Chapter Sixty-Nine: Group Deterrence
When Xiang Kun arrived, Tang Baona and the other two were already waiting for him in Yang Zhen'er's X3.
After opening the car door and getting into the back seat, the three women took turns greeting him, and then Tang Baona asked, "Have you had lunch?"
"Of course I ate it," Xiang Kun nodded in response.
Yang Zhen'er, having signaled and driven back onto the main road, said, "That eel rice at that restaurant is amazing! 'Saitama-sensei,' you should try it sometime. Eel should be high in protein, so it's a healthy food." When they were about to have lunch, they naturally invited Xiang Kun, but unsurprisingly, he rejected them again.
"I don't eat eel," Xiang Kun replied simply.
"You don't even eat eel? This isn't controlling your diet, it's just being picky..." Yang Zhen'er asked, puzzled.
Xiang Kun said, "Indeed, my tastes are rather peculiar, so I basically don't eat with people anymore."
"So what do you usually eat?" Tang Baona, sitting in the front passenger seat, turned around and asked curiously.
"I'm not sure what I'll eat, but I'll eat very little," Xiang Kun replied vaguely.
He then changed the subject, asking Xia Libing, who was also sitting in the back seat, for advice on several mental illness issues he had read about the previous night.
After chatting for only a few minutes, Xia Libing asked in surprise, "You started reading those books I recommended to you last night?"
The questions Xiang Kun raised were all difficult points from those books; you couldn't ask them without having read the books or having any understanding of the subject.
"Yes, I read until midnight," Xiang Kun said. His questions were limited to one or two books, so he wasn't worried that Xia Libing would doubt his learning or reading speed.
Tang Baona turned around and interjected, "Lao Xia, which city's hospital in Haixi Province are you transferring to this time?"
Xiang Kun asked curiously, "You're going to Haixi Province? Why don't you stay in this city?" He knew very well that the three women were all from this city and their families were relatively wealthy. In addition, given Xia Libing's education and abilities, there shouldn't be any problem for her to stay in a hospital in this city.
Yang Zhen'er, who was driving, curled her lip. "After graduation, everyone else is scrambling to stay in hospitals in this city. But my Lao Xia is different. Top-tier hospitals in this city offered her jobs, but she didn't stay. She used her connections to go to another province! And not even to the provincial capital or other first-tier cities. By the way, Lao Xia, which city are you going to again?"
"Citong City," Xia Libing said.
Xiang Kun was stunned. "Citong City?"
Seeing his expression, Tang Baona remembered something and asked, "By the way, Xiang Kun, you seemed to have told me before that you were also from Haixi Province?"
Xiang Kun nodded. "I'm from Citong City..."
Tang Baona was taken aback, looked at Xia Libing in the back seat, and couldn't help but laugh, "What a coincidence!"
Yang Zhen'er was also somewhat surprised. "What a coincidence? If the hospital that Lao Xia was going to hadn't been booked two months ago, I would have thought she was going to Haixi Province because of 'Saitama-sensei'."
"I'm not in Haixi Province right now." Xiang Kun shook his head, then asked Xia Libing, "Why did you think of going to Citong City? It seems like there's no well-known psychiatry department there. Logically speaking, shouldn't you have better career opportunities in your home city for both of your majors?"
Xia Libing replied simply, "It doesn't matter."
"Connections?" Xiang Kun was puzzled. Didn't Yang Zhen'er say that hospitals in the city wanted her, but she refused to stay? Did she really need connections to get a hospital in a second-tier city in Haixi Province?
Tang Baona sensed his question and offered an explanation, "The vice president of the hospital she went to is her third aunt. She said she's been very good to her since she was little, but we all feel there's more to it than that."
Yang Zhen'er also said, "If we're talking about being good to her, I'm even better to her! I haven't seen her stay with me though! This girl must have some ulterior motive!"
Xia Libing didn't argue, giving off an attitude that said, "Say whatever you want, I'll admit defeat if you offer even one explanation."
It took the four of them more than two hours to reach the horse farm in the neighboring city. Actually, there was a horse farm in the suburbs of their city, but that horse farm was not only more expensive, but also had more people and fewer horses, and the grounds were much smaller.
"'Saitama-sensei,' you've really never ridden a horse before, have you?" Before getting off the carriage, Yang Zhen'er turned around and asked Xiang Kun with a serious expression.
"Never ridden one before, what's wrong?"
"Hmph, I don't believe a newbie like you can beat me this time!" Yang Zhen'er said confidently. She was an experienced rider, and horseback riding was not an ordinary sport; it wasn't just about having good physical fitness.
Xiang Kun smiled but didn't say anything.
However, the reason he agreed to ride horses today was to test his ability to intimidate animals, to see if it would have any effect on horses, and whether he could use this to control them.
But what he didn't expect was that the effect was indeed very good, even too good...
When they were led to the arena by the staff of the horse farm, and under the guidance of the coach, they first familiarized themselves with the horses and various precautions, he locked onto one of the horses, tensed his muscles, held his breath, concentrated his attention, and mentally prepared for the battle.
The horse that Xiang Kun had targeted was startled by his successful influence and retreated repeatedly. The staff at the horse farm couldn't hold it back, and it retreated directly into the stable. No matter how the coach and staff tried to pull it out, it wouldn't budge. It even resorted to lying down on the ground in a spoiled manner.
Xiang Kun realized that he seemed to have "overdone it".
What he didn't expect was that the impact was "collective," affecting not only the horse he had targeted, but all the horses in the entire stable.
It was as if running around any further would be considered disrespectful if Xiang Kun were here, so they all stopped. No matter how the keepers, handlers, or riders tried to shoo them away, it was no use; some even lay down on the ground and went on strike.
The horse farm had never seen anything like this before, and they panicked, thinking there was something wrong with the horses. They had no choice but to temporarily stop serving customers and take them out for a refund.
When Xiang Kun was intimidating the horse, from an observer's perspective, all they could see was that his expression seemed to become a little more serious; otherwise, nothing seemed amiss. Therefore, no one realized that the horses' collective erratic behavior at the stable was because of him...
However, based on past experience, his deterrent effect on animals cannot be that wide; it generally only affects animals that have noticed him and have been targeted by him.
Moreover, he did not undergo any specific training for this during these blood-drinking periods.
This situation could occur either because his body undergoes further mutations as he drinks more blood, naturally increasing his intimidation factor over animals, or it is directly related to the blood he drank from that Giant Owl earlier.
In comparison, he felt the latter possibility was more likely.
After leaving the horse farm, Tang Baona and the other two girls marveled at the situation and discussed the horses' strike. Yang Zhen'er, in particular, had been to many horse farms both domestically and internationally since childhood and had encountered many horses, some gentle and some irritable, but she had never seen anything like it before.
Unbeknownst to them, shortly after they and Xiang Kun left the horse farm and got into the car, all the horses in the farm returned to normal.
After returning from the neighboring city and exiting the highway, Yang Zhen'er frowned and asked her companion in the car, "Where do we go now? We can't just go home like this, can we?"
"Want to come to my house to play cards?" Tang Baona suggested.
"Okay, but we'll play until 6:30." Xiang Kun thought for a moment and said. Although the three girls didn't know, they hadn't been able to ride horses today because of his mistake, so he couldn't refuse Tang Baona's suggestion.
Yang Zhen'er pouted and turned around to say, "It's only been a few hours? We can continue after dinner. If you don't want to eat the same things as us, you can order takeout. You can eat separately from us too!"
Before Xiang Kun could reply, Tang Baona in the passenger seat exclaimed, "Watch out!..."
Yang Zhen'er quickly turned around and instinctively stepped on the brakes, but it was too late. The front of the BMW X3 still bumped into the rear of the SUV in front of it.
Fortunately, we were driving in the city at a very slow speed, and the brakes were applied in time. Apart from being a little startled, neither the car nor the people should have been seriously injured.