Huo Yuhao rose to his feet under everyone's gaze. The oppressive aura Zhou Yi constantly radiated felt to him like a gentle breeze brushing his face, utterly ineffectual.
Everyone in the class except Wang Dong looked astonished. Who was this guy, to be so utterly unfazed in front of that old witch?
"Outrageous!" Zhou Yi's expression darkened. Those words were a brazen challenge and a slap in the face. The authority she had only just begun to establish among the students vanished in an instant.
"What's your name? What did you mean by what you just said?" Zhou Yi's voice was low, and the fury in her heart burned hotter.
"I meant exactly what I said. When you can't win an argument, you compare cultivation levels with us freshmen. If our cultivation were already that high, what would we need you for?"
"In your eyes, anyone who follows the rules is a spineless mediocrity? I remember that for ten thousand years, Shrek Academy's policy has been to advocate peace and oppose war. By your logic, geniuses can cause trouble whenever they please. Doesn't that make everyone at Shrek Academy an Evil Spirit Master?"
"And any student who doesn't meet your standards gets expelled on the spot? What an impressive show of authority!"
"Let me guess. The reason students who don't meet your standards have to be expelled immediately—is it to boost your advancement rate?"
"You don't expel a whole bunch of the students ranked near the bottom every year, then shamelessly claim your advancement rate is the highest in the entire year, do you? That'd be utterly shameless. You're not that shameless, are you? No way, right?"
Huo Yuhao methodically explained what he had just said.
Zhou Yi hadn't expected anyone to dare challenge her authority to her face. Her face grew redder and redder, until she looked like a volcano on the verge of erupting.
Everyone in the class saw Zhou Yi's face turn an extreme shade of red, and felt something stir within them.
"Could that guy actually be right?" Wang Dong said, her expression strange.
Wang Dong was increasingly convinced that Huo Yuhao's guess was probably true.
She looked at Zhou Yi with deep disdain.
After hearing Huo Yuhao's reasonable analysis, the other students in the class gradually caught on, and one after another they looked at Zhou Yi with contempt.
At that moment, Zhou Yi wanted nothing more than to tear Huo Yuhao's mouth apart.
She had long used these despicable methods to cover up her woefully inadequate teaching ability.
But now Huo Yuhao was slapping her right in the face, exposing all her tricks. How would she maintain her advancement rate from now on?
Having her darkest secret exposed in front of everyone drove Zhou Yi to the brink with humiliation and rage.
At that moment, she seriously wondered if some new kind of recording Soul Tool had been installed on her.
Otherwise, how could Huo Yuhao know her methods so well?
Zhou Yi raised her head, only to see contempt in everyone's eyes as they looked at her.
Furious, she snapped, "Enough! Are you useless fools qualified to question my teaching methods? Don't you know how to respect your teachers?"
"And you! What's your name? State it!" Zhou Yi glared at Huo Yuhao with hatred.
Seeing how furious Zhou Yi was, Huo Yuhao grew even more disdainful. "You call us useless at every turn, and you still have the nerve to talk about respecting teachers? You're not fit to teach anyone! My name is Huo Yuhao!"
Huo Yuhao stood where he was and announced his name without the slightest fear.
As soon as he said it, everyone in the class except Wang Dong looked astonished.
"He's Huo Yuhao!"
"The one who used a single-ring cultivation to defeat a three-ring Soul Elder, and won with ease!"
"No wonder he's so confident. He really is a monstrous genius."
"Haha, that old witch was mouthing off in front of a monster like him and ran straight into a brick wall. Just like Huo Yuhao said, she's a CJB teacher who's famous in name only."
"How did Shrek Academy end up hiring someone like her? How can someone like that be a teacher?"
A rustle of whispered conversation spread among the students.
"Bastard!" Zhou Yi glared at Huo Yuhao. "So you're that brat who's been stirring up trouble in the Outer Court lately. You think you're invincible just because you have some ability? You're only a one-ring Soul Master, and you dare challenge a Spirit Emperor?"
At that, Huo Yuhao asked in genuine confusion, "I don't get it either. You're an old woman who's decades old, yet you've only managed to reach six rings. I think you're the useless one. What gives you the right to swagger around in front of me? If you're so capable, why don't you go cultivate in the Inner Court?"
"You're useless yourself, yet you keep claiming you're going to raise monsters. Have you ever considered that a useless person can't raise monsters? Your students are exceptional because they were talented to begin with. It has nothing whatsoever to do with you."
"With teaching skills like yours, how have you managed to stay at Shrek? Did you only manage to secure a place at the academy by relying on some man?"
"When people gossip about you, do you try desperately to prove yourself? Is that why you use these despicable methods to improve your advancement rate?"
"Maybe you even deliberately keep that man at arm's length to escape the gossip? Just to deceive yourself?"
Huo Yuhao's questions came in an unending stream.
Rumble! An immensely powerful aura erupted from Zhou Yi. This time, everyone except Huo Yuhao—including Wang Dong—was crushed by the pressure and immobilized, pinned firmly to their seats. Some of the weaker support-type Soul Masters even rolled their eyes back and fainted.
Zhou Yi raised a finger and pointed angrily at Huo Yuhao. Her entire body trembled with rage.
"You—you!" The overwhelming surge of emotion made her chest heave, but she couldn't get out a complete sentence.
Huo Yuhao stood there with a mocking expression, watching Zhou Yi lose her composure. He found it rather amusing.
That was all it took to break her? Her ability to handle pressure was pathetic.
Compared to the flame wars he'd seen on the forums in his previous life, this was barely a drizzle.
If Zhou Yi could see what the forum users in his previous life had said about her, she might just drop dead on the spot.
Zhou Yi stood there for a long time, trying to calm herself. At last, she managed to suppress the knot of emotions in her heart.
Her eyes shifted, and then she said, "You sharp-tongued brat. If you've got the guts, come with me to the Spirit Fighting Arena. We'll fight with the same cultivation level. If you lose, you'll leave Shrek Academy on your own. How about it?"
Huo Yuhao smiled. "We don't need the same cultivation level. I can give you an advantage. You can stay at three rings. I'll fight you with my one ring. I wouldn't want people saying I bullied an old woman. I know how to respect the elderly and care for the young. If you lose, I won't make you leave the academy. I'm kindhearted, after all. All you need to do is give me one Spirit Bone that's at least eight thousand years old."
"An eight-thousand-year-old Spirit Bone? You've got some nerve asking for that." Zhou Yi looked Huo Yuhao up and down. "Brat, I may be at three rings, but I have a Spirit Emperor's physical strength. Do you really think you've already won?"
Huo Yuhao couldn't be bothered to answer. He simply walked out of the classroom.
At the classroom door, he didn't look back. He left Zhou Yi with nothing but his departing figure and said one last thing in a calm voice.
Zhou Yi and every freshman in the class heard his words perfectly clearly.
"You should be glad we weren't born in the same era. What you see me do now is like a frog at the bottom of a well watching the moon in the sky. If we had been born in the same era, seeing me would be like a mayfly gazing at the azure sky."
"I'll wait for you at the Spirit Fighting Arena."
Before you continue