currently was. He still remembered the old times, when he was very adamant in defeating Awakened Soul Engineers despite being unawakened himself.

'Now that I thought about it, Randi really looked like me back then,' he thought to himself. 'Maybe... Maybe if it was him, he could perfect this technique'

He quickly shook his head, there's no point in giving his son more hope, "Let's start the real training. Yesterday we have gone through the topic of Soul Weapons. Repeat them." Dana spoke after seeing that Randi was ready.

Randi answered calmly, "Soul Weapons are the product of humanity's hard work over these past two hundred years. While the first heroes were facing the onslaught of the Soul Beasts, the engineers were developing a weapon that could be effective against them. After a long period of experiments, they finally understood that the Soul Beasts were unaffected by the hot weapons because of the Soul Layer on their skin. That layer can only be penetrated by a Soul-imbued attack, which is the specialty of a Soul Bearer."

"Even though there are a lot of awakened Soul Bearers, the majority of humanity are unawakened. If this keeps on going, then the Soul Beasts will win the battle of attrition. Thus, the engineers decided that they have to develop the Soul Weapon as soon as possible."

"The First Soul Engineer, The Great Genius Edwin, finally managed to create the first prototype of a Soul Weapon, a Soul Sword. The sword was designed from the materials and Soul Cores left behind the corpse of Soul Beasts. By relying on the energy from its external Soul Source, even normal people could imbue their weapon with Soul Energy and be able to inflict damage to the Soul Beasts. The weapon was then manufactured in mass quantity to provide for normal soldiers. It was the start of humanity's comeback."

"Since then, Soul Weapons had undergone through a lot of upgrade and redesigns. Now, even hot weapons can be imbued with Soul Energy, thus creating a devastating impact on the battlefield. Furthermore, since unawakened people can be strengthened using Soul Weapons, then naturally Soul Weapons would also increase the power of Soul Bearers. From what I've heard, the Legendary Blood Paragon had an 8th Grade Soul Weapon, the Ancient Blood Gloves." Randi ended his explanation.

Dana nodded, seemingly satisfied with his son's answer. "Good, now we'll move to the next topic. We have already known that there currently exist 8 different grades of Soul Weapon, but what is it exactly that differentiate them?"

"If all of the previous era's hot and cold weapons can be classified as No Grade, then 1st Grade Soul Weapons should have the most minimal option for a Soul Weapon, and that is to be able to be imbued by Soul Energy from an external Soul Source. It's not that hard to create them. As long as we thoroughly understand the basic of Soul Devices, we would definitely be able to successfully create one after a few tries. Of course, the products is just mediocre. It's basically just kitchen appliances."

"The real challenge is the 2nd Grade. Even though the requirement sounds simple, creating a cold Soul Weapon that can pierce the hide of a 2nd Circle Soul Beast is by no mean an easy feat." Dana paused for a bit, before continuing, "And that's the requirement for passing the 2nd Rank Soul Engineer test. Creating a 2nd Grade Soul Weapon from scratch in no more than six hours."

It was Randi's next hurdle, creating a 2nd Grade Soul Weapon