All four lackeys rose together and surrounded Zhou Nan in the middle. Fear welled up in Zhou Nan's heart. According to what he knew, Teng Chaoguo had caused a major incident in a fight back in middle school. Rumor had it that he had swung a construction-site pickaxe and driven it straight into someone's waist, smashing one of their kidneys to pulp. If Teng Chaoguo's family had not had some connections, he might have ended up behind bars.
Of the Four Heavenly Kings, aside from the senior-year one, Zhou Nan had seen them all. Liu Shufeng could fight well, and Brother Da Long could fight even better. But while they were formidable fighters, neither of them radiated Teng Chaoguo's vicious aura—the kind that, from the inside out, treated human life and dignity as worthless.
But since things had come to this, Zhou Nan decided to kill two birds with one stone. He would settle the matter of the new kid while also pinning the missing cigarettes on someone else. So he braced himself and continued the act. "I know I handled this badly, but Brother Guo, it can't all be blamed on me. Someone else was stirring up trouble!"
"Stirring up trouble?"
"Yes, Brother Guo. Some kid deliberately led Zheng Fangtou over there and deliberately had Zheng Fangtou inspect me! Zheng Fangtou had never come to our dorm at that time before. This was definitely premeditated, aimed straight at me. Brother Guo, everyone in Fengming First High School knows you get cigarettes from me. Going after me was just a cover—nine times out of ten, he was really coming after you."
"Coming after me?" Teng Chaoguo paused, then gave a dark, disdainful smile. "Who? What death-seeking bastard dares come after me?"
"He just transferred into our class. I asked around—he came from a Key Class."
"Heh heh, Zhou Nan, do you take me for some idiot?" Teng Chaoguo patted Zhou Nan's face, not too hard but not lightly either, each slap ringing out with a smack. "A bookworm exiled from a Key Class, coming after me? Let me tell you, if it weren't for your brother's sake, you..."
Smack, smack, smack. Three more slaps landed, harder than before.
"Brother Guo, I absolutely didn't lie to you!" Zhou Nan swore bitterly to heaven and earth. "I swear to Heaven, that guy definitely did it on purpose. No mistake about it!"
Teng Chaoguo did not care. "Then tell me, who exactly is this guy, and why would he come after me?"
"Why that kid wants to come after you, Brother Guo, I don't know. But after asking around all morning, I finally found out who he is." Zhou Nan looked around, then leaned close and whispered to Teng Chaoguo, "He was originally in Key Class Seven. His name is Shi Tiexin."
"Who?" Teng Chaoguo's eyes widened in apparent surprise. The other four lackeys froze as well, then suddenly burst into loud laughter.
"Shi Tiexin? Hahahaha! Good, good, so it's him!" A dangerous, savage gleam lit Teng Chaoguo's eyes. "That brat... is asking... to die!"
Seeing Teng Chaoguo's reaction, Zhou Nan smiled faintly to himself.
Just as expected. It worked.
From here on, I won't need to do a thing. Someone else will charge into battle for me.
How much substance Shi Tiexin truly had would depend on Teng Chaoguo to weigh him. If he was heavy enough, then he could first fight Teng Chaoguo to mutual ruin, and Zhou Nan could swoop in when the nest was empty. If he was lightweight, nothing but a flashy fraud, then heh heh, that brat would be shedding a layer of skin!
Zhou Nan's calculations left him brimming with satisfaction.
Shi Tiexin's calculations, meanwhile, left him frowning in distress.
He had the manuals. He had the Auxiliary Cultivation Manual. He had both the time and the environment to focus on cultivation. He even had instructors—and their standards had far exceeded Shi Tiexin's expectations.
Class 28 truly lived up to its name as a Trash Class. The homeroom teacher paid no attention to the place at all. Even when a new student arrived, he merely glanced at him and moved on, without saying anything to Shi Tiexin. Yet the teachers themselves were quite capable. None of their main efforts were here, and they did not seem to care much whether the Trash Class students listened. They simply lectured on their own, with no particular enthusiasm. But neither were they lazy. They covered everything they should, proper and steady, neither outstanding nor lacking.
Shi Tiexin could not understand any of it, but he knew these people were competent. They could at least make up for one of the weak points in his mental arts cultivation.
Yet he still frowned in distress.
The reason was simple: he had discovered that his mental arts cultivation faced a major problem that urgently needed solving. If he did not solve it, his mental arts might not advance a single step. That problem was—
His level was far, far too poor!
The manuals were comprehensive?
He did not even meet the requirements to cultivate them!
The instructors taught well?
No matter how well they taught, it was useless to him!
The mental arts here had generally advanced to the third level, yet only three of his first-level subjects were even above passing. In other words, he would stumble and barely scrape through even when they taught second-level material. When they taught third-level material, it was like listening to a heavenly book.
He had eagerly taken out the Auxiliary Cultivation Manual just now, but no matter how he tried, there was not the slightest response. He could not even understand the questions in the Auxiliary Cultivation Manual, so how could he possibly try to break through and solve them?
A huge stack of Auxiliary Cultivation Manuals lay before him, yet he could not use any of them. It left Shi Tiexin so anxious that he scratched at his ears and cheeks. The feeling was like unexpectedly inheriting a hundred-billion fortune overseas, only to find he could not actually get his hands on it.
Throughout the entire first Mathematics class and the second Chinese class, Shi Tiexin had no mind to listen at all. Of course, he knew he would not understand even if he listened, so he simply gave up completely and racked his brains for a way to resolve the predicament before him.
After thinking it over for half a day, the only solution Shi Tiexin came up with was to fill in the manuals from the very beginning and start practicing from the beginning.
Based on the memories he had dissolved, Shi Tiexin guessed that what he most needed to study was not Fengming First High School's first-year textbooks, but this world's elementary school material.
The first level of Basic Mathematics was called "Numbers and Operations," while the first level of Basic Rhetoric was called "Reading and Writing Characters." Put another way, weren't those just elementary school mathematics and elementary school Chinese? What he most needed to do now was catch up on elementary school textbooks and find a way to buy some Auxiliary Cultivation Manuals suited to elementary school students—or even lower elementary school levels.
Only things at that level would suit his condition.
But...
Was his ability here really only equivalent to that of a seven- or eight-year-old child? No, no. The other consciousness in his memories had scored perfect marks in every subject at seven or eight years old. That was at least the standard of excelling in both subjects. As for him, one passing grade and one failing grade—he would be dead last even in a class of seven- or eight-year-olds. Elementary upperclassmen would absolutely crush him in seconds.
This was truly humiliating!
Good thing Old Tie's face was not very sensitive, or it would definitely have turned as red as a purple eggplant by now.
Just as Shi Tiexin was calculating how to get his hands on some elementary-level Auxiliary Cultivation Manuals, the bell rang, ending the second Chinese class. The teacher did not drag class out for even a minute, leaving crisply and decisively. The students immediately rushed toward the classroom door like wild horses.
But then a shriek rang out. A boy came running back in with panic written all over his face, shouting, "Black Hand Hungry Tiger is here!"
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