Daily Life

As soon as Lin Ke woke, he heard Wang Lin speaking slowly nearby. She seemed to be talking about the bracelet on his wrist?

The Coiling Dragon Bracelet?

That sounds impressive!

Wearing it, he had only noticed that his arm felt heavier after he kept it raised for a while, and that the bracelet felt cool against his skin. There had been no other obvious sensations.

It had not grown so heavy that he could no longer lift his arm.

Of course, his inability to lift his arm at the very end earlier had been because he had held the same position for too long.

He could chop firewood for half a day straight, yet he could not do the same with painting?

And so, midway through making those dots, Lin Ke had understood.

The bracelet Wang Lin had put on him was nowhere near as simple as it looked!

The Coiling Dragon Bracelet!

The Coiling Dragon Bracelet must affect gravity!

More importantly, that gravity must be unstable.

No matter how heavy an ordinary bracelet was, its weight always pulled downward when worn.

But the Coiling Dragon Bracelet?

One moment left, the next right; one moment up, the next down; one moment strong, the next weak.

That made keeping his arm steady extremely difficult.

But because Lin Ke often chopped firewood with his right hand, his arm was strong in both power and endurance. Only that had allowed him to cope, just barely.

As he dotted the paper with his brush, he had to do everything he could to hold his arm steady, resisting the force that alternated between heavy and light, sometimes even tugging abruptly left or right.

"So it's the Coiling Dragon Bracelet..." Understanding dawned on Lin Ke's face, and he smiled at Wang Lin. "Master, this thing must be expensive, right? Hehe, thanks for the gift!"

Mine now!

There's no shame in taking something from my own master.

"Huh?" Wang Lin paused with her brush in hand. "What treasure? You mean this thing?"

She immediately laughed. "Hahaha... These things are a dime a dozen! Everyone has one, and you're treating it like some treasure."

"A dime a dozen?" Wang Lin's words left Lin Ke rather speechless.

But a moment later, he realized she must be lying to him!

How could something like this not be precious?

While Lin Ke lowered his head to examine the bracelet, however, something flickered in Wang Lin's eyes.

Putting aside whether the Coiling Dragon Bracelet was precious or not.

What she had actually wanted to say was that an ordinary person wearing it for the first time could last, at most, just under an hour.

Yet Lin Ke had lasted two hours!

And nearly another fifteen minutes on top of that!

Granted, no one else, herself included, had fainted the way Lin Ke had.

But Lin Ke had actually exceeded her estimate by well over an hour!

She had not told him that this was already an impressive feat. For the vast majority of ordinary people, even lasting fifteen minutes was remarkable.

Naturally, Lin Ke knew none of this. He was raising his arm to study the Coiling Dragon Bracelet on his wrist.

Wang Lin spoke again. "From now on, wear this bracelet when you paint. Take it off and leave it here the rest of the time."

Hearing her words, Lin Ke nodded to show he understood.

She raised her head to check the sky and said, "All right, it's getting late. Rest for a while. You can stay here or go outside, but you're not allowed inside the house. Otherwise, from now on you'll be painting out on the street by the entrance."

Then Wang Lin turned to leave.

When she looked back, she saw Lin Ke raise his right hand and pick up his brush.

Keep painting!

And just like that, the afternoon passed.

The sky had gradually darkened. Wang Lin sat on a stool in the courtyard, looking at the unconscious Lin Ke with an expression caught between laughter and tears.

"This kid... Does he really need to work himself this hard?" Wang Lin chuckled, her voice carrying amusement and a hint of admiration.

Suddenly, Lin Ke sprang off the ground with a kip-up and stared straight at Wang Lin in front of him.

Then he hurriedly felt himself all over, only breathing a sigh of relief after taking off the bracelet and placing it on the easel.

"Well, handsome, what are you doing...?" At the sight, Wang Lin gave Lin Ke a sultry look and leaned toward him, her body moving like a water snake.

Lin Ke immediately ran toward the shop without looking back, calling as he fled, "Master, if you're that thirsty, find someone else! I'm still a minor... Ah!"

Clutching his backside, Lin Ke walked out of the Painting Studio and glanced back. He seemed to see a figure entering the shop from the rear courtyard, so he turned and ran toward the end of the street.

The Tongfu Grand Restaurant.

Upon arriving, Lin Ke ran straight into the restaurant, then hurriedly looked back toward the Immortal Realm.

Fortunately, she had not followed him. He sighed in relief, only to remember that he still had to go back tomorrow. What was he going to do?

His master seems to want to be an old cow grazing on tender grass!

Although Wang Lin did look like a sixteen-year-old girl, who would believe that?

Just then, the restaurant's proprietor came over as well. Smiling, he looked in the direction Lin Ke was watching and asked, "What are you looking at? A beauty?"

Lin Ke turned at his words and found a fat, big-eared face pressed right up against his own. He nearly kissed it!

He gradually calmed his suddenly racing heart and cautiously edged away from the proprietor before saying, "Nothing much. I ran into a lecher... By the way, sir, is there anything you need me to do now?"

At that moment, the restaurant worker came over and said, "Lin Ke, you don't need to do anything. I've finished it all!"

Lin Ke nodded and looked around the restaurant. A few tables of customers were eating, but there were not many people, so he said, "Then I'll fetch some water for the kitchen's water vat."

The proprietor's expression did not change. He was still smiling. "All right."

Lin Ke went straight to the rear courtyard, searched around, and found two wooden buckets by the kitchen door...

After that, Lin Ke ran back and forth along Chaoyang Street, from one end to the other, never tiring of it...

Two hours flew by.

When Lin Ke left the restaurant, the worker brought him two piping-hot steamed buns, saying he had secretly taken them for Lin Ke and telling him to tuck them away and eat them while they were hot.

Lin Ke took a cloth bag from inside his clothes and put them in it...

"Creeeak..."

He returned to his little courtyard.

Once back, he took the steamed buns out of the cloth bag and placed them on the table.

Then he changed into the dark clothes he wore for chopping firewood.

He went into the courtyard and began practicing dance.

Although this "Lin Ke" had a reasonably fit body, it was still rather stiff.

What he needed to do now was stretch his muscles and tendons, restoring his body to the flexibility he had possessed in his previous life, or making it even more flexible.

At around midnight, Lin Ke drew back his legs after holding the splits for two hours, then limped into the house.

The next day, Lin Ke hurried out of bed and marked a cross on the ground.

He had drawn a grid three squares across and thirty down on the wall of his room. With the cross he had just drawn after waking, the first row was now full.

This was how he kept track of time. There were only eighty-seven days left until his contest with Qi Ye!

As soon as he reached Wang Lin's Immortal Realm Painting Studio, he saw the brand-new easel he used sitting by the entrance.

Apparently, she had overheard him speaking ill of her at the restaurant yesterday, because she had put his easel and brush outside the Painting Studio early that morning.

And so, that afternoon, he collapsed outside the Painting Studio, got back up, and collapsed again, managing one more round than yesterday.

Because Wang Lin had told him today that yesterday's one thousand dots would become eleven hundred.

With each attempt, the count would increase by one hundred. Once he could hold out for ten thousand dots, he would be allowed into the courtyard to paint...

That evening, Lin Ke returned to his courtyard, hurriedly set down the piping-hot steamed buns, and continued warming up...

Every day was full and peaceful.

Could anything unexpected happen in this daily routine of gradual growth?

Of course not!

But...

Would it really not?