"Nana, who did this?" Yan asked Hu Liena in a low voice.
Dark circles shadowed Hu Liena's eyes, and the whites were threaded with blood. Her eyes were slightly red, making her look as though she had suffered a terrible grievance, cried over it, then stayed awake all night.
After letting his imagination run wild, Yan had already constructed a scene in his mind in which someone had wronged Hu Liena, giving him the perfect opportunity to play the hero saving the beauty and ultimately win her heart.
Of course, all of this depended on Hu Liena actually having been bullied, needing someone's help, and Yan being capable of dealing with whoever had upset her.
But Hu Liena did not need anyone to stand up for her, especially not Yan.
She regarded Yan as a friend, a comrade-in-arms, and a companion, but had never intended to consider him a future partner.
She had rejected Yan's advances before, but he was as stubborn as a mule and showed no intention of giving up his pursuit of her.
And as he grew older, Yan had even developed an obsession with Hu Liena.
One could only say that people should not romanticize the road they had never chosen. Even if Hu Liena accepted Yan, could the two of them really have much of a future?
"Yan, I only see you as an older brother, so you don't need to interfere so much in my affairs." Hu Liena once again explicitly rejected Yan's goodwill and delivered a final verdict on their relationship.
Yet Yan acted as though he had not heard her at all, turning his gaze to Tang Mo.
In his view, if an elder had wronged Hu Liena, Bibi Dong would certainly not have stood idly by, so Hu Liena could not possibly have spent the entire night stewing over it.
Following that reasoning, the person most likely to have gotten the better of Hu Liena was a young Soul Master of their own generation, and Yan knew the other young people in Spirit Hall all too well.
Practically none of the young Soul Masters he knew were a match for Hu Liena. Even the few who were somewhat older than them and had already become Three-Ring Soul Elders could not possibly defeat her.
In other words, a stranger had bullied Hu Liena, and she had been unable to retaliate.
Yan turned it over in his mind before finally locking onto the only unfamiliar face present.
Even though Tang Mo looked several years younger than them, once every impossibility had been eliminated, whatever remained, however impossible it seemed, could only be the truth.
Moreover, under the influence of his Flame Lord martial soul, his temper was rather flammable and explosive. Once a seed of suspicion took root in his heart, he stopped thinking any further and pronounced Tang Mo guilty on the spot.
"It was you!" He glared viciously at Tang Mo. "You made Nana cry! I want to fight you one-on-one!"
Li Songnian, who should have maintained order in the classroom, made the rare choice to remain silent. He did not stop Yan from confronting Tang Mo.
"You're sick." Tang Mo flatly spat those words at Yan, then lowered his head and focused on leafing through a few documents that particularly interested him.
"Martial soul, possess!" At this, Yan instinctively glanced at Li Songnian. Once he confirmed that Li Songnian had no intention of stopping him, he decisively activated martial soul possession.
The instant the Flame Lord possessed him, interwoven red and dark-brown stripes appeared on his body, and the temperature in the classroom rose faintly.
His Flame Lord martial soul was an ancient martial soul that commanded both fire and earth. However, because he focused his cultivation on the fire attribute, his control over the earth attribute's power was somewhat weaker.
"Yan, Level 26 Power Attack System Battle Soul Master. Martial soul: Flame Lord. Please enlighten me." Anger churned in Yan's heart, but he did not recklessly attack. Instead, he formally introduced himself to Tang Mo.
"Yan, have you ever lost?" Tang Mo suddenly asked.
"What do you mean?" Baffled by Tang Mo's question, Yan instinctively asked one of his own.
"Not a loss in a sparring match between peers, but a defeat that could overturn everything you had ever taken pride in." Tang Mo's tone was calm, as casual as if he were asking whether Yan had eaten.
"If you're going to fight, then fight! Cut the nonsense! If you're a man, fight me fair and square!" Regardless of what Tang Mo had said, Yan immediately let out an angry roar.
"Tang Mo, Level 20 Quasi-Soul Grandmaster. Martial soul: Tang Sect Grandmaster. Please enlighten me." At that moment, Tang Mo suddenly understood what it meant for a scholar to meet a soldier and find reason powerless. He simply stopped trying to reason with Yan and introduced himself in turn.
"If you're going to fight, take it outside." Just as the two stood with swords drawn and bows bent, Li Songnian suddenly lowered his voice and warned them.
Tang Mo glanced at Li Songnian and roughly guessed what he was thinking. Having just suffered a defeat, he wanted to recover his dignity as a teacher through another means.
If Yan, a student whom Li Songnian had brought into line, could defeat Tang Mo, then in a sense, it could also be considered a victory achieved under his instruction. That way, he would be better able to preserve his dignity as a teacher before Tang Mo in future lessons.
"Get outside..." Yan was just about to spout arrogant words at Tang Mo, but before he could finish, Tang Mo suddenly appeared before him and interrupted him.
Bang!
Tang Mo pressed a palm against Yan's chest and released a burst of soul power together with the force of his palm. Yan swayed, then stumbled backward uncontrollably.
Feeling his body slip out of his control, Yan mobilized his soul power, trying to steady himself. But before he could act, Tang Mo would raise a hand to press his shoulder or lift a foot to kick his leg, controlling him like a puppet and making him retreat out of the classroom one step at a time.
Yan struggled with all his might, trying to regain control of his body, but Tang Mo's movements were exceptionally crisp and clean, without the slightest wasted motion. Every strike landed precisely on one of Yan's joints.
Coupled with the extreme speed of Tang Mo's hands, this made it look to Xie Yue and Hu Liena as though Yan were voluntarily backing out of the classroom under the pressure of Tang Mo's imposing presence.
Of everyone present, only Li Songnian detected Tang Mo's movements, and even he barely managed it. Unless he concentrated fully on Tang Mo's movements, all he could see was a blurry shadow repeatedly striking the joints throughout Yan's body.
As Tang Mo deftly employed his methods to forcibly drive Yan out of the classroom, Bibi Dong's and Qian Daoliu's gazes fell upon him almost simultaneously.
At that moment, Bibi Dong had yet to fully suppress the strange sensation produced by the martial soul resonance between her and Tang Mo. Yet she had no choice but to pay attention to Tang Mo's movements, because she sensed that Qian Daoliu was watching him.
The Worship Hall stood at the mountain's summit. In a rare departure from the hall, Qian Daoliu stood at its entrance and gazed down toward the mountainside.
Ordinary Soul Masters, even those who had just become Titled Douluos, could not stand at the summit and gaze toward the mountainside as Qian Daoliu did, taking in everything that happened there.
As the Angel God's high priest, the one who would use his life to open the final divine exam, Qian Daoliu could neither break through Level 100 through his own efforts nor inherit another divine position.
Thus, he had been stuck at the realm of Level 99 Limit Douluo for many years. After remaining at that bottleneck for so long, he naturally had to find something to pass the time.
Aside from occasionally guiding others in their cultivation, all he could do was explore his Six-Winged Angel martial soul in depth and develop methods useful to himself.
Among the self-created soul skills he had developed were mental secret techniques. Thus, he was not watching Tang Mo with his eyes, but probing his situation with spiritual power.
While observing Tang Mo, Qian Daoliu detected Bibi Dong's gaze.
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