The entire hall fell silent.
The surrounding disciples looked at Yu Qingtang with all sorts of expressions.
One of them seemed to realize something and smiled. “Well, well. Couldn’t tell at all. Junior Brother, did you come here to compare tricks?”
As he spoke, he rubbed his fingers together in a subtle gesture.
“Huh?” Yu Qingtang hurriedly shook his head. “I didn’t cheat!”
Peeking at everyone’s fortune shouldn’t count.
“I know, I know. If nobody caught you, then you didn’t.” The senior brother smiled amiably. “Looks like I misjudged you at first. I thought...”
“What nonsense are you talking about?” The dealer was unconvinced. “That was just an accident! I kicked the table by mistake. Again, again!”
He planted his feet firmly apart, gripped the dice cup in both hands, and stared at it with intense concentration as he rattled it furiously.
Everyone around the table immediately cocked their heads to listen—
Of course, listening now was useless. The dealer had to wait until Yu Qingtang made his choice before he could start cheating.
The rattling stopped.
Nobody looked at the dice cup.
Instead, every pair of eyes swung toward Yu Qingtang.
The dealer’s competitive spirit had been thoroughly aroused. “Big or small?”
“Last time was small, so this time, big.”
Yu Qingtang had tested the waters and made a few points, but he still wasn’t getting carried away. He remained cautious and put down only one point.
This time, the others didn’t rush to pile onto the opposite side like before.
Several people exchanged glances. Only a few stubbornly bet on small.
The dealer glanced at Yu Qingtang’s single point, narrowed his eyes, and subtly exerted force through his wrist.
Suddenly, a commotion broke out behind him.
Apparently someone at the neighboring table had gotten into a fight over catching a cheat. A lid came flying through the air and struck the cover on their table with a loud bang, knocking it open.
The whole hall went dead silent.
Yu Qingtang guiltily glanced left and right. “That was... an accident too, right?”
That was what he said.
His hands, meanwhile, showed absolutely no hesitation as he swept the points into his arms.
Scholar Xiao stood beside him with the picture of genial innocence. “Everyone, just an accident. Purely an accident. Shall we go again?”
Dot Star Formation shot him a sideways look, clearly wanting to say something.
Scholar Xiao’s eyes curved with amusement. He snapped open his folding fan to hide half his face, leaned toward Dot Star Formation, and whispered, “Relax. He knows what he’s doing.”
“Brother Yu has extraordinary good fortune, but he isn’t greedy. He knows when to stop while he’s ahead. That’s the truly rare part.”
Dot Star Formation gave a soft laugh. “Funny. When you’re fleecing your own fellow disciples, you never seem to know when to stop.”
After two rounds, the mood at the table had already changed.
A good number of people switched sides and started betting with Yu Qingtang.
Sweat appeared on the dealer’s forehead. Refusing to believe it, he rolled up his sleeves. “Impossible. There has to be something going on here! Again!”
Yu Qingtang counted his points, gathered up the bamboo tallies, and shook his head. “No more. I’ve made enough.”
“You’re leaving already?” The dealer grew anxious. “I still haven’t figured out how you keep making these ‘accidents’ happen! Don’t go! Let’s fight it out until dawn! I’ve got plenty of points left. I can keep losing!”
“But I only have to take the exam once. I’m not even an academy student.” Yu Qingtang looked perfectly innocent. “What would I do with that many points?”
The dealer froze, then blurted, “Then I’ll gamble something else with you!”
“Huh?”
Yu Qingtang stared at him, then earnestly tried to talk some sense into him. “Your academy doesn’t allow that. Think carefully, my friend. A little gambling is entertainment; too much is bad for your health!”
He patted the dealer on the shoulder.
“You can’t get too obsessed. If you need help, I can play you a Heart-Cleansing Melody. I’ll only charge you... three points! It’s a basic qin piece, after all. Someone in your Qin School should probably know how to play it too.”
Scholar Xiao chuckled and glanced at Dot Star Formation. “See?”
Dot Star Formation glanced back. “Don’t get too pleased with yourself.”
Yu Qingtang was just about to continue when his gaze suddenly stopped on a disciple in the crowd.
His eyes widened.
He grabbed Scholar Xiao. “Brother Xiao! Him, him, him!”
“The paper man who was selling the answers!”
He was so excited that his words came out in a jumble, but Scholar Xiao understood immediately.
His expression sharpened. He followed Yu Qingtang’s pointing finger and gave chase.
His steps were nimble, moving with some strange rhythm that let him weave effortlessly around every obstacle in his path. In moments, he caught up and clapped a hand onto the young man’s shoulder.
The young man jumped and spun around in alarm.
Then he froze. “Senior Brother Xiao...”
“Let me see. You’re—” Scholar Xiao smiled pleasantly as he looked him up and down. “From the Painting School?”
“Y-yes.” The young man hurriedly saluted. “I only entered the Painting School last year. It’s perfectly normal that you wouldn’t recognize me, Senior Brother...”
Yu Qingtang arrived a few steps behind Scholar Xiao, clutching his bamboo tallies as he squeezed through the crowd.
He leaned close, carefully examined the young man’s face, then nodded with certainty.
“That’s him!”
He paused.
“Well, maybe not actually him. But it was definitely this face. Except there was a beauty mark under the eye.”
The young man took two steps back and stared suspiciously at the pair.
He didn’t look particularly guilty. Just wary.
“What beauty mark? What are you two even talking about?”
Scholar Xiao smiled and hooked an arm around his shoulders. “Junior Brother, has anyone ever asked you to buy exam answers? Quiz answers, weekly exam answers, monthly exam answers... Think carefully.”
“Nonsense!” The young man flushed scarlet. “Why would I ever need something like that?”
“Even if my grades have slipped a little lately, you can’t just—”
Yu Qingtang moved to his other side and patted his shoulder with the air of someone who had been through it all before.
“Your grades slipped, you were miserable and distracted, and somebody targeted you, right?”
“Even if you didn’t buy anything, someone must have approached you.”
The two of them tightened their arms around his shoulders.
For once, their combined presence carried a faint but unmistakable pressure.
The young man’s eyes flickered. He cleared his throat.
“Well... someone did ask me.”
“It was one of the academy’s senior brothers. He asked whether I wanted one of those... mock exam papers that supposedly had a very high chance of predicting the monthly exam questions.”
“Oh?” Scholar Xiao raised an eyebrow. “A mock exam paper?”
“I refused him immediately.” The young man crossed his arms with righteous dignity. “The point of our academy’s exams is to make sure we’ve genuinely absorbed what we’ve learned. They’re not just about rankings!”
“If all you care about is passing, then buying some paper that claims to predict the questions is completely missing the point. Right, Senior Brother Xiao?”
“Hm?” Scholar Xiao smiled a little sheepishly. “I like exams mostly because of the rankings. As long as I come first, I’m happy.”
The young man: “...”
“But I don’t need to buy mock papers either.” Scholar Xiao’s eyes curved into crescents. “I already know everything, so I always come first.”
The young man looked away.
Yu Qingtang elbowed Scholar Xiao. “Quit showing off. Ask about the important part.”
“Oh.”
Scholar Xiao cleared his throat.
“Enough of the noble speeches, Junior Brother. Just tell us the truth.”
“What I said was the truth!” the young man protested indignantly. “I really didn’t buy it! It’s just... it’s just...”
His gaze darted away.
“I knew that senior brother’s grades weren’t anything special. If he really had access to questions like that, how could he still score so badly?”
Scholar Xiao burst out laughing. “That does make some sense.”
“Exactly!” The young man instantly regained his confidence. “Besides, he wasn’t charging cheap prices either. I’m not stupid.”
“People in the academy usually trade with points. He opened by asking for spirit stones, which was already strange. And the more I looked at him, the more he seemed somehow different from usual...”
Yu Qingtang pointed beneath his eye. “Did he have a beauty mark?”
“Yes! Yes!” The young man slapped his palm as realization struck. “Now that you mention it, he did! A beauty mark! No wonder that senior brother looked strangely unfamiliar that day...”
“You already knew that senior brother?” Scholar Xiao pressed. “Could you show us where to find him?”
The young man gave two awkward laughs.
“No need.”
“You’ve probably all heard about him already.”
At last, a hint of guilt appeared on his face.
“He’s the senior brother who got caught cheating. The academy’s searching everywhere for whoever sold him the exam paper.”
Scholar Xiao: “...”
Yu Qingtang: “...”
After going in a great big circle, they had ended up right back at a clue they already knew.
“Everyone around him was questioned when the incident first happened,” the young man said with perfect justification. “Since I’m still here at the academy, obviously I was cleared. So you don’t need to keep testing me.”
Yu Qingtang and Scholar Xiao exchanged a look.
Both nodded.
Scholar Xiao sighed with a wry smile. “Looks like we still haven’t made any progress.”
They released the young man and headed toward the exit together.
Scholar Xiao draped an arm over Yu Qingtang’s shoulders. “And here I thought we’d found a breakthrough.”
“Look on the bright side.” Yu Qingtang patted Scholar Xiao on the shoulder. “We’d only get a few points for solving the case anyway. We already have enough.”
“That’s not all.” Scholar Xiao looked deeply regretful. “It would also satisfy my curiosity immensely.”
Yu Qingtang: “...”
“Let’s go find everyone at the martial-practice platform first. Then...”
Scholar Xiao finished for him with a smile. “Then we go back and study.”
Yu Qingtang looked up at the sky with a sigh. “Fine. I should probably study at least a little. I can’t rely entirely on my luck.”
They were just about to head toward the martial-practice platform when they spotted Chi Yantian looking around.
Clearly, he was searching for them too.
—Incidentally, Flamelet wasn’t allowed inside the academy proper.
The academy did, however, have a spirit-beast facility devoted specifically to spirit pets. If a pet had a gentle temperament, its owner could supervise and spend a few points to have it given a bath.
Girl in the Bamboo usually looked after the two Desert Spirit Cats.
Even now that she no longer deliberately hid her presence, she still disliked appearing before people, which meant the two kittens also tended to come and go without a trace.
This time, the kittens had smelled the food at the spirit-beast facility and forced Girl in the Bamboo to show herself.
She was currently over there keeping company with all three spirit pets.
“Finally found you.” Chi Yantian scratched his head, looking distinctly unused to the situation. “Normally, with Flamelet around, I only have to ask where you are and it can follow your scents straight to you.”
“Without it, I completely forgot to arrange a meeting place with you. I didn’t even know where to start looking.”
“Good thing we ran into each other.” Scholar Xiao laughed. “Come on. We were just heading to the martial-practice platform to find Brother Ye.”
“He went to the martial-practice platform?” Chi Yantian thumped his chest. “You should’ve told me earlier! I could do that job too! It’s way better than standing there without being allowed to move.”
“No need.”
Yu Qingtang handed him fifteen bamboo tallies.
“I already won enough points for everyone.”
“I wonder how your Brother Ye is doing... Hm?”
Scholar Xiao glanced ahead and raised an eyebrow.
“Was the martial-practice platform this crowded when we came by earlier?”
He pulled aside a senior sister passing nearby.
“Senior Sister, what’s happening in there...?”
“Someone broke through in the middle of a fight,” she answered offhandedly. “He was literally fighting while breaking through. See the phenomenon in the sky? He’s about to trigger a heavenly calamity! It isn’t even a major-realm breakthrough, yet it produced a celestial phenomenon. And he can keep sparring while breaking through. What a heaven-blessed genius!”
“Stop asking questions! Everyone’s trying to watch. Even the head of the Painting School came over!”
Scholar Xiao’s gaze shifted.
Sure enough, beneath the eaves overlooking the martial-practice platform stood a middle-aged man in white robes splattered with every color of paint imaginable.
His eyes burned as he stared at Ye Chenyan in the arena.
He couldn’t help sighing in admiration.
“Excellent.”
“What a fine specimen. Astonishing talent. Powerful body. And he even... has a brain.”
“Rare indeed.”
Yu Qingtang: “...”
He turned to Scholar Xiao. “Was that a compliment?”
“Getting an evaluation like that from the Painting School head is already pretty good,” Scholar Xiao whispered. “But Brother Ye really is terrifyingly talented. We look away for a moment and he’s about to break through again.”
“Come on. Let’s squeeze closer to the front...”
He turned his head.
Yu Qingtang had already retreated all the way to the entrance of the martial-practice platform, with only his head poking inside as he watched from afar.
Scholar Xiao stared.
“Brother Yu? Aren’t you going to get closer and watch?”
Yu Qingtang pointed at the thunderclouds overhead.
“Are you stupid? What if I get too close and the lightning hits me too?”
Scholar Xiao: “...That makes an alarming amount of sense.”
He choked for a moment.
“But you two are practically made for each other. Surely you could at least...”
“That doesn’t mean we have to be glued together every second.” Yu Qingtang mercilessly shuffled another step backward. “Especially when it’s dangerous.”
He raised a thumb.
“Safety first.”
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