"Are you also a new student heading to Shrek Academy?"
Tang San looked at Shangguan Hong beside him, marveling at such a coincidence. Someone he had happened to meet on the road was actually a future schoolmate.
With that connection, Tang San's wariness eased a little. After all, he was only a child from a poor family, with nothing at home but an utterly ordinary blacksmith father. What did he have that anyone would covet? Besides, Shangguan Hong looked every inch the young aristocrat, his eyes brimming with confidence. Apart from being somewhat childish in his words and conduct, he had no apparent faults. At a glance, he was clearly a pampered young master from a wealthy family.
Relying on his exceptionally high emotional intelligence, Shangguan Hong chatted with Tang San and Xiao Wu. The atmosphere among the three had gone from tense at first to harmonious now, which came as no surprise to Shangguan Yanhong. After all, in his previous life, he had been a star salesman with a silver tongue. Making fools of a Tang Sect assassin who had seen little of the wider world and a humanoid Soul Beast as blank as a sheet of paper was a piece of cake, wasn't it?
As the three strolled and chatted, Shangguan Hong soon shared his background-carefully packaged by him, of course. He said he came from Nuoya City and had been an orphan. Thanks to his outstanding talent, he had received sponsorship from many people, which had allowed him to attain his current cultivation.
Tang San and Xiao Wu noticed nothing amiss, because Shangguan Hong had already deceived himself. He no longer thought about Heavenly Spirit Village's sordid past or its bloodshed. The only memories left in his mind were of what he had experienced after leaving Heavenly Spirit Village.
Back then, to hide, he had fled to Nuo'er City, more than three hundred li from Suotuo City. There, Shangguan Hong had displayed his Soul Master-level cultivation and easily secured admission to the junior Soul Master Academy. The academy had practically treated him as a living advertisement. Not only had it waived all his tuition fees, but its aristocratic headmaster had also lavishly established all manner of scholarships. Naturally, every one of those scholarships had ultimately ended up in Shangguan Hong's pocket.
At Nuo'er Junior Soul Master Academy, Shangguan Hong had practically been an overlord! Take the young nobleman who had just brought him to Suotuo City: he was the son of Nuo'er City's most distinguished aristocrat, and also Shangguan Hong's lackey. After all, even that established aristocrat's Soul Power cultivation was only rank 39. Strength was the only passport on this continent. A six-year-old Soul Master was nothing short of a bombshell to a small city, let alone Shangguan Hong, who had already reached the Soul Elder level at eleven and become the most valued guest of numerous aristocrats.
Those aristocrats held him in the highest esteem. Everyone wanted to draw the extraordinarily talented Shangguan Hong into their family, and their descendants naturally dared not act arrogantly either. Following their families' instructions, they desperately tried to grow closer to Shangguan Hong, but...
Shangguan Hong's character was rather nasty at its core.
As for just how nasty...
Tang San and Xiao Wu soon found out.
For instance, as the three walked along, the generous Shangguan Hong volunteered to buy three skewers of candied hawthorn. After finishing his food, he casually stuck his bamboo skewer into the crack of a passing little brat wearing split-crotch pants.
In truth, Shangguan Hong had no small change on him. Most of his money consisted of Silver Soul Coins and Gold Soul Coins, and the candied hawthorn vendor could not break such large denominations. So, with one Silver Soul Coin, he took ten Copper Soul Coins from a roadside beggar's bowl, infuriating the beggar pretending to be blind into a torrent of curses.
There were many other incidents like this. Shangguan Hong was so unruly that hardly a few minutes passed without him stirring something up. With the thick skin he had developed as a star salesman in his previous life, he cared nothing for other people's opinions. Tang San and Xiao Wu beside him could not do the same, though. The strange looks passersby shot them made both their faces flush. Tang San had tried tactfully dissuading him, only to fall into contemplation as he looked at the snacks in his hands, sold on a "fill it as much as you like for three Copper Soul Coins" basis, which Shangguan Hong had piled into a small mountain.
"Brother, isn't this guy a little..."
Xiao Wu trailed off. She had lived for tens of thousands of years, yet had never seen such a strange creature. Tang San beside her knew what she wanted to say. He watched Shangguan Hong, who had left the snack vendor not knowing whether to laugh or cry, run over to a melon stall and start arguing with its owner about whether the melons priced at two Copper Soul Coins a jin had rinds made of gold or seeds made of gold.
Monster Academy... From a certain perspective, Brother Shangguan really does qualify as a monster.
Has he done a single thing fit for a human being?
"Brother Shangguan, it's getting late. Why don't we find somewhere to rest first?"
Seeing that Shangguan Hong had already seized the melon vendor by the collar, simply because the man had sold a melon for the exorbitant price of two and a half Silver Soul Coins, Tang San chose another way to stop his antics.
"Huh? Oh, right, we really should find somewhere to rest! You two go ahead. I still need to wait for this fellow to give me my change!"
As he watched Tang San and Xiao Wu walk away, the smile gradually vanished from Shangguan Hong's face. Meanwhile, the melon vendor put the melon into a bag, preparing to complete this unusually large sale to an outsider.
Boom!
The dull crash plunged the bustling street into a moment of silence. Everyone turned to look. The melon vendor, who had been all smiles a moment earlier, now had his head embedded in the pile of melons in front of him. Fine melons had been smashed apart, their sweet red juice seeping out, tinged with the metallic smell unique to blood... The cause of it all was a hand wearing two rings!
"You dared charge me two and a half Silver Soul Coins for one lousy melon? This melon isn't made of gold, and your head isn't made of iron!"
Grinning savagely, Shangguan Hong grabbed the vendor by his hair and forcibly hauled him out of the melon pile. Broken wood splinters pierced the vendor's skin, leaving him in an utterly wretched state, with none of his earlier smugness at the prospect of fleecing an outsider.
"L-Lord Soul Master, spare me!"
At this point, how could the melon vendor fail to realize that Shangguan Hong was a Soul Master? After all, what ordinary twelve-year-old child could possess such strength? To commoners like the melon vendor, Soul Masters were important figures they must never anger. Although the law offered commoners like them protection, Soul Masters were still Soul Masters. Even if they killed a commoner, they would not face severe punishment.
"Hmph! Since you at least guarantee this melon is ripe, I'll spare your life! If there's a next time, say goodbye to this beautiful world!"
Where was there any trace of Shangguan Hong's earlier frivolous manner? His presence was so chilling that he no longer seemed like a living person.
A full year of humiliation, six years of erosion from the void after his Martial Soul Awakening, and, on top of that, the terrifying path Shangguan Hong had chosen to grow stronger... His mental state was becoming ever more beautiful. In the truest sense, he had an evil ghost in his heart!