At the sight, the onlookers all cried out in surprise.
Could it be that Lin Luoluo had summoned an S-Rank Contract Spirit, only to be unable to form a contract with it?
Seeing this, some people even wore mocking expressions.
An orphan who could only sit in a wheelchair all day was still just an orphan, no matter how unimaginably lucky she got.
When virtue did not match one's station, calamity was sure to follow. Such good fortune was destined to be more than she could bear.
"Make way, make way."
Just then, a haughty voice came from behind them.
The crowd parted of its own accord.
Jiang Ruoxue rose from the candidates' area beside the array, smoothed her skirt, and walked over at a leisurely pace.
When Lin Luoluo saw Jiang Ruoxue approaching her wheelchair, her heart clenched.
Forcibly snatching a Contract Spirit someone else had summoned was not uncommon in the Underground City, where the weak were prey to the strong.
But this Cold Moon Fox carried all her and her younger sister's hopes for the future. She would never let it be taken away!
The gloating gazes around her became even more piercing.
The Underground City was neither particularly large nor particularly small.
But at the mention of the Jiang Family, even beggars in its most remote corners had to think twice.
On the surface, the Jiang Family ran the Underground City's largest spiritual materials exchange and three Spirit Tamer equipment shops, monopolizing more than seventy percent of its resource trade.
Behind the scenes, the Jiang Family was rumored to be the agent of a major power in the Upper City, the uncrowned king that truly controlled the shadows of this underground world.
Town Chief Liu hurried forward, trying to stop her, an awkward smile forced onto his face.
"Miss Ruoxue, with your Jiang Family's wealth, you have every chance of replenishing your mental strength and summoning again. Why don't you..."
Jiang Ruoxue did not even turn to look at him. She walked straight past him.
Her gaze was fixed on the Cold Moon Fox, and her eyes lit up at once.
"So beautiful."
She sighed in genuine admiration, then turned to Lin Luoluo in the wheelchair and looked her up and down.
"Your name is Lin Luoluo?"
Lin Luoluo raised her head, met her gaze stubbornly, and nodded.
"S-Rank mental strength. Very impressive."
Jiang Ruoxue sounded as though she were praising her, but the words that followed were grating.
"But you understand your own situation, don't you? The Cold Moon Fox is an ice-attribute S-Rank Contract Spirit. Raising it takes a huge amount of ice-type spiritual materials and high-purity psionic crystals."
She paused and held up three fingers.
"Just feeding it the basics while it's young will cost at least thirty thousand Psionic Coins a month."
At that number, gasps rippled through the crowd.
An ordinary worker in the Underground City might not save that much in a year, even without eating or drinking.
Jiang Ruoxue was pleased with the effect. She tilted her head slightly, looked at Lin Luoluo's face, which had gone pale in an instant, and deliberately slowed her speech.
"You can barely afford your younger sister's medicine anymore, can you?
If the Cold Moon Fox stays with you, what do you plan to feed it? The energy jelly mixed with impurities that only the poor in the slum alleys eat?"
Lin Luoluo's shoulders visibly shrank.
Her delicate little face was full of helplessness and misery. Only in her eyes did a trace of stubbornness remain.
Jiang Ruoxue ignored her and turned to the Cold Moon Fox, crouching gracefully.
She took a crystal radiating a faint blue chill light from her pocket and held it in her palm.
"That's an Ice Soul Stone! A rare, high-grade ice-type spiritual material!"
Someone in the crowd recognized it.
"I'm Jiang Ruoxue. I have A-Rank mental strength."
"Come with me, and you'll have the best spiritual materials and the most systematic training plan."
"You're an S-Rank Contract Spirit. You deserve better conditions. Our Jiang Family is the largest Lineage in the Underground City. My family has several spiritual materials exchanges and equipment shops. Come with me, and you can take your pick of all kinds of spiritual materials. We can even go adventuring together in Rifts that require official backing to enter!"
"Come with me, and I promise I'll make you one of the strongest Contract Spirits in the world!"
The array's only function was [Summoning]. The actual [Contract] required both parties' consent.
Besides, S-Rank Contract Spirits were highly intelligent and capable of thinking and judging for themselves.
Simply put, this Cold Moon Fox had been observing and assessing them ever since it appeared.
Lin Luoluo had summoned it, but it had not yet accepted her.
The Cold Moon Fox lowered its head and sniffed the Ice Soul Stone in Jiang Ruoxue's hand, longing showing in its ice-blue eyes.
Then it raised its head, its slit pupils sweeping back and forth between Lin Luoluo in her wheelchair and Jiang Ruoxue.
Lin Luoluo sat in her wheelchair, her hands clasped helplessly in front of her ample chest.
"I... I don't have any money, but I'll treat you well and train with you. I... I can cook too!"
By the end, her voice was thick with tears. It was the only good thing about herself she could think of.
"Heh."
Jiang Ruoxue laughed disdainfully.
"What fucking good is cooking? Without money, you can't give it the life it wants."
"The Cold Moon Fox can only grow stronger and be happy with me!"
Sure enough, the Cold Moon Fox barely thought about it before stepping forward. It gracefully walked around Lin Luoluo's wheelchair and went to Jiang Ruoxue's side.
Unlike its reserved and distant behavior toward Lin Luoluo just now, it willingly rubbed against Jiang Ruoxue's calf.
"All right."
Jiang Ruoxue smiled in satisfaction, preparing to pick up the Cold Moon Fox with one hand while holding the other out to the attendant behind her.
The attendant understood at once and handed her a black lump.
Uh... to be precise, it was Bai Chen, whom Jiang Ruoxue had just summoned.
At some point, an attendant of the Jiang Family had picked him up.
Held between two fingers in disgust, he was dropped onto the ground in front of Lin Luoluo's wheelchair with a smack.
"Nobody wants this useless Slime. You can have him."
Jiang Ruoxue looked down at the dazed Lin Luoluo in her wheelchair, a smile on her lips.
"Anyway, you two are quite a match. A pauper and a piece of trash—you're perfect together."
With that, she picked up the Cold Moon Fox and began registering their contract under the gaze of the staff nearby.
Liu De walked over and looked at the girl sitting in her wheelchair, her shoulders trembling slightly. He let out a heavy sigh.
He had seen situations like this countless times over the years.
The darkness of the Underground City was beyond imagination. As town chief, he had no say whatsoever before the Jiang Family.
"Luoluo, go home for now.
I'll report to the Federation that you missed this summoning because of your physical condition.
With your S-Rank talent, the higher-ups might be willing to match you with a B-Rank Contract Spirit instead."
"A B-Rank Contract Spirit doesn't consume that many resources. When the time comes, you only have to join the city's Mining Team, and your monthly pay will be enough to support one. You might even have a chance to enter the Upper City someday."
"Thank you, Town Chief... but there's no need."
She knew very well that, for someone else with S-Rank talent, the Federation might even offer an A-Rank Contract Spirit to recruit them early.
But... she was a cripple.
She could not even stand. The Federation would not want a useless person like her.
Lin Luoluo turned her wheelchair and bowed deeply to Liu De, her expression sincere.
Then she turned around, her gaze falling on the black lump on the ground.
In front of Bai Chen, she laboriously leaned forward and crouched slightly from her wheelchair.
Bai Chen's gaze fell on her as well.
The girl had white twin tails that reached her waist, an excessively pretty little face, and delicate features. She was very cute.
Best of all, her loose clothes, washed pale with age, could not conceal her breathtaking curves at all.
Wasn't she much prettier than that willful, spoiled young lady from just now?
And she'd definitely be soft and squishy to hug!
Not to mention she was kind, well-behaved, and could cook!
As for the girl being in a wheelchair, that did not enter his considerations at all.
His reason for coming to the human world was simple: he had been far too bored!
He had chosen to be summoned only because he wanted to contract a human servant, so he would at least have someone to talk to.
As the mighty Devouring Demon God, Bai Chen knew very well that one day he would stand at the pinnacle of this world.
As for whether the person standing beside him had an illness or how talented they were, none of it mattered to him. As long as he liked them, that was enough.
Jiang Ruoxue and the group who had just laughed at him all thought he was a trash Slime...
Then he'd show them how he could take a crippled loli soaring to the top!
Besides, the girl had S-Rank mental strength. That was far better than Jiang Ruoxue, who had summoned him.
And the system had stated it very clearly.
After successfully contracting a human, he would get one chance to max out an ability!
That meant that as long as he bound himself to the white-haired loli before him, he would not have to accumulate progress bit by bit the next time he devoured a Devil Creature.
He would have at least two S-Rank abilities then!
While Bai Chen was rejoicing inwardly, Lin Luoluo crouched down.
She reached out and carefully stroked the top of Bai Chen's head.
"Little one, did nobody want you either?"
Her voice was soft, as though she had found a kindred spirit in the same plight.
"If you don't mind, come be with me."
"Although you're only a Slime, I have S-Rank mental strength. If we're together, you'll level up very quickly."
Generally, the lower a Contract Spirit's quality, the less experience it needed to level up.
And the higher its master's mental strength, the more efficiently the Contract Spirit would level up.
An F-Rank Contract Spirit paired with an S-Rank master would level up at a terrifying speed.
But no normal person would ever do that. It was the ultimate waste of S-Rank talent.
Lin Luoluo knew that with her talent, [Ten Thousand Arts Sovereign], even if she contracted an F-Rank Contract Spirit, it would be enough to surpass most D-Rank and even C-Rank Contract Spirits!
Most importantly, with fewer resources consumed, she could free up even more Psionic Coins for her sister's treatment.
The more Bai Chen looked at this white-haired loli, the more he liked her, but he could not make a sound right now.
The contract had not yet been established, so they could not communicate through a mental link either.
So Bai Chen could only control a black, limp tentacle and slowly extend it from his body.
The slightly sticky tentacle gently wound around Lin Luoluo's fair, slightly fleshy thigh before coming to rest in her palm.
Her legs had long since lost feeling, and she could only faintly sense the unusual touch.
The strange sensation made Lin Luoluo's body tremble sharply.
A rush of heat surged to the top of her head, and her cheeks instantly turned red enough to drip blood.
She instinctively wanted to pull away, but then she saw the black tentacle writing a word in her palm, stroke by stroke.
Yes.
Seeing Bai Chen agree, Lin Luoluo froze for a moment before immense joy welled up in her heart.
In her joy, Lin Luoluo forgot that Slimes did not have tentacles at all...
She nodded vigorously and hugged Bai Chen tightly to her chest, as though she were embracing the whole world.
Then she closed her eyes and began to establish the contract.