He Really Had Guessed Right

A color poster was pinned to the bulletin board. It showed a sunny, handsome young man, surrounded by a ring of small print.

Before Chu Ge could squeeze in to read it, the students in front started shouting.

"Whoa, national idol Xu Junyuan is coming to East Sea for a concert next month? Is that for real?"

"Of course it's real. The poster's right there, isn't it? And it's going to be in our school gym!"

"Yes! I want to go, I want to go! I'm a die-hard fan of Senior Xu Junyuan!"

Hearing that, Chu Ge stopped trying to push forward and turned toward the classroom.

He really had guessed right. It was a concert.

Xiao Yan backed out after him and hurried to his side, a nosy look on her face.

"Little bro, how do you feel right now?"

"What do you mean, how do I feel?" Chu Ge didn't quite understand. "A celebrity's just coming to hold a concert. I'm not a fan."

Although Blue Star was a high-martial world, it was fairly peaceful overall.

Aside from the occasional fatal skirmish with the demon race, there were fewer wars than on Earth in his previous life.

Emotional value mattered in any era, so the entertainment industry was doing pretty well.

"I mean Xu Junyuan, of course."

Xiao Yan's eyes sparkled with gossip, as if she had seen through everything.

"You only just took first place in the class placement exam. You're the talk of the school. Whenever you walked by before, so many people stared at you."

"But look at today. Everyone's talking about Xu Junyuan, and nobody's paying you any attention."

"Doesn't it feel awful and painful to have someone steal your thunder?"

"You're overthinking it." Chu Ge couldn't even be bothered to look at her. This silly roe deer's train of thought took some bizarre turns.

With an imagination like that, why was she drawing doujinshi? She was wasting her talent by not writing palace intrigue dramas.

She could write The Palace Intrigues of a Silly Roe Deer. It was guaranteed to be a hit.

Once in the classroom, he went straight back to his seat, took the hand gripper out of his desk drawer, and started training.

His hand kept moving, but his mind wandered, and for some reason he thought of Xu Junyuan.

Xu Junyuan was a local from East Sea. He had also attended Donghai Martial Arts No. 1 High School, three years ahead of Chu Ge.

His martial arts talent was poor. His qi and blood had only been at the third level in the entrance test, and rumor had it that he had gotten into the school through the back door.

By all estimates, the Black Iron Realm was the highest he could reach in his lifetime, so he hadn't even finished high school. He had dropped out in his second year to make his debut.

Thanks to his outstanding looks, he had quickly become famous. Some people even called him the nation's husband.

Xu Junyuan hadn't forgotten his roots after becoming famous. He often returned to East Sea to do charity work and donated money to his alma mater.

His photo was still on the school's list of a hundred alumni, and Chu Ge even remembered his motto.

[There are no worthless lives, only worthless wills. Go and shine in the field where you belong.]

...Come to think of it, could his concert at this particular time have anything to do with the appearance of the demon beast?

It was a little too much of a coincidence.

The Scarlet-Eyed Giant Rat's trail had only just been discovered, and right on its heels, he was coming to East Sea for a concert.

As he was thinking, the class bell rang, and Wu Xuzhou walked into the classroom with his textbook.

Meanwhile, at the East Sea Martial Arts Association.

In his office, Lin Yuliang stared at the examination report on the Scarlet-Eyed Giant Rat's corpse that the technical department had just delivered, his brows knitted tightly together.

The report said that an external Primordial Force that didn't belong to the giant rat itself had been detected in its body.

This Primordial Force had a berserk attribute and could greatly increase its host's strength, at the cost of making the host lose its mind and become a machine that knew only killing.

Take the dead giant rat, for example. It had originally been only at the forty-third level of the Qi and Blood Realm, but with the boost from this berserk Primordial Force, its actual combat power had reached the threshold of the eightieth level.

He had never even heard of a method that could nearly double a living creature's strength.

The technical department was currently working urgently to analyze the source of this berserk Primordial Force.

The association had also tightened security in East Sea City, adding patrol personnel both inside and outside the city and establishing a dedicated investigation team for the Scarlet-Eyed Giant Rat invasion.

Lin Yuliang was a veteran of the association, so he had naturally become the team leader.

Knock, knock, knock.

He was absorbed in reading when a knock sounded at the door.

"Come in."

The door opened, and Lin Lan walked in with a piece of paper in her hand.

"Dad." Her voice was sweet as she handed him the paper.

Seeing that it was his daughter, Lin Yuliang frowned even harder and immediately scolded her:

"Forgotten again? Use my title during work hours. What would it look like if outsiders heard you?"

"Yes, sir!"

Lin Lan promptly gave him a textbook salute.

Lin Yuliang felt even more helpless.

"Can't you be serious for once?"

He took the paper, glanced at it, and looked up. "What do you need time off for?"

"To go to a concert, of course!"

At the mention of it, Lin Lan immediately grew excited.

"Xu Junyuan is coming to East Sea for a concert next month. I'm a fan, so I absolutely can't miss it."

"Besides, it's his first concert since his debut. I have to go support him."

"No." Lin Yuliang refused without a second thought, his tone leaving no room for negotiation.

"Why?" Lin Lan looked bewildered. "Dad, haven't you always been okay with me being a fan?"

"Being okay with that is one thing. Approving your time off is another." Lin Yuliang tapped the desk. "National Day is next month. Don't you have any idea how many people will be in East Sea City then? The association doesn't have enough people to maintain order as it is, and you want time off?"

"...All right." Lin Lan pouted, knowing her old man was telling the truth.

In fact, she hadn't had much hope of getting time off in the first place. She had just come to try her luck.

If that route was blocked, she had a second plan.

Xu Junyuan's concert was being held at a school, so there were bound to be a lot of people. For safety's sake, the association would surely send people to maintain order. She could apply to be assigned there, and that way she could listen to the concert without taking time off. She could work and support her idol without neglecting either.

I really am a genius.

Watching Lin Lan walk out of the office with a smile on her face, Lin Yuliang shook his head helplessly.

His daughter was good in every way: talented, well-behaved and filial, with a mind of her own and good morals...

But she was a constant worry.

He put his stray thoughts aside and turned his attention back to the report.

The most important matter at hand was still the Scarlet-Eyed Giant Rat invasion.

He looked at the words "external berserk Primordial Force" on the report, the doubts in his mind growing heavier.

The beast tide ten years ago really had come suddenly, leaving East Sea City completely unprepared.

And the Scarlet-Eyed Giant Rats back then had shown similar signs of turning berserk. Their strength hadn't increased by this much, though, and the technology at the time had been limited, so the exact cause had never been determined.

Could this incident be a continuation of what had happened back then?

If it really was, then this was serious.

Lin Yuliang picked up the phone on his desk and called the technical department.

"Make the sample comparison a priority. Compare it with the demon beast tissue preserved from the beast tide ten years ago. I want to know whether the two are the same thing."

After hanging up, he got up and walked to the window, looking at the crowds coming and going on the street below.

The sun was shining, and the streets were peaceful.

But beneath that calm surface, something seemed to be quietly welling up.

In the classroom, Wu Xuzhou was explaining advanced techniques for the Black Iron Realm, and most of the students were listening attentively.

Chu Ge sat in the back row, his hand gripper never stopping, but his mind was still turning.

The Martial Arts Association would surely investigate the Scarlet-Eyed Giant Rat, but he couldn't afford to let his guard down either.

If the beast tide really did come again, the ordinary people in the city would be the first to bear the brunt.

He was still weak and couldn't do anything about something so big, but it never hurt to be more careful.

As he was thinking, Xiao Yan nudged him with her elbow and passed him a note.

Chu Ge took it and glanced at it. There was a crooked little figure drawn on it, with a line of writing beside it:

"Wanna go to the supermarket after class? Your older cousin will treat you to a grilled sausage."

Chu Ge turned his head to look at her. Xiao Yan immediately blinked at him, wearing an ingratiating expression.

Even his toes could tell that this silly roe deer was hungry again and wanted to trick him into paying.

He said nothing and only nodded slightly. He would consider it a way to continue repaying her kindness from yesterday.

Mainly because he was a little hungry himself.

But to be fair, in his previous life, he'd had a cat, and it had cost him roughly forty or fifty yuan a day.

Now he was keeping a silly roe deer, and she only cost a little over ten yuan a day. That was much cheaper than keeping a cat.

Except that this one occasionally hissed at him.

"Yay!"

Xiao Yan immediately broke into a beaming smile. She turned back around, sat up perfectly straight, and put on a more convincing show of listening attentively than anyone else.