The Rabbit Falls in Love

After comforting Wang Dong'er, who had been devastated by the Tang Sect's actions, Xu Xingyu and the others decided to watch the Soul Fighting match between the senior students. Not only did they know the participants, but two-on-two matches between senior students were also uncommon.

Once everyone had found a seat, Jiang Nannan explained to the others about the upcoming competitors: Bei Bei, Xu Sanshi, Dugu Yanran, and Tang Ya.

Xu Xingyu had long known all this information, but Xu Yanxue and Wang Dong'er did not. So there was no harm in letting them learn a little about it.

Thanks to Jiang Nannan's explanation, the two girls gained some understanding of the strength and Martial Souls of those about to appear, but it also left them with a few more questions.

Wang Dong'er asked, "Um, Sister Nannan, according to what you said, Xu Sanshi's Martial Soul is already the Black Tortoise, a divine-beast-level Martial Soul. Why can't he beat Bei Bei, whose Golden Sacred Dragon isn't pure?"

Beside her, Xu Yanxue nodded repeatedly to show that she had the same question.

Jiang Nannan did not shy away from Wang Dong'er's question. She explained, "There are several factors. One is that those two are fairly close friends, so they both hold back somewhat when they fight."

"Another reason is that although Xu Sanshi awakened the Black Tortoise Martial Soul, it's so powerful that it puts an enormous strain on him. So when he uses Black Tortoise Power, he doesn't use too much of it."

"Of course, there's another reason: the academy's upper ranks reject the existence of Soul Spirits, considering them an external force. So students are expressly forbidden from releasing Soul Spirits to fight during Soul Fighting matches."

"As a result, unless he goes all out, Xu Sanshi, who's at the Soul Elder level, can fight a high-level Soul Ancestor at most. Add in the fact that the two of them hold back a little against each other, and that's why they've fought to a draw so many times."

At that moment, Xu Yanxue suddenly asked, "Then, with Dugu Yanran and Tang Ya added to the mix, what changes do you think there'll be in the battle?"

"Hmm, in that case, I think Xu Sanshi's side has a better chance of winning. That's not only because Dugu Yanran is far stronger than Tang Ya, who's only just reached the Soul Elder level, but also because Dugu Yanran and Xu Sanshi work together better than Bei Bei and Tang Ya."

As soon as she finished speaking, Jiang Nannan began to get a headache over the complicated relationships among the people on the stage.

After all, she had close ties of one kind or another with everyone about to appear. Xu Sanshi went without saying: she had nearly become a sacrifice for the awakening of his Martial Soul. Dugu Yanran was a friend she had made at the Spirit Contract Pagoda, while Tang Ya was her roommate.

Tang Ya and Dugu Yanran had originally met because Jiang Nannan had wanted to introduce Tang Ya to her friend from the Spirit Contract Pagoda. But once the two learned each other's identities, they began to argue.

What gave Jiang Nannan the biggest headache was that every time the two met, they would get into endless arguments over the most trivial things.

Because of that, Jiang Nannan tried to meet them separately whenever possible and no longer stayed in the same place with both of them.

Fortunately, most of the time, neither of them made things difficult for Jiang Nannan. After all, even if they couldn't stand the sight of each other, Jiang Nannan had nothing to do with their grudge and was a complete outsider.

So when Jiang Nannan was present, they tried to suppress their dislike of each other, sparing her the awkwardness of being caught between them.

Just as Jiang Nannan was still fretting over how to make Tang Ya and Dugu Yanran less hostile toward each other, Xu Xingyu suddenly asked, "Um, Sister Nannan, I can see your cultivation is already close to Soul King. Are you going to apply to enter Shrek's inner courtyard once you break through to Soul King?"

Jiang Nannan smiled and said, "To be precise, my cultivation is already at level forty-five. If I can become a Soul King this year, I can apply to the academy's teachers for early admission to the inner courtyard."

Seeing Jiang Nannan's slightly proud expression, Xu Xingyu felt gratified. In the past, Jiang Nannan had often felt inferior because she came from a commoner's family and had relatively poor cultivation talent.

But ever since Jiang Nannan had activated her Supreme Yin Jade Body constitution, her cultivation talent had soared at an incredible rate, and her sense of inferiority had vanished with it.

The Jiang Nannan of today was nothing like the one in the original story, who could only serve early on as a reverse-scale trinket for Xu Sanshi's Black Tortoise awakening and later as an ornamental vase whose presence hardly mattered. Jiang Nannan had become a true daughter of heaven!

While Xu Xingyu was still feeling gratified by Jiang Nannan's current achievements, Xu Yanxue suddenly pinched his waist and said, "Brother Xingyu, watch yourself. Don't you know it's rude to stare at a girl like that?"

Only then did Xu Xingyu realize that he had been staring intently at Jiang Nannan this whole time. If the girls present hadn't all known his character so well, his behavior just now might well have been taken for that of some kind of creep.

At the thought, Xu Xingyu hurriedly apologized to Jiang Nannan. She didn't seem to mind much, though for some reason, Xu Xingyu noticed that her face was a little red.

Little did he know that Jiang Nannan had already tossed her plan to reconcile her close friends into the trash. Her head was now filled with a single question: Has Young Master Xingyu started to take an interest in me?

But isn't this too fast? Wasn't Young Master Xingyu supposed to be the type who only slowly opens his heart after someone has spent a long time by his side?

Or did I really underestimate my own charm, like Sister Zi JI said? But compared with Pagoda Master Gu Yuena, I'm really just an insignificant little girl!

Compared with her counterpart in the original story, Jiang Nannan's only flaw was that whenever she faced Xu Xingyu, she would unwittingly begin to let her thoughts run wild about their relationship.

But that couldn't be helped. Without Xu Xingyu's help, Jiang Nannan would have had no choice but to sell herself to the Mysterious Underworld Sect as a child to pay for her mother's treatment, while forever losing the cultivation talent her Supreme Yin Jade Body had given her.

Afterward, Xu Xingyu had even made Jiang Nannan his personal secretary at the Spirit Contract Pagoda he had built, making her an indispensable presence there.

She no longer had to worry about her family's finances and could shop for pretty clothes and cosmetics for herself and her mother like a normal girl. (Of course, Jiang Nannan herself usually only bought them for her mother, because she personally disliked living too extravagantly and rarely bought anything beyond necessities.)

After receiving such help, wouldn't even a girl who didn't dream of a prince on a white horse fall in love?

It was no wonder, then, that Jiang Nannan had fallen for such a man.

Wang Dong'er, who had been watching Jiang Nannan's thoughts run wild from the side, couldn't help sighing. She murmured to herself, Sure enough, Sister Nannan has fallen for Brother Xingyu's charms too.

I have to win Sister Nannan over and form an alliance with her as soon as possible. Only then can I get Xu Xingyu to pay more attention to me and keep him from being drawn in by the other seductive hussies at the academy!

Only then could she stand against Gu Yuena's Soul Beast alliance and become the most important girl to Xu Xingyu!

Just then, loud cheers began to rise from the stands. The two sides in the match had begun to enter.

As the two sides took their places on the fighting platform one after another, the spectators fell quiet, eagerly awaiting the Soul Fighting match that was about to begin.