Chapter 4

Chapter 4: I Don’t Want It

Li Shuang’s eyes were cool and distant as she suddenly stepped forward. Sheng Yuan’s hand trembled without thinking. Li Shuang reached out, but only plucked the tassel from the Deepwater Sword.

Sheng Yuan blinked in surprise, then blurted: “First Senior Sister, you…”

Li Shuang spoke calmly: “More than half of the materials used to forge your Deepwater Sword were things I searched everywhere to find. This tassel came from the market back then. Wearing it long term keeps the mind clear. Sheng Yuan, I won’t charge you for the materials. Since you now look down on me, you must also look down on this tassel. I’m taking my gift back.”

With a light squeeze of her fingers, the tassel turned to powder and vanished in her hand. Sheng Yuan’s heart gave a quiver. That tassel had been her birthday gift to him. He had complained that the Deepwater Sword lacked a good tassel, and First Senior Sister had walked every market to find that one for him.

But now the tassel had been destroyed by her own hand. Sheng Yuan stared hard at Li Shuang. Her face was still so calm, as if she had crushed nothing more than a common trinket.

[What else is she taking back?] The question sprang up in his mind. [Besides the tassel, is she also taking back every tie between us?]

His sword hand shook again. He could not understand. In his mind, First Senior Sister was the one who had done wrong, and they had already been generous enough. Why did she act as if she was completely in the right? [She was the one at fault!]

Li Shuang ignored him. She glanced at the Heaven and Earth Furnace’s progress bar, now at one percent, and the corner of her lips showed the faintest smile. The tassel was not anything rare, and it was a little wasteful to destroy it outright. She had only pretended to crush it. In truth, she had fed it into the furnace, adding a sliver of progress.

Ye Zhao Zhao watched the scene, her eyes flashing. In her mind, she whispered: [System, show me the current negative emotion points.]

No one knew the truth: Ye Zhao Zhao was a Transmigrator bound to a strange System. The System’s name was the Parasitic System.

It required her to bind to a host. Once bound, whenever that person produced negative emotions, she would gain points. Those points could be used to speed up her cultivation so she would soar ahead like a top genius.

The stronger the host’s talent and luck, the stronger the negative energy they produced. She and the host would become a zero sum pair. As she absorbed energy, the host’s cultivation would be affected. If the feeding lasted long enough, she could even seize the host’s luck for herself. Under the System’s scan, Li Shuang’s luck was nearly full.

If this were a novel, Li Shuang would be the true Heavenly Dao heroine. Near-max luck and peerless talent meant that, barring any accidents, she would rise into a legend.

But Ye Zhao Zhao intended to be that accident.

She chose Li Shuang as her host without hesitation and then used every method to make everyone resent and blame Li Shuang. Whenever Li Shuang felt negative emotions, the System swallowed them and turned them into fuel for Ye Zhao Zhao’s cultivation.

So while Ye Zhao Zhao became an unmatched genius, Li Shuang’s cultivation stalled.

But that still wasn’t enough.

The System said that if she killed Li Shuang, she could take all of Li Shuang’s luck. Somehow, Li Shuang had returned alive from the snowy mountain.

That was fine.

It would only take more time. She could harvest more negative emotion from her. Sheng Yuan’s questioning should also draw some out. As Ye Zhao Zhao thought this, the System displayed the number.

Her expression flickered in disbelief: [Negative emotion points: 0.]

Zero? How could it be zero?

She had already spent everything she harvested before and was waiting for the next wave to keep advancing. Yet Li Shuang hadn’t produced even a single point just now?

[No. That won’t do at all.] She had grown used to rapid improvement. Without Li Shuang’s negative energy, her own spiritual roots would soon hit a wall. [Sheng Yuan is so useless he can’t shake her at all!]

Ye Zhao Zhao took a step forward and suddenly said: “First Senior Sister, I don’t actually blame you. There were so many Snow Fiends that day. It was normal to be afraid to step in. I remember Long Yan begged you anxiously to save me, and you scolded him. A Sword Spirit cannot resist its master, so he could only leave with you. First Senior Sister, Long Yan only wanted to save me. He didn’t mean to defy you. Please don’t be angry with him.”

A small, pleased feeling rose in her chest. She knew Long Yan would strike the fatal blow at the last moment. Although she didn’t know why Li Shuang had survived, she and Long Yan should already have fallen out.

[Li Shuang, Li Shuang. How does betrayal by the one you trust most feel?] She didn’t believe it wouldn’t stir negative emotion.

Sheng Yuan gave a cold laugh: “With a master like you, Long Yan was a pearl cast into dust.”

Li Shuang looked at the two of them and smiled. A sword engraved with dragon patterns appeared in her hand. It was the Dragon Roar Sword.

Ye Zhao Zhao’s gaze turned greedy. The Sword Pavilion housed many sword embryos. When disciples entered the pavilion, each was assigned one at random. How far a person could raise the sword and its Sword Spirit depended on their own ability. With nearly full luck, Li Shuang had forged her sword step by step into the current Dragon Roar Sword, and its power was well known.

Ye Zhao Zhao’s own luck was not so good. The sword embryo she selected had a very weak Sword Spirit. After so long, she still hadn’t awakened it. She had thrown that Black Abyss Sword into a corner and rarely used it. A sword like that didn’t deserve her. The Dragon Roar Sword should have been her true partner.

Unfortunately, the sect’s rules were strict. Although she had lured Long Yan into betraying Li Shuang, if she openly seized the Dragon Roar Sword, she would face heavy criticism. Originally, she had planned to go to the snowy summit after Li Shuang’s death and then take the sword with a clear name.

Who knew Li Shuang would return alive.

Li Shuang studied her quietly and said: “To make a Sword Spirit betray its master, Ye Zhao Zhao, you do have skill.”

Ye Zhao Zhao put on a hurt look and said: “First Senior Sister, what betrayal? He only wanted to save me.”

Li Shuang’s lips curved into a cold line: “A sword that turns on its master is not a sword I dare to use. I don’t want the Dragon Roar Sword.”