"Big Head must be piecing together some kind of nonsense in his head right now. During class, I clearly saw him sitting there like an idiot, eyes half-closed, wearing a lecherous, foolish grin, practically drooling. He looked like he was sleepwalking. He didn't take in a word Teacher Daina said!" Light muttered to Doug beside him. Barry gave him a light kick, and only then did he shut up. Barry didn't know that Light's guess was actually right.
"Last night, I was boiling water at home. Once it came to a boil, I lifted the kettle off the stove and set it on the floor. I forgot to pour it into the thermos. When I remembered and went to fill it, I found the water in the kettle had already cooled down..." The other guys stared at Zhang Tie, their eyes bulging like ox testicles, with no idea what this rambling was supposed to mean. Fortunately, everyone behaved best during Teacher Daina's lessons. If this had been any other class, Zhang Tie might have been pelted with rotten eggs before he even finished his opening.
Teacher Daina listened patiently without urging him on, giving Zhang Tie more time to gather his thoughts.
"I didn't think much of it at the time. I just boiled the water again. But later, when I was going to bed, I remembered what had happened and started wondering about something I couldn't figure out. So I thought I'd ask Teacher Daina about it today. Is every one of us like a kettle of boiled water from the moment we're born, unknowingly losing the energy in our bodies every day, every moment?"
It was a novel question, and a completely unexpected one. Even Light and the others were startled by it. They hadn't expected Zhang Tie's wild guesswork to produce such a profound question: was each person like that kettle of boiled water?
The question came from the information Zhang Tie had seen when the Flawless Fruit was generated. He had never quite understood it, so he took this opportunity to ask Teacher Daina about it.
"This student is very perceptive, and his question is quite unusual. This is everyone's final semester at school. According to my original lesson plan, I intended to discuss the energy in the human body with you later in the term. I didn't expect this student to have already noticed the issue. In that case, I'll bring the discussion forward and talk about it with you now..."
"Ding-a-ling..."
Just as Teacher Daina was about to begin, the bell rang for the end of class. She paused for a moment until it stopped, then smiled apologetically. "Let's end class here for now. Take a break. It'll take quite a while to explain this properly, so we'll discuss it next period..."
Class was over. A few people left the classroom, but most lingered inside. Some of the bolder ones found all kinds of excuses to drift over to Teacher Daina, deliberately asking stupid questions about the biology lesson she had just taught. Teacher Daina patiently answered them, apparently unaware of the guys' ulterior motives. Gelis and his three lackeys were especially blatant. They practically surrounded Teacher Daina, while Gelis talked loudly and laughed exaggeratedly from time to time, trying to show how familiar he was with her and make it look as though they were enjoying a lively conversation. Whenever Teacher Daina wasn't looking, he turned toward everyone else in the classroom with a smug, boastful expression.
"Gelis is an idiot," Sista muttered beside them. "If his dad weren't so influential and his family wasn't so well-off, if he and Baghdad had started on equal footing, Baghdad would be able to beat him until he was crawling on the ground by now. Then he wouldn't be strutting around like he owns the place!"
That suited Baghdad just fine. He gave a heavy snort and glared at Gelis. Everyone in the Airplane Brotherhood knew that Gelis was the target Baghdad had set himself to surpass in this life.
"I hear they're finalizing the recommendation list at the end of this semester. Gelis wants a recommendation so he can get into the Alliance's Officer Training Academy. He needs to put on a dazzling show now. Being a Level 2 Battle Soldier might make him a big shot at our school, but it doesn't mean much outside. I hear that, for the last couple of years, the Alliance's Officer Training Academy has required applicants in Black Flame City to be at least Level 3 Battle Soldiers. Gelis still falls a little short. With Level 2, getting in is a toss-up!" Light added.
"Even if he doesn't get in, Gelis is already pretty impressive!" Shavin said enviously.
"Shavin, the Alliance's Officer Training Academy is impressive for ordinary people, but it's not the most impressive place out there. Our Andaman Alliance is only a small power in the Blakerson Human Corridor, barely strong enough to defend itself, and it isn't known for its military might. The Alliance's Officer Training Academy is one of the better schools in the Alliance, but it's nothing to brag about outside it. The truly amazing geniuses are like our former senior, Li Shizhen. I hear he was chosen directly by an elder of the Alchemist Guild and taken away as the elder's personal apprentice. He soared straight to the heavens. That's what you call impressive—he's a million times better than Gelis. Forget Gelis; even his father would be dirt in front of someone like that!" Barry patted Shavin's shoulder and spoke with the air of an old hand.
"I hear Pill Masters make a lot of money?" Zhang Tie was interested in any high-paying profession, so the moment Barry mentioned alchemists, his first thoughts were money and gold coins.
"There are only four Pill Masters in all of Black Flame City. Three are resident consultants at the city's three great Battle Halls, and one is an Attendant of the Coal and Steel Union. What do you think? There are only a handful of professions on the whole continent that make more money than Pill Masters..."
"It'd be great if I could become a Pill Master!" Doug said naively, listening from the side.
The moment Doug spoke, everyone fell silent and turned to look at him. Doug put on a proud expression. After a long moment, Barry finally patted his shoulder. "Doug, I never knew you were so funny!"
The ten-minute break passed quickly, and the final class of the morning began. The guys sat upright again, both hands on their desks. Without any preamble, Teacher Daina began drawing on the blackboard with chalk. In just a few minutes, she had drawn something like an old tree wrapped in countless vines. Nobody knew what it was. When she finished, Teacher Daina put down the chalk, clapped her hands, and turned around.
"The question that student asked last period was whether our bodies are constantly losing energy. I'll begin with an anatomical diagram of the human body. This diagram shows the urinary tract and blood vessels around the bladder. That old-tree-looking thing on the blackboard is the urinary tract in the bladder region of the body. The vine-like structures wrapped around it are tiny blood vessels. Their function is like that of tree roots: they draw back into the human body some of the trace elements and energy in urine that are beneficial to us, preventing those useful substances from going to waste. The development of anatomy has given us a tool for understanding the mysteries of our bodies, but what it can tell us is very limited. Our bodies are the most precise instruments in the world, and their many mysteries can't be explained by something as simple as anatomy. In fact, even though our bodies have countless complex systems and functions to prevent energy from being wasted, they still waste enormous amounts of it every moment. Take urine, for example. As you learned in Survival Class, in certain frigid wildernesses, holding in your urine can help you last more than five hours longer than someone else. And when you can't get food or water, collecting and drinking your own urine can help you last another forty-eight hours. Why can a single piss sometimes mean the difference between life and death? Because urine contains enormous amounts of bodily energy and beneficial substances. That energy should have stayed in the body, but it's lost for no reason. Our bodies have already developed many ways to prevent that loss, but they only help a little. Most of our bodily energy still disappears needlessly through various channels. I know there are certain groups of people who regard their own urine as medicine that can strengthen the body and prolong life. The first thing these people do when they wake up in the morning is urinate, then collect and drink it, because they believe this method prevents the loss of energy and beneficial substances from their bodies..."
This sounded even more shocking than anything about the Blood Clan. The guys gaped at Teacher Daina, dumbstruck. The strange thrill of hearing about "drinking urine"—and hearing it from Teacher Daina herself—nearly made them howl at the ceiling.
"Teacher Daina, are there really people who drink urine?" one of the guys in the front row couldn't help asking loudly.
"There are!" Teacher Daina was completely serious, without the slightest embarrassment. In her eyes, this was simply an academic question. "They only drink the urine from their first pee in the morning. They believe its energy keeps them young and healthy. And in fact, every one of them is famous for their longevity. They also regard the urine of children and babies as a miraculous medicine, believing that it contains the purest life energy!"
The classroom erupted again.
"I used urine as an example only to show you that our bodies needlessly waste a great deal of energy in our daily lives. No one knows exactly how much energy is wasted, but I know that if someone could collect the energy their body wasted each day—even just a small portion of it—the amount would be enormous. Besides urine, our bodies have other channels that waste even more energy!"
"What channels, Teacher Daina?"
"Nocturnal emissions and masturbation!" Teacher Daina's expression was serious and calm, but when those two words came from her mouth, the classroom fell into another eerie silence. The guys looked this way and that, their expressions indescribably strange. Some lowered their heads outright, not daring to look at Teacher Daina. Zhang Tie glanced at the guys from the Airplane Brotherhood beside him and saw that their faces were just as colorful.
No one spoke this time. After looking around the classroom, Teacher Daina continued on her own. "Every male sperm can create and nurture a great life when it joins with a female egg. Each sperm contains a great miracle of life, waiting to be born. Have you ever wondered why? It's because every sperm contains tremendous life energy. A mature woman can produce only one egg a month, while an adult man can produce hundreds of millions of sperm every day—that is, hundreds of millions of miracles of life. Do you know how powerful the life energy in those hundreds of millions of sperm is? You don't, and neither do I. I only know that in ancient times, in the East, the cultivators known as Qi Practitioners regarded the life energy that produced sperm as a treasure capable of lifting their lives and bodies to a higher level. Aside from fathering children, they rarely let their sperm leave their bodies and go to waste. There's another kind of waste you may not know about: the countless distracting thoughts that surge through our minds without pause. They consume tremendous amounts of mental energy every moment. In this age, in places beyond what you can imagine, there are powerful cultivators and Warriors who use self-discipline and secret cultivation methods to transform the tremendous life energy and mental energy produced by their bodies. They use it to ignite the Bright Point and break through one cultivation barrier after another, eventually becoming powerful Warriors and guardians of humanity whom people can only look up to. The path of every strong person is incompatible with indulgence..." Looking at the students lost in thought, Teacher Daina smiled as beautifully as a spring breeze. "Do you know what Teacher Daina's greatest wish is?"
The guys in the classroom stared at her in astonishment. Zhang Tie's eyes flickered slightly, as if he was thinking about something.
Amid the anticipation of all the guys, Teacher Daina spoke words that were enough to change their outlook on life and the world.
"Teacher Daina's greatest wish in life is for one of my students to become a powerful Warrior or a strong person capable of protecting humanity. Then I could dress up beautifully and marry him. Unfortunately, I haven't met anyone I could marry yet. So I want to ask you all a favor. Let's make a promise..." The guys were captivated by the mature, womanly smile on Teacher Daina's face and the sparkle in her beautiful eyes. They stared at her radiance, speechless, never expecting her to say something even more astonishing.
"Here's the promise I want to make with you: when you're strong enough to protect Teacher Daina, will you let Teacher Daina marry you?"
Will you let Teacher Daina marry you...
Will you let Teacher Daina marry you...
Will you let Teacher Daina marry you...
The words thundered through every guy's mind. They could hardly believe what they had heard. Boom—the classroom exploded...
"Are you willing to make this promise with Teacher Daina?"
"We are!" The guys' unified roar nearly shattered the classroom windows.
"Good. Then our promise is sealed. You're all young men now, and a woman's youth is precious. Teacher Daina can't wait for you all her life. So here are the terms of our promise: whichever of you earns the Blood Scorpion Warrior rank badge first, before turning twenty, gets to marry Teacher Daina!"
"All right!"
At that moment, the guys still couldn't understand that there was something in this world called a loving lie, one that could weave the most beautiful hopes and blessings and become the greatest spur and source of strength on a person's path to adulthood. Right then, every guy's eyes were bloodshot as he stared at Teacher Daina, breathing heavily, feeling the big head and the little head swell with blood at the same time.
Zhang Tie had lost his composure too. Only one thought thundered through his mind: Earn the Blood Scorpion Warrior rank badge before turning twenty...