Gone

Lu Menge realized that she had miscalculated that very evening.

She was curled up in a rattan chair, reviewing Class Zero's training plan for next week. Little White Tiger was dozing on the windowsill, its tail hanging down and swaying lazily. Her communicator vibrated. The message from Tang Wulin was brief, but every word carried cautious embarrassment: "Sister Lu, um... the money's gone."

Lu Menge stared at the screen for several breaths. She had calculated Tang Wulin's allowance according to the standard cost of an ordinary couple's date in Eastsea City, then doubled it—enough for a meal, some small purchases, and a stroll around town. She had also considered that neither child was ordinary. The Golden Dragon King's and Silver Dragon King's metabolisms far exceeded those of Soul Masters their age, so she had deliberately made the budget generous. She had thought she had considered everything. Clearly, she had not considered enough.

Before she could reply, Tang Wulin sent another message: "There's actually a little left. But Gu Yue said she wanted grilled fish, so we went in. Then she ordered two, and I ordered two. Later, she said the salt-and-pepper flavor was pretty good too... so we added a third one."

Lu Menge closed the training plan over her lap. She remembered scouting that grilled fish restaurant in the West District last week. She had ordered one medium fish and failed to finish it. One medium fish, and she had not finished it. Yet those two little brats had eaten four grilled fish—without counting the grilled squid, sesame pancakes, fried rice cakes, and two bowls of iced jelly they had already demolished on the snack street. She seemed to have underestimated the appetite of nine-year-old Soul Ancestors. No, what she had underestimated was the fighting power of the Golden Dragon King and Silver Dragon King when they joined forces to forage.

Then a third message lit up: "Gu Yue also packed one up. She said she'd bring me lunch tomorrow—she thinks grilled fish tastes good cold too. She also said that since Sister Lu raised my allowance, we should come again next week."

Lu Menge stared at the words, "Since Sister Lu raised your allowance," then scooped Little White Tiger off the windowsill and buried her face in its fluffy belly. A muffled sigh escaped her, halfway between laughter and heartache. She knew Gu Yue could guess anything. That girl did not need logical deduction—just one extra glance Lu Menge had given Tang Wulin that morning, one extra envelope she had stuffed into his hand, one additional sentence of "Don't let her pay," and she could reverse-engineer the entire matter, from motive to funding source. And not only did she not expose it, she accepted the extra subsidy as though it were only natural—and even packed food to take away. The Silver Dragon King never suffered a loss. That trait had been inherited quite thoroughly from the Dragon God.

Tang Wulin did not ask about the money again, but those words, "come again next week," were more effective than any bill collector.

Resigned, she picked up her communicator and transferred Tang Wulin additional funds, adding a note: "Order five next week. Don't let her pack cold food. Buy her hot food."

After sending it, she leaned back in the rattan chair and let out a long breath at the ceiling. Class Zero's second instructor, the Sacred Beast White Tiger, could not outcalculate the stomachs of two nine-year-old brats.

Wu Changkong learned about it the next day at noon. At lunchtime beneath the ginkgo tree, the four of them sat on the ground as usual. Lu Menge told last night's ordeal as a joke—how Tang Wulin had sent message after message to report the expenses, how Gu Yue had wanted to pack food even after finishing everything, and how she herself had cracked up while transferring extra funds in the middle of the night.

"...So you gave him more," Wu Changkong said.

"What else was I supposed to do? Let Gu Yue eat cold food tomorrow?" Lu Menge placed a piece of braised pork into Wu Changkong's bowl, as naturally as if she were merely switching hands with a thermos. "You saw how he described it—'the salt-and-pepper flavor was pretty good too.' Obviously Gu Yue wanted to order it but did not want to say so herself, so he spoke for her. What did that show? It showed that he had learned how to put my 'don't ask, just buy it' lesson into practice. That money was well spent. Extra strategist funding was entirely justified."

Wu Changkong fell silent for a moment. Looking at Lu Menge's smug expression, he did not refute her theory of "extra strategist funding." He simply ate the braised pork she had given him, then placed the only—and largest—piece of sweet-and-sour pork ribs from his own bowl into hers.

"Give them twice as much next time. Calculate their appetites based on that."

Lu Menge lowered her eyes to the sweet-and-sour rib that had suddenly appeared in her bowl and froze for a moment. Then she understood—Wu Changkong normally never touched sweet-and-sour dishes, but this piece had been the one she had deliberately placed near the edge of the lunch box when arranging the food that morning, the nearest one and the most thoroughly braised. He had set it right in the center of her rice. She picked it up and bit into it. The sweet and sour balance was perfect.

"Fine. Double the allowance next month—you have the final say." She cleaned the rib to the bone and laid her chopsticks across the empty bowl.

Tang Wulin and Gu Yue sat across from them. Tang Wulin was carefully using his chopsticks to divide the last piece of braised pork in half, keeping one half for himself and pushing the other toward Gu Yue's bowl. His movement was light and practiced, clearly not his first time doing it. Gu Yue did not refuse. Before his chopsticks had even fully lowered, she placed the remaining half-portion of vegetables from her own bowl back into his. Neither said a word throughout the entire exchange.

Gu Yue placed the last rib into her bowl, looked up at Tang Wulin, and said in her usual calm tone, "There's a newly opened place on that snack street next week. We can try it while we're there. No need to pack anything this time—freshly grilled tastes better."

Tang Wulin chewed his braised pork and nodded solemnly. "Okay. Sister Lu said next week's budget is doubled—the new place has a line, so we should go early."

"Doubled." Gu Yue repeated the two words. Her dark eyes gleamed faintly beneath the ginkgo shade as they shifted toward Lu Menge. "Sister Lu—Teacher Wu set Tang Wulin's budget for next month, didn't he?"

The hand holding Lu Menge's thermos paused for an instant. Wu Changkong calmly picked up another piece of food. Tang Wulin looked up blankly, chopsticks still in his mouth, not knowing why the topic had suddenly shifted to Teacher Wu.

"How did you know he set it?"

"Teacher Wu nodded when you said 'extra,'" Gu Yue replied, lifting her soup bowl in a matter-of-fact tone. "Besides, you never do the math yourself. Before, you always just gave money on instinct. The only person who would make it precisely double—could only be him."

Lu Menge turned and glared at Wu Changkong. He neither denied it nor explained. He simply moved the final sweet-and-sour rib from the edge of his bowl into hers. It was a little smaller than the previous one, but the sauce was richer—he had deliberately saved it for last.

A ginkgo leaf drifted down from the branches and landed perfectly in the gap between the four lunch boxes. Gu Yue set down her soup bowl, and Tang Wulin casually picked up the leaf and placed it on the grass beside the picnic cloth. Then they both rose to clear away the bowls, their movements so synchronized they looked like they were coordinating a position swap in combat class.

As Tang Wulin was packing up, he suddenly paused and asked Gu Yue in a lowered voice, "So... can we use Sister Lu's new budget for the snack street next week?"

Gu Yue stacked the lunch boxes into the cloth bag without looking up. "She said it was doubled. If she doubles it, we go. How much is the budget?"

Tang Wulin pulled a small accounting notebook from his pocket and turned a page. He left two blank lines for the new place Gu Yue had mentioned, then quickly estimated a figure on the right according to Lu Menge's additional-funding ratio. Gu Yue leaned over to glance at the number, tapped the cover with the end of her chopsticks, and added two small amounts. Tang Wulin nodded and copied the revised figure onto a new line. One on each side of the cleared picnic cloth, they crouched and calculated next weekend's menu, quietly muttering about how the newly opened taro ball shop had somehow not made the list. Meanwhile, Wu Changkong gently pushed the Heavenfrost Sword into its sheath and looked toward Xie Xie, who was still doing extra training on the distant field. Lu Menge lifted her thermos and lightly tapped its rim against his.