When they returned to the Rose Hotel, the attendant behind the counter startled so badly that his hand jerked, nearly dropping his ledger. He hurried forward with a bow.
"Honored guest, you... please, come in! What sort of suites would you like?" the attendant asked in a trembling whisper.
Before Su Chen could speak, Ning Rongrong stepped lightly forward in her pale green dress. She casually took a purple-gold card from her waist and tapped it onto the counter.
"Reserve your three top-floor Rose Emperor luxury suites for three months. Have three meals delivered to the rooms every day, all to your highest standard, and keep anyone unrelated from disturbing us."
A lifelike Seven Treasure Glazed Tile Pagoda was engraved on the Purple-Gold Card, its sumptuous radiance shimmering beneath the lobby's crystal chandelier.
The Seven Treasure Glazed Tile Sect possessed wealth unrivaled under heaven. Its exclusive black-and-purple-gold cards carried unlimited credit at major merchant associations and upscale establishments throughout the Douluo Continent.
Recognizing the sect emblem on the card, the attendant bowed repeatedly and respectfully presented three solid-gold room cards with both hands.
Ning Rongrong accepted the cards and turned, handing one each to Su Chen and Xiao Wu.
"Young Master Su Chen, thank you for tearing the masks off those unscrupulous Soul Masters in front of everyone at Shrek Village today. Otherwise, I might have stumbled blindly into that shabby nest. I have few other talents, but arranging a comfortable, suitable place for everyone to stay is well within my means."
Ning Rongrong had completely reined in the spoiled, overbearing habits of the Little Demoness she had been within her sect. As the most gifted direct heir the Seven Treasure Glazed Tile Sect, one of the Three Upper Sects, had produced in a century, she had grown up absorbing her father Ning Fengzhi's skill at managing people and his eye for business.
At the village entrance, she had personally watched Su Chen withstand the level seventy-six Soul Saint Zhao Wuji head-on with the body of a Quasi-Soul Ancestor. Then she had seen the mysterious Shadow Guard who crippled a Six-Ring Soul Emperor with one strike bow respectfully to him... towering waves had already surged through Ning Rongrong's heart.
An unparalleled prodigy with godlike talent, a body that dominated all beneath heaven, and unfathomable backing was destined to stand above the entire continent! If she did not devote every resource to befriending him now, what was she waiting for?
Su Chen glanced at the gold card Ning Rongrong offered and reached out to accept it.
"That was thoughtful of you, Miss Ning."
That seemingly casual acknowledgment sent a sudden rush of joy through Ning Rongrong. She knew this mysterious, powerful youth had tacitly accepted her overture.
The four went straight to the luxury suites on the top floor, where the view was widest. Beyond the spacious sitting room lay an elevated terrace overlooking all of Suotuo City.
Even more remarkable was the private cultivation chamber within the suite, built entirely from soundproof black basalt.
"Xiao Wu, Rongrong, Zhu Zhuqing, choose your rooms and get some rest. I gained some insights at the village entrance. I'm going into the chamber to cultivate for a while."
Su Chen stopped in the center of the sitting room and swept his gaze over the three girls.
"Go ahead and cultivate in peace, Brother Su Chen. I'll guard the door!" Xiao Wu's lively eyes curved into crescents as she obediently took her place beside the chamber entrance.
Ning Rongrong and Zhu Zhuqing nodded gently as well, their expressions full of reverence.
Su Chen pushed the door open and entered. The heavy Black Basalt Stone Door slowly closed behind him.
A smooth Spirit-Gathering Jade Meditation Cushion sat in the center of the chamber. With a flick of his sleeve, he sat cross-legged upon it. His quiet meridians circulated steadily, and his Purple-Gold Double Pupils emerged.
Deep within his sea of consciousness, a fist-sized sphere of brilliant golden light floated in the void, radiating an ancient, boundless aura... it was none other than the divine reward he had received after thwarting Tang San's sneak attack and subduing Zhao Wuji at Shrek Village: [God-Gifted Fourth Soul Ring]!!
"Merge."
With a thought, Su Chen drew upon the god-gifted golden light without the slightest hesitation.
Humm...!
The golden sphere slipped silently into the point between his brows. In the blink of an eye, it became a vast, sacred current of warmth that surged through every limb and bone like a waterfall pouring down from the nine heavens!
When ordinary Soul Masters absorbed high-grade Soul Rings, they often suffered the agony of violent energy tearing through their meridians. They had to grit their teeth and endure until blood poured from their seven orifices and their bodies were on the verge of breaking apart.
But the moment this god-gifted energy entered Su Chen, it encountered his fully mastered Ancestral Dragon Hegemony Body Art and the supreme Chaos Ancestral Dragon Martial Soul.
Rooar...! A deep, majestic Primordial Dragon Roar from the dawn of the universe reverberated within Su Chen!
His pure yang dragon emperor aura became blazing dark-gold force, raising mountainous waves through his meridians and devouring every last trace of the god-gifted energy!
The greatest feature of a god-gifted Soul Ring was that its final age evolved entirely according to the limits of its absorber's physical endurance and willpower.
The stronger the body, the more unfathomable the Soul Ring's quality!
Thunder rolled endlessly through Su Chen's bones. Under the repeated tempering of his Pure Yang Dragon Aura, every inch of his flesh took on a glasslike dark-gold glow.
The dense Soul Power circulating within him continually compressed and purified at a visible pace, charging fearlessly toward the solid barrier at level forty!
The god-gifted radiance enveloping him began transforming at tremendous speed. It started white, turned yellow in a blink, then became a rich, deep purple. The cloud patterns upon the purple ring grew increasingly intricate and ancient.
When its age broke through the five-thousand-year threshold, an ordinary Soul Ancestor's body would already have burst. Yet Su Chen's breathing remained deep and steady, his body greedily receiving every wash of divine power!
The purple deepened further and further until, at last, it transformed completely into a terrifying black as dark as night!
A Ten Thousand Year Soul Ring!! His fourth Soul Ring, a ten thousand year black ring!!
Boom...!
With the sound of an invisible barrier shattering within him, his Pure Yang Dragon Aura stomped through the level-forty bottleneck with the irresistible force of snapping rotten wood!!
Su Chen opened his eyes. Two purple-gold beams, condensed almost into physical substance, flashed through the dark chamber.
He raised a hand and lightly clenched his fist. The space between his fingers trembled faintly, and the power coursing through him elevated his sense of control over the world to an entirely new level.
Level forty Battle Soul Ancestor-achieved!!
Su Chen walked steadily out from the depths of the chamber. The three girls guarding outside had been speaking quietly, but the instant the stone door opened, all three went rigid!!
Ning Rongrong, standing at the front, bore the brunt of it.
Before she could even make out Su Chen's figure, her dormant Seven Treasure Glazed Tile Pagoda Martial Soul sensed an overwhelming suppression from a divine plane of existence!
"What... what an overpowering aura..."
As a support-type Soul Master, Ning Rongrong was especially sensitive to the world's Soul Power and the rank of Martial Souls. The pressure that had just emanated from Su Chen was clearly more frightening than facing the Soul Kings and Soul Emperors within her sect!
Only an hour had passed, yet this youth had undergone another earth-shaking transformation! Ning Rongrong's heart raced, and her determination to stay firmly by Su Chen's side, no matter what, grew even stronger.
"Brother Su Chen! Did you break through?" Xiao Wu bounded happily to his side and affectionately caught his sleeve.
Su Chen nodded slightly and stroked the top of Xiao Wu's head. Just as he was about to speak, something suddenly went wrong!
"Ngh...!!"
A stifled, agonized moan came from the corner of the sitting room. Zhu Zhuqing, who had been standing quietly beside the window, crumpled to her knees on the thick wool carpet, curling up in pain.
Her cool, exquisite face had turned deathly pale. Wisps of dark, ghostly cold poured wildly from every pore, freezing the wool carpet beneath her into a sheet of frost in an instant!
"Zhu Zhuqing! What's wrong?" Ning Rongrong startled and hurried forward to help her, but as soon as she came within three feet, the bone-piercing extreme yin chill made her shudder.
Zhu Zhuqing clutched her arms tightly, curling into a small ball as a thick layer of white frost rapidly formed on her eyelashes.
Her feline eyes, once gleaming with a ghostly green luster, were now unfocused and vacant. The pain left her unable to utter a complete sentence; only anguished whimpers escaped her throat.
"Stand back. Don't touch her."
Su Chen stopped Ning Rongrong in a grave voice.
He strode forward. Beneath his Divine Pupils, the state of Zhu Zhuqing's meridians was perfectly clear. To gain an advantage in the brutal competition within the imperial family, generations of direct descendants of the Star Luo Empire's Zhu Family had practiced the extreme Netherworld Assassination Art from childhood, tempering their bodies in the Extreme Yin Cold Pool year after year.
To avoid being discarded by her family, and to survive after Dai Mubai fled, Zhu Zhuqing had driven her body to its limits. Years of overexertion and accumulated cold poison had long since riddled the depths of her meridians with damage.
The wisp of supremely pure yang primordial dragon might that had escaped when Su Chen emerged from his breakthrough was like a drop of blazing oil falling into scalding ice water. It had directly stirred the netherworld extreme yin cold poison she had desperately suppressed for over a decade, causing it to erupt completely and lash back at her heart meridians!!
Unless it was neutralized immediately, before half an incense stick could burn, this gifted girl's entire Martial Soul and heart meridians would be frozen dead by the extreme yin chill. She would be left crippled, or even perish, a fragrant blossom fading away!!
Without a moment's hesitation, Su Chen bent down. His long, powerful right arm slipped beneath Zhu Zhuqing's knees and slender waist, securely lifting the ice-sculpture-cold girl into his arms before he strode toward the broad, soft couch in the center of the sitting room.
The instant their skin touched, Zhu Zhuqing felt a blazing, mighty aura like that of an ancient ferocious beast flow from the youth's arms. It restored the faintest trace of clarity to her frozen consciousness.
She struggled to lift her frost-covered lashes and looked at the handsome face so close to hers. Tears slipped unconsciously from the corners of her eyes, freezing into beads as they traveled down her deathly pale cheeks.
"Su... Su Chen... I'm... so cold..." Her voice was as faint as a mosquito's, filled with helplessness and despair.
Su Chen gently laid her flat on the couch and slowly turned his right palm in midair.
Humm...!
With a low vibration through the void, a drop of liquid roughly the size of a fingernail condensed out of thin air above Su Chen's palm, pure golden divine radiance flowing through it.
A divine-grade natural treasure... [Pure Yang Dragon Marrow]!
Ning Rongrong and Xiao Wu watched from the side, dazzled. Even from several yards away, the Soul Power within them instinctively began circulating faster with the appearance of that drop of dragon marrow.
"This is pure yang origin dragon marrow refined from within the Primordial Chaos Ancestral Dragon."
Su Chen gazed at the coldly beautiful girl curled in agony on the couch. "The netherworld cold poison in your body has already invaded your bone marrow. Ordinary methods won't save you. They'll only destroy your meridians instead."
"Swallow this, and I'll use my Pure Yang Dragon Aura to help refine it into your marrow. It won't just root out all the extreme yin cold poison accumulated over the past decade and more. It can also reshape every meridian and bone in your body, allowing your Nether Civet Martial Soul to undergo a true rebirth."
At this point, Su Chen paused, looking into the feline eyes she struggled to keep open.
"But the dragon marrow is fiercely potent. Guiding it requires the fullest union of our bodies. Are you willing?"
Zhu Zhuqing trembled uncontrollably on the couch. Looking at the golden divine substance suspended above the youth's palm and feeling the vast, warm, commanding aura surrounding Su Chen, every defense in her heart collapsed in that instant.
With the last trace of strength in her body, she gently lifted her frost-covered hand and caught the hem of Su Chen's clothes. Tilting her exquisite, deathly pale face slightly upward, she gave her answer in a weak yet utterly resolute voice.
"I... am willing..."
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