Dai Huabin finished his self-deprecating remark and left first with Zhu Lu.
The days that followed passed in an orderly routine.
After Wang Dong'er, Xiao Xiao, and Cui Yajie officially became disciples of the Tang Sect, Tang Ya practically couldn't wait to bring out every cultivation manual she had tucked away.
That very day, she passed on the Mysterious Heaven Skill's cultivation formula, along with the entry-level method for the Purple Demon Eye to Cui Yajie.
Bei Bei stood by and watched as Tang Ya taught them.
He couldn't help feeling a little emotional.
After all these years of the Tang Sect's decline, they had finally gained three promising new disciples—and all of them were girls.
"Xiao Ya, take it slow. Don't pour everything into them at once. They need time to absorb it."
Bei Bei offered a reminder.
Tang Ya didn't take it to heart at all. She took Xiao Xiao by the hand and immediately began explaining the route of the Mysterious Heaven Skill's circulation.
Cui Yajie, by contrast, was patient. After receiving the Purple Demon Eye formula, she read it over and over several times, then began trying to absorb the purple qi in the morning sunlight.
Wang Dong'er sat to one side, clutching her handwritten copy of the Mysterious Heaven Skill, but her thoughts were in a jumble.
She couldn't shake the feeling that her decision to join the Tang Sect had come out of nowhere.
She hadn't given it a moment's thought before, yet the instant she stood in front of Tang Ya, a thought had popped into her head: Join.
The thought had been so strong it didn't feel like her own.
"I only bought grilled fish from him once. How could I possibly feel this way?"
Wang Dong'er shook her head hard, trying to fling all those chaotic thoughts away.
Whatever. The Mysterious Heaven Skill did look pretty good. She'd learn it and see what happened.
A month later.
The Mysterious Heaven Skill worked even better than Dai Huabin had expected.
Wang Dong'er's Soul Power was the first to break through to Level 22.
She had always possessed the foundation of two Martial Souls, the Light Goddess Butterfly and the Clear Sky Hammer. With her innate talent already established, once the Mysterious Heaven Skill improved her meditation efficiency, her Soul Power growth became almost visible to the naked eye.
Cui Yajie wasn't far behind, steadily advancing to Level 25.
What excited Cui Yajie even more was the Purple Demon Eye.
Though she had only been practicing it for a month, her spiritual power had already improved noticeably.
In the past, when she used "Charm," its effect had diminished considerably against Soul Masters above Level 20. Now, she could faintly sense that her spiritual power's range had expanded quite a bit.
As for the Tang Sect, Huo Yuhao's reaction surprised Dai Huabin.
According to Cui Yajie, when Huo Yuhao first heard that the Tang Sect had gained three new members, he had been delighted.
But later, after somehow finding out that all three were close to Dai Huabin, he had grown cold.
"That grilled-fish boy is strange."
One evening in the dormitory, Cui Yajie mentioned it to Xiao Xiao and Wang Dong'er.
"Whenever we show up at the Tang Sect training grounds with Huabin, he comes up with an excuse to leave."
Xiao Xiao tilted her head and thought it over. "Maybe he's just shy?"
Cui Yajie shook her head.
"It's not shyness. I've watched him several times. Whenever Huabin is there, that Huo Yuhao seems to have this... How should I put it? A very oppressive air about him."
She didn't use the words "negative emotions," but that was more or less what she meant.
Xiao Xiao looked worried. "Should we tell the class monitor?"
"No need." Cui Yajie flicked her long pink hair. "The class monitor is sharper than we are. He must have noticed already."
Wang Dong'er leaned against the head of the bed, hugging a pillow as she listened to the two of them talk. She didn't say a word.
She had noticed Huo Yuhao too.
To be precise, whenever she went to the Tang Sect to train, she found herself looking for the gray-clothed boy without even realizing it.
The feeling made Wang Dong'er extremely irritable.
She and Huo Yuhao had spoken fewer than ten words in total, most of them when she bought grilled fish from him.
What was so special about an ordinary boy with barely over ten levels of Soul Power that could make her, a direct descendant of the Clear Sky Sect, care about him?
"This is wrong! Twelve out of ten kinds of wrong!"
Wang Dong'er buried her face in the pillow and muttered gloomily.
"Dong'er, what did you say?" Xiao Xiao leaned closer.
"Nothing! Go to sleep!"
Dai Huabin was quite pleased when he learned that all three girls had kept their distance from Huo Yuhao.
Wang Dong'er reassured him most of all.
In the original story, Wang Dong'er and Huo Yuhao had an absurdly deep bond. But now, though Wang Dong'er occasionally felt something strange, she kept actively resisting it.
That meant the butterfly effect was working.
At least for now, Wang Dong'er had had no chance to form any deep connection with Huo Yuhao.
Without sharing a dorm and spending every day together, without the accidental triggering of a Martial Soul Fusion Skill, the "fated connection" between them was no more than a faint, wispy thread.
Dai Huabin wasn't sure whether he could sever it completely.
But what he could do was make sure Wang Dong'er had plenty of people around her—people strong enough that she would never need to care about some boy with barely over ten levels of Soul Power.
Over the past month, Dai Huabin and Zhu Lu had poured nearly all their spare time into cultivation.
They got up at six every morning to practice the fundamentals of Martial Soul resonance in their private dormitory. In the morning, they attended theory classes with Mu Jin, and in the afternoon, they never missed their practical sparring sessions.
The teams were always the same.
Dai Huabin and Zhu Lu were one team.
Wang Dong'er, Xiao Xiao, and Cui Yajie were another.
Ning Tian, Wu Feng, and Nanmen Yun'er made up the third.
The three teams took turns fighting.
At first, Dai Huabin and Zhu Lu beat Wang Dong'er's team so badly they couldn't fight back at all.
But as their teamwork grew more and more polished, and with Xiao Xiao's "Cauldron Defense" proving incredibly sturdy, they could occasionally withstand several rounds of Dai Huabin's attacks.
Ning Tian's team was even more interesting.
Once Ning Tian activated the support of her Seven Treasure Glazed Tile Pagoda, Wu Feng's Dragon Fire surged in power.
With Nanmen Yun'er's Jade Slash providing long-range fire support, the three of them proved surprisingly threatening as a team.
After one sparring session, Wu Feng plopped onto the ground, panting, and glared at Dai Huabin. "You... Can you stop going for me first every time?"
Dai Huabin wiped the sweat from his forehead. "Because you're the strongest fighter. If I don't take you down first, Ning Tian's support will keep boosting you."
Wu Feng froze. She hadn't expected that the other team had focused on her because they took her seriously.
The corners of her mouth twitched. She almost let a smug expression show, but managed to hold it back, then huffed and turned away.
Ning Tian smiled and shook her head beside her.
In fact, a lot of the time, Dai Huabin had been holding off two Soul Grandmasters by himself while Zhu Lu slipped around to ambush Ning Tian. Wu Feng's eyes were always fixed on Dai Huabin, though, so all she saw was him beating her up.
Zhu Lu silently handed Dai Huabin a towel, then took the cap from his water flask, unscrewed it, and passed it to him. The whole sequence flowed seamlessly, without a word exchanged.
For no reason at all, Wang Dong'er clicked her tongue when she saw them.
"What are you looking at?" Cui Yajie sidled over with a mischievous grin.
"I wasn't looking! I was counting the ants on the ground!" Wang Dong'er flushed bright red, grabbed Xiao Xiao, and hurried away.
And so the days flew by amid cultivation and sparring.
In the blink of an eye, only two days remained until the Freshman Assessment.
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