Little Witch

"Jiang Chen, you're not deliberately messing with me, are you?"

Ning Rongrong glared at him suspiciously.

"Messing with you?"

Jiang Chen crossed his arms and smiled. "Why would you think I'd mess with you? We have no grudge against each other. We've only met a few times, so at most, we're friends."

"Whether you can finish or improve has nothing to do with me."

"You..."

Ning Rongrong opened her mouth, but could not find any reason to argue back.

For some reason, hearing Jiang Chen say they were friends at most made her chest feel tight.

Jiang Chen ignored her expression and continued twisting the knife.

"Besides, if you want to learn how to hit people, your body has to withstand the most basic level of exercise first, right? Otherwise, when you throw a punch, the enemy won't feel any pain, but your own hand will hurt instead. That would be a real joke."

Ning Rongrong glared at him indignantly for a while. "Then I'll run! Do you think I'm afraid of that?"

She took a deep breath, lifted her skirt, and charged toward the muddy ground.

The first two laps were fairly easy. Ning Rongrong even found time to turn around and raise her chin at Jiang Chen.

But by the fourth lap, her steps had clearly grown heavy, and her breathing had become ragged.

By the seventh lap, her cheeks were flushed red, the loose strands before her forehead clung to her skin with sweat, and every step felt like she was dragging sandbags.

"I... I can't..."

Past the halfway point of the eighth lap, Ning Rongrong could only walk slowly with one hand on her waist, feeling as though her lungs were about to explode.

"Didn't you say you'd trained before? You're done already?"

Jiang Chen had appeared beside her at some point, a teasing smile on his face. "Do you know Xiao Wu?"

Ning Rongrong panted and stammered, "X-Xiao Wu? What about her?"

"Nothing. It's just that when Xiao Wu was seven, she could run fifteen laps in half an hour."

Hearing Jiang Chen's words, Ning Rongrong nearly failed to catch her breath. She glared at him while gasping for air.

"S-seven... fifteen laps in half an hour?! Y-you think I'm stupid?!"

Jiang Chen did not answer. He merely chuckled.

But to Ning Rongrong's ears, that chuckle was incomparably grating.

She felt a surge of blood rush to her head. Somehow, she found the strength to grit her teeth and start running again.

"Oh? I didn't expect you to still have the strength. I thought you were going to give up."

"Ah, if you can't do it, don't force yourself. As the princess of the Seven Treasure Glazed Tile Sect, there's no shame in admitting you can't run ten laps."

Jiang Chen's low voice echoed beside her ears. With every sentence he spoke, Ning Rongrong felt her blood boil another degree hotter.

"Y-you just wait!"

She panted as she made her threat. "Once I finish... I-I'll definitely hit..."

Jiang Chen strolled along at her side. "Sure. If you can finish it all in one go, I'll stand still and let you hit me three times."

When dealing with a pampered young lady like this, brute force alone would not work. You had to strike at the most vulnerable part of her pride.

Only by prescribing the right remedy and targeting her pride could he awaken her fighting spirit.

This was also something Jiang Chen had learned from Tang San.

By the ninth lap, Ning Rongrong felt as if her legs no longer belonged to her. Every time she lifted one, it was like pulling a radish out of a swamp.

Just as the tenth lap began, her vision started to blur, yet Jiang Chen's voice still drifted into her ears.

"If you can't do it, give up. No one's forcing you, and there's no shame in giving up."

Ning Rongrong no longer even had the strength to glare at him. She could only shuffle forward on instinct.

When she finally crossed the finish line, her legs gave out, and she was about to collapse to the ground.

Jiang Chen reacted quickly. Just before she hit the ground, he reached out to support her shoulders, while his other hand hovered against her back.

A green glow emerged from the Glazed Green Lotus, and soft emerald light flowed into her body.

Ning Rongrong felt warmth envelop her entire body. Her aching muscles rapidly relaxed, and her nearly depleted strength quickly returned.

Once she caught her breath, the first thing she did was raise her limp fist and punch Jiang Chen in the chest.

"Y-you have to keep your word... Stand still... and let me hit you three times..."

Jiang Chen neither dodged nor avoided it, allowing those powerless punches to land on him. "Of course I'll keep my word. But your fists feel like tickling."

"Don't look down on me!"

Ning Rongrong puffed out her cheeks and punched him twice more, but she still could not put any strength into her body. Her blows were indeed light and weak, more like flirtatious banter between lovers.

She also felt that she had no strength left, so she simply leaned against his arm. "I'm exhausted... This training of yours is practically inhuman."

"You're already done after just ten laps?"

Jiang Chen withdrew the Green Lotus and raised an eyebrow. "Add five more laps every day from now on."

"You..."

Ning Rongrong had just been about to curse him when a water bottle was pressed against her little mouth.

She gulped down several mouthfuls of water and finally caught her breath.

Jiang Chen patted her head. "Your performance wasn't bad for your first time. At least you didn't give up halfway through. Keep it up."

Ning Rongrong had wanted to glare at him, but when she heard that, the corners of her lips curled up uncontrollably. "Of course... I'm very impressive."

Jiang Chen smiled at that and did not refute her.

The more smug she was now, the better. When she wanted to give up later, she would have to think about what she had said today.

After resting for a while, Ning Rongrong felt that she had mostly recovered her strength. Just as she was about to get up and go back to bathe, Jiang Chen reached out and stopped her.

"Physical training is done. Now we'll train your spiritual power."

Jiang Chen walked over, crouched down to meet her gaze, and looked directly into Ning Rongrong's eyes with his bright golden ones.

"W-what are you doing?"

As Ning Rongrong was stared at by those golden eyes, her heart inexplicably skipped a beat, and she instinctively tried to look away.

"Don't hide. Look into my eyes."

At his words, Ning Rongrong instinctively met his gaze.

In an instant, Ning Rongrong felt the scene before her suddenly sway.

Deep within Jiang Chen's pupils, an illusory Green Lotus seemed to bloom. As its Lotus Petals slowly spun, her consciousness was drawn in by invisible threads and sank into them of its own accord.

"Y-you... What did you do to me?"

Although Ning Rongrong could barely stay conscious, she felt as though her head had been stuffed with cotton, leaving her dazed and muddled.

"Relax. Don't resist."

Jiang Chen's voice was steady. "Use your spiritual power to clearly observe the shifting light and shadows in my eyes. If you can hold on for ten breaths without getting dizzy, you pass."

"Ten breaths? Who are you looking down on!"

Ning Rongrong widened her eyes defiantly and tried her best to focus.

But the phantom Green Lotus within those golden eyes flickered between light and dark. At times, it turned into streams of light spiraling about; at others, it scattered into tiny motes of light. The longer she looked, the more dizzy she became.

After barely three breaths, she felt the world spinning. Her legs went weak, and she nearly toppled over.

Jiang Chen reached out and steadied her by the shoulders, mocking her without mercy. "You can't hold on already? As the young lady of the Seven Treasure Glazed Tile Sect, your spiritual power is actually this weak?"

"No, it's obviously because you..."

Ning Rongrong instinctively wanted to argue, but Jiang Chen silenced her with a single question.

"Let me ask you one thing. What level of the Seven Treasure Glazed Tile Sect's Mind-Splitting Secret Art have you cultivated to?"

"How do you know about that?" Ning Rongrong's face filled with astonishment.

The Mind-Splitting Secret Art was a closely guarded secret of the Seven Treasure Glazed Tile Sect. When cultivated to its peak, it could grant one the Seven-Orifice Wishful Heart.

"Answer my question."

"Um..."

Ning Rongrong hesitated before answering, "The third level, I think."