Just then, several more girls came over, their faces bright with childish innocence.
"Big sister, your cosplay is so accurate! You look exactly like her in the anime. Can we take a picture with you?"
Bibi Dong looked at Tang Fan, who nodded. "Of course. I'll take it for you."
"No need, uncle. We can take it ourselves."
Tang Fan's face stiffened in embarrassment. He had reached the age when elementary schoolers called him uncle.
And they called Bibi Dong big sister but called him uncle. These elementary schoolers sure knew how to treat people differently depending on who they were.
Bibi Dong obligingly crouched halfway down and helped the little girls take a photo with their smartwatches.
Tang Fan smiled and shook his head. "I'm the one falling behind. Smartwatches have more and more functions these days."
Bibi Dong asked the girls another question. "Do you think I'm a villain?"
"She's a villain in the anime, but that doesn't matter. Big sister, you're so pretty that it doesn't matter whether you're a hero or a villain."
"What heroes and villains? Anyway, I don't think Tang San is a hero. Aren't they all just standing up for their own sides?"
Tang Fan noticed more students gathering. Elementary schoolers loved to crowd around a spectacle.
This wouldn't do. If too many people gathered, the police would have to give him a talking-to.
"Let's go! I really underestimated how much attention you'd attract. It won't be good if we get surrounded."
"Oh!"
Tang Fan led Bibi Dong away from the school gates and back to the car.
The scene of the elementary schoolers leaving school was also being shown on the sky screen over the Douluo Continent.
The Douluo Continent had never had children like these, brimming with vitality, youth, and innocent delight.
Qian Daoliu and Qian Xunji made a special trip to Spirit Hall Academy, which was under Spirit Hall, to see its students.
The students on the two sides looked as though they belonged in entirely different worlds.
Many of Spirit Hall Academy's students were only middle-school age, but they had completely lost the innocent delight of childhood.
All that could be seen in them was self-interest, greed, and violence.
More importantly, there was only this one school in all of Spirit City, and it didn't have many students.
On the Douluo Continent, only children with Innate Soul Power had a chance to attend school. Those without it had no chance at all.
"Ji'er, can you make sure all the children around Spirit City have a chance to go to school?"
"Father, that's impossible. Leaving aside the funds needed to build schools, even if we built them, what could we teach children who have no Innate Soul Power?"
"This... really is a problem..."
Qian Daoliu had tried to shift Spirit Hall's focus toward the common people, but only when he set about carrying it out did he discover how great the problems involved were.
This simply wasn't something that brute force alone could solve in a short time. Even he, a level 99 Peerless Douluo, was powerless to do anything about it.
"Father, let's see if Dong'er can ask him for anything else useful."
"Mm, I suppose that's all we can do. Spirit Hall Academy needs some changes too. Add a class on praying to the Angel God. They must pass it."
"Yes. I'll make the arrangements right away."
In Tang Fan's car, Tang Fan asked, "You graduated from Spirit Hall Academy too, right? Tell me, how are schools today different from the Soul Master Academies on the Douluo Continent?"
"The difference is enormous!"
Bibi Dong recalled her life at the academy.
"There weren't many people at Spirit Hall Academy, but the academy itself was very large, so it felt empty.
"What each grade studied was different, and there was no situation like this where everyone got out of school at the same time.
"Most importantly, the competition among the students was fierce, and many had their own little groups.
"The academy seemed to encourage that competition deliberately, saying it could motivate students to advance in their cultivation.
"But all I felt was that they were growing colder and colder. They cared about nothing except the interests of their own little groups."
By the time Tang Fan heard this, he was already making the old-man-on-the-subway face. So it wasn't just Shrek Academy; the Soul Master Academies on the Douluo Continent were all alike.
That made sense. Yu Xiaogang had hidden at Nuoding Academy for so many years without ever taking part in teaching.
So the methods he used to train the Shrek Seven Devils could only have come from Spirit Hall, with some of his own subjective conjectures added in.
Weren't the Shrek Seven Devils the most typical academy-trained Soul Masters? They put the interests of their little group above everything else. Within the group, they seemed to love and help one another, but toward outsiders, they were a bunch of selfish scum.
"From the way you talk, it sounds like you weren't happy with your life at the academy. You were Qian Xunji's disciple and the Holy Maiden of Spirit Hall, so you must have had your own little group too.
"Given who you were, your life at the academy should have been comfortable."
"I didn't have any little group. I didn't like the people who deliberately came to curry favor with me, and as time went on, I ended up keeping to myself."
"Ostracism and bullying? I didn't expect the Douluo Continent to have that too. All I can say is that there's a problem with education on the Douluo Continent-a huge problem.
"You really only teach cultivation and don't teach moral education at all."
"Moral education? What's that?"
"It means teaching people about moral character, how to establish the right worldview, outlook on life, and values. It's very important.
"Without a good education in those three outlooks, people can easily grow up to be a menace with a twisted worldview, outlook on life, and values.
"I think the reason there are so many nobles on the Douluo Continent who behave like beasts has a lot to do with that lack of moral education."
When those words reached the Douluo Continent, that group of nobles was ready to start cursing again.
"How dare you say we behave like beasts? You're a lowborn wretch. Are you even fit to call yourself human? My family's dogs are worth more than you."
"Hmph! A lowborn wretch! If he dares show up on the Douluo Continent, I'll chop him into eight pieces. A lowborn wretch dares talk nonsense about nobles? He's courting death!"
"What bullshit moral education? Nobles have their own rules. Trying to use the ways of lowborn wretches to constrain nobles is utterly turning heaven and earth upside down."
All they could do was let loose at the sky screen. If Tang Fan ever really came to visit the Douluo Continent, those nobles would probably drop to their knees faster than anyone.
"Tang Fan, do you mean the Soul Master Academies can improve just by adding moral education?"
Tang Fan shook his head. "You're oversimplifying things. Education is the foundation of a nation. If education goes astray, the foundation goes astray with it.
"And universal education doesn't exist on the Douluo Continent. Soul Master education is also badly warped at its very roots.
"More seriously, you don't even have the ability to coordinate the entire education system.
"The empire has no actual authority to manage the academies in the various regions or those belonging to the various sects.
"In a sense, each academy is a sect of its own, acting independently. There's simply no way to reform them.
"Even if you went back, the most you could do would be to suggest reforming Spirit Hall Academy. That would be a cup of water on a burning cart of firewood."
Bibi Dong was somewhat unconvinced. "If your people can do it, I believe I can too."
Tang Fan looked at Bibi Dong, his expression growing serious. "If you knew what road our forebears had traveled, you wouldn't think that way.
"Come on, it's getting late. I'll take you to have dumplings, and tell you about it while we're at it."