On this night of missing you, how I wish you would see me, I wonder if you could change for me, and let love return to where it began...
The moment Qian Renxue entered, Lin Qian sensed her with his extraordinary Spiritual Power and immediately switched into performance mode.
Do you know how I've spent this past year?
Had circumstances allowed, he would have loved to shout that.
Fortunately, after the refinement he had received at Moonlight Pavilion, he had shed his superficial glitter and become gentle and cultured, pouring all his feelings into the music.
The lyrics above were his heartfelt thoughts; what he thought inside was exactly what he sang aloud.
His lilting singing echoed, accompanied by the harp's melody, voicing his wistful resentment and instantly drawing cheers from his fangirls.
Tang Yuehua: "???"
Just play the harp! Why start singing too? That isn't part of the graduation performance!
Looking at the cheering fangirls around her, Tang Yuehua smiled, believing she had figured out the truth. Behind her, however, Qian Renxue, beneath Xue Qinghe's outward appearance, pursed her lips in a smile.
You little brat, still as frivolous as ever.
Her long-shadowed heart had its strings stirred by his antics, rippling like spring waters, sending waves across a quiet pool.
Onstage.
After greeting Qian Renxue silently, Lin Qian continued playing, immersing both body and mind in the music.
Honestly, a year ago, he had never imagined that an immortal cultivator like himself would one day end up playing the harp at an aristocratic academy. Without exaggeration, when he had first arrived, he had questioned his life every single day.
If he had not feared outsiders' gossip and the scorn of the fangirls pursuing him, he really would have climbed the wall and run away.
Fortunately, all that perseverance had meant something. Even a coarse brute like Tang Hao in the original story had known to send his son Tang San here to study. After experiencing it himself, he had discovered that tempering the heart really did have a unique significance.
When he quieted down and recalled everything that had happened in the first half of his life-though he had actually only lived thirteen years-he realized how empty his inner life had been.
For the twelve years before breaking through to the Nascent Soul stage, he had lived exposed to the wind and dew in Star Dou Great Forest, keeping company with wild beasts all day.
High-level Soul Beasts could certainly speak, but when had anyone ever seen a human marry a beast in purely animal form? Take Tang San: even he played around with Xiao Wu after she had taken human form. Otherwise, try making him fuck an actual rabbit!
In short, his body and mind had enjoyed a good rest over the past year.
Level eighty-nine.
That was Lin Qian's current Soul Power Level.
From his breakthrough to the Nascent Soul stage at twelve to his current age of thirteen, his Soul Power had risen a full nine levels in just one year.
Although he had been busy studying etiquette this year and had only broken through one level, at his age-thirteen years old and level eighty-nine, just one step away from Titled Douluo-who across the entire continent could compare?
Never mind anyone else; just look at Tang San. Soul Power was generally extremely low at this age. If he remembered correctly, Tang San had only been level thirty, right?
Even Hu Liena, bolstered by his Cultivation Method, was only approaching level forty now.
However, his most important task at present was to familiarize himself with the properties of his Soul Rings and Martial Soul and integrate his understanding. So, aside from studying, whenever he had nothing to do, he chatted and played poker with the Soul Spirits in his Sea of Consciousness-the perfectly respectable kind.
The piece came to an end.
The graduation ceremony concluded, and every student received a graduation certificate from Tang Yuehua before returning to their parents.
After attending to the other students, Tang Yuehua walked over to Lin Qian. "Your performance today was excellent. Flawless."
Lin Qian smiled faintly, brushing the strings until the final strand of music drifted away. "Thank you, madam."
"This must be the student Li Si?"
Just then, an abrupt female voice forcefully cut in, shattering the harmonious atmosphere.
Why was it this woman?
The two turned toward the voice. Tang Yuehua was fine, but Lin Qian raised his eyebrows in surprise.
The newcomer looked like a woman in her thirties, dressed in a simple blue-green cloth dress, her long hair hanging loose. Her features were quite delicate and appealing, especially with that voluptuous figure, whose fullness girls and even some young married women could not match.
All in all, this woman was very empty inside and very suitable for fucking!
The newcomer was no mere NPC, but a fairly heavyweight figure-Liu Erlong.
The illegitimate daughter of Yu Luomian, second-in-command of the Blue Lightning Tyrant Dragon Sect, and a woman who had fallen for her own older cousin Yu Xiaogang, she was quite formidable herself: a level seventy-seven Soul Saint.
At her peak, she had once formed the Golden Iron Triangle with Flender and Yu Xiaogang and roamed unchecked across the continent. She had also been their strongest damage dealer, the Horn of Slaughter.
But why had this woman come?
They didn't seem to have any connection!
Wait... could it be because of that?
Lin Qian suddenly remembered that a year ago, when he had made his name in Soul Fighting, the opponent he had defeated in his hundredth and final match had been a teacher from Blue Tyrant Academy: the Soul Emperor Yu Wenmu.
Seriously? Seriously? This woman was coming to pick a fight over that?
A Soul Emperor fighting a Soul Ancestor hadn't been enough, and now they'd upgraded straight to a Soul Saint?
A year had passed, and he publicly claimed that his Soul Power had risen two levels, placing him at forty-three.
"And you are...?"
Pretending not to recognize her, Lin Qian inquired politely, every movement exceedingly graceful.
Influenced by his bearing, even Liu Erlong's normally fiery temper became somewhat restrained. "I'm the dean of Blue Tyrant Academy, Liu Erlong."
"Hello..."
"I won't beat around the bush. I've taken the opportunity of this graduation ceremony to ask whether you'd like to join our academy."
Lin Qian had barely offered his greeting and had not finished speaking before Liu Erlong volunteered her purpose.
He had originally wondered why a proper teacher from Blue Tyrant Academy, who ordinarily had no shortage of money, had suffered a lapse of judgment and taken a job from the Great Soul Arena.
Now that he had met their dean, he understood: like boss, like subordinates, all cut from the same cloth.
The master of Moonlight Pavilion was still right here. Surely there was a time and place for recruiting students?
Sure enough, Tang Yuehua was deeply displeased.
She was a proper member of the Clear Sky Sect, someone even the Heaven Dou Emperor treated with a measure of respect. What was this dean doing, trying to recruit someone right in front of her without so much as a greeting?
She knew Liu Erlong's true identity. With no publicly acknowledged status, and having founded a Blue Tyrant Academy that only admitted commoners, she was not actually all that distinguished.
Her own sect had several Titled Douluo. Why would she fear a mere illegitimate daughter of the Blue Lightning Tyrant Dragon Sect?
Thus, before Lin Qian could answer, she spoke first. "Blue Tyrant Academy hasn't visited us in so long, yet the moment you arrive, you set your sights on the finest student of my Moonlight Pavilion~"
The implication was-
Who do you think you are? Even sending you an invitation was doing you an honor. Don't get too arrogant!
Liu Erlong was fiery, not stupid. She quickly caught on, her expression souring. "From what the master of Moonlight Pavilion is saying, I'm not even worthy of standing here and speaking to you? You're merely a..."
"Ladies, there are many people here, and loose tongues abound. Please mind your words."
Seeing that things were about to escalate, Lin Qian hurriedly interrupted. On the surface, he was telling both sides to be quiet, but in reality, he was siding with Tang Yuehua.
Liu Erlong could naturally sense it too. Just as she was about to flare up, another person walked over.
With this person's appearance, the battle grew even more unpredictable, rivaling a battle royale of beauties.
Lin Qian wailed inwardly-
I'm done for!