Music clubs scramble for the guqin god? Sorry, I'm choosing drones!

Lin Bei extended two fingers and lightly checked just above Shen Ruoxi's smooth forehead.

Her pulse was steady.

The cold energy that had remained blocked inside her body for years, rampaging everywhere, had been completely dispersed by his Spiritual Power.

The uterine cold and menstrual cramps that had tormented her for several years had finally been eradicated at the root.

Lin Bei withdrew his hand, walked over to the bedside table, pulled out a sheet of notepaper bearing the hotel's logo, uncapped a pen, and swiftly wrote a line.

"The cold energy is gone. Check yourself out when you wake up."

A message that couldn't have been more stereotypically straight-guy.

Weighing the note down beneath a glass of water, Lin Bei opened the door and left.

Even in the dead of night, neon lights still shone along the streets of Jinghai City.

Lin Bei hailed a taxi by the roadside and went straight back to campus.

He pushed open the door to dorm room 502. It was pitch-black inside.

Fatty Wang's extraordinarily penetrating snores shook even the windowpanes into resonance.

Lin Bei had just reached his bed and sat down when the phone in his pocket suddenly vibrated twice.

He pulled it out and looked. The screen lit up with a WeChat message from Ruan Qingwu.

"Asleep yet?"

Lin Bei typed back one-handed, "No, just got back to the dorm."

Her reply came almost instantly. "There's a Hundred Clubs Battle on the school field tomorrow. All the clubs are recruiting. Come check it out with me?"

Even through the screen, Lin Bei could imagine the girl lying under her covers right now, clutching her phone and waiting eagerly for his reply.

The corner of his mouth twitched, and he tapped out a response on the screen.

"Sure. Nine tomorrow morning, at the field entrance."

After sending the message, Lin Bei shoved his phone under his pillow, stripped off his clothes, and climbed straight into bed.

The next morning.

Jinghai University's south field was practically a giant market.

The annual club recruitment event, commonly known as the "Hundred Clubs Battle," rivaled a train station during the Spring Festival travel rush.

Hundreds of clubs had pitched colorful tents across the field, with colorful banners strung up everywhere.

To attract new students, immortals from every quarter showed off their divine powers.

With both hands in his trouser pockets, Lin Bei strolled leisurely through the crowd.

Ruan Qingwu walked beside him.

Today, she wore a simple plain white T-shirt paired with a light blue pleated skirt, revealing two long, fair legs.

Her high ponytail swayed gently with her steps, and she radiated an utterly pure, youthful charm.

Just standing there, the girl was a walking spotlight.

Along the way, who knew how many male students practically had their eyeballs glued to her, but with Lin Bei beside her, not one dared approach her.

"Lin Bei, what club do you want to join?"

Holding several brightly colored flyers, Ruan Qingwu tilted her head to look at him.

"Whatever." Lin Bei yawned. "Whichever club doesn't require attendance checks or meetings."

Ruan Qingwu shot him a glare and grumbled irritably, "You might as well just die of laziness."

As they talked, they happened to reach the section for music clubs.

Compared with the other areas, the atmosphere here was much more artistic, with some people playing guitars and others playing saxophones.

Just then, a male student handing out flyers with a guitar in his arms happened to glance at Lin Bei.

He froze for two seconds, then rubbed his eyes hard.

The next instant, a shrill cry of surprise erupted across the field.

"Holy shit! Isn't that the god who played the guqin at the welcome gala?!"

That one shout brought everyone from the nearby music clubs pouring out.

On the night of the welcome gala, Lin Bei's accompaniment for "Startled Swan" had practically played the souls right out of the thousands of people in the auditorium.

His transcendent guqin skills had long since made him a prized delicacy in the eyes of every music club.

Unfortunately, Lin Bei usually appeared and vanished like a ghost. They couldn't catch him anywhere.

Now that the god himself was standing right in front of them, who could hold back?

"Where? Where? Where's the guqin god?!"

"Don't shove! Don't shove! He's ours at the Ancient Music Club!"

"Piss off! Our Guitar Club spotted him first!"

In a sudden rush.

Over a dozen older students wearing various club T-shirts surrounded Lin Bei like hungry wolves pouncing on prey.

Ruan Qingwu had been walking beside Lin Bei, but the sudden surge of people pushed her straight to the outermost edge of the circle.

Still holding her flyers, she stared blankly at Lin Bei in the middle.

"Lin Bei!"

An older female student in short shorts squeezed straight to the front and grabbed Lin Bei's arm, her eyes practically glowing green.

"Join our Ancient Music Club! Come over, and the vice president position is yours immediately! Take your pick of the club's guqins, and you'll have the final say over our budget!"

"Don't listen to her!"

Another older female student with big, wavy curls refused to back down and pressed close from the other side, her chest almost brushing Lin Bei's arm.

"Join our Pop Music Association! We might not have much else, but we've got plenty of pretty, single older girls! Just say yes, and I'll personally tutor you in music theory. Guaranteed to teach you until you've mastered it!"

"Let's add each other on WeChat!"

"Here's our club's registration form. All you have to do is sign!"

Sales pitches clamored around him from every direction, making Lin Bei's head buzz.

In all his life, this was the first time so many women had besieged him at once.

This spectacle was even crazier than those demonic women in the cultivation world fighting over a cultivation furnace.

The jostling made Lin Bei dizzy, and he was just about to release a little Spiritual Power to shake them off.

Ruan Qingwu, out on the edge, had had enough.

Standing outside the crowd, watching those older girls practically trying to drape themselves all over Lin Bei, she felt as though a whole jar of aged vinegar had overturned in her heart, its sourness bubbling away.

That blockhead! He usually seemed pretty sharp. Didn't he know to dodge when people were taking advantage of him?!

"Excuse me! Please let me through!"

Ruan Qingwu took a deep breath and brought out the same determination she had used to squeeze into the cafeteria during military training, forcibly carving a path between several burly older male students.

She charged right up to Lin Bei and reached out to cling tightly to his other arm.

Lifting her small chin slightly, she glared at the older girls around them.

"Sorry, everyone!"

"Lin Bei already has a club he wants to join! There's no need for any of you to trouble yourselves!"

Their surroundings briefly fell silent.

The girl with the big curls froze, looking at the outrageously pretty girl before her, then at the hands tightly clutching Lin Bei's arm.

"Are you his girlfriend?"

Ruan Qingwu's cheeks instantly flushed crimson.

She opened her mouth, wanting to deny it, but swallowed the words just as they reached her lips.

Instead, she steeled herself, grabbed Lin Bei's arm, and pulled him out.

"Anyway, he's not joining any of your clubs! Excuse us!"

Looking at the girl beside him, whose ears were red enough to drip blood even as she tried to look composed, a trace of amusement flashed in Lin Bei's eyes.

He didn't resist, letting Ruan Qingwu pull him along as they naturally squeezed out of the encirclement.

The two of them jogged away.

Only after they had run several dozen meters and left that pack of fanatical music club members behind did Ruan Qingwu stop.

She released Lin Bei's arm and gasped for breath.

"Why run?" Lin Bei slipped both hands back into his pockets and looked at her with a half smile. "Those girls offered some pretty tempting terms. Vice president, you know."

At those words, Ruan Qingwu's anger surged.

She turned and glared fiercely at Lin Bei.

"Do you think being surrounded by a bunch of beauties makes you look impressive? If you want to join them, there's still time to go back! That girl with the big curls definitely hasn't gone far!"

You could smell that sour jealousy from three streets away.

Lin Bei grinned.

The girl always maintained her aloof campus beauty demeanor in front of other people. Only with him would she reveal this adorably petulant little temper.

"Forget going back." Lin Bei lazily surveyed their surroundings. "Didn't you just tell them I already had a club I wanted to join? Where are we signing up, princess?"

Only then did Ruan Qingwu realize that she had been so flustered, she had simply dragged Lin Bei off in a random direction.

She looked around.

They were already at the very edge of the field.

Only one small tent stood forlornly nearby.

Without even looking, Ruan Qingwu pointed straight at that shabby tent.

"We're joining this one!"

Lin Bei followed her finger, his gaze landing on a banner that had come halfway loose.

Several large, crooked characters were written across it-"Drone Enthusiasts Association."

Lin Bei couldn't help laughing.

To avoid that pack of fanatical older girls, she really was like a desperate patient trying any doctor she could find.

This shabby club probably couldn't recruit so much as a ghost all year.

But he didn't mind.

Any club was the same to him anyway, as long as it didn't interfere with his usual sleeping and cultivation.

"Sure. Whatever you say."

Lin Bei strode over to the dust-covered table and reached out to knock on its surface.

"Hey, man. Recruiting?"

The engineering guy behind the table jerked his hand, nearly burning himself with his soldering iron.

He looked up, and when he saw the two people standing in front of him, he was completely dumbfounded.

His name was Zhao Yihang, a second-year student in the electromechanical engineering department and president of this drone club on the verge of folding.

The club was usually so broke its pockets practically rattled, barely kept afloat by the commercial aerial photography jobs he took on the side.

He had spent the entire morning at the edge of the field during today's Hundred Clubs Battle, and nobody had even stopped to ask for directions.

And yet now.

Ruan Qingwu, universally acknowledged across campus as the campus beauty of the School of Economics and Management, and Lin Bei, the guqin god who had ascended to godhood in a single performance at the welcome gala, had actually come to his booth on their own!

Zhao Yihang sprang to his feet.

"Yes! We're recruiting!"

So excited that his tongue tied itself in knots, Zhao Yihang hurriedly dug two crumpled registration forms out from under the table and presented them with both hands, not forgetting to bow repeatedly.

"Welcome aboard! You're more than welcome! I'm Zhao Yihang, the president. Having two gods like you here really brings splendor to our humble little place!"

Watching Zhao Yihang babble incoherently, Lin Bei took a registration form and casually signed his name.

Ruan Qingwu also signed beside him, her face flushed.

After handing in the forms, Ruan Qingwu glanced at the scrap metal on the table and suddenly felt a little guilty.

I'd been so busy being jealous that I dragged Lin Bei into such an unpopular club. He wouldn't be angry, would he?

She secretly raised her eyes to peek at Lin Bei.

Lin Bei happened to turn his head, meeting her clear, slightly apprehensive eyes.

Seeing how she wanted to apologize but couldn't swallow her pride, the little urge he had to tease her completely softened.

He reached out, his hand settling naturally on top of Ruan Qingwu's head.

"Good eye." A languid smile tugged at Lin Bei's lips. "It's nice and quiet here. Good for sleeping."

Feeling the warmth on top of her head, Ruan Qingwu's lingering unease instantly settled.

Her cheeks faintly pink, she gave a soft huff, but couldn't keep the corners of her mouth from lifting.

That blockhead could actually say the right thing once in a while.