Panic crossed Fanny's face at the sight of Han Shuo's miserable state. Her long, straight, firm legs moved rapidly as she ran toward him, her footsteps clattering.
"Ah..."
Han Shuo screamed and looked up at Fanny, his face deathly pale. "Teacher Fanny, you... you stepped on my hand!" he stammered in pain.
Fanny was already nearsighted, and in her panic, she had run too fast to pay any attention to her feet. On top of that, Han Shuo had stretched both hands far out as he lay on the ground to make his act convincing. That was how his hand ended up under her foot.
Fanny wore tall boots with long, slender heels. With the momentum of her run behind her, her foot landed on Han Shuo's left hand. There was absolutely nothing feigned about the pain on his face-it truly hurt him to the bone.
Han Shuo had just fought Keri and the others for quite some time without suffering much injury. Now, one step from Fanny had instead sent pain piercing to his bones.
"Oh... sorry, Brian. I didn't see that you had stretched your hand out so far!" Startled, Fanny hurriedly apologized. Then, in her surprise, she hastily lifted the boot resting on Han Shuo's left foot and stepped to the right-straight toward his outstretched right hand.
Seeing that sharp heel about to wreak havoc on his right hand as well, Han Shuo was scared out of his wits. He snatched his hand back like lightning, then wiped the "blood" on his face. Pointing at Keri and the others, who stood behind her dumbfounded, he complained of his mistreatment. "They... they hit me!"
At those words, Fanny's face instantly darkened. Although Keri and the others had been covered in injuries too, they had wiped all the blood off their faces upon hearing someone approach, afraid of being held responsible. In their haste, however, they had wiped that blood onto the weapons they then tossed aside.
They had intended to swallow their grievances, accept their bad luck, and cover the whole thing up. How could they have known Han Shuo would be so vicious that, after beating them up, he would frame them as well?
Fanny's beautiful eyes sharpened as she looked at Keri and the others. Although their clothes were disheveled, there was no blood on their faces. The wooden clubs tossed far off to the side, however, did have blood on them.
After that single glance, she looked down at the blood on Han Shuo's face and back. Fanny had already "wisely" worked it all out-Keri and the others had ganged up on Han Shuo, and the blood on those clubs was proof!
"I'll report this to the academy. You can all wait for your punishment. So many of you bullying one frail Brian-I'm truly ashamed of you!" Fanny stared coldly at Keri and the others, her voice sharp.
"Teacher Fanny, that's not what happened! He was the one who beat us! Jack, you saw everything. Tell her, wasn't Brian the one who beat us?" Alarmed, Keri shouted frantically.
The plump little Jack was still trembling where he stood, thoroughly intimidated by Han Shuo's earlier frenzy. At Keri's words, Jack looked at Han Shuo from a distance and found him lying on the ground, winking and making faces to signal him.
Emboldened, Jack thrust out his belly and pointed his chubby right hand at them, declaring righteously, "Keri, stop lying! Teacher Fanny is here now, so I'm not afraid of you anymore. You beat Brian up, and now you want me to lie for you. Honest Jack could never do that!"
Keri and the others tried to say more, but Fanny snorted coldly and raised a hand to stop them. "No more excuses. Just wait for your punishment!"
Turning around, Fanny glanced at the "miserable" Han Shuo, stepped forward, and helped him up by the back of his collar. "Come on, I'll tend to your injuries first," she said gently. "You're my research subject. You can't keep getting hurt like this!"
As Fanny spoke, her sweet breath brushed Han Shuo's nose and mouth, suddenly making the spot she had stepped on seem much less painful. With his back to Fanny, Han Shuo signaled Jack to leave quickly, then gave Keri and the others a simple-minded grin.
But after first suffering Han Shuo's frenzied beating and then his vicious framing, they now found that simple-minded grin the most terrifying, evil smile in the world!
Ten minutes later, in Fanny's laboratory.
Besides Fanny, the little witch Lisa had also come along to her laboratory, using the excuse that she had questions to ask her. All along the way, there had been something peculiar about the way Lisa looked at Han Shuo, making him feel that something was not quite right.
Once they reached Fanny's laboratory, Fanny had Han Shuo lie on the bed and found a bottle of medicine. Just as she was about to apply it for him, Lisa chuckled and snatched the bottle from her hand. "Miss Lisa, you aren't wearing your glasses. Let me apply the medicine for him instead," she said with a smile.
Fanny thought nothing of Lisa's words and nodded. "Mm, all right. Tend to his wounds, then. I'll find some gauze. I don't know where I put it."
Muttering to herself, Fanny rummaged around the laboratory. Meanwhile, Lisa held the medicine in her left hand, dabbed some onto Han Shuo's back with her right, and leaned closer to him. "Huh? These wounds don't look freshly punctured. Why have they already scabbed over?" she whispered.
Han Shuo's heart jolted. Damn! It seemed he had underestimated his body's peculiarities. Practicing demonic arts had enhanced his ability to recover from wounds. The injuries he had suffered before dawn had already begun to scab over in this short time. Now Lisa had spotted the flaw.
Han Shuo kept silent, knowing that anything he said now would be useless. He simply played the fool to the end, pretending not to hear Lisa and groaning incessantly as though his wounds hurt terribly.
Just then, a sudden, intense pain shot from the wounds on his back. Han Shuo cried out and abruptly turned to glare at Lisa. When he saw the smugness of someone who had uncovered a secret in her eyes, he inwardly cried, This is bad. Then he gave a simple-minded grin, said, "Hurts," and turned his head away again.
"Brian, what's wrong?" Fanny was still searching for gauze on the other side of the room. Hearing Han Shuo's scream, she could not help calling over to him.
"Oh, Teacher Fanny, I accidentally touched his wound. It's nothing. I'll be more careful this time!"
"Be careful, then!" Fanny replied, paying no further attention to what was happening over there.
A delicate fragrance entered his nostrils, followed by warm breath against his ear. Lisa whispered, "Damn you, Brian. Do you think I don't know you're playing the fool? Hmph, you pretended to be dead to frighten me, then gave me the wrong method for making medicine. If I hadn't been clever enough to test it on Kerry Borg, you would have gotten me killed.
"I'll tell you the truth. I reached the laboratory before Keri and the others. Through an evil spirit, I saw and heard everything clearly, from your conversation with Jack to you beating Keri afterward. You've really come a long way, haven't you? You've even learned to frame people! Hehe, not bad, not bad!"
As Lisa spoke, she continued applying medicine to Han Shuo. She was clearly tormenting him on purpose, frequently pressing hard on his wounds. Now that she had exposed his act, Han Shuo felt uneasy, not knowing what she was planning. Although his wounds hurt terribly, he dared not cry out loudly and merely grimaced, letting out low, muffled whimpers.
Her small, fragrant lips drew close to Han Shuo's ear, her sweet scent washing over his face. Seeing that he stubbornly refused to speak, Lisa said viciously, "Last time at the training grounds, damn you, you even kissed me, and you touched... touched me there. I'm never going to let you off! I'll wait for you at the rockery behind the teaching building tonight. If you dare not show up, you're dead!"
With that, Lisa pressed hard on Han Shuo's wounds again. Only after seeing him grimace and whimper did she give a smug giggle of satisfaction. Then she walked over to Fanny, handed her the medicine, and said, "Teacher Fanny, I've finished applying it. I just remembered I have something to do, so I'll leave first. I'll ask you about that difficult problem tomorrow!"
"Oh, go take care of it, then!" Fanny replied casually before exclaiming, "Ah, I finally found it! So this is where I put it."
After her exclamation, Fanny walked over to Han Shuo, her lovely legs moving as she carried the gauze. She was about to bandage his wounds when she leaned closer and asked in puzzlement, "Huh? Why are there signs of scabbing on the surface of the skin?"
With his face toward the bed, Han Shuo was worrying over Lisa's behavior, unsure how to face her that night. At Fanny's words, his heart jolted again. Surely Fanny hasn't started suspecting me too?
After saying that, Fanny frowned in thought, then relaxed her brow and exclaimed with misplaced certainty, "Ah, last time Fitch hit you, the swelling on your forehead went down quickly too. Could all these changes be because you were struck by the Pain of the Undead spell? Oh, this is simply unbelievable!"
Han Shuo: "..."
Han Shuo was truly speechless at Fanny's presumptuous conclusion. He simply could not understand how her mind made so many connections that she could come up with a suitable explanation for something so inconceivable.
After saying that, Fanny marveled to herself for a while, then began bandaging Han Shuo's wounds. Her movements were very gentle, as though she was afraid of hurting him.
Han Shuo inwardly sighed that Fanny's touch really was far better than Lisa's. As he turned his head to thank her, he suddenly saw a tall, thin figure beyond her back, staring at him jealously from the open laboratory doorway. Once the figure noticed his gaze, he abruptly vanished from the doorway-it was Fitch.
Before you continue