Chapter 374: You Look Poor
After Lin Sanjiu answered, silence shrouded the lane that lead people to the castle. Three pairs of eyes glared at her.
Even Snow White—who had been blustering and demanding Lin Sanjiu not to betray her—stared at her wide-eyed. It seemed that not even she had anticipated this sudden turn of events.
She stammered for a few seconds before the words finally came out, "For real?"
Rolling her eyes, Lin Sanjiu ignored Snow White and locked gazes with the colossal duck twice her size.
She could see through the misty night that Scrooge McDuck pursed his bill with regret and dissatisfaction at her answer. Wearing a disapproving expression, he tutted while tilting his head to look at Lin Sanjiu.
He seemed confounded, "I don't understand why you would make such a decision. There was a solid vote in favor of my presidency to rule the kingdom. This young lady here is unsatisfied with the result, but there is nothing she can do; society has to move forward."
Scrooge McDuck shrugged, opened his wings and continued, "Everything was done transparently in the most professional way, open and aboveboard. I have done nothing to be sorry for. However, if you choose to help Snow White due to sympathy, then you might be wrong. She's just missing her royal prerogative as a princess."
Scrooge McDuck was apparently known for his eloquence as he seemed to have a knack for playing with his words. Lin Sanjiu found no way to parry his points. She glanced furtively between the daughter and the father and shook her head. With a stern and resolute tone, she restated her answer, "I can't give you a clear answer regarding my selection over a lesser option which obviously brings me nothing good even if you asked me. I merely think that this is the right thing to do."
The commiserate expression grew intense on Scrooge McDuck's face.
"What a waste, what a waste. You seem to be a youngster who has a bright future, yet you made the worst of the worst decisions…" He brushed the invisible dust off his coat with his wings and looked down at Lin Sanjiu through his pince-nez glasses as his irises narrowed into two vertical lines, "All right then, what do you guys want from me?"
Lin Sanjiu went blank. He had gotten her good as she had never thought about this question before. Just as Lin Sanjiu considered how to reply to him, and before she could voice out her response, Snow White jumped in and tugged her sleeve while gritting her teeth, "Let's kill him. After all, he is just a duck!"
To be honest, Lin Sanjiu felt Snow White's stepmother was her birth mother when she exposed her vicious side. Annoyed, Lin Sanjiu shook her hand away and spoke with a rather harsh tone, "Do it yourself if you can. I won't kill a person without any reason."
"You won't? How about my prince? Why did you kill him, then?" Snow White refuted, her words were dripping with sarcasm. However, she corrected herself when she saw Lin Sanjiu's blackened face and threatening gaze, "Fine if that won't work. I want him to return the kingdom to my father, then!"
"This sounded even harder than killing a duck." Before Snow White's voice had dissolved in the wind, and before Lin Sanjiu could reply, a boisterous laughter echoed in the alley. Snow White's naivety tickled Scrooge McDuck so much that he pounded his stomach. He didn't mind that such actions might ruffle his finely groomed feathers.
"There is only one way in and no way out once it's in my possession. That applies to everything," he lifted his glasses and wiped the tear that dangled at the corner of his eyes, "Give it a shot anyway, visitor. Never try, never know; perhaps, you might be the first one in the world to force I, the great Scrooge McDuck, to return what I have taken."
Lin Sanjiu's chest seized. She quickly darted a glance at him as she somehow had caught the meaning in between his lines.
"Is he trying to say that I can get extra Stamina Points here?"
In the Starry Carnival Amusement Park, there was only one way for the players to earn extra Stamina Points. Aside from clearing the attraction, if the players did something that was useful for himself or promoted the storyline, then he could get extra Stamina Points when he exited the attraction.
"Perhaps, Scrooge McDuck is one of the Score Points."
A small smile finally found its way to Lin Sanjiu's lips the moment she figured it all out.
"A little bird told me that the people with deep pockets usually cherish their life more than a dirt-poor person. I want to test the truthiness of that statement," Lin Sanjiu said without looking at Snow White and her father, "The life of yours, for the seat of president. What do you think?"
Scrooge McDuck wasn't affected by Lin Sanjiu's threat and gave her a beaming grin instead. He cracked a half laugh, "Too young. You're still too young to go against…"
However, before the duck could finish his sentence, the woman in front of him suddenly disappeared, giving him a false impression that nobody was there in the beginning. Even the air was still, dead like a pool of dead water.
Scared, Scrooge McDuck jumped two steps back and yelled, "Bodyguard!"
The air surrounding the duck moved once he spoke the word. A few blurred shadows appeared, and ethereal forms began to materialize. Once they had morphed into the figure of a few men in black, they all pounced forward and collided with Lin Sanjiu.
Bang!
Even a high-speed rail paled in the face of Lin Sanjiu current strength and speed. That being said, the few men in black held themselves rather well confronting such brute force. They all intercepted Lin Sanjiu, didn't budge, and rooted their feet firm into the ground in front of her like a huge wall.
"Haha, did you see that? My bodyguards are—" Scrooge McDuck couldn't finish his sentence as what was happening had stunned him. His glasses fell halfway on the tip of his bill. Even Snow White who was hiding far away from them couldn't help but cheer when she saw the scene.
Lin Sanjiu emerged from the top of the few men in black. She still wore her calm and aplomb expression as she swept her gaze over Scrooge McDuck. She gave the bodyguards a light push, and all of them flopped to the ground like a bunch of fish without spines.
At the moment they crashed into each other, Lin Sanjiu had tugged them forward with their neckties and gave each of them a solid headbutt. As a result, the bodyguards fell unconscious. Bruises covered their foreheads, and blood starting to seep out.
Lin Sanjiu couldn't hide her triumphant smile seeing that the few bodyguards wouldn't recover from their unconscious state anytime soon. She clapped her hands and looked at Scrooge McDuck, "What did you say? I can't hear it quite well. Can you run it by me again?"
Scrooge McDuck stared into the eyes of his bodyguards and realized the shock expression still remained on their faces even after they had passed out. As he slowly pulled himself together, he laughed. It seemed that he did not take Lin Sanjiu's mockery to heart, "Seems like I have underestimated you, little girl. I should change my previous statement, then: my bodyguards are not that strong after all."
"These people were not here from the beginning as I didn't sense their presence," Lin Sanjiu strode over the motionless bodies. Locking her gaze on Scrooge McDuck, she said firmly, "I suppose that you summon them, am I right?"
Based on the perception of being the only human being here, Lin Sanjiu slashed the option that these bodyguards were human out from her list. Nevertheless, they did give a different impression to her than characters such as Mickey and Snow White alike. Standing on this idea, there was only one possibility left—
"Yeah," without beating around the bush, Scrooge McDuck admitted readily. He then offered a smile to her, "You're now facing my ability."
[Scrooge McDuck Power]
In this world, there were only two things that came to mind when they spoke of Scrooge McDuck: absolute power and wealth. As a president, he had the Congress in his hand. Every word—even a quack—that came out of his bill would be approved without dissent by Congress. Rumors also said that his assets were so immense that if somebody converted his wealth into gold coins, it would flood half of the planet. Hence, regardless of what you were, be it a human or a duck, once you had those two things in your hand, you had supreme power.
"No matter how overpowered your ability is," Lin Sanjiu said grimly. She raised her hand and activated her hypersensory, "You have no combat capability, and that is the reason for your downfall."
Yes, Scrooge McDuck wasn't a combat person. Truth to be told, he was nothing different from an unevolved human. He was slow and weak. If it weren't Lin Sanjiu was on her guard, she wouldn't even use the combat technique that Hei Zeji had taught to her.
As if moving in unison with her movement, the layers of air current moved frantically in a circle around her. It spun faster and faster, and once it had reached its maximum momentum, it surged forward toward Scrooge McDuck. Although the attack wasn't as strong or versatile as the one used by Hei Zeji and Puppeteer, it was more than enough to deal with a weakling such as—
Suddenly, her intuition kicked in and intercepted her thought. She jumped as if she was stung by a needle.
The enormous attack that could split the heaven and devour the earth had smashed into something a few centimeters in front of Scrooge McDuck and brought forth a storm. The thing had the same attribution as her attack. It had no form, contained boundless power, and Lin Sanjiu would've recognized it anywhere. It was the air current, shaped and formed in the same way as she does.
"Scrooge McDuck knows this combat technique as well?"
Lin Sanjiu narrowed her eyes amidst the turbulence. She stared in disbelief at the duck.
"Phew, that was something." As if he knew what Lin Sanjiu was thinking, Scrooge McDuck adjusted his glasses. His entire being seemed perfectly unaffected, keeping his neat appearance behind the storm aside from a few feathers of his, which were disheveled by the storm. There was nobody by his side, but he stretched one of his wings and said courteously, "Thank you all for your help. As promised, here are the 5 Stamina Points for each of you."
Under Lin Sanjiu's intense and wooden gaze, Scrooge McDuck extended his wing and the winds wafted through his wing as if they were collecting their Stamina Points. Meanwhile, the attack she unleashed earlier had dissipated.
"What's wrong? You seem a bit nonplussed." Scrooge McDuck cast Lin Sanjiu a sidelong glance and flattened his messy feathers. "Fundamentally, your attack was made up of wind, so I spent a few pennies to make the air fight with the air. What's so hard about it? While we're at it, I might as well remind you that everything in this vicinity is now under the effect of my ability. Within this domain, the unthinkable is possible. Everything you see, touch, or feel has become a part of my business."
Lin Sanjiu had fallen into a perfect daze. Her brain burned so she couldn't react.
"Since you're the visitor, my wealth is calculated as Stamina Points." Scrooge McDuck said slowly; his eyes were smiling. "How many Stamina Point do you have now? 10? 20? In any manner, you look poor… Do you have any idea how many Stamina Points I have?"
"8,270,557,295,920,061 Stamina Points: that's the amount I have." Scrooge McDuck raised his head jubilantly. "Well, looking at the conversion rate seems like my gold coins have more value."
This astronomical number would tempt even God.
Lin Sanjiu wasn't a God, so her heart was possessed by burning desire. As long as she could get one ten-thousandth—no, even one-millionth of his Stamina Points would be good enough to solve all of her problems! She didn't need to worry about the cat doctor or the Souls. She even could clear the rest attraction with that number of Stamina Points.
"I have seen thousands, if not millions of people who have the same expression, the same brightness in your eyes," Scrooge McDuck covered his lips with his wing. Then, he gave a little chuckle, "This is the expression, the exaltation of a person who sees the light after he has fallen into the abyss of despair. I'll give you a second chance. Don't you want to reconsider your choice? It's still not too late to change your mind. Kill Snow White and her father. Then, I'll give your 250 Stamina Points and tell you the location of the golden ring that you have been pulling out all the stops for."
As the main focus of the topic, Snow White and her father didn't go too far away. They were hiding behind an abandoned house, their eyes jumping between Lin Sanjiu and Scrooge McDuck. Snow White was younger and had sensitive enough hearing so that when she heard perfectly well the conversation between Lin Sanjiu and Scrooge McDuck. Her face grew ashen.
When Snow White saw Lin Sanjiu suddenly tore her attention away from the duck and looked at her, her knees felt weak. While she was considering the likelihood of her escaping from Lin Sanjiu and Scrooge McDuck, the tall woman turned her head back again.
"Nah, I'm all good. Judging from your poor intellect, I guess you need that 250 Stamina Points more than me."
Taking the advantages over the duck that hadn't figure out the meaning of her words, Lin Sanjiu sneered. She stretched her skeletal wings open and darted at Scrooge McDuck like a beast pouncing on its prey. At the same time, she released her [Vibroblade]. Drawing a curve in the air, she swiped the [Vibroblade] down at Scrooge McDuck with a thunderous force.
The blade was an inch above Scrooge McDuck's skin before he could blink his eyes. His knees went weak, and her horrific, murderous-intent imbued attack transfixed him. Just before the blade contacted with Scrooge McDuck's body, a sudden strange feeling struck Lin Sanjiu. The [Vibroblade] in her hand couldn't move forward as if somebody had applied glue on it.
"Phew, what a close call," Scrooge McDuck quickly stumbled away from Lin Sanjiu. After confirming that he was out of Lin Sanjiu's [Vibroblade] attack range, he turned his head. His body was still trembling from the fear as he flapped his wings, "Thank you for your help. This is your Stamina Point."
"For who?"
Before Lin Sanjiu could figure out who was the recipient of Scrooge McDuck's bribery, the [Vibroblade] in her hand buzzed as if it was showing its gratitude and went silent, ceasing off of its operation in the next instance.
"That damn duck bribed my Special Item?!" The realization stunned Lin Sanjiu. She was so immersed in the stunning news that she didn't realize that the air surrounding her was thinning.