Wang Chong nodded instinctively, then abruptly realized something was wrong. He abruptly turned his head and looked in the direction of the voice.
Zhou You stood smiling behind him, raising a hand in greeting.
He had used the little paper figure to eavesdrop for quite a while, sensing that everyone had discussed it to this extent and the next step would be him passing through an alley and getting ambushed and cornered.
So he appeared.
"Zh-Zhou You?!" Wang Chong's eyes bulged as if he had seen a ghost.
How could Zhou You possibly appear here?
He had meticulously planned this operation and kept it strictly confidential; there was no way Zhou You could have known!
"Discussing how to deal with me right to my face-you really don't take me seriously at all!" Zhou You said indignantly.
He was a man of his word. True to what he had just agreed upon, he strode straight up and delivered a heavy punch right to Wang Chong's face.
Wang Chong's nose bled profusely as he crashed to the ground with a bang.
Before hitting the ground, Wang Chong had only one thought.
Who discussed dealing with you to your face-where on earth did you pop out from?!
"Boss!"
"Brother Wang Chong!"
The person they were supposed to deal with had appeared ahead of schedule and knocked out the employer with a single punch. The sports school students fell into chaos and rushed forward without a second word to beat up Zhou You.
"Just in time!" Zhou You kindly kicked Wang Chong aside to prevent him from being trampled to death in a stampede when this group of sports students rushed over.
The first to strike was the weightlifting student, the muscle definition on his arm clearly outlined, his sandbag-sized fist formidable.
He had displayed extraordinary strength talent since elementary school, and no one among his peers could ever beat him in arm wrestling. By middle school, even adults couldn't match his strength, and upon entering the sports school, he repeatedly won gold medals in weightlifting events at the municipal games.
When it came to strength, he was confident he wouldn't lose to anyone!
"Take my punch! Ha!" he suddenly shouted. This was a technique taught by his coach; by shouting loudly, one could burst forth with even greater strength than usual.
Zhou You threw a punch as well, devoid of any technique, a pure contest of strength. As the two fists collided, the student was sent flying without a single surprise, knocking down several people behind him in the process!
He stared in disbelief at this scene. How could someone with such a skinny, frail body possess greater strength than him!
"Is that it?"
Zhou You patted his hands, regaining some confidence. Yesterday, when he had tested his strength against the mighty warrior, he actually hadn't managed to win.
Now it seemed his own strength was actually quite considerable, though unfortunately, he had run into the mighty warrior, who was no ordinary person.
Another student bypassed the previous one and rushed over, assuming a professional boxing stance to attack Zhou You.
An ordinary person could throw at most two punches a second, a novice boxer could manage three punches a second, and he could pull off four punches a second.
So what if the guy was strong!
An untrained ordinary person simply couldn't react to his punches in time!
Feeling as though he were everyone's last hope, he was in prime condition and directly exceeded his normal limits-five punches a second!
To everyone's shock, every single one of his punches was precisely blocked by Zhou You, and his final punch was even caught by Zhou You, who gave a gentle tug and pulled him straight to the ground.
Zhou You shook his head. In terms of punching speed, this guy wasn't even as fast as yesterday's mighty warrior.
With their two major powerhouses easily defeated by Zhou You, the remaining sports institute students looked at the skinny Zhou You with cold terror, leaving only a single thought in their minds.
"Run!"
The one who ran the fastest was the sprinting student. With wind at his heels, he left everyone else far behind in a solitary lead.
Except for Zhou You.
"You aren't running very fast either." Zhou You caught up with him, immediately scaring him so badly he caught a stitch. His stride faltered, he lost his balance, and he dropped to his knees, only to be hauled right back by Zhou You.
Talking was the ultimate taboo while sprinting, yet the opponent had caught up to him and could still speak in an even, steady tone-what kind of terrifying physical fitness was this?!
Su Tingxue, who had been watching the battle from the mouth of the alley, was also astonished by Zhou You's performance.
Normally, cultivators who had just stepped into the Qi Refining Stage would fail to coordinate their bodies properly due to a too-drastic improvement in physical fitness, yet Zhou You showed no such signs.
This indicated that Zhou You's cultivation talent was ridiculously good.
Zhou You returned to the alley, squatting on the ground to watch these defeated opponents ponder their lives.
How should he put it? So weak.
They weren't in the same league at all compared to the two people he had encountered yesterday.
If the mighty warrior and the Mind Master had been sent by Wang Chong, Wang Chong should have found even more formidable people today.
Unceremoniously, he patted Wang Chong's face. "Did you hire people to teach me a lesson yesterday?"
Normally, if anyone dared to treat Wang Chong like that, he would have long since responded with a barrage of slaps.
Yet facing Zhou You, he could only force a flattering smile. "No, how would I ever dare to provoke you?"
Zhou You frowned. If it wasn't people sent by Wang Chong, then who on earth could it be?
Seeing Zhou You frown, Wang Chong broke out in a cold sweat, terrified that Zhou You would give him another punch.
He had been pampered since childhood and had never taken a beating.
"Fess up. How were you planning to deal with me?"
With a crying face, Wang Chong explained, "I-I just saw that you and Su Tingxue were a match made in heaven and grew jealous. I had my lackies find a few sports students to intercept you on your usual route and teach you a lesson. But it's summer vacation right now, so sports students aren't easy to find; it took me days to track down nine of them, and these are all from the nearby sports school, three hundred per hour..."
"Three hundred? Isn't it one hundred and fifty an hour?" one of the sports students blurted out in shock, which did not match the quote they had received.
Three hundred an hour? Wasn't it one hundred and fifty an hour? The sports students lying nearby stirred at the sensitive numbers, realizing something.
That bastard under Wang Chong's command pocketed the difference!
"Alright, alright, shut it. What a mess. Su Tingxue and I aren't like that." Zhou You stopped Wang Chong. The Mind Master and the mighty warrior were clearly not sent by Wang Chong.
Zhou You didn't actually want money; demanding money would turn it into extortion, and if Wang Chong turned the tables on him later, he wouldn't even be able to clear his name with all the logic in the world.
Helplessly, he walked out of the alley and called out to Su Tingxue, who was standing guard at the entrance. "Let's go. It wasn't her."
Seeing Su Tingxue and Zhou You walking together, Wang Chong was dumbfounded.
And you said the two of you didn't have a thing?
Out late at night skipping evening self-study just to run to the alley entrance and stake me out!
"If it wasn't Wang Chong, then who could it be?" Zhou You was completely baffled. He had thought he'd found the mastermind, only for it to be a false alarm.
He couldn't just go around hanging suspects up and beating them one by one to ask who sent them, could he?
After the incident with Wang Chong, Su Tingxue increasingly felt that the attack on Zhou You was her fault, and she comforted him, saying, "I'll keep a closer eye on those people's movements from now on and notify you the moment there's any abnormality."
"Since the item should have arrived by now, why don't you come to my place and pick it up?"
"What item?" Zhou You asked, puzzled.
"It was sent over by Perfected Lord Wenchang. It should be some kind of cultivation technique or divine ability, though I'm not sure what specifically."
"Sent to me by Perfected Lord Wenchang?" Zhou You was immensely surprised. He didn't seem to have done anything special; he had just casually offered a few suggestions.
Su Tingxue nodded. "Your suggestions were very feasible. Perfected Lord Wenchang has already gone abroad, and right before leaving, he specifically mentioned wanting to send you a gift."
Perfected Lord Wenchang had been impatient to go abroad, feeling that this was destined by some unseen providence. It turned out the old saying that it was hard to leave one's homeland made sense after all; he ultimately had to return to his roots to make further progress.
Su Tingxue felt that Zhou You was underestimating his own importance. If Perfected Lord Wenchang succeeded, it would be no less than pointing out a clear path for those older generations of Literary Dao Cultivators.
Zhou You was flattered.
"Hold on, I'll hail a cab," Su Tingxue said.
She usually rode her bicycle to and from school, but this time she was bringing Zhou You to her house. It wouldn't do for Zhou You to ride his own bicycle while she scanned a shared bike; it just wouldn't look right.
The two alighted from a taxi, passed through strict security gates, and walked into a villa district. Su Tingxue's home was right among them, a detached single-family villa.
"This is your house?"
Zhou You was dumbfounded. It turned out the rumors that Su Tingxue's family possessed vast fortunes were true?
Stepping into the villa, the first thing that caught the eye was the retro copper ceiling chandelier in the living room. Zhou You had only ever seen this kind of chandelier in hotels, resembling an inverted exquisite pagoda. The tables, chairs, and coffee table were all made of wood and felt exceptionally smooth to the touch. Though Zhou You didn't understand the value of furniture, he instinctively felt that these pieces were very expensive.
Zhou You clicked his tongue in amazement. They really were rich. No wonder she could afford a 16-yuan bowl of shaved ice.
If he were this rich, he would definitely order three bowls of 16-yuan shaved ice-one bowl for himself, one for Chu Xiaoyao, and one for Nuomi.
"There's no one home, no need to be so restrained." Su Tingxue invited Zhou You to sit for a moment in the living room.
Zhou You waited with high anticipation. What would Perfected Lord Wenchang send him? A pen that could get a perfect score on every test? A Literary Dao cultivation technique? Antiquities from the Ming or Qing dynasties?
Money would honestly be the best.
Before long, Su Tingxue walked out of the bedroom, carrying a flapping pigeon by its wings.
Zhou You blinked in a daze. "This is what Perfected Lord Wenchang wants to give me... a pigeon?"
What was this supposed to be-a spiritual beast?
Or could it be roasted and eaten to drastically boost one's cultivation?
Su Tingxue held the pigeon and looked at it a couple more times, clicking her tongue in wonder. "This is the carrier pigeon spell; items can transform into the appearance of a pigeon and fly over, then transform back to their original form once they reach their destination. I heard my master mention it before-ancient cultivators used to send things this way, but nowadays this method is rarely used."
"What method do they use now?"
"Post office."
"...That's fair."
The pigeon folded its wings, shrank into a ball, and with a bang turned into a puff of white mist and vanished, leaving behind only an ancient book and a few white feathers drifting back and forth in the air.
"Here, your book."
Su Tingxue handed the ancient book to Zhou You, who accepted it with both hands. The title was written in traditional clerical script, bold and vigorous-at a glance, it was clearly the work of a master.
"Ming King Body-Refining Art"?
Zhou You was puzzled. Why would it be a body-refining cultivation technique? It sounded related to the Buddhist School's unmoving Ming King.
Was the old senior Perfected Lord Wenchang a dual practitioner of literature and Buddhism?
Since this was a gift sent to Zhou You by Perfected Lord Wenchang, Su Tingxue had deliberately avoided looking at what it was. Hearing Zhou You read the title aloud, she was greatly surprised. "It's actually this one."
"You know this book?"
"Of course. This is Perfected Lord Wenchang's signature Body-Refining Technique; countless cultivators desire it to no avail."
Zhou You fell silent for a moment, then couldn't help asking, "Isn't Perfected Lord Wenchang a Literary Dao Cultivator? Why is his signature skill a Body-Refining Technique?"
Su Tingxue thought for a moment before explaining, "As you should know from studying history, during the mid-to-late Ming Dynasty, civil officials would always get into massive physical brawls for various reasons."
"If the civil officials had all been ordinary mortals, Perfected Lord Wenchang wouldn't have feared anything-mortals couldn't hurt him. But the official Literary Dao Cultivators weren't just limited to Perfected Lord Wenchang; they were all rivals."
"To gain the upper hand during fights, he specifically studied the Body-Refining Technique, and frequently beating three or five people by himself was no problem at all."
"Because he was the best fighter, the Literary Dao Cultivators of the Ming Dynasty privately called him the Ming King."
"This nickname somehow reached the emperor's ears, arousing the emperor's suspicion, and he was later stripped of his official post."
Zhou You: "..."
Was this really the way Literary Dao Cultivators fought? If literary debate didn't work, they used martial arts; if martial arts didn't work, they spread rumors?
Before you continue