Chapter 69

At first, Li Wenwen and Tie Yuan did not get along very well.

Li Wenwen liked fluffy things like Tie Yuan, but unfortunately, aside from Song Yi, that guy did not really let anyone pet him. He was always clinging to Song Yi in that tea-scented, fake-innocent way too. One look and you could tell he was no proper cub! Only Song Yi would be so easily tempted by all that fluff!

But not long after, she became familiar with Tie Yuan at lightning speed.

Because when it came to “cultural exchange,” Song Yi clearly did not know how to have fun as well as Li Wenwen did. Setting aside the facts, Song Yi was actually a proper old ancestor. Even though some people did not believe it, she herself had always thought so.

As for Li Wenwen, her life goal of eating, drinking, and waiting for death had never changed.

Food, drink, fun, and games—there was nothing she did not understand.

Under Tie Yuan’s honest and simple appearance was a heart that loved to play.

It did not matter if Li Wenwen disliked him. He could make a tiny sacrifice of his looks. “Every day, when we go to school and come back, I can carry you.”

One person and one beast hit it off at once, whispering together while Song Yi studied seriously.

But before long, this temporary alliance collapsed.

Because Li Wenwen discovered she had been tricked: Tie Yuan lived in the boys’ dorm, which was in a different direction from the girls’ dorm. At night, it was still manageable, but in the morning he could not get up at all. Song Yi was the one who made a detour to pick him up!

If Tie Yuan carried her, then in the end, it would become a human pyramid, and they would become the most eye-catching cubs on the way to school.

Tie Yuan even opened his beady eyes and said innocently, “But I already kept my promise and carried you.”

Li Wenwen felt like she had been used for free: Damn it, what she wanted was to sit magnificently on the back of an iron-eating beast, like a war god, coming and going like the wind. She had even bought an outfit specifically for it!

But a human pyramid did not feel like that at all!

And this guy still had the nerve to make Song Yi take a detour just for him. He was way too shameless!

“Little Yi, do something about him! A cub like this needs to experience the harsh beatings of society.”

Tie Yuan used his racial advantage and performed a buried-head kill. “I didn’t mean to. I was just too sleepy.”

Song Yi had no choice but to step in and mediate. “It’s fine. I can carry both of you.”

She had already reached Foundation Establishment now. Even without using lightening talismans, Song Yi would have no problem holding one in each hand. It just would not look very good to hold them up, so carrying them on her back was better.

Tie Yuan smugly glanced at Li Wenwen.

Li Wenwen’s cheeks puffed up. She felt her status receive the greatest challenge in history. Even Lin Ze had never given her this kind of threat.

It was time to defend her sovereignty!

Li Wenwen gave an “awoo” and pounced at Tie Yuan. “Duel me! I’m going to purge the treacherous minister at the ruler’s side! You traitor!”

No one knew where she had learned those lines.

Seeing the two cubs roll into a ball together, Song Yi was just about to break them up when Lin Ze whooshed over and pulled her into the classroom. “Class is starting. Let them perform a little.”

“But they…”

“Getting punished is also part of school life. Let Tie Yuan experience it. As for Wenwen, she’s used to it, so it’s fine.”

Lin Ze’s persuasion had always been very skillful.

Before long, the two who were rolling back and forth in the corridor rolled right to the teacher’s feet. They successfully traded for the teacher’s Hedong Lion Roar skill, then joyfully received the dusty-faced stand-at-the-back package.

Their physical movements stopped, but when their eyes met, it was a bloody storm.

One person and one beast slaughtered each other with their gazes for most of the day before they belatedly remembered: Wait, wasn’t Little Yi supposed to be with them? How come only they were punished?

They turned their heads and only then discovered that they had already become Song Yi’s abandoned pawns. With tearful eyes, they could only stand at the back of the classroom and stare at the back of Song Yi’s head.

But Song Yi did not look back. Instead, Lin Ze turned back with a beaming smile and glanced at them.

A sense of crisis rose in both cubs’ hearts at the same time: Damn it, our home base got stolen!

Lin Ze quietly reminded Song Yi, “Look at how happily they’re rolling. In the future, you can just let them roll everywhere. Iron-eating beasts like rolling around. This is returning to nature. Wenwen too.”

He was implying that Li Wenwen was like a demon beast. Unfortunately, she herself did not hear it, or she would definitely have been the first to jump up and scratch him.

“When they roll together, their relationship will get better. Demon beast cubs probably communicate feelings like this.”

Most people would not take this kind of suggestion seriously, but Song Yi was not an ordinary person. She would even consider an absurd suggestion like this, because she would think it might really work.

Song Yi nodded thoughtfully. The two cubs in the back row shivered.

This was why Tie Yuan had not tried to scam Lin Ze.

Lin Ze was not bad to him. He would not glare at him like Li Wenwen did, and he knew no less than Li Wenwen did.

But Tie Yuan did not dare make promises to him carelessly, because he felt that the way Lin Ze looked at him was strange, like he was looking at a commodity.

Sometimes Lin Ze would suddenly ask him, “Do you shed? Have those hairs been collected?”

Or, “Are you short on money? Want to cooperate with me? We can get rich together!”

His cuteness was worthless before money.

In any case, whenever Tie Yuan interacted with Lin Ze, he felt a little creeped out inside.

Now that feeling became even more obvious.

Li Wenwen stretched out a hand toward him. “How about we shake hands and make peace?”

With a great enemy before them, personal grudges were no longer important.

The furry paw and the human little hand clasped together.

After class, Song Yi looked at the harmonious appearance of those two and believed Lin Ze’s words even more: letting them act freely, argue when they should argue and roughhouse when they should roughhouse, was much more effective than her usual efforts to balance both sides.

So it turned out that the highest realm of a master water-balancer was not balancing any bowl of water at all.

Only, two days later, Song Yi discovered that Tie Yuan had suddenly become a shut-in cub.

He refused pickup and drop-off for school, sat quietly in class, shrank into his seat after class, and even added a layer of protective barrier, refusing to communicate with the outside world. His entire beast body radiated melancholy.

“What happened to him?” Song Yi was deeply worried.

Li Wenwen also shook her head in confusion. She leaned over and asked, “Round Cub, aren’t we allies now? If you have some new move, you have to let me know first, so I can coordinate with you.”

Unexpectedly, Tie Yuan did not even look at her. He faced the wall in self-reflection, his tone filled with utter lifelessness. “Nothing. I just suddenly saw through this world.”

But Li Wenwen would not give up until she got an answer. If Tie Yuan ignored her, she would squeeze over anyway. As she squeezed and squeezed, she realized that the texture under her hand did not feel right.

She looked down and saw a tuft of fur in her hand, while the very top of Tie Yuan’s head had gone bald in one patch.

One person and one beast looked at each other. The scene was silent and grave.

Then Tie Yuan burst out with a rapid string of yelps. In his panic, he could not even speak human language anymore. He wanted to hug his head and cry, but his furry paws were still a little short of the very top of his head. He wanted to cover it, but he could not reach.

Tie Yuan really wanted to vanish on the spot.

Li Wenwen hurriedly helped him cover his head, letting Tie Yuan breathe a sigh of relief: his image could still be preserved. He could still drag out this miserable existence for a while longer.

Thank you, Li Wenwen.

The next second, Li Wenwen shouted with a sob in her voice, “Little Yi, Round Cub is bald!”

That world-shaking shout did not just reach Song Yi. The whole class heard it.

The classroom, which had been extremely lively during break, seemed to have been hit by a pause button. Everyone’s gazes shot over with a swish.

Tie Yuan: Maybe I should just crawl into a hole forever right now.

He and Li Wenwen really were not compatible after all.

Li Wenwen, however, could no longer worry about his feelings. She was scared too. Although Tie Yuan was a cub, he was actually thick-skinned and sturdy. In terms of strength, he was stronger than she was. Usually, it did not matter if they roughhoused.

But now she had directly pulled off a tuft of hair from the top of his head and turned him into a bald beast. Wasn’t she doomed?

Li Wenwen said tearfully, “I didn’t know my strength had improved by leaps and bounds like this.”

Lin Ze took the fur from her hand. “…You don’t need to be that confident. Your strength has not improved by leaps and bounds. This wasn’t pulled out by you.”

After looking at the fur and the top of Tie Yuan’s head, Lin Ze’s tone became a little odd. “This should be natural shedding? But he put it back on his head.”

In other words, Tie Yuan had made himself a wig.

Although the wig material was his own real hair.

It was probably because he feared the wig being discovered that he had become especially well-behaved.

Eh? It wasn’t because of me?

Li Wenwen’s tears stopped instantly and turned into a huge smile. “Mwehahaha, Round Cub, you turned into a bald cub!”

Once she did not need to take responsibility, Li Wenwen immediately perked up.

Tie Yuan did not even have time to settle accounts with her. He buried himself in Song Yi’s arms and began crying bitterly.

Iron-eating beasts did not shed. He had already become the ugliest cub of his race. “Wuwuwu, it must be that profiteer cursing me into losing fur…”

He had not forgotten how Lin Ze had eyed his fur covetously.

There was no doubt about Song Yi’s fondness for Tie Yuan. Her eyes reddened too. She hoisted Tie Yuan up and rushed toward the teachers’ office building. “Teacher, Round Cub studied until he went bald!”

Compared with suspecting Lin Ze’s curse, Song Yi’s idea was a little more reliable: studying made people go bald, and now it had even harmed demon beast cubs!

For the physical and mental health of cubs, she was going to protest this cruel world where there was only studying!

Her voice echoed through the entire corridor.

People upstairs and downstairs all poked their heads out to look.

Now it was perfect. It was not just the students of Class One who knew Tie Yuan was bald. The other classes knew too.

There was only one iron-eating beast student in the whole school. No one would mistake him.

That day, Tie Yuan emotionally checked out in perfect peace. He no longer had any attachment to this world.

Lin Ze looked at the situation. Student Tie Yuan probably no longer needed the wig. He silently stuffed the fur into his storage pouch, and in his eyes, it was as if a golden light flashed and disappeared.

A strong and sturdy iron-eating beast cub had suddenly developed a problem, and this cub’s identity was not ordinary either, so the homeroom teacher immediately called in Teacher Wang, a beast-studies expert, to examine his body.

On the way over, Teacher Wang did not forget to comfort Song Yi. “Don’t overthink it. Studying won’t make you bald.”

It was still the same saying: in the cultivation world, unless someone cultivated certain special cultivation methods, they generally did not have worries about body shape or hair loss.

To be honest, if the grief of these two had not been so sincere, the homeroom teacher would have suspected that they were causing trouble just to avoid studying.

This was the kind of thing they could do.

Teacher Wang arrived quickly. After examining Tie Yuan’s body, her expression became strange.

As everyone knew, iron-eating beasts were extremely lazy demon beasts. If they could sprawl out, they absolutely would not stand. Although their bodies were excellent, they still had the nerve to lie on Song Yi and let Song Yi carry them—creatures with thick skin and sturdy flesh, especially thick skin on the face.

In fact, this was also the iron-eating beast’s cultivation method. They were a peculiar race. While resting, their bodies themselves refined all sorts of energy.

Cubs needed more rest than adult beasts.

Teacher Wang’s diagnosis just now was this: because Tie Yuan had not rested enough, all sorts of energy had accumulated, causing physical discomfort, which then led to the fur-loss phenomenon.

The accumulation of all sorts of energy was easy to understand. She had seen this fellow’s daily diet. It could completely be described as eating anything, meat or vegetable, gobbling things down together with Li Wenwen. He would even swallow Song Yi’s sword qi in one gulp.

In Tie Yuan’s words, once he digested that portion of sword qi, it was equivalent to him learning it painlessly. He might not be able to replicate it one hundred percent, but seventy or eighty percent was still possible.

But if he could not digest it, this kind of situation appeared.

What Teacher Wang could not understand was how Tie Yuan could possibly not have enough rest time.

First grade already had the fewest classes to begin with. The teachers of every subject did not have high expectations of him either. He was also the sort of guy who would slack off whenever he found the chance…

Iron-eating beasts came with their own dark circles, so it was very hard for others to determine whether he was tired just by looking at his appearance.

If Teacher Wang had not examined his body, she would not have been able to be sure either.

But what was he doing in the middle of the night? The dormitory gates were closed!

Teacher Wang looked at the listless Tie Yuan and suddenly said, “The limited event in Ascend to Immortality is so hard to play.”

“Is it hard? I have a clearing guide. Teacher, I’ll carry you,” Tie Yuan said, patting his chest with solemn confidence.

Teacher Wang’s face instantly darkened. “Student Tie Yuan, please hand over your identity token for inspection.”

This game was currently one of the hottest games in the cultivation world, with a huge student player base. The limited event had only come out in the middle of last night, yet he already had a clearing guide early this morning. There was obviously a problem.

That time period was part of the minor-protection period. Whether for human cubs or demon beast cubs, the treatment was the same. Communication could be used, but things like the Spirit Net and games could not be used.

So, may I ask, Student Tie Yuan, how exactly did you play?

She had only tested him casually, but she had not expected to actually find a problem!

Tie Yuan realized his mouth had moved too fast, and his pleading gaze slid toward Song Yi. But Song Yi, seeing that the situation was bad, was already preparing to slip out of the office. She returned Tie Yuan a look: You hold the line first. I’ll withdraw first and preserve our surviving forces.

Because she was far too familiar with the office, even if she walked backward, she knew where the door was. She prepared to sneak away while the two teachers were both focused on Tie Yuan.

However, her butt slammed into a spiritual power wall, and then she bounced back and sprawled flat on the ground.

The homeroom teacher’s smile was extremely kind. “Student Song Yi, your identity token should also be handed over for inspection.”

They did not need to probe students’ privacy. They only needed to check usage duration to know.

Before long, Lin Ze and Li Wenwen were also caught and brought over. Well, great. Not a single one of them was innocent.

Li Wenwen was possessed by her inner drama queen. “Teacher, have you heard of the school’s ten great unbelievable incidents? There is a mysterious force wandering around the campus. Some say it is the remnant soul from the Old Era… It must have been the remnant soul that used my token!”

The teacher picked at her ear. “Make things up. Keep making things up.”

“Who did it? Be honest and admit it.”

The three people and one beast raised their hands in tacit understanding, but the tacit understanding only went a tiny bit. They each pointed at a different “mastermind.” The speed at which they passed the blame was pretty fast.

The teachers: …

But it did not matter if they refused to admit it. This kind of thing was easy to check. Whoever had first bypassed the anti-addiction system would be obvious at a glance.

It would have been fine if they had not checked. Once they did, they were shocked.

Not long after school had started—in other words, shortly after Song Yi had obtained her identity token—she had already been doing this kind of thing! The Spirit Net’s defense mechanism had actually not noticed at all!

If not for this incident with Tie Yuan, would Song Yi not have played wildly all the way until adulthood?

Song Yi raised her hand.

The homeroom teacher glanced at her sideways. “Are you going to bring up the ten great unbelievable incidents again?”

Song Yi said obediently, “Teacher, I was testing the Spirit Net’s security mechanism.”

She straightened her back. Her bun-like face looked solemn and profound. “The Spirit Net is of great importance and cannot be treated carelessly. All I sacrificed was a little of my personal rest time. It was all for everyone. If I were doing it for myself, I could have used the loophole to make a profit.”

“Should I thank you for that?”

“No need to be polite. I’m serving the cultivation world,” Song Yi said with righteous solemnity.

It even seemed to make some sense. The Spirit Net involved a great many things. If an ordinary person found a loophole, there were plenty of ways they could exploit it and gain benefits. Who would be as pure as Song Yi and use it only to bypass the anti-addiction system?

What a pity it would be if this year’s Ten Figures Who Moved the Cultivation World did not invite Song Yi… yeah, right!

Exhausted, the homeroom teacher sent Teacher Yuan a message: Old Yuan, your legal education work has been pretty good, but moral education still has a long and difficult road ahead.

Teacher Yuan, who still did not know what was going on: ?

That was right. Song Yi had not done a single illegal or criminal thing, but likewise, she had not done anything good either.

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