Chapter 17: Five Hundred Spirit Stones

For physical education that afternoon, Class F shared the class with A Class.

It was still hot in early September, and by two or three in the afternoon, waves of oppressive heat rolled over them. Standing under the blazing sun, the dozen or so students felt as if smoke were about to pour from the tops of their heads.

Because Ding Ling’s arm injury had not yet healed, the teacher gave her special permission to rest in the shade of the trees.

Everyone else had to run two laps around the sports field first, after which they would learn a basic fist routine. This semester included a basic fist technique and a basic sword technique, both of which would be tested at the final exam.

“Teacher, are we going to learn flying swords?”

Teacher Wu was short and chubby, not looking in the slightest like someone who could command a flying sword. With his hands behind his back and feet shoulder-width apart, he scolded the youngsters with a stern face, “Watch fewer TV dramas!”

It was all because of those wildly unrealistic TV dramas making these students think that anyone who could cultivate could use a flying sword.

How could it be that easy?

“Teacher, can anyone actually use flying swords? What about sword flight?”

“If you want sword flight, buy a flying device! I heard Ye Corporation just released a new sword-shaped flying device. Doesn’t it cost tens of thousands of spirit stones? Ye Yibai, have you used it?”

Ye Yibai said nothing at first, but when the person asked again, he gave a slight nod.

They were fifteen- or sixteen-year-old students after all. Learning that Ye Yibai had test-flown the sword-shaped flying device, the entire A Class erupted into an uproar, asking him, “How did it feel? Is it fast when it flies?”

“Quiet! Everyone go run your laps, timed!”

Yi Ang and Zhang Tianyu darted off in a flash, leaving everyone in the dust. Even if they couldn’t beat A Class on academic tests, how could they possibly lose at running in PE class?

The two chatted as they ran. They were curious about the flying device as well, but to preserve Class F’s dignity, they hadn’t joined the commotion, instead maintaining an expression that said, “What’s the big deal?”

Yi Ang nudged Zhang Tianyu with his elbow. “That flying device, do you have one?”

Zhang Tianyu’s father ran a massive business in North City. While it naturally couldn’t compare to the scale of the Ye family’s enterprise, the Zhang family was still wealthy.

Just looking at how Zhang Tianyu had started reselling spirit stones on the very first day of school showed his business acumen ran in the family. How could his father’s business be anything short of prosperous?

“That thing hasn’t been released yet, so I don’t know the price,” Zhang Tianyu said, stretching his long legs to pull a few paces ahead of Yi Ang. “I’ll see if I can earn enough to buy one myself.”

The few from Class F were either running at the very front or trailing at the very back.

Only once they started running did Yao Beibei realize that the gloomy Zhou Ziyue took even smaller strides than she did.

While she could keep pace with the girls in the middle pack, Zhou Ziyue dragged his feet sluggishly at the rear, muttering under his breath as he jogged. Yao Beibei shivered, covered in goosebumps, and quickened her pace by a couple of steps.

Zhou Ziyue couldn’t figure it out.

He had drawn that curse talisman exactly according to the book, so why hadn’t it worked? Before class, he had checked C Class, and that guy was sitting safely in the classroom. Far from breaking a leg, he hadn’t even lost a single hair.

How could it not work?

Ding Ling sat in the shade of the greenery. While resting, she was also looking after Yao Beibei’s water bottle. It was a chubby, round bottle with a little bunny-head cap over the pink straw.

Just before class started, Yao Beibei had shoved the water bottle and a bottle of mineral water into her hands. “It’s too hot, drink this.” Mineral water also cost spirit stones, and Yao Beibei had swiped her own spirit stones to pay for it.

In just this single day, Yao Beibei had already spent four and a half spirit stones on her.

To begin with, once those spiritual plants were grown, Yao Beibei would have a share.

She did not lack aptitude; her spiritual aperture had simply just opened, leaving her still in a muddled state. If conditioned slightly with spirit herbs and taught the techniques of absorption and circulation, she would soon leave most of these people in the dust.

This was something Ding Ling had already planned out.

Never had any sect mate treated her this way.

In the eyes of outsiders, Ding Ling was merely a cripple who lacked a spiritual root. Yao Beibei asked for nothing in return, so she would receive rewards beyond her imagination.

Ding Ling was someone who repaid grievances promptly and returned kindness in full.

Whoever slowed her progress deserved to suffer a bit more.

Her gaze drifted past Ye Yibai and settled upon Chen Li.

She originally hadn’t known who did it, but now she did. Wisps of black mist were coiled around the fingers of his right hand, growing thicker and thicker.

The wound on Chen Li’s index finger was growing larger. At first, it had been almost invisible to the naked eye.

By the afternoon, it looked like a deep cut from the edge of a book page. The wound, which had previously stopped bleeding, began to slowly seep threads of blood again.

“Do you want to go to the school clinic to have it checked out?”

“No need. Does anyone have a band-aid? Give me one.” Why go to the school clinic for such a minor injury?

A girl took out some band-aids and gave Chen Li two.

Chen Li even shook his head. “One is enough.”

Maybe he hadn’t looked closely earlier and the wooden splinter had gone in a bit deep? It didn’t really hurt when left alone, and putting on a band-aid would stop the bleeding right away.

Chen Li wrapped the band-aid tightly. The blood indeed stopped seeping, but a dull ache flared up from time to time.

The pain wasn’t continuous either; it struck abruptly whenever he let his guard down, like a needle stabbing viciously into his flesh.

By the time he finished one lap, the entire band-aid was soaked red with blood.

Ding Ling drew back her gaze. Ye Yibai, is it? This is just the beginning.

After running two laps, Chen Li looked as if he had been fished out of the water. His finger was dripping blood continuously, and several students from A Class crowded around him. “What happened to you?”

Yao Beibei walked over to Ding Ling to grab her water bottle, taking advantage of the small commotion to catch her breath.

Sipping through the straw, she asked, “What’s going on?”

Standing on tiptoe to look, Yao Beibei gasped. “Did his hand get cut off?” Why was there so much blood dripping all along the track?

With everyone’s attention fixed on Chen Li, Yao Beibei sat in the shade and began fretting over her homework. As she worried, she secretly munched on cream cookies. “An observation report, an eight-hundred-word essay… at least school’s out after this period.”

Chen Li suddenly clutched his hand and cried out in agony. Losing his footing, he collapsed onto the track.

Yao Beibei was so startled that she nearly dropped her cookie. “What happened? Did his hand really get cut off?”

Teacher Wu had no idea what was wrong with the student either. Looking at the small wound on his hand, why were beads of blood welling up endlessly? He was in so much pain he couldn’t even stand.

“Ye Yibai, help me take this student to the school hospital.” Teacher Wu pointed at Ye Yibai.

Ye Yibai stepped forward and, together with Teacher Wu, supported Chen Li from both sides to take him toward the school hospital. Chen Li’s face had already gone pale from the pain, his forehead drenched in cold sweat.

Watching them pass, Ding Ling realized belatedly, “Wait, that wasn’t Ye Yibai?”

“Huh?” Yao Beibei looked blank for a moment before catching on. “You… you didn’t know what Ye Yibai looked like?”

During the summer camp exam, Ding Ling had only seen Ye Yibai from behind.

So the person filled with malice toward her outside the cafeteria back then hadn’t been Ye Yibai.

“The one supporting him is Ye Yibai, and the one being helped is Chen Li.”

“I see.” Ding Ling nodded. She said so, but deep down she did not care in the slightest, as long as she hadn’t cursed the wrong person.

What a pity it had flared up so quickly; she should have let him hurt for longer.

Chen Li did not return for the rest of the class.

It was stiflingly hot. After physical education, everyone rushed to the convenience store to buy water and popsicles. Yao Beibei grabbed Ding Ling and said, “Come on, let’s go! I’ll treat you to an orange popsicle!”

Ding Ling followed her to the store. When it came time to pay, she pulled out her campus card^[1]. “My treat.”

Yao Beibei knew Ding Ling wasn’t well-off, but she couldn’t say in front of so many people that she and Zhang Tianyu had bought spirit stones from her. Still, fighting over the bill^[2] where people from A Class could see was a bit embarrassing.

She was just planning to transfer the spirit stones to Ding Ling later when she noticed that the balance on Ding Ling’s campus card was a full five hundred campus spirit stones.

Yao Beibei rubbed her eyes, thinking she had miscounted the zeros. Looking closer, it really was five hundred. Where had this come from? Had Director Chen given it to her?

Holding a soda, Ye Yibai stood at the very end of the line. He looked at that balance, then turned his head away.