Feeding Huo Yuhao, Clingy Wang Dong'er

Wang Dong'er tilted her head back to look at Huo Yuhao, noticing the fine beads of sweat at his temples and the rare light shining in his eyes.

Huo Yuhao was about to ask, "Had enough?" again when he suddenly realized that the person beneath him was far too quiet.

Wang Dong'er, who had been fierce as a little leopard just moments ago, now lay perfectly still, her beautiful pink-and-blue eyes fixed on him.

Then she smiled, the corners of her lips and her eyes curving gently.

"I give up. You're amazing, Yuhao."

Huo Yuhao froze.

Her tone, her gaze, her words—none of them matched the reaction he had expected.

In that instant of distraction, a fresh, sweet fragrance suddenly slipped into his nose.

It wasn't the scent of flowers or a sachet, but the faint fragrance that naturally clung to Wang Dong'er.

Barely there, it felt like a feather had brushed lightly against his heart.

Only then did Huo Yuhao realize that he had her pinned beneath him, her face less than half a foot from his own.

Too close.

Huo Yuhao's face flushed bright red.

It wasn't an ordinary blush; the heat burned all the way from his neck to the tips of his ears.

His mind went blank. That elusive fragrance still lingered at his nose, muddling his thoughts until he couldn't think of anything at all.

He sprang up as though his hand had been scalded and stumbled backward, his back hitting the wall with a dull thud.

"You, you..."

He couldn't manage a complete sentence for the longest time.

Wang Dong'er got up from the floor and brushed the dust off her clothes.

"The floor still isn't clean enough."

She looked up at Huo Yuhao, who stood against the wall with his face bright red, and chuckled softly.

Huo Yuhao didn't understand why his heart was beating so fast, as though he had found something he had lost long ago.

Wang Dong'er paid no attention to what Huo Yuhao was thinking. She made her bed and put away all the luggage she had brought.

Feeling that he ought to do something, Huo Yuhao cleaned the room again.

"I'm hungry. Want to get something to eat?"

Huo Yuhao shook his head.

"Come on, let's go together."

Wang Dong'er linked her arm through Huo Yuhao's and pulled him outside.

Huo Yuhao stared at Wang Dong'er in shock. How could she act so familiar already?

He looked down at the hand hooked around his arm. Its fingers were fair and slender, its nails neatly trimmed. Her movements were so natural that she seemed to have done this countless times before.

Wang Dong'er tugged Huo Yuhao along toward the exit.

A few students passing through the corridor caught sight of what looked like two boys walking out arm in arm, and their gazes lingered with an odd look.

Huo Yuhao noticed their looks, and his face flushed again. He hurriedly pulled his arm free and stepped half a pace to the side, putting some distance between them.

Wang Dong'er glanced at him, her lips curving, but said nothing.

The walk from the dormitory to the dining hall wasn't long.

Wang Dong'er walked very slowly.

Her gaze passed over every tree beside the path and every slightly raised paving stone. These sights, ordinary in everyone else's eyes, were treasures she had lost and regained.

She had walked this path with Huo Yuhao in her previous life too. Back then, her steps had been light, and she had never spared the roadside a second glance.

She had thought those days would go on forever: cultivating, eating, bickering with Huo Yuhao, studying. She had believed every tomorrow would always have another tomorrow.

Only after everything had been taken away did she understand that these supposedly worthless everyday moments were the most precious things of all.

There weren't many people in the dining hall. The rich, savory aroma of braised pork mingled in the air with the toasted flour scent of freshly baked flatbread.

The moment Wang Dong'er entered, she headed straight for the serving counter and ordered a pile of food.

Then she carried it over to Huo Yuhao's table.

She saw a bowl of plain rice porridge and two steamed buns on his tray, a pitifully bland meal.

Huo Yuhao picked up a bun and began eating it with his porridge, as though he were enjoying some delicacy.

Wang Dong'er frowned at the meager food on his tray.

Huo Yuhao had been like this in her previous life too. When he first came to Shrek, he had been so poor his pockets practically jingled with emptiness, wishing he could split every coin in two to spend.

Her foolish boy had never been willing to treat himself a little better.

Wang Dong'er lifted the plate of soy-braised beef and swept her chopsticks across it, sending half the meat neatly onto Huo Yuhao's tray.

Huo Yuhao froze.

"You..."

"It's too much. I can't finish it."

Wang Dong'er pushed half the sweet-and-sour fish over as well.

"You have to help me finish it."

"But..."

"No buts. Eat up. It won't taste good once it's cold."

Huo Yuhao looked at the meat that had appeared on his tray. Golden-red sweet-and-sour sauce coated the white rice, and the aroma of soy-braised beef wafted straight into his nose.

Huo Yuhao wasn't stupid.

He hesitated, then asked, "Why are you so good to me?"

Wang Dong'er's chopsticks paused.

Why am I good to you?

Because you risked your life for me in our previous life. Because I felt every bit of your pain as those blades pierced your body, one after another.

But she couldn't say any of that.

"What's with all the questions? Hurry up and eat every last bite."

Huo Yuhao looked at her for a while, then stopped asking.

He lowered his head, picked up a piece of soy-braised beef, and put it in his mouth.

Savory and richly seasoned, tender yet still pleasantly chewy—it was a flavor he had secretly smelled outside the kitchens of the White Tiger Duke's Mansion but had never tasted.

He chewed very slowly, not because it wasn't delicious, but because his nose stung a little.

No one had treated him this well since his mother died.

That evening, after returning to their dorm room, Huo Yuhao sat cross-legged on his bed and began cultivating.

Huo Yuhao's innate soul power was very low, and his progress was much slower than everyone else's, so he had to spend more time cultivating.

Wang Dong'er didn't disturb him.

She sat on her own bed with her head propped in both hands, simply watching him.

Starting at his forehead, her gaze traced slowly downward.

The shape of his eyebrows, the curve of his lashes, the line of his nose, his lightly pressed lips.

So handsome.

Over the next two days, Wang Dong'er clung to Huo Yuhao, barely leaving his side.

At first, Huo Yuhao found it very hard to get used to.

"Could you stop staring at me all the time?"

"I like it."

"Why do your eyes keep following me?"

"I like it."

Huo Yuhao had no answer. He hadn't caught the true meaning behind those words.

By the second day, Huo Yuhao couldn't be bothered to say anything anymore.

Instead, he had grown somewhat used to Wang Dong'er sticking close to him.

On the first day of classes, they walked to the teaching building together.

The first-year classrooms were on the ground floor of the main teaching building. Inside, the excited students crowded together, chattering away.

Wang Dong'er and Huo Yuhao found seats near the middle.

Huo Yuhao sat perfectly upright. Wang Dong'er turned sideways, propping her head on one hand as she watched him.

Huo Yuhao looks even better in profile.

The bell rang, and a woman walked in.

She was an elderly woman with graying hair pinned at the back of her head and a long white robe. She looked like someone no one should cross.

Her gaze swept over the students' faces, and wherever it passed, the classroom's lingering whispers instantly fell into utter silence.

This woman's name was Zhou Yi.

She was the most notorious demonic teacher in Shrek Academy's outer court.

Zhou Yi's teaching philosophy was simple and brutal: get stronger or get out. Her classroom required neither explanations nor reasoning, only obedience.

Zhou Yi took her place at the lectern and declared her teaching philosophy the moment she spoke. She was here to cultivate monsters, not trash.

"Anyone who's been in a fight since arriving at the academy, stand up."

Quite a few of them had fought over the past few days. They had all been geniuses at their previous schools, and naturally wanted to test themselves against the other geniuses.

Yet now they fell silent. No one dared admit it.

Huo Yuhao's heart lurched.

That fight with Wang Dong in the dorm room—strictly speaking... it counted, didn't it?

He instinctively started to rise.

A hand pressed down on his arm and pulled him back into his seat.

Huo Yuhao paused, then turned to look at her.

She shook her head almost imperceptibly.

No one in the classroom stood up.

Zhou Yi's gaze grew colder.

Her lips curled into something that wasn't quite a smile, sending a chill down the backs of several students in the front row.

"What a bunch of trash. You don't even dare admit you've fought, and you call yourselves Soul Masters? Everyone, get to the track and run a hundred laps. Anyone who doesn't finish within two hours is expelled!"

The classroom erupted in an uproar.

Someone tried to object.

But faced with the six Soul Rings Zhou Yi released, no one dared make another sound.

Out on the track, Huo Yuhao and Wang Dong'er ran side by side.

"Why didn't you let me admit it just now?" Huo Yuhao asked, lowering his voice.

"Do you think that old woman would've let everyone else off if you'd stood up?"

Huo Yuhao faltered.

"We did fight. But do you think the others in that classroom who'd fought would've stood up with us?"

Huo Yuhao fell silent.

No. Those people clearly hadn't intended to admit anything.

"So even if you'd stood up, Zhou Yi would've found a reason to punish the whole class anyway. She isn't making us run a hundred laps because none of us admitted it. She's doing it because she wants us to run a hundred laps."

"That old woman just wants to torment us."

Huo Yuhao thought it over and felt that she had a point.