The Rise of the Winter Wolf - Book 5 - Chapter 14.3 - Conjunction Part III (Patreon)

                                       The Other Side of Wolf’s Portable System Store

Crystal wasn’t sure how she felt about Wolf . The guy was always a goal to strive towards since the start of the dungeon. Someone who excelled in most of what they did and almost always came out on top somehow.

The most powerful Competitor by leaps and bounds.

But now… how do I still catch up to him if he’s not even in the same damned dungeon as me?! He was given a handicap for heaven’s sake! He’s not even a Competitor anymore!

Crystal can’t help but feel even more conflicting thoughts as she looks at Wolf, who is just sitting on his couch like nothing had happened. Like everything was still just as it was in the last Conjunctions, where the two of them, along with Norbert and Ariana would just lounge around chatting with Sapphire avoiding them all the entire time.

Many people think it’s rather clear that Crystal has feelings for Wolf. And even Crystal isn’t sure about that. Whether she has feelings for him or not.

Not that it would matter, considering his apparent lack of interest in romance.

Crystal glances at Sapphire who is lounging around on a different couch, just reading a book on the System Forums while leaning with her arms out over the edge of the couch and her face almost smack dab into the screen as she reads. And just the sight of it makes a wave of sadness rush through Crystal. At how she initially treated the girl, scaring her off most likely forever.

Or at least until she’s mentally a teenager or something.

“I came because master told me that I needed allies in the dungeon,” Crystal’s head jerks around as she hears Ruth say this, only to narrow her eyes at the girl who had robbed her more than once by now. “And since my master is planning on getting married with your adoptive mother, I thought you would work.”

Crystal’s eyes widen at that before she turns to look at Wolf, just to find him looking vaguely surprised as well. But it doesn’t last for long before he returns to his usual laidback and neutral expression.

“I guess it doesn’t hurt to have another ally,” Wolf says while focusing on Ruth, to which she nods her head and simply walks over to a couch and sits down, not saying another word. Then he turns his focus to Alaric, who has simply been snooping around the room nonstop since arriving – just walking around and checking everything out. “And why are you here, Techral?”

I guess he really doesn’t know the guy…

The man in question just continues snooping around as he answers, “Oh, I don’t know, just checking out your place.”

“Why?” Wolf asks, a genuinely confused frown on his face.

Techral just continues looking around for a moment before finally turning around and answering, “Well, at first it was because I wanted to test if I could steal some of your luck while we were here.” Wolf’s eyes narrow and a faint frosty mist begins leaking out of both him and Sapphire at those words, but the man quickly backs up and raises his hands to say, “Woah, woah, hold your horses. I said test to see if I could! I was gonna return it right away!”

The mist doesn’t disappear as Wolf asks, “Was ‘gonna return it’? Explain.”

“Weeelll…” Techral begins, dragging out his words in a rather annoying way before simply shrugging and saying, “I tried, and it didn’t work.”

Crystal blinks in surprise. Ruth ignores everything to pull up the System Forums while Ariana and Norbert just sit down and have their own conversation. Wolf just frowns harder. And Sapphire snorts before returning to her book.

“And why not?” Wolf asks while tapping his finger on the arm of the couch.

“Because of whatever it is you’re wearing around your neck,” Techral says while stopping in the middle of the room with his arms held behind his head. “Whatever it is seems to be blocking my luck element from working.”

Crystal notices everyone who previously wasn’t paying attention suddenly begin paying attention as the man finally reveals the truth about his powers. That they are indeed from the luck element.

“You can see it?” Wolf asks with a frown, and everyone can’t help but glance at his chest, where they don’t find anything.

What are they talking about?

“No, but I can definitely sense some sort of void there that’s simply absorbing and eliminating any luck element that gets near you, along with other conceptual elements,” Techral says with a frown, “it’s kind of annoying.”

I think that may have been the first time I’ve seen him show an expression other than that annoying grin and his smile…

Crystal turns away from him to open the System Forums before looking up what a conceptual element is.

An element that involves a concept instead of an actual natural element. How descriptive… wait, this one’s better. A list of various concept elements, such as luck, curse, creation, destruction, time, space, mental, and anima. And all concept elements are the rarest elements in existence, with the only ones that are rarer being the variant elements belonging to harbingers.

She raises her head to glance at Wolf at the mention of harbingers before turning back to Techral again as he asks, “Any idea what that thing is, anyways?”

She looks back at Wolf again when he answers, “No idea. Just that it’s from a progenitor.”

Crystal feels a shiver run down her spine at the mention of the beings that are apparently on the level of gods.

Even though she doesn’t know the full story behind them, she knows purely just from seeing The Reaper that they’re all powerful beyond any single mortal. Not even Wolf will ever likely be able to touch them.

And yet… he’s connected with three of them in some way. It’s just unbelievable.

Crystal can’t help but give up on ever being able to catch up to him at that thought alone.

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