The Story of the Tortoise and the Snake
In the end, to escape the awkward situation, Xu Xingyu could only bear the pain and coax the two girls on the way to the dormitory. Only then did they let him off.
Xu Xingyu took the opportunity to steer the conversation toward the purple-haired girl who had been chatting so happily with Xu Sanshi. He asked who she was and why she was so close to him.
Jiang Nannan told Xu Xingyu what she knew about her. After all, she could tell he had no designs on the girl. He was simply curious why Xu Sanshi had seemed like a different person after seeing her.
The purple-haired girl was named Dugu Yanran. She was a descendant of Poison Douluo Dugu Bo from ten thousand years ago, and her Martial Soul was the Jade Phosphor Thunder Serpent. She was Xu Sanshi's current girlfriend and fiancée.
A few years ago, the Dugu Family had also been one of the few families to join the Spirit Contract Pagoda. Besides seeking some benefits while the pagoda was still expanding, they had joined because its medical and pharmaceutical techniques far surpassed their family's. Thus, they had a chance to completely resolve the backlash from their inherited poison.
As a result, the Dugu Family had inevitably come into contact with the Mysterious Underworld Sect. After numerous exchanges, the two families got along splendidly, and Xu Sanshi and Dugu Yanran met during this time.
Back then, Xu Sanshi was still mired in self-reproach over his family having done something so despicable to an innocent girl. Dugu Yanran noticed him sitting all alone and, on a whim, greeted him.
At first, Xu Sanshi didn't want to pay her any attention, but in the end, he couldn't bear it anymore and found himself telling her what was troubling him. Perhaps all he had needed at the time was someone to listen.
As his listener, Dugu Yanran offered timely advice: rather than sighing and lamenting here, he would be better off thinking carefully about how to make it up to the girl.
Hearing this, Xu Sanshi acted as though he had been injected with chicken blood, trying every way he could to make up for the harm Jiang Nannan had suffered. Dugu Yanran became his strategist, helping him come up with ideas.
The two became very good friends as a result. As they spent more time together, Dugu Yanran began to develop feelings for Xu Sanshi. After all, she had seen for herself how much he wanted to make amends and take responsibility.
Unfortunately, those feelings of his weren't directed at her, so Dugu Yanran kept her own feelings hidden. That lasted until the day Xu Sanshi confessed to her.
Dugu Yanran was astonished by Xu Sanshi's confession. She had always thought the person he liked was Jiang Nannan, whom he had been trying to make amends to. After all, she was inferior to Jiang Nannan in both looks and talent.
In fact, Xu Sanshi had indeed been attracted to Jiang Nannan herself. But after spending a long time with her, he knew she regarded him as no more than an ordinary friend. Jiang Nannan also had someone she liked, and that person was someone Xu Sanshi could never compare to in his entire life.
After learning this, Xu Sanshi, unusually, backed down and chose to let go of the unrealistic feelings in his heart. After all, if not for Xu Xingyu, he might truly have ruined Jiang Nannan's life without realizing it.
He was therefore full of gratitude toward Xu Xingyu, because if that incident had really happened, he wouldn't even have been worthy of being Jiang Nannan's friend.
After letting go of his feelings for Jiang Nannan, Xu Sanshi gradually realized that Dugu Yanran had feelings for him too. It also reminded him that she had been looking after him for the past few years.
It would certainly have been a lie to say he hadn't noticed Dugu Yanran's feelings for him. But at the time, he had been so deeply attracted to Jiang Nannan that he hadn't taken those feelings to heart.
Thinking back on who he had been then, Xu Sanshi supposed he really had been a bastard. After all, he had claimed he wanted to make amends to one girl for his mistake, only to turn around and use another girl's feelings for him to achieve his own goal.
Having realized this, Xu Sanshi felt he was no different from that grand elder back then. The thought made him furious, because he didn't want to become the kind of person who would casually sacrifice the futures of innocent lives for his family.
To bid farewell to that self, Xu Sanshi confessed to Dugu Yanran and swore that he would do everything in his power to take care of her for the rest of her life.
Dugu Yanran didn't immediately accept Xu Sanshi's confession. Although she didn't know why he had let go of his feelings for Jiang Nannan, she was certain that he wasn't confessing because he liked her.
So she could only steel herself and turn him down. Xu Sanshi knew Dugu Yanran might have noticed something, so he wasn't particularly surprised or disheartened by the result.
Instead, after Dugu Yanran rejected him, Xu Sanshi declared that he would prove he was a man worthy of her devotion for a lifetime, and launched a courtship that lasted an entire year.
In the end, Dugu Yanran simply couldn't withstand Xu Sanshi's advances any longer. A year ago, she accepted his feelings, and they became a couple.
After the two became a couple, the families behind them applauded and approved of their relationship. They immediately arranged an engagement for them, and the two officially became betrothed.
As for the Mysterious Underworld Sect's so-called Second Martial Soul awakening ceremony, Xu Sanshi had not performed it at his coming-of-age ceremony, both because he personally objected to it and because he had awakened his Black Tortoise Bloodline by absorbing a Mysterious Serpent Soul Spirit. Instead, he intended to perform it on their wedding night.
After all, he didn't want to take the most important thing from the woman he loved merely to purify his bloodline. He wanted her to perform the ceremony because of the feelings between them.
In short, Martial Soul Evolution and bloodline purification were secondary. What mattered was that the feelings between them were genuine love!
After hearing the story of the tortoise and the snake, Xu Xingyu looked again at Xu Sanshi and Dugu Yanran flirting and couldn't help marveling at Xu Sanshi's romantic history.
In all fairness, having read the original story, Xu Xingyu had very complicated feelings about Xu Sanshi. On one hand, he hated Xu Sanshi because his own mistake had left Jiang Nannan with a psychological scar she would never forget. At the same time, he admired Xu Sanshi's desire to make it up to her and his tireless pursuit of her.
After all, that also showed that he might truly have realized what a deed worse than a beast's he had committed and reflected on it.
Of course, that didn't change how serious the incident was. On top of that, he was always making lewd remarks, causing his image in people's eyes to plummet. So it was only natural that many people hated Xu Sanshi in the original story.
But when Xu Xingyu thought of the women back home, he felt he wasn't much better.
After all, no matter how awful Xu Sanshi's character and behavior were, he was at least devoted to one person.
Xu Xingyu, on the other hand, theoretically already had his feet in four... no, counting the one he had met today, he probably had his feet in five boats.
The one thing he was glad of was that his first wife didn't object to such matters. Still, he had better take it easy from now on, or he might find himself chopped into several pieces one day.
At that thought, Xu Xingyu could only trudge toward the dormitory with the support of the two peerless beauties, praying inwardly that he wouldn't accidentally add another color to his first wife's hair.
After all, Gu Yuena had done so much for him. He couldn't just keep picking flowers and flirting with women everywhere he went!
He could only hope his life at Shrek Academy would be relatively peaceful.
But Xu Xingyu had forgotten one thing: there was no such thing as a peaceful life at Shrek Academy. His future was therefore bound to be full of all sorts of irresistible forces.