The idea was put into action soon enough. He Piaojian prepared the ingredients and brought them to the table.
They poured them into the hot pot and waited for it to boil.
"You know what? This tastes pretty good," He Piaojian said, praising it again and again as he ate his fill. "But the insect eggs still have the best texture."
Fan Daoyi nodded in agreement. "It's a shame the mother won't produce any more eggs once it's dead."
While they were eating with gusto, the diners who had fled reported the incident to the professionals. They came to document and handle it, arriving just in time to see He Piaojian cutting into the mother's lower abdomen with a knife.
Juice burst out. Seeing the newcomers, He Piaojian casually wiped it from his face, then turned and smiled amiably. "Oh, perfect timing. Want to join us for a bite?"
The result was...
"Name."
"He Piaojian."
"Sex."
"Male," he answered honestly, then explained the situation. "Officer, I'm a good guy. I saved the people and killed the insects. I just got hungry and ate a little something. There's nothing wrong with that, right?"
"Mm, nothing wrong with it." The police officer opposite He Piaojian closed his notebook. "It's just that, given what you did, we're putting it on record..."
The officer thought back to the scene he had found upon entering the hot pot restaurant and felt a sudden, inexplicable shiver of fear. What normal person would excitedly chop a monster to pieces and eat it? And then tell them the idea had come from that well-behaved student beside him?
Wasn't that a vicious slander?!
Meanwhile, Fan Daoyi, whom He Piaojian had pointed out, was drinking the water the police had given him and calmly talking in the lounge. Unlike He Piaojian, who had been sent straight to an interrogation room.
He sat there, composed, answering the officer's questions in an orderly manner.
"Your accounts are more or less the same, but why did the mother choose that moment to activate the Adult Insects?" The officer looked puzzled.
After receiving the report, the police had questioned every diner and pieced together the sequence of events.
But as they saw it, if the mother had simply sent the hosts carrying insect eggs into the city, wouldn't it have caused an even greater disaster? Instead, it had exposed itself with this single infestation. There weren't even many Adult Insects, and they had been killed outright.
"I'm not sure. Maybe it was overconfident in its own strength," Fan Daoyi offered, keeping his answer vague.
Once his statement had been taken, there was nothing more for Fan Daoyi to do. He came out of the room to see He Piaojian holding a commendation banner in one hand and raising his phone with the other, leaning next to a police station staff member for a photo.
After taking the photo, He Piaojian put the banner away, shook hands with the staff member, and received a cash reward as well.
The two split the reward evenly, and He Piaojian chose to transfer Fan Daoyi's share to him online.
Now there really was nothing left to do but wait for admissions to begin.
He Piaojian suddenly received a phone call. After speaking with the caller, he said he had something else to do and parted ways with Fan Daoyi there.
Fan Daoyi searched his phone for an address. It was an apartment the authorities had assigned him after the college entrance exam, along with a cash reward of over a hundred thousand.
None of that mattered. What mattered was that they had given him a special item. According to them, it could be used to contract a Guixu creature and become what that blond guy had called a Ghost Tamer.
The item was extremely rare and strictly controlled; only those who made outstanding contributions were eligible to receive one. So, as far as the authorities were concerned, these rewards were enough to match Fan Daoyi's achievement in killing the boss and saving the remaining examinees.
"The authorities, and the Four Fiends Cult too." Fan Daoyi used Teleportation to enter the apartment, tossed the item from his pocket into a random drawer, and paid it no further attention. "Does commanding Guixu creatures really appeal to them that much?"
Recalling the personalities of the bunch under him, he shook his head helplessly.
"They can't even handle the simplest things properly. What use is commanding them? They're all a bunch of troublesome dumbasses."
Over the following days, Fan Daoyi stayed at home and rested, occasionally browsing his phone for news about Guixu entrances.
Perhaps because the college entrance exam incident had caused such a terrible impact, the moment an entrance opened, the authorities immediately sent people to take control and barred anyone from approaching.
They then sent their own people in to investigate. When those people came out unharmed, the people who had been barred began to have other ideas.
Could this be an excuse for the authorities to monopolize Guixu's benefits?
A small-scale riot broke out and was quickly suppressed, but the incident was also posted online.
"I don't get it. Why protect them so well?"
Fan Daoyi browsed the news. Neither the Wang Family incident nor the one at the hot pot restaurant had made a single ripple; everyone was still going about their lives as usual.
From beginning to end, the only thing everyone feared was the college entrance exam incident. Yet that panic gradually faded after the authorities took control of the Guixu entrances.
They were extremely greedy.
When the day came to check the college entrance exam scores, feelings of anxiety and unease came from all directions.
Fan Daoyi, on the other hand, slept from night until the afternoon. He got up at his leisure, washed up, searched for the official website and entered it. After going through a series of steps, his scores popped up.
His academic score was nearly six hundred. With his Guixu score added, choosing Dawn shouldn't be much of a problem. If all else failed, he could have Xuan Miao alter their consciousness or switch accounts and start over.
"Two in the afternoon, meet at the city gymnasium." He glanced at the time in the lower right corner of the computer screen. "One fifty-eight. I'll make it."
The thought had barely crossed his mind when he was already outside the gymnasium. He pushed the door open and walked in, feeling the cool air conditioning overhead.
After comparing his clothes to everyone else's, he took a step forward. His dark blue-green outer robe dissolved, leaving a short-sleeved white shirt.
"Everyone, take your seats according to your assigned schools. Come forward in an orderly manner for testing and registration." The announcement played on a loop over the loudspeaker throughout the venue.
He found his school's large sign and took a seat. The floor below held an enormous arena, with two large stones set on each side.
Representatives from the various academies were stationed around the arena, with the five great academies positioned closest.
Those whose names were called went up to be tested one by one. Their abilities were either arm enhancement or eyesight enhancement, and they were mostly at the Initial Illumination Realm First Tier. There was nothing new about any of them.
"Jiang Wanyu."
Fan Daoyi looked up. A girl from the school opposite stood. She wore a simple white dress, its hem swaying gently as she walked.
Her appearance drew quite a few gazes, and they watched the testing stone curiously.
The moment Jiang Wanyu placed her hand on it, a fierce wind swept through the arena. The representative teachers from the various academies brightened and all looked up at the words above the testing stone.
[Wind]
"That's an elemental ability. Anyone who awakens one of those is guaranteed to become a local powerhouse if they reach the Governance realm!" a student in the stands exclaimed.
But the person beside him retorted, "What are you talking about? Who reaches the Governance realm without becoming a local powerhouse?"
"People really are different. I've only got an ordinary enhancement ability, and she's already playing with natural elements." A student hung his head and muttered to himself, somewhat dejected.
The student to his left patted him on the shoulder to comfort him. "We can't compare ourselves to someone that talented. We're just the most ordinary people among the teeming masses."
Meanwhile, Jiang Wanyu stood amid the fierce wind, her expression impassive.
Once her ability had been officially registered, she turned and placed her hand on the stone on the other side, which tested her tier.