Young People Are Hard to Manage

At the same time Lu Yuan and Xu Wenbin were chatting, the two guards, Guo Huai and Sheng Hong, were in a room aboveground.

They wore white coats bearing the words "Jiangzhou City Psychiatric Hospital."

It really was a great place for a cult to hide. No normal person would want to go near it.

A cultist knelt before the two guards and pleaded, "My lords, my Twilight Syndrome has flared up again. Have mercy on me! Please ask the divine lord to grant me divine water!"

The man had been full of life in the prayer hall just two days ago, but now he lacked even the strength to stand, tormented by agonizing pain.

Guo Huai smiled. "The divine lord cured your Twilight Syndrome. How could it have flared up again?

"It must be because you aren't devout!"

The cultist was horrified. He strained to lift his head and protested, "My lord, no, I'm very devoted to the divine lord..."

Before he could finish, Guo Huai wrung his neck.

"Someone, drag this apostate out!"

Two people came in from outside and silently carried the corpse away.

Once they were far enough away, the guard Sheng Hong frowned and said:

"That's the fourth one this month. Why has all the trash we've recruited lately been like this?"

Guo Huai smiled. "They were all half-dead to begin with. Wouldn't drinking divine water just make them die faster?"

"I wonder how many will be left when it's time for the operation."

"Doesn't matter. They're just extras anyway. One more or one less makes no difference."

Sheng Hong nodded, fully agreeing with Guo Huai.

The cultists underground now were all cannon fodder for the operation. Not one of them would survive.

"But once this operation is over, I'm going to talk to the protector. When we recruit believers in the future, we shouldn't look for these sickly weaklings anymore. They're stupid and weak!

"Those students in the cells are pretty good, though. They're clever.

"We should have more young people among the believers!"

Guo Huai lit himself a cigarette and stared out the window, speaking glumly:

"Everyone understands that, but this generation of young people is hard to manage.

"With young people these days, who the hell knows what's going on in their heads?

"Last time, I recruited a middle school student. Guess what happened.

"He went around school showing off to everyone that he'd found himself a boss and was now a respectable believer of the Holy Church.

"We're the Holy Church, not the mafia! Fucking moron!"

Sheng Hong was amused. He laughed and said, "Young people should be left to young people to deal with.

"Zhang Baocheng's suggestion last time was good. He proposed controlling a few female internet celebrities to help us recruit believers. That was a good idea.

"Young people don't believe what we say, but they'll do whatever those online fan-service girls tell them. They're more effective than the divine lord."

"What's a fan-service girl?" Guo Huai asked.

"You don't go online anyway, so never mind if you don't know." Sheng Hong blew a smoke ring. "It's a good idea, but unfortunately Zhang Baocheng is dead. I don't know if he found any candidates."

At the mention of Zhang Baocheng, Guo Huai raised an eyebrow. "Zhang Baocheng sent Lu Yuan here. There's something unclear about that. I still think he's a spy for the Internal Affairs Bureau.

"That kid spends all day in his room looking at review materials, acting like he's really preparing to take the college entrance exam."

"What are you worried about? He's not a cultivator. In a few days, the protector will come to preside over the Holy Descent Ceremony. After the ceremony, won't he spill whatever little schemes he's hiding?"

"That's true." Guo Huai nodded.

Lu Yuan stayed in the cell for a long time, growing increasingly anxious. Were they really going to wait until the day of the college entrance exam to take him out?

Whatever the cultists' plan was, surely they had to rehearse it at least once.

At this rate, he had no way to pass information to the Internal Affairs Bureau, and it would even be hard to keep himself alive.

Besides that, Lu Yuan missed his parents and his younger sister.

Mom should have been discharged from the hospital by now, right? Would she be worried when she couldn't see me? How did Xiao Bing explain it to our parents? They must be looking for me everywhere, right?

Without me cooking, what if Xiao Bing goes hungry and loses weight?

For the first time, Lu Yuan realized that his adventure might have been a huge mistake.

Still, he was a very mature person. Even under these circumstances, he could remain calm and keep up his studies and cultivation. His difficult life in his previous life had taught Lu Yuan a simple truth:

Under any circumstances, stay steady and don't panic!

Panicking was useless. Instead, it could make him miss a real opportunity.

The middle school student Xu Wenbin, by contrast, had no such patience.

The boy had been driven mad by his confinement. Starting one day, he kicked the door frantically and shouted at the top of his lungs:

"Let me out!"

"I want to go home!"

"Liars! You're all liars!"

He shouted over and over, giving Lu Yuan a headache.

At first, Lu Yuan tried to talk him down, but Xu Wenbin wouldn't listen at all. In the end, Lu Yuan stopped paying him any attention and continued balancing chemical equations.

Before long, Lu Yuan heard someone passing by. Judging by the footsteps, there was more than one person. He put down his pen and heard a key opening the door next door.

Immediately afterward, he heard Xu Wenbin shout, "You lied to me! You never taught me spiritual arts at all!"

A muffled thud cut Xu Wenbin's shouting short, and screams took its place. Before long, the screams gradually grew faint, but the beating continued.

Lu Yuan put down his pen, leaned against the ventilation window and pleaded, "Brother Cheng, Xu Wenbin doesn't know any better. We're all brothers and sisters in the Holy Church. Please don't beat him to death!"

Guo Huai's face appeared at the window. Lu Yuan immediately stepped back and bowed respectfully.

"Lord Guard!"

He had thought Zhang Cheng was beating Xu Wenbin, but he hadn't expected it to be Guo Huai.

Guo Huai pointed at Lu Yuan. "You're a loyal one, kid."

Worried that he would be beaten too, Lu Yuan briefly considered activating his Body-Protecting Shield, but immediately abandoned the idea. He didn't want anyone to notice anything was wrong.

Fortunately, Guo Huai did nothing more.

"Let's go!"

He called out, and the sound of a door locking came from outside. The footsteps gradually receded.

Lu Yuan waited a while, then called softly through the ventilation window:

"Xu Wenbin! Xu Wenbin!"

There was no answer from next door. Lu Yuan cocked his ear and listened carefully, hearing faint breathing.

He sighed and went back to working through practice questions.

It wasn't as though Lu Yuan could change anything. In this place, where danger lurked on all sides, he could barely protect himself. He had already taken a great risk by speaking up just now.

After all, he and Xu Wenbin weren't close.

About two or three hours later, Xu Wenbin suddenly spoke.

He said, "Lu Yuan, we can't get out, can we?"

"Lu Yuan, I want to go home!"

Lu Yuan didn't answer, and Xu Wenbin didn't need an answer. He was just talking to himself.

After that, he talked about many things: how the people in his class bullied him, how his dad always beat him when he drank too much, and a girl he liked named Wenwen.

After talking for a long time, Xu Wenbin suddenly asked, "Lu Yuan, are you listening?"

Lu Yuan paused, his pen tip still. "I've been listening the whole time."

"Thank you."

After that, Xu Wenbin became quiet and spoke little.

Lu Yuan continued studying and cultivating.

During this time, he made two particular discoveries.

One was about studying. Lu Yuan found that his ability to learn seemed to have improved greatly.

He had originally thought there was no way he would have time to go through his books, but that wasn't the case. With many problems that would have taken him a long time in his previous life, his train of thought was now especially clear, and he could get through them almost in one go.

Had his IQ gone up?

If I'd known, I would have stayed home and studied, Lu Yuan thought.

By now, Lu Yuan had basically finished reviewing math and the combined science subjects, and he felt pretty good about how he was doing on practice questions.

Chinese was progressing slowly because many things were different from his previous life and had to be memorized again. As for the foreign language, there was no point talking about it. He had already given up on that.

Looking at it this way, if he took the college entrance exam now, he still had a chance of reaching the passing mark of 450 points, as long as he could get out.

The other important discovery concerned the system.