"Teacher Mu, this is a sensitive topic. You shouldn't get involved; it won't do you any good." Lin Yao interrupted Mu Jin, then stood and spoke to him.
"Ye Guyi is still waiting for me. I'll go eat and get some rest."
Mu Jin nodded. In truth, Lin Yao hadn't waited for him to tell him he could leave. As soon as he finished speaking, he turned and headed out.
Mu Jin naturally didn't stop Lin Yao. Instead, he watched as Lin Yao and Ye Guyi left the Soul Fighting Zone together.
As soon as they stepped outside the Soul Fighting Zone, Ye Guyi asked Lin Yao curiously, "Brother Yao, what were you just talking about with Teacher Mu?"
Lin Yao smiled. He didn't mention the sensitive things he'd said afterward, choosing instead to focus on what came before. "Teacher Mu was explaining how devoted she is, so she wanted me to imagine how you'd react if you fell for someone else."
Ye Guyi gave Lin Yao a stern look. "I'm not the kind of woman who flits from one man to another!"
Lin Yao smiled and nodded, then told Ye Guyi, "I never said you were. I confidently told Teacher Mu that you wouldn't fall for anyone else, and that you're not the kind of woman who doesn't know how to keep herself pure."
Only then was Ye Guyi satisfied. She said to Lin Yao, "Of course! I'm not some slut who has a boyfriend but still gets involved in questionable relationships with male disciples or male best friends."
Lin Yao smiled and poked Ye Guyi's cheek. "We're only twelve. Where'd you get a boyfriend?"
Ye Guyi finally realized what she'd said earlier, and her face immediately flushed red. She abruptly drew the Angel Holy Sword and declared, "You're clearly overflowing with evil energy! Today, I shall slay this demon dragon with my holy sword!"
Lin Yao grinned, spread the Ender Dragon's wings, and beckoned to Ye Guyi with a finger. "That depends on whether you've got what it takes. Come and catch me."
A golden figure and a dark one raced toward Shrek Academy's cafeteria, one chasing the other, leaving a trail of laughter in their wake.
Life was bitter and dreary. The only way to ease it was to rely on your own powerful inner drive to find balance.
That afternoon, Lin Yao glanced at the stands. Zhou Yi hadn't shown up at all, while Mu Jin stood by the stage, her eyes fixed on him and a smile playing on her lips. Clearly, seeing her seed team had put her in a good mood.
Before the match began, Lin Yao spotted a well-informed student from another class whose team was in a different zone and asked, "Why isn't Teacher Zhou Yi here?"
The student knew what had happened between Lin Yao, Zhou Yi, and Fan Yu. Still, he shrugged and said, "There's only one reason a teacher would be absent on an occasion like this, Brother Yao. Class One, Zhou Yi's class, has been completely wiped out. Not a single team advanced."
Lin Yao's mouth twitched. "They're that bad?"
The student smiled and continued, "It's not that they're bad. They were just incredibly unlucky. Five teams made it in total. One ran into your team, three ran into teams led by Soul Elders, and the last ran into a team where every member had two rings. Only that last match was close; the rest were crushing defeats."
Lin Yao was about to reply when the referee's voice rang out. "You two over there! Students from different zones shouldn't be standing around chatting. Get back to your own positions. The matches are about to begin!"
"Good luck, brother." Lin Yao patted the student who'd given him the news, then turned and walked into his zone.
"I don't need to wish you luck, Brother Yao. For you, my blessing would just be stating an insignificant fact." The student smiled at Lin Yao, cupped his hands, and headed to his own zone.
In the matches that followed, Lin Yao's team swept through one opponent after another like a fierce gale scattering fallen leaves, scoring crushing victory after crushing victory.
With Huo Yuhao's team out of the running, Lin Yao had little interest in the rankings for the new student assessment.
He'd also heard what happened to Huo Yuhao's team afterward.
Before the competition began, Zhou Yi had warned them that if they failed to take first place, they would face extremely rigorous training.
Although Zhou Yi knew in her heart that losing to Lin Yao's team hadn't been Huo Yuhao and the others' fault, the threat still came true. It could only be said that Zhou Yi never disappointed when it came to being outrageously unreasonable.
Huo Yuhao's grilled fish stall also stayed closed for several days in a row. They said that after the first day of training, his back was covered in blood from the iron vest and straps digging into him, and his face had gone several shades paler.
The final match was, without a doubt, Lin Yao against Dai Huabin and his team.
Faced with Lin Yao's Ender Dragon, Dai Huabin and Zhu Lu didn't even have the chance to unleash their Martial Soul Fusion Skill before Lin Yao suppressed them with his absolute aerial dominance.
Just as Dai Huabin finally broke free of Lin Yao's dragon breath and tried to reach Zhu Lu to complete their Martial Soul Fusion, Lin Yao used his superior mobility to sweep Zhu Lu up into the sky.
As a purely land-dwelling feline thrust into the domain of the sky, Zhu Lu immediately panicked. Dai Huabin, too, stared anxiously upward.
Lin Yao breathed a mouthful of dragon breath into his hand and waved it back and forth just beside Zhu Lu's face.
"Do you surrender? If you don't, she's going to end up disfigured." Lin Yao smiled as he spoke.
As Zhu Lu's face grew paler by the second, Dai Huabin clenched his fists so tightly that they nearly drew blood. Gritting his teeth, he shouted at Lin Yao, "Let her go! I concede!"
"How touching. All right, catch her." As he spoke, Lin Yao reached out and tossed Zhu Lu toward Dai Huabin.
Dai Huabin hurriedly caught Zhu Lu and looked at her with concern. "Are you all right?!"
Zhu Lu clutched Dai Huabin's clothes as two streams of tears ran down her face. She stammered, "Huabin, I—I held you back!"
Dai Huabin shook his head and comforted Zhu Lu. "It's all right, it's all right. What he did just proves we won, because he didn't have the guts to face our Martial Soul Fusion head-on."
Lin Yao replied to Dai Huabin without a care, "Right, right, think of it that way. The greatest thing about people is that they can find all kinds of reasons to manage their emotions. People who don't wear themselves down with inner conflict live longer."
Du Weilun promptly stepped in to restore order. "All right. Since neither contestant was injured and the match has produced a winner, that's something to be happy about. Both sides, don't use this moment to attack each other and cause unnecessary conflict."
Seeing that neither side said anything more and both were looking at him, Du Weilun continued...
Before you continue