So Ning Rongrong merely treated them as she would any stranger passing through the sect—courteous, polite, and keeping just the right distance.
She neither deliberately kept them at arm's length nor took the initiative to draw closer.
Some of those talented young men thought she had a cold personality. Some felt her standards were too high. Others privately wondered whether there was already someone in her heart.
Ning Rongrong had heard those discussions, but she had never explained herself.
Life passed at an unhurried pace. The sect's operations, the alliance's affairs, and the progress of her cultivation all required her attention, each one filling her time.
Ning Rongrong rarely had the leisure she once did to think about distant matters, such as becoming a god.
In fact, she did not even know that there was a possibility beyond Soul Masters—becoming a god.
In Ning Rongrong's current understanding, a Title Douluo was the pinnacle of Soul Masters, an endpoint countless Soul Masters could never reach even after exhausting their entire lives.
She still had a long way to go before reaching that endpoint. She had never even considered matters of a higher level.
Sometimes, on a quiet afternoon, Ning Rongrong would pause in her work and vaguely recall herself from several years ago, when she had participated in the Soul Master Tournament.
Back then, she had followed Heaven Dou Royal Academy's team all the way to the finals. Standing on the arena stage and facing her opponents, she had only one thought in her heart: win.
Life had been much simpler then. She had not needed to worry about the sect's affairs, weigh the alliance's gains and losses, or seek balance amid the cracks between various factions.
Back then, she had friends. True friends.
Ning Rongrong set down the book in