Qian Yuhan: "?! What?" I'd already asked the locals about all the famous, good schools in Bright Capital while out for a stroll as a tourist this morning, and even put together a guide to the academies.
It was true that Mingdu Soul Engineer Academy was also a famous first-rate school in the Sun Moon Empire.
But compared to the Sun-Moon Royal Soul Engineer Academy, the number-one school in the Sun Moon Empire and the second-best on the entire continent, it fell far short.
Why on earth were we visiting that academy?!
Wait! Let me sort this out... morning, afternoon, princess, visit, Sun-Moon Royal Soul Engineer Academy, Mingdu Soul Engineer Academy...
Could it be... that little princess hadn't applied to the Sun-Moon Royal Soul Engineer Academy, but to Mingdu Soul Engineer Academy, and these people wanted me to go with her?
How did this princess's brain work? She had the number-one academy in her own country, yet she was going to one that was more than a tier below it. That was nothing short of a waste of her talent!
Qian Renxue's classic case of wasting her talent by infiltrating Heaven Dou to usurp the throne, only to fail and gain nothing while squandering the most precious years of her youth, stood like a priceless jade example right before him.
So when Qian Yuhan saw these three extraordinary traits gathered in one person—a young girl coming up with what she thought was a brilliant idea, and wasting her talent—the low-level code inside him known as "Can't Stand to See a Young Girl Waste Her Talent" was instantly triggered. A terrifying, powerful aura radiated outward from him as its center.
"..." Qian Yuhan's expression darkened, so gloomy it seemed as if water could be wrung from his face. He said:
"Tell me honestly. Did your princess not apply to the Sun-Moon Royal Soul Engineer Academy? Did she apply to Mingdu Soul Engineer Academy, and do you want me to go with her?"
"Um..." Xu Yan pretended not to hear and changed the subject. "The weather's pretty nice today. Even the sun is a really nice sun!"
"Don't change the subject! Look me in the eye and tell me the truth!"
Xu Yan's feigned ignorance left Qian Yuhan deeply dissatisfied, forcing him to release a little of his "I'm the greatest under heaven" kingly aura and give this immature middle-aged man a tiny taste of a powerful expert's might.
The sort of awe-inspiring majesty possessed only by peerless experts at the very pinnacle of their era was under Qian Yuhan's control. Though it appeared for only a brief instant, it still sent a chill down Xu Yan's back.
"!"
"...Ahem, ahem!" Xu Yan coughed a few times, wiping the cold sweat beading on his forehead like soybeans as he muttered to himself:
That kid's got some presence! Even when my old man tied me to the ancestral hall's rafters with the family rules and "disciplined" me, he wasn't as scary as that just now.
Come to think of it, why did I feel damp? Had some rain blown over and soaked my clothes? Oh, it wasn't rain. It was sweat!
That's what I thought!
There was no way a mere eleven-year-old kid could summon wind and rain...
As these aimless thoughts drifted through his mind, Xu Yan looked up and saw Qian Yuhan turn his back to him. He pulled out a newly printed, simplified Bright Capital tourist map, sold by the Imperial Tourism Bureau, from his Storage Soul Tool and began pointing and scribbling on it.
With a living map of Bright Capital like me standing right here, an expert who could find his way anywhere, you don't ask me—you turn around and look at a simplified tourist map? What a joke!
Feeling as though a child had ignored him, Xu Yan's face darkened. He forced down his embarrassment, strode forward, and bent over. "Oi, what are you using that map to find? I can help you!"
"The Princess Mansion!" Without even sparing Xu Yan a glance, Qian Yuhan began circling things on the map with the tourist pen that had come free with it that morning.
"Come on, kid. How could private residences like a prince's mansion or the Princess Mansion possibly appear on a tourist map that costs five Copper Soul Coins? The Imperial Tourism Bureau isn't stupid. They wouldn't mark secretive places like that on a tourist map!"
"If you can find the Princess Mansion in that shaded area, I'll... tear up the map in your hand and eat it!"
"Found it."
Qian Yuhan's cool "Found it" and Xu Yan's impassioned "eat it" rang out almost at the same time. Xu Yan's heart gave a thump, then he thought to himself:
No way. He couldn't really have found the Princess Mansion in that shaded area on the map, where there's practically nothing to use as a reference!
"Found it? Where? Let me see!" Xu Yan swallowed and fixed his gaze on the center of the map in Qian Yuhan's hand, which had been folded over and over—the area at the center of a dozen or so strange black lines.
Bad news: Qian Yuhan really had found the Princess Mansion.
Good news: The area was vague, and there were other people's homes besides the Princess Mansion. He only needed to quibble a little, and he wouldn't have to eat the map.
"Here."
Qian Yuhan took the map from Xu Yan, slowly drew one stroke in the central area where more than ten black lines crossed, then handed it back to him.
The spot marked by the circle he'd drawn was, without the slightest deviation, exactly where Xu Tianzhen's Princess Mansion was.
Xu Yan: "..." Nice. You're not even pretending anymore. I bet you were just waiting for me to ask you that question, weren't you?!
"Want me to go buy you some seasoning to dip it in?" Qian Yuhan asked with an innocent, harmless smile.
"No need!" Xu Yan took a deep breath, rolled the Bright Capital tourist map in his hand into a long tube, then savagely tore and chewed at it as if he were savoring a sauce-dipped scallion.
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