Chapter 181: Convergence and Conflict

The sudden change in the situation caught Su Chen completely off-guard. He had never seen something like this before.

"Qingluo, what's wrong?"

Gu Qingluo hurriedly clasped her arm and pressed on her wrist as she said, panicking, "It's sucking my blood...... Heavens, it's trying to take all of my energy away!"

Su Chen hurriedly tried to pull the Sky Armor off of her, but given how powerful its defenses were, how could Su Chen possibly hope to rip it off with brute strength?

Gu Qingluo yelled, panicked, "It's my bloodline power! It's trying to absorb my bloodline power!"

What?

Su Chen was stunned.

Could it be that it was her Origin Beast Bloodline that had incited this kind of response?

Wait a minute!

He suddenly realized that the Gu Clan’s blood was used to refine Lifesource Candles, whose effect of amplifying an Origin Skill’s power seemed eerily similar.

Could it be that this "divine being" was actually......

An idea suddenly popped into Su Chen's mind.

However, now was not the time to think about these theoretical things. Gu Qingluo’s bloodline was still being absorbed uncontrollably, so Su Chen calmed himself and said, “Qingluo, control your strength. You are its owner! Whether or not it takes your power is dependent on your will. If you don’t want to give it your power, then it can’t take it from you!”

“What should I do?” Gu Qingluo was beginning to panic.

Su Chen’s instructions sounded quite easy in theory, but the problem was that whatever was sucking away at Gu Qingluo’s bloodline had no intention of respecting her authority.

Su Chen lowered his head, deep in thought. “Any creature, even a divine one, must have a consciousness, and it is likely that the same holds true for the Sky Armor. Only by targeting its consciousness......”

“I can’t do it. My consciousness power is insufficient, and it’s also resisting me every step of the way,” Gu Qingluo said dismally while shaking her head.

“I’m also here.” Su Chen stepped forwards and hugged Gu Qingluo tightly as he gently said, “Release your consciousness and let me in!”

Gu Qingluo shut her eyes and opened up her consciousness without reserve to Su Chen.

Her entire heart was laid bare in this moment.

In that instant, their hearts became truly connected, and their wills melded, making it nearly impossible to distinguish between who was Gu Qingluo and who was Su Chen.

At that moment, however, a powerful will suddenly appeared.

A profound voice reverberated through the room as this powerful presence manifested itself. “Qingluo, what happened?”

It was one of the clan’s Ancestors!

Gu Qingluo felt her heart tremble.

Even though the Sky Armor had only caused a limited commotion, the fluctuations of Divine Power had still ended up catching one of the Gu Clan’s Ancestor’s eyes.

The Ancestor who had appeared was the Gu Clan’s Fourth Ancestor, Gu Xinrong.

Su Chen’s arrival was of utmost importance to the Ancestors, so Gu Xinrong had left a fragment of her will near their room to keep an eye on the situation. Any commotion would be immediately noticed by her.

Gu Qingluo was just about to reply when Su Chen instructed her not to be distracted.

They had reached the crux of the merging process, and no distractions would be tolerated.

Even though Gu Xinrong had nothing but good intentions, Su Chen found that her goodwill was impossible to accept in these conditions.

When Gu Xinrong received no response, she grew alert, and almost instinctively attempted to enter the room.

Her consciousness, however, was simply too powerful. It would definitely influence Su Chen and Gu Qingluo as soon as she entered the room, and as such, it was impossible for Su Chen to allow Gu Xinrong to ruin the situation. He had no time to explain, so he could only unleash a wave of consciousness power in an attempt to stop her from entering.

Boom!

A Divine Palace appeared behind his own head, and a wave of vast consciousness power enveloped the entire room.

Gu Xinrong discovered that her consciousness fragment had actually been prevented from entering the room.

What was happening?

Even though she had merely tried to send in a fragment of her will, she was still an Ultimate Emperor Realm cultivator, someone who stood at the peak of humanity. And yet, right now her consciousness fragment had been unceremoniously stopped at the door, causing her to immediately feel like she had lost face.

Gu Xinrong knew that Su Chen would never do anything that could harm Gu Qingluo, and that he probably had a good reason for keeping her outside. However, given her explosive personality and impatient temperament, her fighting spirit was kindled by the fact that a junior was trying to keep her out.

Oh? You’re not going to let me in? Well, I’m going to come in anyways.

She activated her consciousness power and began to pile on the pressure. Thankfully, the old woman knew how to hold back a little. Instead of immediately coming at him with her full strength, she slowly ramped up the amount of consciousness energy.

Su Chen could sense the increasing pressure bearing down upon him, but there was nothing he could do.

The situation was just too urgent. He had no focus to spare, so he could only discard all other thoughts and concentrate on merging his consciousness with Gu Qingluo’s as he responded to Gu Xinrong by tapping into his own consciousness power stores.

Even though Su Chen was only at the Spirit Burning Realm, he had formed an extremely stable Divine Palace, and his soul mastery had already reached the Tenth-Ring level — when he had ascended to the Spirit Burning Realm, his soul mastery had also increased by a tier.

Tenth-Ring Arcana Masters could hold their own against high-layer Thought Manifestation Realm cultivators. When this foundation was supplemented with Su Chen Spirit Burning Realm cultivation base and his exceptionally vast consciousness power, it was safe to say that Su Chen’s consciousness power was virtually unrivalled throughout the entire country.

As such, Gu Xinrong felt like she had run into a steel wall, and that there was seemingly no way for her to break through.

This shocked her quite badly, but she continued to pour her consciousness in in an attempt to break through.

Su Chen cursed madly in his heart.

Even though his consciousness wasn’t weaker than Gu Xinrong’s in any way, consciousness power didn’t exist in a vacuum, and personal skill also mattered. More importantly, he was attempting to merge his consciousness with Gu Qingluo’s at the same time, and Gu Xinrong’s pressure was distracting him from that process.

He could only curse silently at Gu Xinrong for being so untactful and do his best to hold on.

The two of them quickly sank deep into an invisible battle that was fought on the level of a person’s consciousness.

Su Chen was beginning to find it hard to breathe, which only caused his curses to intensify.

His consciousness had started the process of merging with Gu Qingluo’s, so Gu Qingluo could also sense the ferocity of his irritation. There was nothing she could do but roll her eyes.

“Hm? What cultivation method has this kid been practicing? Why is his consciousness that powerful?” The old woman had long since forgotten about any official business that she had to take care of and was instead now focusing on the pressure coming from Su Chen.

Hold on!

Hold on!

Su Chen yelled repeatedly in his heart.

Their mind meld was almost complete. At this point, there was only a little bit left.

The clock was ticking down, but Su Chen had started coughing up blood.

The old woman didn’t know what was going on, and her efforts only grew stronger.

Ten.

Nine.

Eight…

Time passed by second by second, but to Su Chen, those seconds almost felt like years.

Even Gu Qingluo was filled with a paranoid fear.

She feared that Su Chen wouldn’t be able to withstand the Ancestor’s might and would be killed on the spot.

However, Su Chen gritted his teeth and refused to let go.

He knew that stopping the process now would basically undo all of their progress, and that they would miss a critical opportunity at stopping the armor’s invasion. It was entirely possible that Gu Qingluo would be sucked dry if he let go.

As such, he needed to endure no matter what.

Gu Qingluo could sense Su Chen’s determination in that moment because of their consciousness connection.

And in that moment, she was deeply moved.

She finally believed that Su Chen truly loved her.

He could come up with a plan and bow down to an enemy for Zhu Xianyao, but he could also put his life on the line by fighting against an Ultimate Emperor Realm cultivator for her.

Tender feelings began to swell within her heart.

Four.

Three.

Two.

One!

Success!

Their consciousnesses finally merged, dissolving the final boundary of distinction between them.

Su Chen could sense Gu Qingluo’s love for him deep within his heart, not from reading any superficial social cue. In a way, it somewhat felt like he was in love with himself. Gu Qingluo could also sense Su Chen’s towering ambition and his boundless knowledge, as well as his similarly deep love for her. Finally, Su Chen’s consciousness energy flooded into her being like an unstoppable sea. It was both his and hers.

She closed her eyes, and yet she could still sense everything around her.

Gu Qingluo could immediately sense Su Chen’s intentions without even opening her mouth. She immediately knew what to do.

At the same time, Su Chen could finally speak.

He spat out a large mouthful of blood as he barked, “You old coot, stop! Stop! Stop! Are you trying to kill Qingluo and me?”

Gu Xinrong trembled as she immediately stopped pressuring Su Chen. “What is going on in there?”

“We can talk about it later. Withdraw your consciousness energy now, or else you can’t blame me for being impolite. Damn, you almost killed me!!!” Su Chen cursed angrily.

Gu Xinrong went pale with anger, but she also knew that she had probably caused a great deal of trouble for Su Chen and Gu Qingluo. Her face reddened, but she ultimately remained silent as she hurriedly withdrew her consciousness power.

If it had been any junior other than Su Chen, she probably would have slapped them to death for speaking to her in that tone even if she was the one in the wrong.

Gu Qingluo gathered her consciousness energy and began to infuse it into the Sky Armor. Very quickly, she began to sense some kind of response out of the armor.

The armor’s will appeared somewhat hazy, and it was clearly lacking in intelligence. However, it was unbelievably vast, preventing Gu Qingluo’s consciousness from entering the armor.

Gu Qingluo knew that this was the Sky Armor’s consciousness. Or, was it an element of its divinity?

The Sky Armor had originally been an inanimate object, but after being imbued with a divine spirit and the faith of the masses, it had developed a consciousness.

Because this consciousness was still maturing, it typically remained hidden, choosing only to manifest itself at critical moments.

Such as now, when it had sensed the power of Gu Qingluo’s bloodline.

This was akin to the instinctive thirst of a baby for its mother’s milk.

The Sky Armor was just as desperate for Divine Power.

It had lost the nourishment of the Mother Goddess Sect, and at that moment of extreme thirst, it had suddenly sensed the smell of fragrant milk nearby.

Even though this new milk’s scent was different from its mother’s, milk was still milk.

That explained what had just transpired.

Gu Qingluo felt a lot more confident after understanding what had happened.

She began to try and convince Sky Armor to not be so greedy.

However, the growing consciousness also behaved like a child, and there was no reasoning with it. If it wanted to eat, then it wanted to eat. It left no room for negotiation.

Gu Qingluo felt completely helpless.

Thankfully, Su Chen was also present.

Through Su Chen’s consciousness, Gu Qingluo knew exactly what she needed to do.

If you don’t have intelligence, then I’ll give you intelligence!

A moment later, Gu Qingluo began to infuse the armor with her consciousness.

A vast will began to surge into the armor.

If the will’s intention was to wipe out the armor’s consciousness, then the armor’s consciousness would have fought back. But since this will was being offered to it as a supplement, the armor’s consciousness didn’t hesitate to take it in.

However, this will was also imbued with Su Chen and Gu Qingluo’s human intelligence. When the armor’s consciousness absorbed this strand of will, it also absorbed this intelligence.

Actually, the end effect was even stronger than anticipated because the intelligence had appeared too suddenly. As soon as that spark of intelligence appeared, it overtook and overpowered the primitive consciousness from before. In other words, this Sky Armor had basically become a clone of the merged Su Chen and Gu Qingluo.

Since it was now a duplicate of her will, it was only natural that it didn’t want to hurt her anymore.

The Sky Armor’s strap began to loosen.

Gu Qingluo let out a long sigh of relief. She inspected her bloodline power and found that eighty percent of it had been absorbed in this brief period of time. “Thank goodness. Any longer and I would have been sucked dry by this guy.”

“It’s my fault. I put you in harm’s way,” Su Chen said in shame.

Their consciousness separated, and the feeling of being so closely joined together disappeared along with it. As such, they could only rely on words to communicate again.

But Gu Qingluo didn’t seem to mind. “You didn’t know that this would happen. And we were able to gather some good fortune in the midst of disaster. Now, this Sky Armor truly belongs to us. Without my permission in the future, no one else will be able to use it.

Yes, the Sky Armor had truly officially recognized a new master this time, and it would only obey Su Chen and Gu Qingluo in the future.

As for the bloodline power that Gu Qingluo had lost, she would be able to recuperate it after just a few days of eating and sleeping well.

Su Chen, however, had lost a significant portion of his consciousness energy, and the Ancestor’s actions had also tormented him quite badly. However, in his eyes, such a price was worth gaining the Sky Armor’s complete loyalty.

“Su Chen, may I come in now?” Gu Xinrong asked.

She only asked this time after hearing the two of them talking to each other.

Su Chen frowned. “Troublemaker! If only you were this polite earlier.”

An Ultimate Emperor Realm cultivator and the ancestor of an Origin Beast Bloodline clan was casually called ‘troublemaker’ by Su Chen. Gu Xinrong almost spat out a mouthful of blood.