Arthur clasped his hands in a polite bow, then turned and walked briskly toward the door.
Afraid that Cai Yue'er might not take the bait, he paused just before leaving to glance back and wink at her, his eyes brimming with provocation and anticipation.
Cai Yue'er watched him go, grinding her teeth so hard they clicked, her soul power nearly bursting free of its restraints.
But Ya Li's gaze locked onto her like the edge of a blade, and that alone was enough to keep her still.
Pressure. She couldn't beat Ya Li.
Ya Li was no fighter by nature, yet the gap in cultivation was undeniable. Cai Yue'er was nowhere close to being her match.
All she could do was watch helplessly as Arthur's figure disappeared through the door.
"Ya Li!" Cai Yue'er rounded on her the moment he was gone. "Did you see him? Did you see how smug he was? You just let him walk away like that? He was making fools of us!"
No. He was making a fool of you.
Ya Li slowly withdrew her soul power and shook her head, looking tired. "Enough, Cai Yue'er. What happened today was your own fault for acting without thinking."
She walked to the window and gazed in the direction Arthur had gone, a flicker of something complicated passing through her eyes. "Having him as a friend would serve us far better than making him an enemy."
Back at the hotel, Arthur and Wu Changkong found the others already packing their things, getting ready to head back to Eastsea City.
Na'er was the first to rush over. She grabbed Arthur's sleeve with both hands and shook it eagerly. "Arthur, what did they want with you?"
Gu Yue set down her luggage and turned to look at him, waiting.
The others stopped what they were doing and looked over as well, curiosity written across every face.
Arthur gave a small smile and recounted what had happened, leaving out the part about his scheme to bait Cai Yue'er into attacking him. He told them simply that he had turned down Shrek's invitation for now.
"What? You turned them down?" Xu Xiaoyan stared at him, a half-eaten pastry still stuffed in her cheek. "That's Shrek Academy! People would kill to get in!"
Arthur patted her on the shoulder, his tone easy and certain. "What's the rush? Once we're strong enough, we can always go to Shrek. There's no hurry."
"When we go, we'll all go together, and I'll make it something to remember."
Xu Xiaoyan's excitement had nothing to do with what he said. It was the pat on the shoulder. She had been a devoted admirer of his for a long time, but thanks to Na'er's relentless vigilance, this was the first time he had ever touched her.
She made a silent resolution: this outfit was never getting washed. She was going to frame it and put it on her altar when she got home.
Wu Changkong stood off to the side, watching the boy with his spirited, carefree confidence, and murmured quietly, "Go together, is it..."
He paused, then added, "Still, Cai Yue'er is impulsive. After the way you provoked her today, I imagine she'll..."
He knew Arthur too well. Halfway through the thought, something clicked, and he stopped. "Wait. That was deliberate, wasn't it?"
"You..."
"Shh." Arthur raised a hand at once. "Don't say it out loud."
"As long as you know what you're doing." Wu Changkong shook his head.
"Guaranteed."
Arthur was supremely confident. The moment Cai Yue'er made a move, four enforcers would materialize and beat her senseless.
Zhen Hua and Mu Chen were a bit lacking, sure, but Mu Ye's combat strength far exceeded what his cultivation rank suggested. Cai Yue'er wasn't going to cause any real trouble.
Before long, the group headed to the soul train station.
"Oh wow, the Young Genius Rankings just updated!" Xu Xiaoyan, who spent most of her time at home surfing the web, let out a gasp and held up her soul communicator for everyone to see.
"Arthur jumped to second place, and Gu Yue is first!"
"Where am I, where am I?" Na'er shoved her way over for a look. "Huh, how am I only ninth?"
"And this nickname... Golden Dragon Girl. Just one word off. If they'd swapped 'girl' for 'king,' it would've been perfect."
"Probably because you haven't really shown much in battle," Xie Xie guessed.
Na'er's performance throughout the tournament had been almost uniformly the same: charge straight across the stage, knock someone flat, done.
The Spirit Pagoda had an equally hard time with her during internal assessments. When Na'er was in the tower with nothing to do, she spent most of her time bullying Leng Yaozhu with sheer force of presence.
All anyone could tell was that she was strong. Everything else about her was a mystery. Her nickname had basically been assigned based on her martial soul and left at that.
Gu Yue, on the other hand, had shot straight to the top of the rankings after defeating Arthur.
The Young Genius Rankings weighed raw strength heavily, but it wasn't the only factor, otherwise every slot would belong to someone right at the eighteen-year-old cap.
Arthur's record of defeating a Titled Douluo rank opponent while several ranks below was genuine, unmistakable gold.
The Spirit Pagoda had originally planned to give him the number-one spot, but Gu Yue had beaten him, and that was a real result backed by real evidence.
Looking back at the recorded footage, it was clear Arthur had been about to release Excalibur when Gu Yue interrupted him. The Spirit Pagoda acknowledged her performance as legitimate.
It also gave pause to everyone who had been stunned by Arthur's defeat of Qian Wu. So that technique had a weakness after all: the wind-up was long, and it could be interrupted.
Arthur, for his part, was thinking: I let you believe that. Actually, I can release it in an instant.
"Oh man, Qian Wu is getting absolutely roasted," Xu Xiaoyan said, shaking her head in wonder.
With the new rankings out, the Shrek fan camp had latched onto Gu Yue's performance and turned it into a full-throated condemnation of Qian Wu.
They demanded to know why he had simply stood there while Arthur charged up instead of interrupting the attack. The consensus was that he had been arrogant enough to wait and let it happen.
Qian Wu had no idea how to defend himself. How was he supposed to have interrupted Arthur? That oppressive pressure had been overwhelming. He had practically seen his entire life flash before his eyes.
Wu Changkong watched the group bickering and chattering, shaking his head in quiet exasperation, though his gaze softened despite himself.
He caught the feeling and reined it in. "Stop fooling around. The train is almost here."
The group moved quickly toward the boarding platform.
Xu Xiaoyan was still scrolling through the comments, letting out the occasional click of her tongue. "Qian Wu is fighting back in the comments now. He's saying Arthur's move couldn't have been interrupted at all, that he was completely paralyzed."
"Respect to Qian Wu," Xie Xie said with genuine admiration. "He actually chose to fight back instead of just playing dead."
Mid-conversation, Arthur suddenly stopped in his tracks.
The others kept moving, talking and laughing, completely unaware.
He swept a glance at the crowd around him. No one was paying him any attention.
In that moment, Arthur felt as though the world had come apart from him. A sourceless chill crawled up his spine and over his scalp, and his soul power stirred on instinct.
He could feel it clearly: the surrounding environment had been sealed off by some invisible force.
The noise of the crowd, the shuffle of footsteps, even Xu Xiaoyan's exclamations all blurred and receded in an instant, as though a thick wall had been dropped between him and everything else.
"Cai Yue'er?" A cold weight settled in his chest. He tried to step forward and catch up with his companions, only to find himself bound in place by countless unseen threads pulling from every direction.
He looked ahead. Tang Wulin, Xie Xie, and the others were still chatting and walking forward. Even Wu Changkong had noticed nothing wrong, and the distance between them was growing with every second.
Among them, Na'er and Gu Yue quietly exchanged a glance.
Na'er's eyes held anger.
Gu Yue shook her head. "Don't rush. We don't need to step in."
A figure emerged slowly from the crowd and approached him.
It was, of course, Cai Yue'er.
Her voice was cold and flat. "Arthur... your potential is interesting. It's a pity you turned down Shrek just now. Since that's how it is..."
"What was that move you used to defeat Qian Wu?"
"A Spirit Elder should never possess power like that."
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~ Push the story forward with your Power Stones