Infinite Regeneration In The Apocalypse

Chapter 155: Sucked Of Dual-Talent!

Vogue stepped forward toward the massive four-hundred-meter door, his heart beating with anticipation mixed with a subtle thread of caution. Something about the way Family Head Marcus had smiled when explaining the opening mechanism felt slightly off, but Vogue pushed the feeling aside. This was a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity.

The door had two distinct palm imprints carved into its surface at approximately chest height—one on the left half of the door, one on the right. The imprints glowed faintly with residual energy from the broken formation.

Vogue raised both hands and activated his elemental talents simultaneously.

On his left palm, he channeled his ice element. Frost immediately spread across his skin as his hand transformed, becoming covered in crystalline ice so dense it looked like his entire hand had been carved from a glacier. The temperature around his left side dropped noticeably, and his breath became visible mist.

On his right palm, he activated his fire element. Flames erupted and wrapped around his hand, transforming it into something that appeared to be made entirely of living fire. Heat radiated outward, creating a shimmer in the air. The contrast between his two hands—one frozen, one burning—was visually striking.

The moment both talents activated fully, Vogue’s expression changed dramatically.

A powerful magnetic force suddenly erupted from the palm prints on the door, yanking his hands forward with irresistible strength. Before Vogue could even react or pull back, his palms were forcibly slammed into the two imprints and locked in place.

"What the—?!" Vogue tried to jerk his hands away, but they wouldn’t budge. It was as though his palms had been fused to the door itself.

Then something far worse began happening.

A vacuum-like suction force activated through the palm prints, and Vogue felt his energy being violently drained from his body. It wasn’t a gentle extraction—it was aggressive, forceful, like having your blood pulled out through your skin.

"What the fuck is this?!" Vogue shouted, genuine alarm flooding through him.

He could feel his fire origin energy and ice origin energy being sucked directly from his core cultivation foundation, flowing through his meridians and out through his palms into the door. The massive structure began glowing—the left side turning brilliant blue as it absorbed ice energy, the right side turning blazing red as it consumed fire energy.

The door was literally draining his elemental talents.

Vogue’s face went pale as panic set in. He tried desperately to remove his palms from the imprints, pulling backward with all his physical strength, but they remained completely stuck as though magnetically sealed.

"What’s happening?! What the hell is going on?!" Vogue shouted at the Klein Family members standing behind him.

Family Head Marcus’s expression remained calm—far too calm for someone witnessing an unexpected disaster. In fact, a small, almost apologetic smile crossed his face.

"Oh dear," Marcus said softly, his tone carrying false regret. "I suppose I forgot to mention one small detail about how this door actually works."

Vogue’s eyes went wide with horrified realization. "You... you knew this would happen!"

"It’s true that we need the elemental energy of a dual talent to open the door," Marcus continued matter-of-factly, as though discussing the weather rather than someone’s life being destroyed. "But what I didn’t explain is that the door doesn’t just borrow that energy temporarily. It requires complete absorption—draining every single bit of elemental origin energy including the fundamental source that creates your talents in the first place."

His smile turned slightly colder. "Sorry, but it had to be done this way. I’m sure you understand—business is business."

Sean’s face had gone completely pale with shock. He took a step forward, his expression twisted with distress. "Father! You didn’t tell me this would happen! You said he would just need to channel some energy, not that it would destroy his talents permanently!"

Marcus glanced at his son with mild irritation. "Someone had to make a sacrifice for this family, Sean. This Saint’s ruin is far too important—far too valuable—to give up just because we felt squeamish about the cost. We’ve waited a hundred years for this opportunity. Did you really think I would let moral concerns prevent us from claiming what’s inside?"

He looked back at Vogue’s struggling form. "If we had told Young Master Vogue the truth about what opening the door required, do you think he would have willingly come here? Of course not. He would have refused and we’d be back where we started. So we did what was necessary."

Sean’s hands clenched into fists, his face showing genuine anguish. "But Father, this is—"

"Furthermore," Marcus interrupted, his tone becoming sharper, "did you actually believe we would simply give away a Creation Seed to some unaffiliated outsider with no strings attached? Even if our family can’t personally use that treasure, we could certainly sell it for an astronomical price to someone who can. The seed alone is worth more than most people earn in ten lifetimes."

He shook his head as though disappointed in his son’s naivety. "The techniques and the seed were bait, Sean. Nothing more. We needed dual talents to open this door, and Young Master Vogue happened to be the first dual awakener we found who wasn’t already claimed by a major power. So we used him. That’s how the cultivation world works."

"You motherfuckers!!" Vogue roared, his voice filled with absolute fury and betrayal.

He exploded with every bit of strength he possessed, channeling his dragon physique, activating his time law, trying to freeze the suction or break free through sheer force. His muscles bulged, his dragon scales manifested, all four of his awakened elements surged simultaneously.

But nothing worked. The door’s mechanism was designed by a Saint specifically to drain dual talents—it had countermeasures for resistance. The vacuum suction actually increased in response to his struggle, pulling even harder.

The assembled Klein Family members simply stood there watching impassively as Vogue’s talents were systematically destroyed. Some looked vaguely uncomfortable, a few appeared sympathetic, but none of them moved to help him or objected to what was happening.

This had clearly been planned from the very beginning. They had all known what would happen to him.

Vogue could feel it happening—his fire origin energy, the fundamental essence that allowed him to manipulate flames, was being torn from his cultivation foundation and absorbed into the door. His ice origin energy followed, flowing out of his core like water draining from a broken vessel.

The two elemental dragon heads connected to those talents began flickering, becoming translucent and unstable as the energy that sustained them was removed.

"No... no no no!" Vogue gritted his teeth so hard they cracked, fighting desperately against the inevitable.

But cultivation talents couldn’t be protected through willpower alone. They were fundamental aspects of one’s spiritual foundation, and this Saint-level mechanism had been specifically designed to extract them.

After approximately five agonizing minutes that felt like hours, the process finally completed.

Vogue’s fire talent and ice talent were completely gone—extracted entirely and absorbed into the door’s mechanisms. The two dragon heads associated with those elements had vanished, leaving him with only his time and thunder heads remaining.

The door suddenly released his palms, the magnetic seal deactivating now that it had taken what it needed. The massive structure began grinding open slowly, its ancient mechanisms activating for the first time in three centuries.

But Vogue couldn’t even appreciate the opening. His body collapsed backward, barely conscious, looking frighteningly thin and frail. His face was pale as death, his skin sunken and paper-thin. He looked like someone who had been starved for months.

Most devastatingly, when he tried to sense his cultivation level, he found that his realm had plummeted catastrophically. He had been at Level 7 Stellar Knight after merging six clones. Now he was barely at Level 1 Stellar Soldier—the very beginning of cultivation, weaker than he’d been even before his Osympic Trial.

The loss of two talents had caused his entire foundation to collapse and rebuild at a drastically reduced level.

Sean rushed forward and caught Vogue before he could hit the ground completely. The young Klein heir’s face showed genuine guilt. "I’m really sorry," Sean said quietly, his voice filled with emotion. "I swear I didn’t know this would happen. My father kept the truth from me too. I thought you would just channel some energy and be fine. I never would have brought you here if I’d known—"

"Save it," Vogue gasped in anger. He pushed Sean away with what little strength remained and forced himself to stand on trembling legs, glaring at all of them with pure hatred burning in his eyes.

"My talents are completely gone," Vogue stated, his voice shaking with barely controlled rage. "Both of them. Permanently destroyed. And my cultivation has dropped all the way down to Level 1 Stellar Soldier. I’m barely stronger than a regular person now."

Family Head Marcus had the audacity to chuckle slightly, though at least he had the decency to look somewhat apologetic about it. "Don’t be so angry, Young Master Vogue. There’s bound to be enough treasure inside this Saint’s ruin to go around for everyone. I’m quite confident we’ll find something valuable that can compensate you for your... sacrifice. Perhaps even something better than the talents you lost."