Beautiful Girl

When Flender and Zhao Wuji returned to the examination grounds, they found a complete mess.

More than half the wooden huts had collapsed. The grass was pitted with craters and crisscrossed by sword marks, with muddy water still seeping from the deepest one.

The latrine reeked, and several villagers stood nearby, pinching their noses as they peeked around.

Zhao Wuji's bald head reflected the orange-red afterglow of the sunset. Combined with his dazed expression, it looked rather comical.

Dai Mubai crouched miserably nearby, giving off an indescribable stench. He stared blankly at the ground and muttered under his breath.

Tang San's face was swollen like a pig's head, with dark red-purple handprints on both cheeks.

His lips were turned outward, and his eyelids were so swollen that his features were nearly unrecognizable.

Sitting cross-legged on the ground, a healing Soul Master was bathing his face in pale green light.

The gaze visible through the slits of his swollen eyes was so gloomy it sent chills down one's spine.

Xiao Wu huddled nearby with her knees hugged to her chest, her eyes red and swollen and her scorpion braid mostly undone.

"Where are the other three?"

Zhao Wuji scratched his bald head in confusion.

Just now, he had sensed two terrifying auras, as though two Titled Douluo had been confronting each other.

Then they had suddenly vanished.

Flender stood with his hands behind his back, his face grim as he surveyed the ruins.

His gaze shifted from the collapsed huts to the sword marks on the ground.

Then from the sword marks to the scattered wood chips.

Finally, it settled on the only two remaining newcomers and Dai Mubai, who reeked of shit.

"Didn't Li Yusong say there were five little monsters? Why are only two left?"

Flender's voice was as cold as ice chips.

"What happened here?

And what was that Titled Douluo aura just now?"

No one answered.

Dai Mubai suddenly jumped to his feet and ran off without so much as a greeting.

Tang San's swollen face prevented him from opening his mouth.

Xiao Wu was still staring blankly in the direction the black-robed figure had disappeared, the three red rings replaying over and over in her mind.

The healing Soul Master worked busily for quite some time.

Xiao Wu finally came back to her senses.

Under Flender's nearly murderous stare, she stammered through the whole story.

From Zhao Wuji telling the five of them to hold out together for the time it took an incense stick to burn, to Fang Fan sending Zhao Wuji flying with one sword strike, to Tang San being beaten, the Titled Douluo appearing, two Titled Douluo confronting each other, and Fang Fan leaving grandly with the two girls.

Flender's face darkened more and more, black enough to drip ink. After Xiao Wu finished, he remained silent for a long while before slowly turning to stare at Zhao Wuji with an almost murderous gaze.

Zhao Wuji took a step back and crashed into a tilted beam, which creaked under the strain.

"You big idiot! You really have no brains!"

The roar shook the few remaining wooden huts three times, and thatch rustled down from the roofs.

"How could you listen to Dai Mubai? You believed whatever he said?"

Zhao Wuji opened his mouth, but swallowed the words that reached his lips.

He lowered his head and looked at the reflection of his bare scalp in the window glass.

Then he remembered the faintly aching wound on his ass.

Suddenly, he felt that Flender's scolding was absolutely right.

Listening to that brat Dai Mubai's nonsense had been the stupidest thing he had ever done.

Just like that, three little monsters were gone.

The reason Spirit Hall had produced its youngest elder was that it relied on the most exceptional geniuses.

And today, three had appeared at once.

A level twenty-eight Hell Spirit Cat, a level twenty-six Seven Treasure Glazed Tile Pagoda, and a drunken youth who could send a Soul Sage flying with a single sword strike.

They had all run away.

Flender felt as though his heart were bleeding.

The three of them walked along the official road outside Suotuo City.

The sunset set the sky ablaze in a fierce orange-red. The evening breeze blew from the forest, carrying the fragrance of grass and trees along with the chill of approaching night.

Wheat stalks rolled through the fields like golden waves.

Several farmers carrying hoes walked home along the ridges between fields.

They saw one man and two women, but merely gave them a few extra glances before looking away.

Fang Fan took the wine flask from Zhu Zhuqing's hand and tipped back a mouthful. The amber liquid slid down his throat, spreading a faint warmth through him amid the twilight.

The evening wind lifted the hem of his white robe and stirred the loose strands of hair before his forehead. Fang Fan was perfectly sober at that moment, his eyes bright and sharp. Where was the slightest trace of drunkenness?

He simply liked the faintly tipsy feeling.

He liked the pleasure of warmth surging through his body when wine flowed down his throat.

He liked catching that elusive, half-present sword intent in the space between drunkenness and sobriety.

For others, drinking was an escape. For him, it was cultivation.

Zhu Zhuqing walked beside him at an unhurried pace.

The evening breeze stirred her black skirt.

The sunset's lingering glow fell across her cool profile.

It edged her jawline with a warm golden light.

She had been exhausted all day. Though her wounds had mostly healed.

The weakness from blood loss remained, and her calves ached with every step.

But she said nothing. She only occasionally turned to look at Fang Fan.

Whenever he needed wine, she promptly brought the flask to his lips.

Ning Rongrong followed not far behind, holding up her skirt with both hands as she tilted her head and studied Fang Fan ahead.

From the first moment she had met this guy, he had been drinking.

He drank while leaning on Zhu Zhuqing's shoulder.

He drank half-asleep.

He even found time to drink while fighting four people at once.

When the Titled Douluo descended and killing intent blanketed the area, he had even turned back to ask for more wine.

This was no longer merely liking alcohol. He treated it like his life.

Yet whenever he acted, he was so dashing and handsome.

Seven-colored light flowed with every gesture.

A five-meter giant sword descended from the sky.

The scene had been as beautiful as a painting.

He descended from the heavens and stood upon his sword, white robes fluttering as sword light crisscrossed around him.

He looked less like he was going into battle than heading to a wine banquet.

She had been cherished and pampered since childhood.

She had seen no fewer than eight hundred, if not a thousand, outstanding young men.

But someone as contradictory as Fang Fan.

At times, he was so drunk he could barely stand.

At others, he was so fierce that even a Soul Sage could not stop him.

She had never seen anyone like him before.

She felt that her interest in this drunkard.

Had already surpassed her interest in Shrek Academy itself.

"Where are you going next?"

Ning Rongrong quickened her pace, came up beside them, and tilted her head toward Zhu Zhuqing as she asked.

"I don't know."

Zhu Zhuqing's tone was calm and frank, without the slightest hesitation.

She truly did not know, nor did she need to know.

Wherever Fang Fan went, she would go. She had made that decision the moment he descended from the sky onto the wasteland.

"Oh."

Ning Rongrong was somewhat surprised. Just as she was thoughtfully looking at Fang Fan.

Her attention was drawn to a figure on the road ahead.

When they were still several hundred meters from Suotuo City, they saw someone walking toward them from the city gate in the distance.

The person was short and unusually bloated, looking from afar like a rolling barrel.

Only when he came closer did they see that he was a youth about their age.

He wore wrinkled cloth clothes, with two buttons at his chest popped open to reveal a pale, flabby belly.

His neck and head seemed almost fused together, his chins layered atop one another.

The fat on his body quivered slightly as he walked.

Ning Rongrong and Zhu Zhuqing both noticed the fat man at once.

Not for any other reason.

But because of his eyes.

The fat man had noticed them as well.

His previously lazy gaze suddenly lit up as though someone had set it ablaze.

His eyes first landed on Zhu Zhuqing, sweeping back and forth across her impressive curves several times.

They slid down to her shapely rear and lingered there for a long time.

Then they turned to Ning Rongrong and examined her from head to toe.

His small eyes narrowed into two slits, and the corners of his mouth curled up to reveal a mouthful of yellow teeth.

"Damn... these two chicks are really pretty..."

His voice was shrill and lecherous, completely at odds with his bloated build.

Fang Fan stopped walking.

Of course, he knew who this fat man was. Ma Hongjun, ranked fourth among the Shrek Seven Monsters, the Evil Fire Phoenix with the mutated Phoenix martial soul.

In the original story, he had relied on special methods to vent the side effects of his Evil Fire for years, which had cultivated his lecherous, lustful nature.

But none of that mattered. What mattered was where his eyes had just been looking.

Fang Fan raised his eyelids. There was no anger in his bright eyes.

Only an indifferent, almost bored scrutiny.

"How much for the big-breasted beauty to play with this young master for a night!"

The fat man whistled at Zhu Zhuqing, his expression lecherous and his gaze greedy, as though he wanted to swallow her whole.