Chapter 57

“Cousin, I just don’t know how to deal with that guy right now.”

“That’s easy enough. Just grab that girl, lure him over, and then humiliate him right in front of her. Make sure he makes a complete fool of himself. Let’s see if the girl still likes him after that.”

“That’s why you’re different, cousin—two birds with one stone.”

“I’ve been looking into another guy myself. He embarrassed me on the plane a while ago.”

“Cousin, all right. When you find him, let me help you get back at him.”

“Enough, Abi, just focus on your own business for now.”

…

Feng Yisheng had no idea someone was plotting against him. Last night, he had already broken through to the second level of Qi Refining. His cultivation speed was astonishing, but since he wasn’t in the world of cultivators, he had nothing to compare it to, and couldn’t really judge if he was fast or not.

“Sigh, only after reaching the tenth level of Qi Refining can I build my foundation. It’s been two weeks, and it took me eighteen days to reach the second level. Back in the cave, it took eight days to get to the first level, and now eighteen days for the second. By this rate, the third level will take almost a month. The higher you go, the slower it gets. Maybe I won’t reach the Foundation Building stage until after the college entrance exams, when I’m off to university.”

Feng Yisheng wondered to himself, at this rate, when would he ever reach Nascent Soul? Could it be done within ten years?

…

April arrived swiftly. At Nanshui Foreign Language School, a monthly exam was scheduled just before the Qingming Festival.

April 2.

Feng Yisheng glanced at the exam schedule:

April 3
Chinese: 9:00–11:00
Mathematics: 14:30–16:30

April 4
Foreign Language: 9:00–11:00
Politics and History: 14:30–17:00

…

April 3.

Although Feng Yisheng had missed a week of classes in mid-March, he had worked hard to catch up. While cramming, he discovered that he seemed to have a photographic memory. In truth, cultivators start out as ordinary people, but once they become attuned to spiritual energy, they surpass others in every way.

But all would have to wait until after the exams to see how he truly measured up. There were over a thousand students in his grade, and Feng Yisheng had always ranked in the top three hundred. He wondered where he would stand after this exam.

At Nanshui Foreign Language School, being in the top three hundred meant a spot at a top-tier university. Feng Yisheng was looking forward to it.

…

Following the seat assignment on his exam permit, Feng Yisheng entered the classroom.

Hey!

He hadn’t noticed until now—Zhuang Bi was in the same exam room as him.

…

December 25, 2017. Changnan City, Xijiang Province.

It was Christmas day, the day Jesus was born. But for many young people in the Celestial Empire, they didn’t care about whether Jesus was born today. What mattered to them was whether they’d confessed their feelings successfully, whether their relationships had moved forward.

Yun Yuan wandered aimlessly through the city. Because it was Christmas, couples strolled and laughed together in the shopping plazas, making Yun Yuan feel completely out of place.

Yun Yuan was someone whose intelligence and emotional intelligence were inversely proportional. Born on January 1, 1990, he was a child of the nineties, right on the tail of the eighties generation. In just six days, he would turn twenty-eight.

But that wasn’t the point. The point was, at twenty-eight, he was still a virgin. That would be laughable not only in the sexually open societies of Western Europe and North America, but even in the rapidly developing Celestial Empire, where traditional mindsets still prevailed, a twenty-eight-year-old virgin would be ridiculed by many.

In this country, where all sorts of messaging apps make one-night stands easy, there are only two reasons why a man approaching twenty-eight would still be a virgin: he’s either too ugly or too poor.

Neither applied to Yun Yuan. He stood 190 centimeters tall—even in shoes, he was taller than most Westerners. In a country where the average male height was only 170 centimeters, he stood out like a crane in a flock of chickens.

Years of working out had given him a muscular, athletic build—he was quite literally a walking clothes hanger. During his university days, he even turned down lucrative offers from several modeling agencies.

He didn’t want to be in the public eye, and most importantly, he didn’t need the money.

So neither of the usual reasons applied.

Ever since his first year of high school, he’d been hailed as the school heartthrob, receiving no fewer than twenty love letters a day. At first, Yun Yuan replied to every letter, always saying that he just wanted to focus on his studies and wasn’t considering anything else.

His replies only made him more popular, painting him as a warm and considerate guy in the hearts of countless schoolgirls. The daily letters rose from twenty to at least thirty.

There was an amusing reason for this: Yun Yuan’s handwriting was elegant and flowing, and his gentle image only added to his allure. By 2007, he was considered one of the two male idols among high school girls in the city—the other being Zhou Jielun, the pop singer whose songs swept the nation.

Back in 2007, the country was still relatively conservative, and Yun Yuan never bragged about receiving so many love letters. Only his close friends and some teachers knew he was popular; the rest was a mystery.

But what no one knew was that after the summer break following his first year of high school, Yun Yuan returned for his second year with a complete change in demeanor. Gone was the warm, approachable idol—in his place stood a cold, distant figure who kept everyone at arm’s length.

He showed no interest even when greeted by underclassmen and upperclassmen alike, leaving many to wonder what on earth had happened to him.

Time flew by, and two years later, everyone had gone their own way and forgotten this little episode. Yet Yun Yuan remained a legend, one who could be compared to Zhou Jielun in the hearts of five graduating classes’ worth of girls.

Back in his second semester of first year, something unforgettable had happened to Yun Yuan: his first love and first kiss were both taken from him. It took him a long time to recover, and that remained his only romantic experience to this day.

…

Twelve years ago.

A private high school in Changnan City, Xijiang Province.

Yuwen Private High School was the best private school in the province, accepting only six hundred of the province’s five hundred thousand middle school graduates each year—a true one-in-a-thousand chance.

But being an excellent student wasn’t enough to get in. The real barrier was the steep tuition: fifty thousand US dollars a year.