Early the next morning, the entrance to Jiangbei University of Finance and Economics bustled with young men and women, all brimming with youthful energy.
Jiang Chen walked among them, savoring the fresh air of the summer morning. Every supernatural incident meant walking the line between life and death. Despite the extraordinary madness he had displayed, the two incidents had still left a trace of gloom in his heart.
Only amid such a vibrant scene could he truly relax.
While browsing the Unusual Person forum on the Underworld App last night, Jiang Chen had seen others mention this problem too.
Unusual Persons came into contact with ghosts, experienced bloodshed beyond ordinary people's imagination, and frequently witnessed humanity's darkest side. Over time, they could easily develop mental problems. Plenty of Unusual Persons had gone mad.
So after dealing with a supernatural incident, some Unusual Persons would party at bars for days and nights, some would sit in meditation at a Buddhist monastery for a long time, and some would even work through an entire volume of Three Years of College Entrance Exams, Five Years of Practice Tests...
Everyone had wildly different ways of letting off steam, and they often took a considerable amount of time.
Perhaps because he had lived two lives, Jiang Chen found, after comparing himself with others, that he suffered the least psychological trauma from facing ghosts. A lap around the university campus was enough to dispel most of his pent-up gloom. He even felt a little eager to see how much Ghost Qi the next ghost would bring him.
After finishing his lap, he headed toward the Economics Institute's teaching building. The second lecture was about to begin, and the road was crowded.
Honk-! Honk-!
Two shrill blasts of a horn came from behind, startling plenty of people. A group of students turned around angrily, but when they saw the Ferrari, some of their expressions shifted. They swallowed the curses on their tongues and silently cleared a path.
Inside the car, Zheng Shaoming kept one hand on the steering wheel and leaned against the convertible's door, a cigarette between the fingers of his left hand. He let the wind scatter its ash.
Without so much as glancing at the students on the road, he drove slowly forward, the nose of his car almost pressing against several people.
Yet this arrogant behavior drew no complaints. Instead, excited shrieks rose from quite a few girls in the crowd.
"Wow! Is that Zheng Shaoming from the Economics Institute? He's so domineering. I love it!"
"He's the heir to the Zheng Group! A domineering CEO in the making. He's got such style!"
"I'd be willing to be his girlfriend even if he dumped me afterward..."
"Who wouldn't? Getting dumped by Young Master Zheng would still give your status a boost!"
"..."
Walking along the roadside, Jiang Chen shook his head with an incredulous chuckle at their remarks. Gold-digging existed in every world, but this was his first time seeing gold diggers as adaptable as these girls.
Then Zheng Shaoming noticed Jiang Chen by the road. He had been basking in the girls' flattery and the boys' jealous, angry looks, enjoying how none of them dared lose their temper. Now his face darkened slightly.
Seeing Zheng Shaoming's sour expression, every student his gaze landed on instinctively quickened their steps, desperate to get away.
Jiang Chen continued strolling along. When he noticed Zheng Shaoming looking at him, he even waved in greeting. "Hey, Young Master Zheng! Driving yourself here? Your mommy didn't bring you to school today? Aren't you afraid you'll get lost?"
Zheng Shaoming drew a deep breath at those words.
He had never expected this guy to have so little regard for his own life. He had already offended him, yet now he dared provoke him again.
"Jiang Chen, you've got some nerve." After his expression shifted several times, he left those words behind and drove away.
The surrounding students were astonished. They could clearly see that Zheng Shaoming had taken a jab but was unable to lash out.
As students at the same university, they had all heard something about the campus's handful of super-rich heirs. In their minds, Zheng Shaoming was one of the hardest to mess with. Yet some nobody who could only walk to class had actually mouthed off to him?
Many of them took a few more looks at Jiang Chen. They genuinely didn't recognize him, so he probably wasn't some wealthy heir keeping a low profile.
Only students from the Economics Institute recognized him as a classmate who rarely stood out. He apparently had an unpleasant run-in with Zheng Shaoming during roll call yesterday, too.
"He's done for. This is a grudge to the death now. He'll probably end up worse off than Huang Tao and Zhang Yiyuan!"
"Man, this guy's too stubborn. Why bother?"
"He probably doesn't know what happened to Huang Tao. He'll regret it when he gets expelled and his parents lose their jobs."
"Zheng Shaoming is way too arrogant!"
"What can you do? Besides, couldn't he just back down? He insists on standing his ground. When his family's ruined, he'll finally realize how stupid he was today!"
"..."
As several students whispered among themselves, Jiang Chen suddenly turned and smiled at them. Their faces instantly went white, and they broke into cold sweats.
The moment Jiang Chen looked at them, they felt as though a cold-blooded beast had fixed its eyes on them, ready to tear out their throats and kill them on the spot!
By the time the students came to their senses, Jiang Chen had already turned away and left.
They exchanged glances and saw the fear in one another's eyes. Hastily lowering their heads, they didn't dare say another word.
At the same time, they began to understand why Jiang Chen dared provoke Zheng Shaoming. The latter was a rich heir, but this seemingly unremarkable classmate was hardly ordinary himself.
Jiang Chen paid those kids no further attention. If their comments hadn't grown increasingly out of line, he wouldn't even have bothered looking at them.
"Still, with the power left over from those two monster transformations, I could probably handle resentment-level ghosts now even without a Monster Transformation Card!"
He could sense that, besides his physique and Demonic Power, he had permanently retained the savage, ferocious presence unique to monsters. A single look from him might now be enough to intimidate a weak resentment-level ghost!
"I can give it a try when I get there tonight," Jiang Chen murmured, entering the teaching building.
The morning classes soon ended. He had barely listened, spending his time in the back row browsing the Underworld App.
Over the course of one class, Jiang Chen gained a deeper understanding of Living Person Forbidden Zones. The forbidden zone in the Nine Provinces was designated SSS-Class-2, code name [Fengdu]. It was the most terrifying known forbidden zone located within any nation's borders.
That was because SSS-Class-1, [Dream Country], lay in the middle of the ocean, and every outbreak of unrest there required nations to join forces to suppress it.
SSS-Class-2, [Fengdu], had a ten-year unrest cycle. Yet only a little over eight years had passed since its last outbreak, and yin energy was already showing signs of erupting along the forbidden zone's edges.
Every eruption of yin energy heralded unrest in a forbidden zone. Within three to six months afterward, unrest was certain to break out!
"So that's why the Nine Provinces have been so unsettled these past two years." Jiang Chen drew a deep breath.
He saw that it wasn't just the true Living Person Forbidden Zones developing problems. Even some Pseudo-Restricted Zones designated SS-Class had undergone unusual changes.
For example, two years ago, the Pseudo-Restricted Zone SS-08, [Blood-Red City], within the Nine Provinces had erupted into unrest ahead of schedule. Unprepared, the Netherworld and the Dao Alliance had suffered heavy losses. In the end, they had needed to call in six reclusive S-Class King Realm experts to forcibly suppress it.
"Forget it. None of this is something I should be worrying about right now..." Jiang Chen put away his phone and headed out for lunch.
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