Hoarding Goddesses' Affection

Chapter 003

Ten months into his transmigration to this world. Only sixty days remained until the fateful Awakening Ceremony.

On the top floor of the Spirit Martial Academy's administrative building, the door to May Lewis's private office was shut tight. Inside this room, tightly sealed by soundproofing arrays and a constant-temperature system, the air felt somewhat scorching.

May Lewis—revered in the West Martial Military District as the Tier-5 powerhouse "Tactical Master Sonya"—was currently standing before the massive floor-to-ceiling window. Wearing her signature charcoal-grey tailored suit that accentuated her breathtakingly perfect curves, her icy profile, illuminated by the setting sun, exuded a forbidding majesty that kept people at a thousand miles' distance.

However, the other person in this room was clearly immune to such majesty.

Leo Shaw lounged lazily on the exceedingly expensive leather sofa, his long legs crossed, holding a freshly graded exam paper on "High-Tier Mutant Beast Anatomy." The bright red "100" at the top of the page was exceptionally glaring.

"Another perfect score." Sonya didn't turn around, but her voice held not a shred of praise; instead, it revealed deep worry and a faint irritability. "Leo, your theoretical knowledge has already surpassed that of most professors in the academy. But you know better than I do that in this world, a perfect score on paper won't stop even a single, weakest Tier-1 Iron-Spike Cactus."

Leo raised his eyelids, a flash of cold calculation passing through his profound dark eyes.

For the past ten months, he had perfectly played the role of a "corporate young master who possessed an absolute genius brain but was destined to never awaken high-tier martial power." This contrast, to a strong, fiercely protective, and extremely responsible female powerhouse like Sonya, was the most fatal temptation. Subconsciously, she had already placed Leo within her "absolute protection circle."

But what Leo wanted had never been protection. What he wanted was absolute domination.

"The Awakening Ceremony is only two months away." Sonya finally turned around, walking briskly over to the sofa. Her obsidian eyes stared fixedly at Leo, the usual mask of the "Ice Queen" showing a c***k, revealing undisguised anxiety. "I hacked into the military district's medical database yesterday and reviewed your bone age and Spirit Vein scans again. B-tier... or even C-tier. Leo, if this is your limit, what will you do if your father's enemies or the Fiend Sect strike, while your sister Sia is far away at the Azure Dragon Academy?"

"So what, Professor?" Leo tilted his head slightly, a careless smile curling the corners of his lips. "Are you going to provide me with twenty-four-hour close protection?"

"If you need it, I will apply to the military district for a transfer and draft you into my private logistics staff team," Sonya blurted out.

The weight of this sentence was immense. For a rising Tier-5 military star to ruin her own future for a student with no blood relation to her—this was practically equivalent to the deepest of confessions.

But Leo's heart remained completely undisturbed; he even wanted to check off a box for this perfect "feedback data."

Just then, Sonya's brows suddenly locked in pain. She abruptly clutched her chest, several distinct veins bulging instantly on her previously pale neck. An extremely violent, scorching dark-red flame—her innate "Vermilion Bird Fire"—spilled uncontrollably from her fingertips, instantly reducing the solid wood edge of the office desk to ashes.

"Ugh..." Sonya gritted her teeth, forcefully channeling her Spirit Power to suppress the rampaging flames within her body, fine beads of cold sweat breaking out on her forehead.

If it had been an ordinary student, they would have been terrified into fleeing out the door by now. But Leo didn't move.

With an extremely professional, cold, and greedy gaze, he watched every detail of Sonya's Spirit Power rampage. Over the past few months, he had leafed through countless ancient texts, and through an immensely massive amount of calculation, reverse-engineered Sonya's cultivation technique. He had waited for this "flaw" for three whole months.

"Forcefully pressing the 'Vermilion Bird Fire' into the third collateral meridian near the heart meridian, trading this for an instantaneous increase in explosive power." Leo's voice suddenly rang out in the quiet office. He was no longer the lazy corporate young master, but spoke with an absolute confidence, like a god looking down upon mortals, stating a simple fact.

Sonya jerked her head up, looking at him in shock, even her action to suppress the flames pausing for a moment. "How... how do you know?" This was a top military secret; not even her direct superior was aware of this hidden injury in her technique.

Leo slowly stood up. He didn't use any Spirit Power, but as he walked toward Sonya, the oppressive feeling of extreme rationality radiating from him actually made the Tier-5 powerhouse Sonya instinctively want to step back.

"Not only do I know you are drinking poison to quench your thirst, I also know that if you continue to forcefully circulate this flawed cycle every full moon, in three years at most, your heart meridian will be completely burned through by the Vermilion Bird Fire."

Leo walked up to Sonya, the distance between them far breaching the boundaries of social safety, standing merely four inches apart. He could even feel the astonishing heat wave radiating from Sonya and the sandalwood scent belonging to a mature woman.

"What do you know? This is the price of surviving on the battlefield..." Sonya attempted to don the armor of the "Ice Queen" once more, trying to push Leo away with a cold face.

But Leo's movements were faster than hers. Or rather, he had accurately predicted her psychological defenses.

Suddenly, Leo reached out and firmly grasped Sonya's right wrist, which was still entwined with residual Vermilion Bird Fire.

The scorching high temperature instantly burned red the palm of Leo's hand, which lacked any Spirit Power protection, but he didn't even furrow a brow. His strong, powerful fingers pressed down on Sonya's pulse with extreme firmness, his thumb precisely pressing against the "Shenmen Acupoint" on the inside of her wrist.

"You're crazy! You'll cripple your hand!" Sonya cried out in shock, her internal defenses collapsing instantly in the face of Leo's nearly self-mutilating, domineering act. She frantically tried to withdraw her Spirit Power, terrified of hurting this "fragile" mortal.

"Listen, Sonya." Leo suddenly lowered his voice, a deep, husky baritone full of magnetism and absolute command. He didn't call her Professor, but addressed her directly by name.

He lowered his head slightly, his pitch-black eyes like bottomless black holes, locking dead onto Sonya's flustered gaze.

"When your Spirit Power flows to the Shaochong Acupoint, forcefully divert fifteen percent of the Spirit Air into the Taiyuan Acupoint. This will reduce your explosive power by 0.5 seconds, but it will perfectly bypass the load on your heart meridian." Leo spoke extremely fast, every word he spat out like a precise scalpel, cutting open the fatal dead knot in Sonya's technique.

Sonya was stunned. Her brain, acting as a high-level military tactical board, completed the route deduction Leo described almost instantly.

Perfect. Simply flawlessly perfect. A fatal hidden injury that had plagued her for three years was actually resolved so effortlessly by an eighteen-year-old youth with less than C-tier potential, using pure theoretical knowledge.

In this moment, Leo's image in her eyes underwent an earth-shattering change. He was no longer the fragile cub that needed to be protected under her wing, but an unfathomable... monster, who grasped the truths capable of overturning the life and death of the strong.

"You keep saying you want to protect me." Leo still hadn't released her wrist. He took a step further, his chest almost pressing against her collar. He lowered his head, bringing his lips to Sonya's ear, his warm breath hitting her sensitive auricle, sparking an uncontrollable shudder within her.

"But, Sonya... you can't even protect yourself. You fierce Vermilion Bird, who exactly is protecting whom here?"

This was an extremely fatal psychological "Push and Pull." First, Leo shattered Sonya's pride with an overwhelming amount of knowledge. Immediately following, he used a highly aggressive masculine posture to break the ethical boundaries between student and teacher. Finally, with a possessive taunt, he completely dragged Sonya down from the pedestal of the "protector," turning her into a piece on his chessboard, utterly psychologically dominated.

Sonya's breathing became completely chaotic. Her cheeks burned red all the way to the roots of her ears, and her heart rate was even faster than when her Spirit Power had rampaged just now. She had lived for over twenty years, crawling out of piles of corpses, yet she had never faced such a terrifying emotional assault.

"Insolent..." Sonya bit her lip, forcefully pulling her hand back. But this time, she didn't even dare to look into Leo's eyes.

She turned around, her back to Leo, resting her hands on the edge of the desk. She took several deep breaths of the ozone-scented air, trying to piece back together her dignity as an instructor and a soldier.

"Your theory... I will go verify it." Sonya's voice still trembled slightly. She jerked her head back, looking at Leo with an extremely complex gaze—one that contained awe, anger, shyness, and a trace of secret submission.

To cover up her loss of composure, she brought out her strictest face, issuing an eviction order through gritted teeth. "Now, get the hell back to your dorm! And bandage that hand!"

Leo looked at his scorched red palm, the corners of his mouth curling into a victor's smile. A minor epidermal burn in exchange for the absolute devotion of a Tier-5 powerhouse—the profit margin on this trade was outrageously high.

"As you wish, Professor." Leo bowed elegantly and slightly, reverting to his lazy demeanor as he turned and walked toward the door.

"And!" Just as Leo's hand rested on the doorknob, Sonya's stern voice came from behind, carrying a warning tinged with embarrassment and anger. "Tomorrow morning's 'Mutants & Monsters' class, I will be focusing on the ecological weaknesses of the 'Earth Demon Bear' and the 'Iron-Spike Cactus.' Leo Shaw, if you dare to sleep on your desk like you usually do..."

She paused, taking a deep breath.

"I swear, I will personally smash your head open with a piece of chalk!"

Leo didn't look back; he simply waved his hand over his shoulder.

As the door lock clicked shut, Leo walked into the somewhat dim corridor. The hallway lights hit his handsome face, illuminating the cold sneer of a dictator stripped of all emotion, leaving only ultimate calculation.

The iceberg had been completely melted. Next, all he had to do was wait for the storm to arrive.