Adorable Meng Hongchen, Holding Hands at First Sight

"Stop right there. What are you three doing here?"

Huo Yuhao and the other two had just reached the Sun Moon Imperial Soul Engineering Academy when they were stopped by a guard.

"Uh, we..." Huo Yuhao carefully considered his words. It was not enrollment season, so saying they had come to enroll out of the blue would be...

"Hey! You three!"

At that moment, a crisp female voice called out in a domineering tone.

"Everyone in the class is busy, yet you're slacking off here? Come with me, now!"

The speaker was a white-haired girl with adorable twin ponytails. Her fiery red, gem-like eyes were as flamboyant as her words. Her skin was fair, and there was a touch of haughty sharpness at the corners of her eyes. With her delicate, lovely features enhanced by white hair and red eyes, her beauty was no less than Wang Dong'er's or Wang Qiu'er's.

"What are you standing around for? Let's go!" The white-haired, red-eyed girl grabbed Huo Yuhao's hand and pulled him inside. Her hand was soft and slightly cool.

Huo Yuhao and the other two exchanged glances in secret. Then Huo Yuhao said, "Sorry, sorry. We'll come right away."

The guard did not react further and let the three of them enter.

After they had walked some distance inside, the white-haired, red-eyed girl turned around and said to them:

"I helped you get in. That guard is the worst. He refuses to let anyone in without a school uniform. But it's the Soul Tool School Games these days—how can we wear school uniforms every day? What if it affects the competition? Seriously."

The white-haired, red-eyed girl looked the three of them over.

"My name is Meng Hongchen. By the way, which class are you three from? I don't think I've seen you before."

Meng Hongchen? Wasn't she the granddaughter of Jing Hongchen, the master of Mingde Hall? No wonder the guard had not dared make a sound when she spoke.

And she was so pretty.

"Uh... we really aren't students of this academy." Huo Yuhao scratched his head awkwardly and decided to tell the truth.

"..." Meng Hongchen was embarrassed as well. So these three really were not academy students. She had thought they were classmates who had been stopped for not wearing uniforms.

"But we came to enroll. Thank you for your help. My name is Huo Yuhao. Wang Qiu'er is on my left, and Wang Dong'er is on my right."

Meng Hongchen scratched her head. Hadn't the enrollment period already passed? Why were they only coming to enroll now?

"Alright... The admissions office is over there. Your name sounds kind of masculine."

"I am a boy... Thanks."

Huo Yuhao's hair, which had grown out because of his soul skill, had only been casually trimmed and was still rather long. Combined with the frail, tranquil aura he had gained after absorbing the Soul Bone, it was normal for people to mistake him for a girl...

"Huh? You..." Meng Hongchen had genuinely mistaken him for a girl. Otherwise, she would not have grabbed his hand just now.

"Anyway, thank you."

Huo Yuhao and the other two arrived at the admissions office. It was a relatively leisurely post, but there were two teachers seated there.

"Hello, teachers. We would like to take the entrance test."

One of the admissions teachers looked at the three of them in surprise. "Isn't it outside the enrollment period?"

Still, there were not many visitors here, so he was quite patient.

"Alright then. What are your names? What's your cultivation level? What rank Soul Engineers are you? And what are your martial souls?"

Wang Dong'er and Wang Qiu'er released their martial souls. Their three soul rings revealed Soul Elder cultivation, startling the admissions teacher so badly that he stood up.

Children this young were actually Soul Elders?

A fervent look appeared in the admissions teacher's eyes. The other two teachers could no longer sit still either. They could not let these two get away.

However, Huo Yuhao's lone soul ring looked rather conspicuous among them...

"Wang Dong'er, Light Goddess Butterfly."

"Wang Qiu'er, Golden Dragon."

"Huo Yuhao, Spirit Eyes."

The first admissions teacher had been carefully registering their information stroke by stroke. When he heard that, the pen in his hand stopped.

"Spirit Eyes?"

Huo Yuhao pointed at his own eyes. "A spiritual attribute."

In an instant, the admissions teacher tossed the registration form to another teacher, grabbed Huo Yuhao's hand, and held on tightly as if afraid he would run away.

"A spiritual attribute!" The admissions teacher looked delighted. "I actually ran into one! You register and assess the two girls first. I'll take him away first, hahaha!"

"Wait, where are you taking him?"

Before Wang Qiu'er and Wang Dong'er could stop him, Huo Yuhao had already been taken away by the admissions teacher. The two wanted to chase after him, but the remaining admissions teacher called out to stop them.

"Don't leave. You still need to be assessed. Although you'll definitely pass, you still need to be assigned to classes."

"What about Yuhao?"

"Isn't he a spiritual attribute soul master? What's there to worry about?"

Meanwhile, Huo Yuhao himself was still confused. Why had he suddenly been taken away? He asked, "Teacher, where are we going?"

"Sorry, sorry." The admissions teacher realized he had lost his composure. "My surname is Li, Li Ran. Just call me Teacher Li. I'm taking you to get familiar with the place."

"Teacher Li, but I haven't been assessed yet."

"What assessment does a spiritual attribute need?" Li Ran said as if it were only natural. "I'm taking you to get familiar with the place. You won't lose out, and it'll be much easier for you to enter Mingde Hall in the future."

Li Ran led Huo Yuhao all the way to the experimental area, stopping outside a room with a sign that read Third Laboratory.

"Old Xuan! Old Xuan! Are you in there? I brought you something good!" Li Ran pounded hard on the door.

Old Xuan? Could it be...

"Coming, coming." But the voice that answered was a soft, gentle female voice. Then the door opened, revealing an adorable, sleepy-eyed girl who looked seventeen or eighteen. "Teacher Li? What brings you here?"

"Is Old Xuan here?"

"Teacher Xuan is inside." The girl yawned again.

Li Ran led Huo Yuhao straight inside. A man in his thirties sat at the workbench, intently studying a design blueprint.

Li Ran was not polite at all. He grabbed a stool and sat down.

"What?" Teacher Xuan asked irritably.

"I brought you something good. This is a new student who came for the entrance test today. Tsk, tsk, he actually has a spiritual attribute, so I brought him straight to you." Li Ran spoke smugly.

By now, Huo Yuhao was basically certain that the person before him was Xuan Ziwen. In the original story, he was the only eighth-rank Soul Engineer who was this young.

Xuan Ziwen did not care whether it was enrollment season. He carefully examined Huo Yuhao.

"A spiritual-type? There really is a spiritual-type martial soul? But he's too young, and his Soul Power is so weak..."

"Oh, now you're being picky?" Li Ran raised an eyebrow. "Once his cultivation gets higher, every teacher will be fighting over him. Going by seniority, would it even be your turn?"

"Are you asking for a beating?" Xuan Ziwen shot Li Ran a glance, then looked at Huo Yuhao. "What's your name?"

"My name is Huo Yuhao."

"Little Yuhao, are you willing to study Soul Tools with me?"