Astral Pet Store (WN)

Chapter 98: Inferno Dragon

Su Ping intended to try the pool out straight away. Perhaps he could get lucky with it. Besides, he was still under the beginner’s protection according to the system; each incubation would only cost him 10% its original price during this period. Afterwards, he would need to pay 10,000 energy points for each attempt.

He had an egg still kept inside a nursing pen which had yet to hatch. He still had no idea what kind of pet would be born out of it. Using the incubation pool to directly get a pet sounded like a good idea.

“My balance… After earning a million, which was converted to ten thousand energy points, I used it to level up the pool. Now I have seven thousand points remaining, which means seven incubation chances.”

Of course, he couldn’t use up all the points because he still needed some to get his mission done. That is, the specialized training session. To be safe, he would save up a few thousand energy points for this job.

A failed incubation means a thousand points thrown down the drain. Gosh, this is madness.

A thousand energy points were equal to 100,000 Yuan in cash. That was almost a year’s worth of tuition for Su Lingyue. Average workers in the city usually needed two or three years to earn that much money.

Su Ping stood in front of the incubation pool, crossed his fingers, and offered prayers to a bunch of random gods and deities he could think of.

Then he took a deep breath and activated the pool.

[Energy points -1,000]

The incubation pool brightened up as soon as it received his “payment.” The light was naturally stronger than the last time when the pool was still at level 2. When standing nearby, Su Ping could feel that the astral power radiating from it had grown at least ten times richer than before.

A while later, the light dimmed down and revealed a Rock Lion cub sitting at the bottom of the pool, curiously looking at Su Ping with its amber-like eyes.

This was a disappointment. The lion was a common fifth-rank pet easily found on the market. Selling as it was would get him roughly 100,000 Yuan. That was about it.

He gently carried the small feline in his hands and had his arm tickled as the creature happily nudged him. Looking at the cub’s twinkling, puppy-doll eyes somewhat cured his frustration.

After giving it several playful head-rubs, he sent it to a nursing pen and returned to the incubation pool.

Another 1,000 points gone.

The astral power in the pool seemed to be lasting longer this time. Like a whirlpool, the energy swirled around for a while, before it condensed at the bottom of the pool and started shrinking.

The retreating light first gave way to a red, slim and pointy tail. For a moment, Su Ping thought he was expecting a snake or something similar.

He was proven wrong when he saw a pair of tiny wings stretching open.

It was a dragon, the “meta pet” in the current world. Su Ping went wide-eyed as he recognized this awesome species.

That’s an Inferno Dragon… A ninth-rank dragon-type pet.

Compared to Beast Kings that were always a rare sight in this world, ninth-rank Astral Pets usually had a bigger population and variety. Even common civilians who had no business with Astral Pets would know some of the famous ones since they appeared in online advertisements on a daily basis. For instance, many titled battle pet warriors would take their ninth-rank pets and become brand ambassadors for certain products to get some quick money. As a result, the images of several ninth-rank pets could be seen everywhere, from random street posters to large advertising screens in the cities’ downtown areas.

Having a powerful ninth-rank Astral Pet meant looking cool in battles. For this reason, film production companies and sponsors alike always seeked to have them in their footage to attract more customers.

This Inferno Dragon was one of the best among all ninth-rank pets. The Silver-Winged Dragon and the Thunder Basilisk who made their appearance in the academy were both ninth-rank upon reaching maturity, yet they would all fall short when compared with an Inferno Dragon.

There was a group of experts who maintained a ranking list for ninth-rank pets and kept it updated. On the list, an Inferno Dragon was always within the top ten. Or the top three, if people only looked at dragon-type pets.

“Oh sh*t oh sh*t oh sh*t. I hit the jackpot!”

Su Ping didn’t know the exact value of an Inferno Dragon, as nobody could easily find it on sale. Not even in the black markets.

The small dragon was currently gazing at him warily, with a pair of bright red eyes that seemed to be on fire. It had its body covered in beautiful red scales that looked almost polished. The only thing ruining its overall image was the pair of undeveloped wings that looked like plucked chicken wings. There was no way it could fly with them at the moment.

Su Ping couldn’t persuade himself to look away now. A level-3 incubation pool should have a very low probability of creating a top-tier pet. It seemed that his luck was in full swing that day.

The Inferno Dragon whelp opened its mouth and yelled at Su Ping as a warning. Though it only sounded like a cat’s purr.

Just like humans, newborn Astral Pets tended to have different characters from the beginning. Looking unfriendly was, in fact, a good perk, because the dragon might be more intelligent. Training it could be harder, yet the result was very likely to be sweeter.

Su Ping quickly made a pact with it. When this was done, Su Ping found a new consciousness full of anxiety and doubt connected to his mind.

It seemed that the dragon whelp would see everything in this world as a threat for the moment, except for its master.

Su Ping carefully picked it up and felt its warm and smooth scales, whereas the whelp kept edging away from his embrace. He then placed the small creature inside a nursing pen to let it take in some anima aura as soon as possible, so it could grow strong enough to fight.

Since he still had more points to spare, he decided to keep trying and see whether he could get an even better result.

His streak didn’t keep up though. The third attempt ended up as a complete failure. He used an additional thousand points and got nothing in return.

Damn. 100,000 Yuan went down the gutter. This thing is the biggest money drain I’ve ever heard of.

The system spoke in his mind, “As aforementioned, the incubation pool may experience exceptional failure, causing fruitless results. The chances of such failures occurring will decrease as the level of the pool increases. A maxed-out incubation pool will no longer yield such failures.”

“It failed once out of two last time, then it happened again on the third try today. Isn’t it a little bit too high??”

“This is beyond the system’s control.”

“Ugh, forget it. Or, can you at least refund half of the wasted points to me?”

“Currently using a proper response as observed from the host to address such a question: ‘piss off’.”

“…You got me. Fine.”

Su Ping was once again reminded of the saddening fact that he should never try to reason with this shameless system. The incubation pool was another of its many traps to burn his energy points away. He might find chances to get large amounts of energy points in the future, but the system would always force him to spend them!

He was left with a little above four thousand points. Using the points on the incubation pool during the “beginner’s protection period” was a good choice, but he couldn’t do that now, as he needed some points to ensure a successful outcome for his mission. Perhaps he could try again later, once the emergency mission was done.