“What in the world just happened?” Li Luo wondered to himself, staring down in surprise at the cool, black plaque in his hand. It had been left to him by his parents.
It had something to do with the bloodline of Heavenly King Li.
And now the black plaque had absorbed a dragon’s bloodfire for him?
Li Luo inspected the plaque closely, but nothing seemed to have changed… No, wait. There was something on the bottom of the “Li” character.
There was a faint imprint of a dragon there. It was a vague, barely visible imprint, but Li Luo could sense a special and ancient power emanating from it.
It was, for all intents and purposes, a shallow, vague imprint of a dragon, and there was no explicable reason why he should feel such tremendous power coming from it.
And at the head of the dragon, roughly at the mouth’s position, there was a faint, red dot.
It was so small that Li Luo would not have noticed it if not for his super-thorough inspection.
Still, he was sure that there had been no such red dot at the dragon’s mouth back when he had first received the plaque.
So…
It had just appeared?
A jolt of realization hit him. Could it be that the dragon’s bloodfire had been absorbed into the plaque?
What was going on?
Li Luo was sweating like crazy from the confusion. He didn’t like it when he didn’t understand what was going on. Even if it seemed to be a good thing for him.
While he was still reeling from his serendipitous encounter, another barrage of dragon’s bloodfire came at him from all sides. Rudely shaken out of his reverie, Li Luo scrambled to protect his anima dew membrane from instant evaporation.
But his alarm was not necessary, and it was soon replaced with pure astonishment.
He realized that the dragon’s bloodfire was flying like birds heading home to nest… straight towards the black plaque in his hand.
Li Luo froze on the spot, too dumbfounded to move.
More and more jets of dragon’s bloodfire streamed into the black plaque like some sort of magical vacuum, and the dull, red dot was now growing clearer by the second.
It looked like an orb of ruby in the dragon’s maw.
Li Luo’s eyes sparkled with deep interest. Was dragon’s bloodfire food for the dragon imprint on his black plaque?
And what uses did the red dot have?
He pondered this for a moment. Should he head to Dragonbone Island as quickly as possible, or let the dragon imprint continue to absorb its fill of dragon’s bloodfire?
His gut told him that a little patience would pay off. The red dot smelled like power and goodness in his future.
Li Luo made his decision very quickly.
The island could come later. First, the dragon’s bloodfire stockpiling. Dragonbone Island had to be in chaos right now. The elite schools had all arrived, and intense eliminations were probably going on at this very moment.
Li Luo was more than happy to give it a miss. Less work, more rewards—he would sign up for this every time.
If he could skip past the first grueling phase of elimination on the island, and also stockpile dragon’s bloodfire, he might be able to emerge on top of the world.
Of course, there was an important disclaimer to all this… that the Nightmarish Eversnow Platemail would hold out. How strong was Lu Qing’er’s technique?
It was a difficult question to answer. The platemail was unique, but it was limited by Lu Qing’er’s resonant power. Neither was it completely impervious to the extremely destructive heat of the Dragon’s Belly. Li Luo had been very worried about it up until now.
His worries were gone.
Because the depletion rate of the Nightmarish Eversnow Platemail had slowed.
This was no misperception on Li Luo’s part—he had paid close attention to it.
By right, being swarmed by dragon’s bloodfire should have melted the Nightmarish Eversnow Platemail significantly, not slowed down its depletion rate.
“Is it because of the absorption?” Li Luo mused. In any case, this was good news for him. If the Nightmarish Eversnow Platemail could hold out, his plan was good to go.
“Qing’er’s really did me a solid on this one,” Li Luo thought to himself cheerfully. Without her protection, his anima dew membrane would have torn long ago, even with the black plaque to absorb dragon’s bloodfire away from him. He would have had to give up on this competition.
“But just to be safe, I should drift a little closer to Dragonbone Island, so I can immediately head up the moment I’m done here.”
Li Luo set off again, but at a much more moderate pace this time.
Along the way, he sucked more jets of dragon’s bloodfire into the black plaque like some sort of magnet for fire, making the red dot glow even more brightly than ever.
The silhouette of Dragonbone Island could be made out in the distance now, but the black plaque seemed limitless.
Li Luo frowned. His Nightmarish Eversnow Platemail was wearing very thin now. Once it broke, there would probably only be ten minutes left on his anima dew membrane.
“Five more minutes!” he thought. If he could not finish filling his plaque in five minutes, he would head off regardless.
There was no point in filling the bucket to the brim if he was going to spill it.
300 seconds passed in the blink of an eye.
The black plaque was far from satisfied.
Li Luo sighed to himself, but he didn’t hesitate to make his way towards Dragonbone Island.
The Nightmarish Eversnow Platemail melted fully, and now his anima dew membrane started to tank the brunt of the heat again.
It was uncomfortably thin now, and he felt the prickling heat on his skin.
He curbed the rising panic within him and pressed on.
A few minutes later, the red water under his feet grew shallower and he rose up into the air, landing safely on the ground of Dragonbone Island.
He was here.
Li Luo sighed at the plaque in his hand. “You disappoint me,” he told it petulantly. He’d wasted so much time on it.
Just as he was about to stow it away, the plaque suddenly started vibrating.
The red dot was glowing brightly now, and a ball of fire seemed to be emerging from it, hovering above the plaque like a mini sun.
“It’s done?” Li Luo exclaimed. But then again, what was done? What was this bunch of dragon spit supposed to do, even though it was very pretty?
As though hearing his question, the ball of fire resonated with the “Li” character on the plaque.
Again, he felt the ancient power present around him.
And then, to his surprise, a scarlet-pearl object materialized out of the black plaque, with fiery marks deep within its crystalline, garnet depths.
The red light faded away from the mouth of the dragon imprint.
“This is the result of all the dragon’s bloodfire it absorbed?”
It seemed magical enough, but what was this thing supposed to do?
Li Luo hesitated, then he gripped the garnet sphere tightly in his hand. A dragon’s roar filled his ears.
His eyes widened.
He understood.
He knew what it was for…
Wasn’t it a primary material for his third acquired resonance?
A… dragon resonance?
