31: Chapter 31 Backlash of Luck!

At the same time.

Jiangcheng Number One Courtyard.

On the second underground floor, in the Zhao family's private training room.

Two Black Iron Rank bodyguards deftly fastened the last dark red scale plate onto the shoulder armor buckles of Zhao Kuo, then took three steps back.

Zhao Kuo stood in the very center of the training room, slowly spreading his arms.

The C-rank fire-element armor, Crimson Flame Armor, clung to his body.

Faint fire-element patterns flowed across the surface of the dark red scales, and it looked as if magma was slowly flowing inside the armor.

It was made from the belly skin of a Tier 3 Fire Lizard, tanned with a special process, capable of absorbing thirty percent of physical impact and boosting fire-element talents by twenty percent.

It was a fine item that Zhao Kuo's father had spent four million to acquire.

Zhao Kuo moved his shoulders, causing the armor plates to emit a faint friction sound, and the corners of his mouth curled up.

"How is it?"

The two bodyguards behind him exchanged a glance and chimed in unison, "Young Master Zhao is mighty."

"Stop buttering me up." Zhao Kuo said this with his mouth, but his chin was already raised.

He turned and walked toward the safe in the corner of the training room, entered a six-digit code, and the latch popped open.

The box was lined with velvet, and in the very center lay a crystal the size of a pigeon egg.

It was dark red all over, with liquid light faintly flowing inside, like a miniature magma ball.

It was a Tier 2 Fire-element Beast Crystal.

Zhao Kuo pinched it in his palm and turned to look at the corner of the training room.

Inside the Spirit Gathering Array, Liu Ruyan sat cross-legged with her long hair draped down and her eyes slightly closed.

Her slender fingers formed complex hand seals as she circulated the A-rank special-type Luck Companion.

She looked quiet and focused.

But inside, she was sneering.

Luck Anchoring had already hooked onto Zhao Kuo's origin, and Private Domain Interception was already prepared.

When the fire-element energy released by Zhao Kuo while absorbing the crystal traveled through the dual-cultivation chain, she would intercept ninety percent and leave one percent of the dregs for Zhao Kuo.

She had practiced this operation countless times.

It was very smooth.

Feedback? Hah.

She never intended to actually give Zhao Kuo anything.

This man had an S-rank talent, family resources, and a top-tier training environment.

And all she had was this body naturally capable of absorbing luck, and a heart colder than anyone else's.

Su Ming would surely die in the arena five days later.

She would step on the luck of these two men to reach Bronze-rank within half a year and Silver within two years.

Once she reached that height, whether the only son of the Jiangcheng Zhao family was fit to carry her shoes would depend on her mood.

"Ruyan."

Zhao Kuo's voice interrupted her thoughts.

Liu Ruyan opened her eyes and revealed a gentle smile just at the right moment.

"I am ready."

Zhao Kuo strode over, held the crystal up in front of her, his face full of pride.

"Do you see this? It's a Tier 2 fire-element crystal; my dad had to pull strings through three layers of connections to get it. Once I absorb this, plus your feedback..."

He leaned close to Liu Ruyan's ear, his voice low and fanatical.

"I will be able to touch the door to Bronze-rank tonight."

He paused for a moment.

"Five days from now, I will have the bones of that trash Su Ming burned to ash, inch by inch, in front of the whole school."

The coldness in Liu Ruyan's eyes flashed and vanished, and the gentle curve of her lips remained unchanged.

"I believe in you."

Zhao Kuo stepped back two steps, satisfied.

He clenched his right hand tightly.

"Shatter!"

The Tier 2 crystal shattered in his palm.

Violent, crimson-red energy was like opening a miniature volcano, and his S-rank talent, Lava Earth Fire, instantly erupted from his body.

Dark red liquid fire seeped out from every pore of his body, sweeping in all directions while carrying scorching heatwaves.

The temperature in the training room soared.

The two Black Iron Rank bodyguards and the three lackeys standing at the door were forced back several steps by the heatwave, and one who was slow to react even had his eyebrows singed.

"Holy crap..." Lackey Number Three shielded his face and dodged backward, "Isn't Young Master Zhao too fierce this time?"

"S-rank is indeed S-rank... If he threw a punch, the whole street would melt."

The bodyguard sternly ordered them to shut up, but the awe in his eyes could not be hidden.

In the center of the training room, Zhao Kuo was enveloped in dark red flames, and the patterns on the surface of the Crimson Flame Armor shone to the extreme.

He looked like a god of fire crawling out from the depths of the earth.

This power was too strong.

He could feel the energy inside his body expanding crazily, getting closer and closer to the threshold of the Bronze-rank.

It was just one step away.

Just one last step.

"Ruyan! Feedback!"

Liu Ruyan formed hand seals with both hands, and her talent sequence activated.

Luck Anchoring locked onto Zhao Kuo's origin, successfully.

Private Domain Interception began to pull the fire-element energy...

A mutation occurred.

There was no warning whatsoever.

The underlying energy within Liu Ruyan that maintained her talent's operation.

That "meager luck" she had absorbed from Su Ming for three whole years suddenly began to collapse.

It was not a slow loss.

It was a collapse.

Liu Ruyan's face instantly turned deathly pale.

What was going on?!

She had no time to analyze the reason.

That luck was the foundation of her talent awakening, the trump card she had absorbed and accumulated bit by bit from Su Ming over the past three years.

Without this foundation, her A-rank talent was a building constructed on sand.

And now, the sand was being pulled away.

The thing she had absorbed for three years was being pulled back by its original owner.

She did not know that Su Ming had broken through to Tier 2 Bronze last night, but her talent did.

On the other end of the Luck Anchoring, that trash she once used as nutrients to drain dry.

His origin strength at this moment was already strong enough to allow the ownership rights to correct themselves.

The luck was flowing back.

She could not stop it.

Her talent sequence was in violent disarray.

Luck Anchoring lost its foundation and suppression, and the link snapped instantly.

Energy Interception not only failed to intercept Zhao Kuo's energy, but because the sequence jammed, it formed a terrifying energy vacuum.

The vacuum needed to be filled.

The underlying instinct of her talent made the most primitive reaction: absorb.

Not absorbing Zhao Kuo's fire-element energy.

But absorbing Zhao Kuo's origin.

Zhao Kuo's whole body stiffened.

The Lava Earth Fire circulating on his body suddenly stalled, and the light on the surface of the Crimson Flame Armor suddenly dimmed by thirty percent.

"What..."

He looked down at his hands.

The flames were shrinking.

It was not him retracting them, but them being drained away.

That power flowed backward frantically along the dual-cultivation chain, like a bottomless pit devouring everything he had.

"Ruyan?!" Zhao Kuo turned his head abruptly.

Liu Ruyan's face was already devoid of color, cold sweat beaded on her forehead, the hand seals of her hands were trembling violently, and she was swaying, on the verge of collapsing.

She was desperately trying to stop the backlash.

She couldn't stop it.

"Zhao Kuo... something... is interfering..." She gritted her teeth and squeezed out a few words.

How could Zhao Kuo listen to that?

The energy was leaking away.

In front of the bodyguards and lackeys, at the critical moment when he was about to break through to Bronze-rank, the energy was running away.

This was worse than killing him.

"Get back here!!!" Zhao Kuo roared, suddenly stimulating his S-rank origin, forcibly pulling the leaking fire-element energy back.

With this pull, things went completely wrong.

The luck backlash inside Liu Ruyan reached a critical point.

The crazily collapsing underlying luck, the out-of-control interception sequence, and the violent pulling force from Zhao Kuo's forced retraction.

The three forces twisted into a ball within the dual-cultivation chain.

The A-rank talent, Luck Companion, triggered its most primitive parasitic instinct: self-preservation.

Self-preservation at all costs.

All the backlash damage, all the energy turbulence, followed the anchoring chain and transferred entirely.

Target: Host Zhao Kuo.

Zhao Kuo was completely unprepared.

The liquid fire, which had been intercepted and then flowed back, was completely out of control.

Together with the shockwave of the luck backlash, it slammed heavily onto his own chest.

"Bang!!" A muffled sound.

The Crimson Flame Armor blocked the external impact, but could not block the internal explosion.

Pungent black smoke emerged from the gaps in the armor, Zhao Kuo's body suddenly arched forward, and a taste of rust surged up his throat.

"Pfft...!" A mouthful of blood sprayed out, splattering all over the floor.

Zhao Kuo's knees went weak, and he slammed one knee onto the floor of the training room.

The whole scene was silent.

The bodyguards reacted the fastest, rushing up to support him.

The three lackeys were stunned, their expressions changing from awe to terror.

"Zhao... Young Master Zhao?!"

Zhao Kuo supported himself on the ground, his whole body shaking, with blood still hanging from the corner of his mouth.

He didn't understand what had happened.

Everything was fine just a moment ago, the energy was rising, Bronze-rank was beckoning, how could it suddenly...

He turned his head to look at Liu Ruyan.

Liu Ruyan had already "timely" collapsed into the Spirit Gathering Array, looking extremely weak.

But her mind was racing.

Luck backlash.

Underlying foundation collapsed.

It took her less than two seconds to figure out the reason: Su Ming.

The man whose luck she had absorbed for three years.

He had become stronger.

Stronger to the point where the portion of luck she had absorbed began to flow back automatically.

But she couldn't say this.

Absolutely couldn't say it.

Saying it would be equivalent to admitting that her A-rank talent was stolen.

Liu Ruyan propped her body up, her eyes red, truly red.

The luck backlash had caused many of her capillaries to rupture.

She threw herself beside Zhao Kuo, her face full of panic.

"Zhao Kuo... it's not a problem with the cultivation technique." Her voice trembled, but every word had been precisely calculated.

"I just sensed... a cause and effect carrying a death aura interfering with the feedback.

That energy characteristic... it's like a byproduct of a mutated talent."

Zhao Kuo wiped the blood from the corner of his mouth, the blood trail stretching long.

"What do you mean?"

Liu Ruyan bit her lower lip, revealing just the right amount of hesitation and fear.

"Su Ming."

"His secondary petrification mutation... it's not simply physical petrification.

Do you remember? His talent is 'Increasingly Heavy', and its essence is devouring his own life force to increase weight.

This kind of mutated talent that overdrafts life span will produce a kind of... causal pollution."

"He is using his life to curse us."

The training room was so quiet that one could hear heartbeats.

Lackey Number Three shuddered and stammered,

"Cur... curse? That trash who is about to die can still curse an S-rank?"

Liu Ruyan didn't speak, just lowered her eyes and let tears slide silently from the corners of her eyes.

Her acting was flawless.

Zhao Kuo's face was already twisted.

Humiliation, pain, anger, and a trace of... fear locked in the deepest part of his heart.

He suddenly shook off the bodyguard's hand and stood up shakily.

A valuable crystal cup was snatched from the table by him and smashed hard against the wall.

"Bang!" Fragments splattered everywhere.

"Call over the people sent to watch Su Ming these past two days!"

Zhao Kuo wiped the last trace of blood from the corner of his mouth, his eyes bloodshot.

"I want to know what that trash has been doing these past two days."