Chapter 138: Three on a Walk (Cultivation)

However, just as he was drowsily about to fall asleep, the dormitory door emitted an extremely faint "click".

Qi Hengyu snapped awake, and Shen Zexi almost simultaneously opened his eyes, cautiously looking toward the doorway.

Every night before sleeping, Shen Zexi checks and locks the dormitory door; outsiders could never have a key to their room......

In the darkness, a vague figure radiating familiar Ying Guang Lu slipped in silently.

He was cradling... a Cover Roll?!

Under the speechless, stunned gazes of Qi Hengyu and Shen Zexi, Ying Duo, as if no one were there, walked to the space between their beds and skillfully spread out the Cover Roll.

Actually, he originally intended to pack the entire bed, but that would make the load too heavy and slow his movement.

So he had to settle for a second‑best option.

After everything was ready, he lay down with effortless naturalness, pulled the blanket tight, crossed his hands over his chest, and assumed an unusually proper posture.

The entire dormitory fell into a dead silence.

A few seconds later, Qi Hengyu finally regained his voice, his tone trembling with collapse.

"Ying Duo!!! What the hell are you doing?! Why are you sleeping in our dormitory?!"

Ying Duo inside the Cover Roll shifted, revealing his unusually bright eyes in the darkness, and clearly answered the information he had eavesdropped from an NPC:

"You have morning training tomorrow, let's go together."

After speaking, he readjusted the blanket, turned over, faced the direction of Shen Zexi's bed, and stayed still.

Qi Hengyu froze on the bed, looking at the unusually dazzling Ying Guang Lu on the floor, then at the equally blank‑faced Shen Zexi on the opposite bed, feeling himself nearly suffocate.

He grabbed a pillow to cover his face and let out a suppressed, desperate wail:

"This is insane... I can't live like this!!!"

That day, from dawn to dusk, Qi Hengyu was "swept" by Ying Duo in every possible way, collapsing on his own bed utterly exhausted, staring at the ceiling, with only one thought remaining in his mind.

Can we still attend this Academy?! What about Luo Jinyou? Hurry and handle your roommate! Share some of the firepower!

In the end, the two of them also got a taste of Luo Jinyou's treatment.

They turned off the extra night lamp, and under the "illumination" of that Ying Guang Lu, they endured this "fulfilling" day.

———————————————

The Exotic Plant Garden was even more tranquil on weekends than on weekdays, especially at night; not even a passerby could be seen, and the lights cast dappled shadows among the lush strange flowers and exotic plants.

Meng Kexin wore an exquisite light‑pink princess dress, its hem trimmed with delicate lace, forming a strange yet harmonious contrast with the surrounding dangerous but beautiful exotic plants.

She was carefully using a small silver sprayer to mist the surrounding exotic plants with a nutrient solution specially made by Chen Mo Zhi.

Her movements were quite slow, as if tending to fragile treasures.

In her other hand she held a thick leather‑bound notebook, its pages slightly yellowed, filled with Chen Mo Zhi's somewhat sloppy handwriting.

It detailed the habits, preferences, care methods, cautions for each exotic plant in the garden, and even contained his personal conjectures and experiment logs on the toxic fusion of certain plants.

Between the lines, one can see Chen Mo Zhi's extreme regard for these plants.

At that moment, a slightly hurried footstep sound broke the garden's tranquility.

A senior‑year girl in a uniform frowned as she entered, scanned the garden, and finally fixed her gaze on Meng Kexin, her eyes showing unabashed disgust.

"Meng Kexin, your family is looking for you; they're waiting at the school gate."

The girl's tone was stiff, tinged with a bit of schadenfreude; she sized Meng Kexin up from head to toe and couldn't help but…

"No matter how beautifully you dress, how attentively you tend the plants, you're still......"

She didn't finish the sentence, but the meaning was clear: she despised Meng Kexin's perpetual delicate, ingratiating demeanor toward Chen Mo Zhi, yet envied her for receiving Chen Mo Zhi's "favor".

Meng Kexin's movements paused briefly, then she lifted her head, instantly blooming a sweet smile, her voice soft and syrupy.

"Thanks, senior, for letting me know; I'll tidy up and be there right away."

The girl was dazzled by her smile, then grew even more annoyed, let out a cold snort, turned and hurried away, as if lingering another second would contaminate her with something dirty.

Meng Kexin's smile faded almost imperceptibly the instant the girl turned, yet it still maintained a perfect curve.

She gently set down the sprayer, carefully closed Chen Mo Zhi's notebook, hugged it to her chest, and only then…

Outside the Academy's main gate, beside a slightly ostentatious small car, stood a middle‑aged man in an expensive suit, several gemstone rings on his fingers.

He was Meng Kexin's father, Zhao Laoban.

His face was ashen, pacing back and forth, looking restless and angry.

The moment he saw Meng Kexin emerge, he strode forward, not waiting for her to speak, lowered his voice, and with barely contained fury questioned:

"What on earth have you been doing at school?! Why has the Chen Family suddenly started suppressing our business! Several partners have terminated contracts! Did you offend Chen Mo Zhi?!"

Meng Kexin clutched Chen Mo Zhi's notebook, and faced her father's accusations with a face full of innocence, her voice tinged with grievance.

"Father, what are you saying? I've always followed your instructions, doing my utmost to please Chen Young Master, you see."

She raised the notebook in her arms as if it were a treasure.

"He deliberately handed this to me before he left; inside are all the care methods for those exotic plants he recorded. If he didn't trust me, why would he give me something so important?"

Zhao Laoban stared at the notebook, his gaze sinister, and instead of feeling reassured, his anger grew even stronger.

"What can a tattered notebook represent?! It must be that you did something wrong, made him displeased! I spent so much money to get you in here, is it to make you a gardener? It's to let you climb the high branches!"

He kept speaking, his anger rising, looking at his daughter's delicate yet, in his eyes, "unpromising" face, thinking of the precarious business, long‑built resentment and current panic intertwining.

He raised his hand high, the slap whistling as it flew toward Meng Kexin's fair cheek.

Meng Kexin watched the incoming slap, her pupils narrowing, a flash of violet light flickering.

Her gaze swiftly swept over the Blue Sapphire Brooch pinned to her father's suit lapel, a faintly glowing sapphire she had received after awakening the Spiritual Anomaly Technique.

It was equipment specifically for resisting mental interference.

Sure enough, it had been guarding her all along.

She sneered inwardly, knowing her Aberrant Arts would be ineffective, her body too weak, and resignedly closed her eyes, her long lashes trembling slightly, ready to take the blow.

However, the anticipated pain never came.

"Swish—!"

Several thick, dark vines with barbs, like lurking poisonous snakes, shot out from the shadows beside the school gate.

They wrapped around Zhao Laoban's raised arm and obese body at astonishing speed, then tightened violently.

"Ah!"

Zhao Laoban, caught off guard, felt a huge force surge; the vines lifted him bodily off the ground and then, like tossing trash, flung him heavily away.

Zhao Laoban slammed into the ground a few steps away, emitting a dull thud; the fall left him dazed, his internal organs seeming to shift, and the blue sapphire brooch almost came loose.

Meng Kexin opened her eyes.

In the shadow of the alley, Chen Mo Zhi stood there, unknown when he had arrived; his complexion was darker than usual, and a cold hostile aura emanated from him.

He wore a dark, practical outfit suited for movement, travel-worn, clearly not returning to school normally but having rushed back temporarily.

His gaze was like poisoned, locked tightly on the groaning Zhao Laoban on the ground, his voice icy.

"What are you doing?"