Gathering Before School Starts

Vacation countdown: 3 days

Mu Baobao had rarely skipped his extra lessons at the Forging Department, but he had worked hard all summer after all...

He could not keep his nerves taut all the time. Early that morning, Zhang Lexuan had dragged him out of bed and told him to go buy ingredients for a gathering of female students.

"Hm?"

"Lexuan, you're really ordering me around like this?" Mu Baobao complained. Beibei should have finished hunting Soul Beasts with Tang Ya by now and be on his way back.

"Go on, go on. They're all beautiful senior sisters. If you like one, I'll set you up with her."

Zhang Lexuan said with a wicked smile. Mu Baobao immediately got chills. Shrek's Inner Court was full of genuine monsters. Though there were pitifully few of them, there were still one or two hundred students. There had to be at least dozens of female students.

Even if they would not invite people they were unfamiliar with, Zhang Lexuan still had more than a dozen friends. They were all older sisters a few years his senior, and some had not even participated in the annual Sea God Fate Conference because they already had boyfriends.

Wouldn't he be walking straight into a wolf den? He immediately refused.

"Then I'll eat outside. I won't disturb you sisters' gathering. I'm afraid I'll see something inappropriate for children!" Mu Baobao cried. Zhang Lexuan rolled her eyes. "Why are you so spineless?"

"You're so outstanding that the sisters all want to throw themselves at you. Hurry up." Zhang Lexuan spoke forcefully. "I'm even giving you a chance to perform. Show off your cooking later and conquer their stomachs."

"Yeah, right. I might end up kneeling and singing 'Conquer' instead." Mu Baobao muttered. Soul Masters could slow aging, after all. Those were a pack of older lionesses—could he provoke them casually?

The two brothers had been raised by Zhang Lexuan since childhood. Their cooking might not rival a master chef's, but it was far from bad.

Quite a few female students, on the other hand, could not cook at all.

Unable to win against his own sister,

Mu Baobao got dressed and headed out, grumbling all the way to the place that sold ingredients.

"I'll feed all of you into chubby little pigs."

He specifically picked meat with high fat content. He worked out whenever he wanted, so he was not worried. Vegetables, drinks, fruit... as long as they had it, he tossed it all into his storage Soul Tool. If not for such a divine artifact,

on Blue Star, he would have needed a small cart. Douluo Continent's cuisine excelled more in its ingredients; its cooking methods were rather hard to look at. Huo Yuhao could grill a fish and call it delicious, but Mu Baobao had countless Chinese recipes in his mind. Zhang Lexuan had teased that even if he could not make it as a Soul Master, he would still become an excellent chef.

"Sisters, move those beautiful legs of yours."

Mu Baobao returned carrying the ingredients. The moment he pushed open the door, it was as though he saw holy light. In the blazing summer heat, they were all dressed coolly in shorts, short sleeves, and long skirts...

Nearly all of them were stunning young women who looked around twenty-four or twenty-five. Yet Mu Baobao knew several of them, and he knew they were all "holy" maidens.

They were two years older than Zhang Lexuan, but Zhang Lexuan was a genius rarely seen in a century and the chief disciple of the Inner Court... even the male students could not compete with her. They had no choice but to respect their senior sister.

There were two redheads who looked explosively hot-tempered: Ma Xiaotao and Wu Ming, who had appeared before. They were known as the Inner Court's two great volcanoes.

Phoenix and Golden Crow were both fire-attribute martial souls with terrifying temperatures, nearly comparable to Ultimate Fire.

There were also two white-haired women: Han Ruoruo, who wore glasses and carried a scholarly air, and the ice-cold Ling Luochen. There was also Lotus Fairy Hua Yao, who had appeared several times... Only Ling Luochen and Ma Xiaotao were around his age, eighteen.

They had appeared at nineteen, when Huo Yuhao had entered school for a year and participated in the Continental Soul Master Tournament. They truly were that age now... They were also the two who had failed to hold hands at the Sea God Fate Conference. Ma Xiaotao had mutated into the Dark Phoenix and been abducted by the Holy Spirit Cult, while Ling Luochen had chosen Huo Yuhao and naturally been rejected.

Wu Ming and Han Ruoruo were the two he still remembered. They had appeared many times in Peerless Tang Sect.

But when they held hands, they had not even known someone liked them. They had only intended to find someone to live with, yet someone had actually secretly admired them.

Han Ruoruo's martial soul was the Golden Rope, and she was the Inner Court's strongest control-type Soul Master. She had held hands with Wang Yan, the Outer Court teacher whose Coiling Dragon Staff was highly compatible with hers, and researched alongside him for two months. Their age gap was not large... it was simply that one had become a teacher while the other remained a student.

As for Wu Ming, that male student had liked her courage and madness. Hua Yao had been introduced only briefly; the rest had all been scenes for the Shrek Seven Devils... Huo Yuhao and the others.

Other than them, Mu Baobao did know some of the rest now, though his impression was not particularly deep. After all, if they were not impressive, they could not be dragged out to become familiar faces alongside the protagonists.

Pairs of beautiful legs swayed before him. In his previous life, he had been too poor even to have the chance to interact with girls.

It had taken him a long time to adapt. Then he began to show his true colors as a man. What beautiful older sisters hated were ugly, broke, potbellied shut-ins. If a man was handsome and not short on money... even lewd remarks would be called romantic.

"Ah, Baobao's back? Hurry and cook for your sisters. What do you all want to eat?"

"On such a hot day, of course... hot pot."

"Agreed."

Hua Yao, Wu Ming, Han Ruoruo, and several senior sisters spoke one after another. Ling Luochen and Ma Xiaotao calmly nodded. "Anything is fine. It won't taste bad anyway."

"Hm?" Mu Baobao looked up.

"Good grief. Luckily, you're all Soul Masters. Otherwise, aren't you afraid of ending up in the hospital in weather this hot?"

He liked it too—spicy hot pot in blazing summer, cold drinks in freezing winter... it was all about the thrill. Resigned, he took the ingredients from his Soul Tool and headed to the kitchen to prepare them. Most of the ingredients could be bought ready-made at restaurants. His sharp knife work stunned the senior sisters; it was nearly on par with a Soul Master whose martial soul was a blade. On Douluo Continent,

even if one had a useless martial soul, once awakened, it could still be used for a corresponding profession and save one from carrying an extra tool.

A hoe, an iron block, a shovel, a pot...

"Such a handsome young man. Who knows which girl will benefit from him in the future? Shouldn't this sister claim a spot first?" The headache was that the senior sisters kept teasing him whenever he came to fetch ingredients.

Ling Luochen was quiet by nature, and Han Ruoruo was very refined and not that bold. Wu Ming... the few hot-tempered ones showed no restraint. Ma Xiaotao was unexpectedly calm, but Mu Baobao knew she could not have changed her nature, because they were all laughing at her!

"Xiaotao, why are you so quiet? Be honest—how many times did you climb into his room this summer? Did you ever fail to hold back... and give Baobao—"

Ma Xiaotao's face flushed red as she snapped in irritation.

"Senior sister, what are you talking about? If it weren't for the Evil Fire, do you think I'd want to?"

"Really? Then this sister won't hold back."

One senior sister smiled seductively. Ma Xiaotao showed a hint of panic, but she still stubbornly said,

"Do whatever you want, Senior Sister. If you're willing, then go ahead."

"Xiaotao really isn't good at lying, is she? If I whisk Baobao away, no one will suppress your Evil Fire anymore!" The senior sisters endlessly teased Ma Xiaotao. Nothing was more fun than teasing a junior,

and they did not remain idle either. They each prepared bowls and chopsticks, then brought out the ingredients. Two long tables were pushed together.

A large pot and stove were placed in the middle, steam rising from them... They skillfully added the ingredients and seasonings. They greatly admired Mu Baobao as well; to think he had come up with such a simple yet enjoyable way of eating. He was a genius.

"Sisters, stop joking around. There really are senior brothers who like you!" After completing all the preparations, Mu Baobao brought out a large bowl of mixed fruit. With a slight use of Soul Power, it became shaved ice.

He had bought several flavors of drinks and let them add whichever they wanted. Hot pot with cold drinks was pure bliss.

"Who?"

"You sisters thought no one wanted you?"

"It can't be you, can it? How greedy—you want to have so many senior sisters at once."

Several senior sisters asked with great interest. Mu Baobao helplessly broke into a sweat. "Spare me. Even if I were a dragon-type martial soul master with great stamina in that department, I still couldn't withstand you sisters' antics."

"You just have to wait about five years!"

Mu Baobao replied. Huo Yuhao had studied for one year before participating in the Continental Advanced Spirit Master Academy Elite Tournament, then went to the Sun Moon Empire's Mingde Hall for three years of exchange study before returning to participate in the Sea God Fate Conference at seventeen.

If not for preventing the Sea God Fate Conference from being nothing but scenes for the Shrek Seven Devils and laying groundwork for the future, these senior sisters would have held hands with those senior brothers successfully years ago. They had been dragged down by them!

"Ah, five years?" The senior sisters were dumbfounded.

They thought he was joking, but when the time came and they discovered that this junior brother had predicted everything perfectly, how shocked would they be?

"By then, we'll all be in our thirties. We'll go from holy maidens to leftover women. Why not let this little brother suffer a little? Your sisters will be very gentle!"

"Uh..." Mu Baobao was speechless. He pointed at the steaming hot pot. "Eat first. The food's getting cold."

The senior sisters rolled their eyes at him. "Ridiculous."

Yet their eyes glimmered uncontrollably, and they were practically drooling. Clearly, they were still extremely eager.

"Hua Yao, I want that meatball."

"Who told you to steal my vegetables?"

Wu Ming and Hua Yao were the first two senior sisters to start fighting over food. Ma Xiaotao and Han Ruoruo were also fighting over a chicken wing, even resorting to verbal tactics.

"Junior sister, respect your senior sister. Your martial soul is a fire chicken, so how can you eat your own kind? Wu Ming's Golden Crow doesn't fight me for food!" Han Ruoruo adjusted her glasses and said provocatively.

"Doesn't that prove her martial soul is a chicken while mine isn't? How can a chicken compare to a phoenix?"

Ma Xiaotao refused to back down. Upon hearing that, Wu Ming stopped fighting Hua Yao for meatballs and began fighting with Ma Xiaotao instead. Everyone was speechless. As expected of the two volcanoes.

"Hehe!"

Zhang Lexuan and Ling Luochen ate quietly. One was the senior sister who took care of her juniors, while the other was originally a junior sister, and a very quiet one at that. Zhang Lexuan even picked plenty of food for her.

The other senior sisters whom he barely remembered fought over their own food as well... In the blazing summer, they ate until sweat soaked them, only making them feel even cooler.

The floor was a mess. Mu Baobao helplessly cleaned up the aftermath. Each senior sister took a large bowl, poured in a little of her favorite drink, and shared the large mixed bowl of fruit salad. Whenever the ice melted, he helplessly blew out a breath, making it icy cold again.

Another round of fighting began, only this time it was over fruit rather than hot pot. They lounged about in every possible pose, reading books, magazines, and study materials... eating and drinking as they pleased.

They showed no guard around Mu Baobao's gaze, even provocatively expressing that if he had the guts, he could come at them.

Summer fun... was nothing more than this.