Purple Dawn and the Auction Appointment

The next morning, Eastsea Academy's rooftop was still shrouded in a mist-like tranquility. The eastern horizon had only just turned pale, like plain silk soaked in warm water, its edges bleeding with the faintest blush of crimson, heralding the sunrise about to break through the clouds.

Yun Zhiyu sat cross-legged beside the rooftop railing, her hands forming seals atop her knees. The morning breeze brushed her cheeks with a hint of chill and stirred the tips of her jet-black hair—a color so deep it was almost pure, a disguise created by repeatedly dyeing it with Tang Sect's special hair dye to conceal the moonlit silver-white beneath.

She closed her eyes and focused, sinking her consciousness deep into her sea of spiritual awareness. An ancient tome floated in the void there, its cover bearing four large seal-script characters: Purple Demon Eyes. Yet this was not the ordinary version passed down by the Tang Sect, but an advanced version obtained through the system's check-in reward, branded into her soul when she was barely one year old and learning to speak.

Later, she had submitted this advanced version, along with improved methods for several other Tang Sect secret arts, to headquarters. After Amorous Douluo Zang Xin personally inspected them and spent three days communicating with Heartless Douluo Cao Dezhi, the two masters of Douluo Hall appeared together and bestowed upon her the title of Tang Sect's Young Mistress.

That day, fireworks bloomed above Shrek City, while disciples from both the inner and outer sects of the Tang Sect lined up to welcome her. Yet she had hidden behind her mother Ya Li's cloak, clutching a sugar-roasted chestnut Grandpa Feng Wuyu had stuffed into her hand, utterly indifferent to that grand ceremony which shook the Federation.

Thinking back on it now, it felt like another lifetime.

Yun Zhiyu slowly breathed in and out, focusing her awareness between her eyes. A thread of pure Soul Power from her dantian was drawn upward, flowing along a special meridian path into her eye sockets, where it resonated with some dormant power deep within her retinas. Her eyelids trembled faintly. Beneath her contact lenses, the vertical pupils of her violet eyes began to contract and expand at a strange rhythm, like some ancient creature slowly opening its eyes in the darkness.

Advanced Purple Demon Eyes: Dawn Radiance Realm.

The Dawn Radiance Realm drew upon the meaning of "purple qi arriving from the east, dawn breaking for the first time." It required one to absorb the first strand of purple qi arriving from the east at daybreak each day, tempering one's vision until it could penetrate the hidden and discern the minute.

Yun Zhiyu had practiced this art for more than nine years. At this moment, the dark brown contact lenses over her eyes seemed to turn transparent, revealing violet-gold vertical pupils that shimmered under the activation of Soul Power. They were like two amethysts pierced by morning light, concealing delicate patterns unique to dragons within.

She "saw" it.

The path of every grain of dust in the morning breeze, the veins of moss between the rooftop's green bricks, the bubbles inside dewdrops gathered on the distant classroom windows, even the angle at which that strand of purple qi along the eastern clouds refracted and split before finally being captured and absorbed by her pupils—everything was visible in exquisite detail through her advanced eyes.

Over the past nine years, the collection in her system space had accumulated into an astonishing treasure vault: Martial Soul Evolution Pills, immortal herbs and spirit fungi, defensive Soul Tools, Torch Dragon Golden Blood, rare metals, divine metals... Materials not even recorded in Douluo Continent's forging tomes silently shone with their own radiance in the corners of the system space. Soul spirits were arranged by category in specially made sealing compartments, ranging from thousand-year to hundred-thousand-year ones, along with extremely rare growth-type varieties. If the upper ranks of the Spirit Pagoda learned of this, it would likely cause a Federation-level uproar.

Not to mention the Federation gold card given to her by Mother Ya Li, the hundred-thousand-year inner core Grandpa Zhuo Shi had gifted her after hunting a Deep Sea Demon Whale, and the rare metals Grandpa Feng and her master Zhen Hua had given her under all sorts of pretexts over the years. At barely ten years old, her wealth was indeed enough to make ordinary Titled Douluo ashamed.

But all of that was merely background.

At this moment, she merely sat quietly on the rooftop, absorbing the purple qi within the dawn and allowing that gentle yet domineering energy to circulate and settle in her eye sockets, finally becoming the faintest, faintest glimmer of violet deep within her eyes.

The instant her cultivation ended, she gently exhaled a breath of stale air. It condensed into a fleeting puff of white mist in the morning breeze before vanishing without a trace. She slowly opened her eyes, and the contact lenses covered those violet-gold vertical pupils once more. Their dark brown surface was calm as ever, as if all the strange phenomena just now had only been an illusion.

"Finished cultivating?"

The voice came from behind her, lazy yet carrying a nearly tender quality, like the satisfied purr of a feline basking in the sunlight.

Yun Zhiyu's body stiffened imperceptibly. She instinctively turned her head and met Gu Yue's gaze.

Gu Yue leaned against the doorframe at the rooftop entrance, her hair gently swaying in the morning breeze, like a crescent moon half-concealed by clouds finally breaking free. She wore a loose gray-white hoodie, both hands tucked into her pockets. Her posture held its usual laziness, but her black eyes were as alert as if she had never slept, staring directly into Yun Zhiyu's eyes.

"Why are you here?" Yun Zhiyu blurted out, a hint of bewilderment in her voice that she had not even noticed herself.

Gu Yue straightened from the doorframe and crossed the distance to her in a few steps. They stood close enough to smell the faint fragrance in each other's hair—a scent of vegetation, like moss deep in a forest after rain, interwoven with the cool morning breeze into a familiar feeling that brought peace of mind.

"I went to your dormitory, but you weren't there!" Gu Yue said calmly, her gaze resting on the increasingly bright crimson along the eastern horizon.

"I guessed you might be on the rooftop."

Yun Zhiyu was stunned by those words.

She did often come to the rooftop to practice Purple Demon Eyes. It was one of the few habits she had at Eastsea Academy that belonged solely to her, yet she had never mentioned it to anyone. How did Gu Yue know?

Before she could react, a burst of noise suddenly rose from downstairs. It came closer and closer, like joy that could no longer be suppressed finally finding an outlet, particularly crisp amid the morning silence.

"My soul spirit! My soul spirit evolved!"

It was Tang Wulin. His voice carried the reckless excitement unique to a young boy, its final note trembling slightly with emotion.

Yun Zhiyu walked to the edge of the rooftop and looked down. She saw the blue-haired boy—no, his hair was still jet-black at the moment, merely tinged with a faint blue sheen from the aftermath of his soul spirit's evolution—jumping around on the lawn before the dormitory building, cradling a shadow that emitted a soft green glow.

It was a grass snake, but it was completely different from yesterday. Its previously dull scales now gleamed with an emerald hue, and its snake eyes no longer held that muddled blankness, but instead revealed a lively light bordering on intelligence. For Tang Wulin, whose innate Soul Power was weak and whose martial soul was ordinary, evolving a ten-year soul spirit into a hundred-year one was no different from being reborn.

Xie Xie circled around him, his brown-gold hair sticking up wildly in the morning wind, envy blazing in his dark green pupils. "Let me see! A hundred-year soul spirit! Wulin, you've struck it rich now!"

Zhang Yangzi leaned against a nearby plane tree with a blade of grass between his teeth. His face wore its usual unruly smile, though a sincere trace of amusement hid in his eyes. "All right, all right, we know you're showing off. Keep jumping and you'll step into the flower bed."

Wang Jinxi and Wei Xiaofeng stood on the steps. The former's dark golden pupils contracted faintly in the morning light. The Bone Dragon King martial soul's sensitivity to energy fluctuations allowed him to clearly sense the changes in that grass snake soul spirit. The latter stood with his arms folded. The gloomy aura of his Azure Shadow Serpent martial soul made him seem like an ink stain that could never dissolve, but the curve of his lips betrayed his mood.

Wu Nianbing practiced swordsmanship at the edge of the lawn. Frostmark from the Icebound Frost Sword carved cold arcs through the morning mist. She seemed deaf to Tang Wulin's commotion, but Yun Zhiyu noticed that her sword movements were half a beat slower than usual. Her gaze occasionally swept toward the blue-haired boy jumping about, and a faint, almost proud light flickered in her eyes.

Yun Zhiyu smiled softly. In the dawn, that smile resembled a flower petal moistened by dew, clear and warm. "Let's go down."

Gu Yue said nothing, merely nodded slightly. The two descended the rooftop stairs side by side, the morning wind blowing from behind them and making their clothes flutter like two silent banners.

Zero Class's exclusive cafeteria was in a separate building on the eastern side of the teaching block, separated from the ordinary student cafeteria and reserved for the academy's elite trainees. It was breakfast time, and the spacious dining hall was filled with the fragrance of food, yet it was quiet to the point of solemnity. The rule here was not to speak while eating, since absorbing the energy from soul beast meat required focus.

The Class A meal was indeed extravagant. On Yun Zhiyu's tray, a serving of steamed hundred-year Blackwater Turtle meat gleamed with a pearly sheen. A bowl of spirit rice porridge simmered with thousand-year ginseng gave off a rich medicinal fragrance, accompanied by several dishes of marinated soul beast organs and a plate of stir-fried tender spirit plant shoots. For an ordinary soul master family, half a month's food expenses might not compare to this single meal.

Everyone took their seats. Tang Wulin's appetite was as astonishing as ever, and his evolved soul spirit seemed to have also stimulated the appetite of his Golden Dragon King Bloodline.

He devoured the hundred-year Blackwater Turtle meat in a whirlwind, even using the spirit rice porridge to scrape the bowl clean of its juices. Xie Xie stared in utter disbelief, his spoon frozen in midair as he forgot to bring it to his mouth.

"Are you the reincarnation of a glutton?" he muttered.

Zhang Yangzi nudged him with an elbow and lowered his voice. "Stop staring. If you keep staring, he'll eat your portion too."

Wang Jinxi and Wei Xiaofeng sat facing one another, their eating styles entirely different. The former ate like some large soul beast tearing into prey, the rugged aura of Bone Dragon Claw even affecting his dining posture. The latter was refined as though conducting some precise operation, chewing every mouthful the same fixed number of times. The gloom of his Azure Shadow Serpent martial soul did not even spare his meals.

Wu Nianbing sat diagonally across from Yun Zhiyu. Her pale lavender skirt had been replaced by the academy's standard uniform, yet she still carried the lingering image of the girl who had bitten into a candied dragon yesterday at dusk. Her gaze briefly met Yun Zhiyu's, and the corners of her lips curved before she lowered her head again and focused on the spirit rice porridge before her.

Gu Yue sat beside Yun Zhiyu. She ate very little, touching only a third of the Blackwater Turtle meat, though she drank more than half the spirit rice porridge. Her attention did not seem to be on the food, however, as it occasionally fell upon Yun Zhiyu's wrist. There, the silver-white bracelet gleamed darkly beneath the cafeteria lights, like the eye of a sleeping beast.

After the meal, everyone went about their own business.

Yun Zhiyu headed to the exclusive forging room the academy had prepared for her, an independent space on the first basement level. The walls were embedded with soundproofing soul guidance materials, and a standard forging platform transported from Shrek City stood in the center, its surface marked with dents from countless hammer blows. Gu Yue followed her without reason or explanation, simply walking silently half a step behind like a shadow.

Xie Xie kept chattering from excitement over the afternoon auction, talking about the history of the Myriad Treasures Pavilion, some soul bone once auctioned for a sky-high price, and how he would dominate the battlefield if he obtained an advanced Soul Tool. Zhang Yangzi was driven nearly mad by him, and the two bickered all the way from the cafeteria entrance to the teaching building. The brown-gold head and messy black hair together looked like a pair of fighting cocks pecking at each other's feathers.

"Can you shut up?" Zhang Yangzi rubbed his temples, the gloom of his Shadow Martial Soul nearly collapsing beneath Xie Xie's noise.

"No!" Xie Xie grinned, mischievous triumph blazing in his dark green eyes. "Make me?"

Wang Jinxi and Wei Xiaofeng each returned to their dormitory to meditate. Both the Bone Dragon King and Azure Shadow Serpent martial souls needed to gather strength in tranquility, and the morning was the best time for them to recover from the exhaustion they had suffered in the Ascension Platform yesterday.

Wu Nianbing went to the training grounds. Frostmark from the Icebound Frost Sword drew cold arcs beneath the sunlight. Her sword movements were sharper than yesterday, as though she wanted to vent some indescribable emotion through every slash.

Tang Wulin, meanwhile, slipped into the academy's plant-type simulation room. It simulated plant growth under all sorts of extreme environments and was exceptionally beneficial to Bluesilver Grass martial soul cultivation. His hundred-year soul spirit—perhaps it should now be called Little Golden Light—coiled around his shoulder, its emerald scales appearing and disappearing within the simulation room's green light.

After the Class A lunch, Yun Zhiyu led the seven others onto the soul guidance car waiting at the academy entrance.

It was an extended business vehicle. Its dark gray shell carried the cold gleam distinctive to metal beneath the afternoon sun. The moment its door slid open, Xie Xie was the first to dart inside, his brown-gold head poking between the seats as if searching for the best viewing spot.

"Class monitor," he called back, anticipation blazing in his dark green pupils. "Sit over here! The view's great!"

Yun Zhiyu ignored him and walked directly to a window seat in the last row. Gu Yue naturally followed at her side, and the two sat down shoulder to shoulder. Their jet-black hair overlapped lightly against the seatbacks like an ink-wash painting with stark contrasts.

Wu Nianbing sat in the row ahead of them. Her pale lavender skirt had been replaced by fitted clothes suitable for movement, though they still retained a softness unique to girls. She watched the passing streets outside the window, the Icebound Frost Sword resting across her knees as her fingers unconsciously stroked the frost patterns on its hilt.

Tang Wulin and Xie Xie squeezed into the middle row. The former was still adjusting to his evolved soul spirit, occasionally lowering his head to look at the little grass snake on his shoulder. The latter had not stopped talking since boarding, speculating about the auction items and discussing how they should divide any good things they won. A cushion thrown from the back row by Zhang Yangzi struck him squarely in the face.

"Can you settle down for a while?" Zhang Yangzi's voice was thick with fatigue. Clearly, the morning's bickering had drained too much of his energy.

Wang Jinxi and Wei Xiaofeng sat on the other side. The former leaned back with his eyes closed, the aura of his Bone Dragon King martial soul forming a faint pressure around him. The latter looked out the window, and the gloom of his Azure Shadow Serpent martial soul made him seem as though he were contemplating some profound philosophy.

The soul guidance car drove steadily onto Eastsea City's main road, heading toward the Myriad Treasures Pavilion. Afternoon sunlight streamed through the windows, casting mottled shadows over everyone. Yun Zhiyu watched the flowing streetscape outside, while the bracelet beneath her sleeve gave off a dark gleam, like the eye of a sleeping beast slowly opening.

The auction invitation lay within her storage space, its gilded patterns faintly warming the moment her consciousness touched them. She did not know what she would see today, but Uncle Mu Chen's words—"There are a few good things you can use"—stirred a vague anticipation within her.

Gu Yue sat beside her, the ends of her hair swaying gently in the air-conditioning breeze. Her gaze rested on Yun Zhiyu's profile, complex emotions churning deep in her black eyes, like a fleeting warmth glimmering when sunlight pierced the bottom of a deep pool.

The car continued onward, leaving Eastsea Academy's outline behind as it headed for the towering building at the city center. The spire of the Myriad Treasures Pavilion had already appeared on the horizon, like a sword pointed toward the heavens, gleaming with cold metallic light beneath the afternoon sun.

The appointment at the auction was about to begin.