"Yuhao, that human elder is no ordinary man! I never expected humans to have someone so powerful."
The moment they entered the dormitory, the Ice Empress spoke with a grave expression.
Tian Meng chimed in:
"Exactly! When you probed him with your spiritual power just now, I felt an enormous surge of spiritual power inside that old man. Yours just isn't strong enough to detect it yet."
"The old man's cultivation is impressive. But I sense grave problems with his body and soul. I'm afraid he won't live much longer."
"That youngster's cultivation is almost as high as mine was in life."
As Tian Meng and the Ice Empress debated in Huo Yuhao's Sea of Consciousness,
two aged voices sounded from the other side of it.
"Elder Yi! Teacher!"
Huo Yuhao's heart leaped at the sound. The voices belonged to Jiang Ziya and Electrolux, who had been asleep for three years.
He hurriedly sank his consciousness into the Sea of Consciousness. Besides Tian Meng and the Ice Empress, whom he saw there every day, two elderly men stood before him.
Seeing Huo Yuhao like this, Jiang Ziya stroked his head with aching tenderness.
"Child, these past few years have been hard on you!"
Huo Yuhao's eyes reddened. He sniffed and said through a tight throat,
"They haven't been hard. Brother Sky Dream, Sister Xue'er, and Sister Jiujiu have kept me company."
"It's just... I missed you and Elder Yi a little."
"Well, my fellow cultivator and I are awake now, aren't we? We'll be here with you from now on."
As Jiang Ziya comforted Huo Yuhao, Electrolux watched him with the same gentle warmth.
He had lived in Huo Yuhao's Sea of Consciousness for five years and knew the boy's character through and through.
He was a good child!
After catching up with his elders in the Sea of Consciousness,
Huo Yuhao finally had time to look around his dormitory.
The small room held two single beds. On the bedside cabinets sat two soul-tool lamps, and at the far end of the dormitory was a bathroom.
But the bathroom had no shower.
Huo Yuhao's face stiffened. He seemed to recall a teacher at new-student registration saying that the dormitory building had no private showers. Anyone who wanted to bathe had to use the large shower room at the end of the corridor.
Had I been a little hasty in coming here?
While helping Xu Jiujiu handle affairs, Huo Yuhao had reviewed conditions throughout the Star Luo Empire. Almost every intermediate-level Soul Master Academy or higher had private bathrooms with showers. Even the wealthier elementary-level academies had them.
Yet here at Shrek Academy, founded over ten thousand years ago, not only did male and female students live in the same dormitory building, but the rooms didn't even have private showers.
Huo Yuhao found it strange. "Where does all the tuition the students pay each year go?"
(A certain miserly iron rooster and porcelain quail in the inner courtyard sneezed violently.)
"Forget it. I'm here now, so I might as well make the best of it. First things first—food!"
After opening the window to air out the dormitory, Huo Yuhao decided to go eat.
With dust flying everywhere in the room, cleaning could wait until later.
What Huo Yuhao hadn't expected was that Shrek Academy's cafeteria would be even harder to describe. The entire place was empty apart from a few serving windows. There wasn't a table or chair in sight.
A sign at the entrance also forbade taking food out of the cafeteria.
According to the cafeteria server, Shrek served valuable Soul Beast meat. The rule was meant to stop people from reselling it.
By the time he returned to the dormitory after eating, it was nearly dark.
Faced with the thick dust in the room, Huo Yuhao made the horn on his head flash blue. Streams of water appeared around him.
Although his other five attributes had yet to be fixed, he could still use them for simple tasks.
Under his control, the streams of water washed over the dusty floor again and again.
Finally, Huo Yuhao hurled the now-filthy water into the bushes outside the dormitory.
He turned to look at the room, clean as new, and nodded in satisfaction.
"Mm. Now this looks like a dormitory."
The sky outside had gone completely dark. Huo Yuhao took the bedding Xu Jiujiu had given him out of his Storage Soul Tool.
The bedding was blue, with purple patterns decorating its center.
It carried a faint fragrance, too.
After making his bed, Huo Yuhao sat on its edge instead of going to sleep. He closed his eyes and sank into meditation.
It was a habit he had developed over the past three years. He only slept on the occasional day when the Snow Empress's training left him especially exhausted.
The rest of the time, he meditated and cultivated in place of sleep.
The next morning, before sunlight reached the dormitory,
the sound of the door opening woke Huo Yuhao from meditation.
He opened his eyes and saw a boy with pink-and-blue hair standing in the middle of the room, wearing a jacket decorated with butterflies.
The boy swept a somewhat haughty gaze around the dormitory.
"Hey, you're my roommate, right? You've done a decent job cleaning."
"I only got here first—"
Before Huo Yuhao could finish, the boy interrupted him.
"Not bad. You can handle cleaning the dormitory from now on."
The boy dropped his luggage onto the bed opposite Huo Yuhao's and continued,
"I have a few rules for this room."
"First, no walking around naked."
"Second, don't bring anyone back to the dormitory."
"Third, no snoring in the middle of the night."
The boy's unreasonable, arrogant manner rubbed Huo Yuhao the wrong way.
His attitude reminded Huo Yuhao of Dai Huabin for no particular reason. Both carried themselves as if they stood above everyone else.
Even so, Huo Yuhao spoke to the boy calmly.
"Listen, this is Shrek Academy, not your home. Put away that spoiled young master's attitude. No one here is going to indulge you."
"What did you say?"
The boy either hadn't heard Huo Yuhao clearly or couldn't believe anyone dared speak to him that way.
Huo Yuhao repeated himself, enunciating every word:
"I said I won't accept your rules!"
"Do you want me to beat you flat?"
The boy raised a fist and waved it in Huo Yuhao's face as a threat.
No one at home had ever dared speak to him like that.
Huo Yuhao ignored him. It was nothing more than a spoiled young master throwing a tantrum.
He closed his eyes, intending to return to his meditation.
The sight nearly made the boy explode with anger. He shouted at Huo Yuhao,
"In the world of Soul Masters, fists do the talking! There's open ground outside the dormitory. Come spar with me if you dare. If you win, you'll have to follow my rules."
At that, Huo Yuhao got off the bed.
"Fine. What happens if I win?"
The boy scoffed.
"That won't happen."
Before you continue