Leng Yaozhu Meets Lin An: I Really Want to Raise Him, I Really Want to Take Him Home

Leng Yaozhu sighed inwardly.

Honestly, it was fortunate that Gu Yue had dyed her hair silver for some reason during this period, and her appearance had inexplicably become much more attractive.

Otherwise, with her behavior.

Clinging, chasing, and monitoring her 24/7.

She would have been a total turn-off, already arrested.

"Young Master Lin An, I've long admired your name."

Leng Yaozhu stood up, a proper smile on her lips.

"Vice Tower Master Leng is too kind," Lin An nodded politely.

Leng Yaozhu's gaze swept over Gu Yue, pausing on her swollen eyes.

A hint of helplessness crept into her tone.

"Yue'er, why are you here too?"

"Wherever my wife goes, I go."

Gu Yue righteously hugged Lin An's arm, her chin slightly raised, with a look that said, "What are you going to do about it?"

Leng Yaozhu's brow twitched.

"...Let go first."

"This is hardly proper."

"Did you forget everything I told you last night?"

Gu Yue reluctantly let go, pouting as she stepped aside.

Only then did Leng Yaozhu turn her gaze back to Lin An.

Then, she was slightly stunned.

She had long heard that the young master of the Universal Group was exceptionally handsome.

But upon seeing him in person, she was still taken aback.

The young man stood in the morning light, his skin so fair it was almost transparent.

His brows, eyes, nose, and lips were all as if sculpted by divine craftsmanship, too exquisite to be of this world.

Yet, his eyes were clear to the bottom, unstained by any impurities.

No wonder.

No wonder her own proud-to-the-bone disciple had fallen for him so completely.

Leng Yaozhu suddenly felt she understood Gu Yue a little.

For a moment, she even had a preposterous thought.

She wanted to reach out and pat his head.

She wanted to take him home.

She wanted to raise him.

Leng Yaozhu abruptly pinched her palm.

The sharp pain brought her back to her senses.

She forcefully suppressed this inexplicable impulse.

Calm down.

You are the Vice Tower Master of the Spirit Pagoda.

You are Heavenly Phoenix Douluo.

You cannot fight your disciple for a man.

She forced herself to look away, resuming a businesslike expression.

Gu Yue keenly caught the fleeting heat in her teacher's eyes.

Her heart skipped a beat.

Could Teacher be planning to steal my man?

She narrowed her eyes, a dangerous glint flashing in her purple irises.

Then, without missing a beat, she moved half a step forward, shielding Lin An behind her.

Leng Yaozhu: "..."

She looked at her disciple's possessive posture, her mouth twitching.

Forget it.

I won't argue with the little girl.

She raised her hand to signal the staff.

A specially crafted sealing box was brought forward with the utmost care.

The box was forged from multiple layers of soul-guide alloy, its surface etched with dense, intricate sealing runes.

Yet, even through so many layers of seals, the air surrounding the box still twisted slightly.

Leng Yaozhu opened the box.

A strange spirit hovered within.

It was translucent, its body as thin and delicate as a cicada's wing.

The space around it warped and deformed, alternately contracting and expanding.

"This is the Empty Cicada you requested."

Leng Yaozhu's voice turned solemn.

"It comes from the Abyss Rift, tainted by both the power of space and the twisting force of the abyss."

"In the entire Douluo Continent, this is the only one."

Her gaze settled on Lin An's face.

"However—"

"However what?" Lin An asked.

Leng Yaozhu fell silent for a moment, her tone growing more grave.

"Its power is far too violent."

"Even a ten-thousand-year sealing array can barely suppress it completely."

"If an ordinary soul master attempts to absorb it, death is certain."

Lin An frowned.

Death is certain.

These four words struck the silent VIP room like a block of ice dropped into water.

"Is there truly no other way?"

Lin An asked, unwilling to give up.

His luck had always been good, but the person absorbing this was Xie Xie.

If something were to go wrong, he would have no way to answer for it.

"No. What I mean is—"

Leng Yaozhu held up a finger, her expression impassive.

"It will cost more."

Lin An: "..."

Gu Yue: "..."

"The Empty Cicada itself is worth five hundred million Federal Credits."

Leng Yaozhu sat back down and took a sip from her teacup.

Her tone returned to its usual composure.

"Including the matching sealing array, a spirit hypnotist, and a forced-contract array... the total is seven hundred million."

Seven hundred million.

Xie Xie nearly fainted on the spot.

"Sev... seven hundred million?!"

His voice cracked.

What kind of concept was seven hundred million?

His family had modest assets in East Sea City, but even if they sold everything they owned, they wouldn't be able to scrape together a fraction of that amount.

All the cultivation resources he would use in his entire life wouldn't even add up to a tenth of seven hundred million.

Gu Yue's expression shifted as well.

She turned to look at Lin An, her purple eyes filled with disbelief.

Seven hundred million?

To buy a spirit for Xie Xie?

Had the Dragon Queen been drugged?

"An'an, have you lost your mind?"

Her voice rose by half an octave, the uncontrollable bitterness bubbling up.

"Seven hundred million to buy a spirit for this guy?"

She leaned into Lin An's ear, lowering her voice as she gritted her teeth.

"I haven't even spent that much money on myself."

Xie Xie swallowed hard and hurriedly waved his hands.

"Lin An, this isn't necessary."

"Just buy me any random one; we don't need to buy such an expensive spirit soul."

"This is practically a scam—"

He glanced at Leng Yaozhu, and his voice trailed off.

Was a spirit master's second spirit ring really worth seven hundred million?

That price could cover all his subsequent spirit rings.

The remaining money would even be enough to buy a house in the city center of East Sea City.

Lin An, however, remained unfazed.

"Seven hundred million is a fair price."

"However, I have an additional condition."

Leng Yaozhu raised an eyebrow.

"Please, go ahead."

"I want the Spirit Pagoda to record the entire absorption process of the Empty Cicada and share the data with me."

Lin An stated the condition casually.

In his view, no matter how wealthy he was, spending seven hundred million on a spirit soul for a new classmate he had only known for a few days and barely spoken to seemed abnormal by any standard.

He needed a reasonable excuse.

Conducting research—that reason was sufficient.

Leng Yaozhu's expression shifted slightly.

As expected.

It was for an experiment.

Although the Empty Cicada was rare, its most valuable aspect was actually its annual molting.

The shed shell possessed space-time attributes and could serve as a rare material to enhance the speed of mechs and Battle Armor.

But that effect was nowhere near worth seven hundred million.

She had been suspicious before—

How could the young master of the Universal Group spend so much money just for a classmate's spirit ring?

No matter how rich one was, one shouldn't be that wasteful.

But if it were for the sake of researching space-time power, everything made sense.

The Abyssal invasion required distorting space-time to connect the two worlds.

If the Universal Group wanted to counterattack the Abyss, they had to master space-time technology.

And the space-time distortion power within the Empty Cicada was the perfect research sample.

The more Leng Yaozhu thought about it, the more reasonable it seemed.

The look she gave Lin An held a deeper meaning.

"What exactly is your Universal Group's objective?"

She narrowed her eyes slightly, her voice laced with scrutiny.

"Is it truly just to buy a spirit ring for this kid?"

"What kind of data could there possibly be to research from a spirit soul absorption? You could have just taken the Empty Cicada back; there was no need to use our Spirit Pagoda's technology to let this kid absorb it."

"This is simply a waste of a heavenly treasure."