The blue interface hovering before my eyes continued counting down the remaining time until the first invasion, and for the first time since the System had appeared, the numbers felt much more real than the words themselves.
[Time Remaining: 02:48:00]
I stared at the countdown for several seconds before slowly lowering my gaze toward the baseball field. The food truck from earlier was still parked nearby, and the colorful ice cream sitting inside had somehow become the strangest evidence yet of what my Infinite Power of Luck could accomplish. I still didn't understand how it had worked, and honestly, I wasn't sure whether I wanted to understand it yet.
If simply wanting an ice cream truck could cause something that absurd to happen, then I couldn't help wondering what would happen if I desperately needed something far more important.
Fang Xiaotong was standing beside me, still looking at the food truck with an expression that suggested he hadn't completely processed what had happened either. After a few moments, he finally looked toward me and sighed.
"Brother Yin, I'm starting to think your luck is much stranger than you realize. Yesterday, you received a power called Infinite Power of Luck, and today you somehow managed to get an ice cream truck to appear in the middle of a school baseball field because you wanted some ice cream. I don't even know whether I should be impressed or concerned."
I gave him an awkward smile. "I'm leaning toward concerned."
"That's probably the correct answer."
"I didn't expect anything like that to happen, and the strangest part is that I didn't consciously control any of it. I just thought about wanting some ice cream, and somehow the circumstances necessary for us to find it appeared on their own."
"That's exactly what worries me," Fang Xiaotong replied, his expression becoming more thoughtful as he considered what had happened. "If your luck can influence events that are completely unrelated to you, then we might not even understand how large its range is. You didn't create the ice cream yourself, and you didn't summon the truck directly. Something else happened in the world that eventually led us to what you wanted."
I nodded slowly. "That's what I've been thinking about too."
What would happen if I desperately needed someone to survive?
What would happen if I wanted to win a battle?
And what would happen if my life depended on it?
I quickly pushed those thoughts aside.
There would be plenty of time to find out.
Right now, we needed to return to the school.
For a few moments, neither of us said anything. The idea was difficult to comprehend, especially because I still had no idea where the boundary of my ability existed. If my luck could turn something as unlikely as an ice cream truck appearing at the right moment into reality, then what would happen if I needed something far more important?
The two of us eventually left the food truck behind and made our way back toward the school. The closer we got, the more obvious it became that the atmosphere had changed. Yesterday, the students had been gathered together because they didn't know what was happening. Now, everyone seemed to understand that something was coming, and the uncertainty had been replaced by preparation.
Soldiers were positioned along the school entrances, police officers were moving between groups of civilians, and students with combat-oriented abilities had been separated from everyone else. Several people were practicing their newly acquired powers while others were discussing strategies with anyone willing to listen.
As Fang Xiaotong and I entered the main courtyard, a familiar voice suddenly called out from somewhere behind us.
"Yin Yuca!"
I turned around and saw a young man rushing toward us from the other side of the courtyard. His black hair was slightly messy, his school uniform was wrinkled from what appeared to be a long morning of running around, and although I recognized him immediately, it had been long enough since I had last seen him that his appearance brought back several memories from school.
"Chen Fei?" I asked in surprise.
Fang Xiaotong smiled when he recognized him. "Chen Fei, it's been a while. I didn't realize you were looking for us."
"Of course I was looking for you. We're about to have an invasion, and nobody knows what we're actually going to face. I figured that if I was going to fight, I'd rather find people I actually know instead of being thrown into some random group with strangers."
I couldn't help smiling at his reasoning. "That's understandable. What happened to you yesterday? We didn't see you after the System appeared."
Chen Fei's expression became slightly more serious. "I went home for a while to check on my parents, and after that, I came here because I heard the school was being used as one of the defensive areas. I've been trying to understand my ability since then."
Fang Xiaotong immediately became curious. "What ability did you get?"
Chen Fei became unusually quiet.
For several seconds, he simply stared at his own hand before slowly raising it in front of us. A faint orange glow appeared between his fingers, followed by a small flame that danced across his palm. At first, it looked like an ordinary fire, but within moments, the flame began changing color, becoming brighter and more intense until the air around his hand visibly distorted from the heat.
Fang Xiaotong's expression changed immediately.
"That's not normal fire."
Chen Fei gave a nervous laugh. "No, it isn't. The System called it Flames of Orion."
The moment he finished speaking, the flame suddenly expanded.
A wave of heat swept across us, forcing me to instinctively take a step backward. The temperature wasn't unbearable, but the sudden increase was enough to make me realize that the flame wasn't something an ordinary person could safely touch.
I stared at Chen Fei's hand.
"What rank?"
His expression became a little more serious.
"SS-Grade."
For several seconds, none of us spoke.
Fang Xiaotong was the first to react.
"SS-Grade?"
Chen Fei nodded. "That's what the System told me. At first, I thought it was just another fire ability, but after I started experimenting with it, I realized there was much more to it than simply creating flames."
He closed his fingers.
The fire disappeared.
Then, almost immediately, flames erupted from his entire body.
Instead of burning him, they wrapped around his clothes and skin like a living cloak, spreading across his arms, shoulders, chest, and legs. His body remained completely unharmed, and the flames seemed to become part of him rather than something surrounding him.
Fang Xiaotong stared at him in amazement.
"You can become fire?"
"Apparently," Chen Fei replied. "I can transform parts of my body into flames, and I don't seem to take any damage from fire either. I've stood inside a burning room without feeling anything, and when I tried touching the flames directly, they couldn't hurt me."
He raised one hand.
A concentrated sphere of fire slowly formed above his palm.
Unlike the earlier flame, this one was intensely bright, and the air surrounding it seemed to bend under its heat. The concrete ground beneath Chen Fei's feet began to darken from the rising temperature.
"I can also control the flames instead of simply creating them," he continued. "I can shape them, move them around, and apparently increase their intensity. I haven't discovered how far I can push it yet, but every time I try to make the fire hotter, the System doesn't give me any warning that I'm reaching a limit."
I looked at the burning sphere with growing curiosity.
"Have you tested how destructive it can be?"
Chen Fei's expression became slightly awkward.
"Not properly. I don't exactly want to discover the answer by accidentally destroying the school."
Fang Xiaotong laughed. "That's probably a good decision."
Chen Fei suddenly took on the form of a fire god. His entire body covered with intense flames, surrounding the environment in extremely high temperatures.
Fortunately, the flames weren't able to reach us, and while we thought he was only able to manipulate and create fire, his feet lifted off the ground.
Chen Fei's eyes widened.
"Wait, what?"
He rose several meters into the air before instinctively spreading his arms. The flames behind him continued burning with incredible intensity, keeping his body suspended above the ground.
Fang Xiaotong looked up at him and immediately laughed.
"Chen Fei, you're flying!"
"I know!" Chen Fei shouted back, although his voice carried a mixture of excitement and panic. "I didn't know I could do this either!"
He began moving his arms and adjusting the flames behind him, slowly figuring out how to control the strange propulsion. After several seconds, he managed to turn himself around before descending toward the ground. He landed with surprising stability, although the heat beneath his feet caused the grass to wither almost instantly.
Chen Fei stared at the ground for a moment before looking back at us.
"I think I've finally figured out what this power actually gives me."
Fang Xiaotong crossed his arms. "Go ahead."
Chen Fei looked at the flames surrounding his hands. "I can control fire, I'm resistant to fire, I can transform my body into flames, and I can apparently use those flames to fly. I haven't discovered everything yet, but those are the things I've confirmed so far."
An SS-Grade ability was already far beyond what most people around us seemed to possess, but the more Chen Fei demonstrated, the more I realized that the rank wasn't the most frightening part. His power had an enormous amount of room for growth, and he hadn't even had a full day to discover what it could truly do.
Fang Xiaotong finally broke the silence.
"Then you might have one of the strongest offensive abilities we've seen so far."
Chen Fei looked down at his hand before slowly closing his fingers, causing the flames to disappear.
"Maybe, but that's exactly what I'm worried about."
I looked at him.
"What do you mean?"
Chen Fei glanced toward the scorched patch of grass where he had landed. His expression had become much more serious than it had been moments earlier.
"I don't know where the limit is. Every time I think I've figured out everything Flames of Orion can do, I discover something else. I can create fire, control it, survive inside it, turn my body into it, and apparently fly with it, but I haven't tested what happens when I stop holding back."
He paused for a moment before continuing.
"What if the flames become hotter than what I've already seen? What if I release too much power at once? What if I lose control during the invasion and accidentally hurt someone who's fighting beside me?"