Love from the Male Protagonist’s Harem - Chapter 46-3

LFTMPH Chapter 46—Old-Age Insurance Part 3

Translated by Snowfall77

“Miss……” Xiaoqing spoke cautiously, “The names have all been read.”

“Mm.”  Chu Yao’s attitude was aloof.

“……”

Not daring to say anything else, Xiaoqing became resigned to the fact that Chu Yao was apparently going to sit through the whole thing.

That didn’t mean Xiaoqing wasn’t deeply bitter about it though.  Liandan was just a bunch of smoke and heat, and the potential inner disciples would be trying to make one of the lowest-level dan too.  Besides, Chu Yao knew nothing about liandan.  If she really wanted to learn, she’d better off inviting the best liandan master from [Order] to teach her, right?

Don’t even talk about Bigu dan.  Not exactly a dan that was going to shake the earth off its axis.  As the eldest daughter of the Chu family of Chang’an, couldn’t Chu Yao  see it anytime she wanted?

So why come to watch a bunch of wet-behind-the-ears……no, that was giving them too much credit.  Besides, could their skill-level even count as liandan?

Time crawled slowly by.

“The last roll call!”  Standing at the front of the platform and holding the roster, a flawlessly groomed Danfeng disciple declared in a hearty voice: “Anyone who does not answer for the final roll call is disqualified!”

Fists clenched, Ye Ze no longer wanted to watch the entrance.  Instead he turned his head and gritted his teeth, wishing he could leave.

——Xia Wuyin, where the hell are you?!

Gu Peijiu flipped a page of the papers she was calmly reading: “Ye Ze.”

Ye Ze’s fidgety movements stopped, but his tone was unreconciled: “Senior Sister, I……”

“Do you not believe in him?”

The young lady’s bearing was utterly still, her voice cold, and her gaze unreadable, like darkest night: “You believed in him before, therefore, believe in him to the end.”

Stiffening, Ye Ze finally gave a self-deprecating smile and restrained himself.

Whether he believed or not……there was nothing he could do one way or the other.

The young lady dressed in impeccable red and white turned another page.

Ye Ze’s lips were pursed thin as a wire, hands still balled up into fists.  Again Senior Sister’s voice sounded, gentle and detached: “At the very least, let us see if he is worthy of your trust.”

Closing his eyes, Ye Ze was completely silent.

In this world, was there anyone that he could possibly put his trust in?

If there was someone, it would be Xia Wuyin.

“”

——But continual trust?  Only time could tell.

“No. 77, Huo Bai!”

“Present.”

The youngster lazily responded, then hugged his shoulders and glanced at the empty spot in front of the furnace to his left.  Eyes narrowing, he commented: “Another one who’s absent.”

The girl to Huo Bai’s right snorted: “Being late for such an important examination, a person like that won’t have much future prospects.”

If Xia Ge had been there, she would have recognized the girl as the one ‘Lei Feng’ had rescued from Chang Lu, and then sent to the doctor and paid her medical fees.

“No. 98, Mao Qing! ”

The girl answered: “Here!”  Huo Bai eyed the furnace in front of her, his attitude unclear.

Really?  An important examination……

“I don’t care what others think, I’m going to place first.”  Mao Qing’s eyes gleamed with a martial fervor, “I want to be the first Danfeng disciple of this year!”

Huo Bai lightly scoffed……how boring.

“What?  You don’t want to place first?”  Mao Qing raised an eyebrow.

Huo Bai: “Not particularly.”

Mao Qing humphed before saying mockingly: “Someone like you, with that attitude, it’d be better if you didn’t come at all.  You’re just going to mess up the rankings——”

She pointed to the unclaimed furnace on Huo Bai’s left: “How are you any different from that kind of dumbass, someone who can’t even bother to show up——”

“No. 124, Xia Wuyin—”

The weather was perfectly clear, yet a black shadow suddenly appeared in the sky, bringing a forceful wind.  A dark horse had emerged from the forest and was about to join the field!

Mao Qing’s words faded away as she gawped dumbstruck at the new arrival.

Meanwhile, Ye Ze’s eyes snapped open, his heart thumped, yet his fists gradually relaxed.

——You’re finally here.

On Jianfeng’s platform, Xiaoqing wondered: “What……who’s that?”  Beside her, Chu Yao slowly stood up, staring up fixedly at the youngster who’d so abruptly made an entrance——

Chu Yao’s pulse quickened.

It was him!

It was really him!

He actually was……a Danfeng disciple!

And the Danfeng disciple reading the roster, distracted by a boy practically falling from the sky, didn’t manage to say: “Anyone who did not answer for the final roll call is disqualified——”

Because before he could,  a hoarse voice pierced the silence, heavy with wild emotion and insolence——

“Present—”

Xia Ge had arrived on the scene just in time!

Like an unbelievable sudden miracle.

Flipping 360 degrees in the air, Xia Ge made a stable landing on the ground before the agog crowd’s eyes.

Down on one knee, Xia Ge adjusted her grimace of discomfort, then lifted her head and aimed a beaming smile straight at the young lady in red and white on Danfeng’s platform.

The thin body wasn’t dressed in outer disciple clothes, but in black rags.  The black hair was messy, but the eyes shone like stars, and the raspy voice said clearly: “Xia Wuyin, the 88th outer disciple of Danfeng’s 556th generation, paying his respects to Senior Sister!”

Gu Peijiu’s pupils reflected the boy grinning up at her as her grip on her reading material gradually loosened.

He was here.  He’d……made it.

Gu Peijiu’s brow lowered, but something in her chest relaxed.  Still, her tone was as impassive as ever when she ordered: “Find your place and ready yourself.”

“Yes!”  Xia Ge answered and stood up.

As Xia Ge moved, she could feel warm liquid seeping through the bandage wrapped around her abdomen. The system hadn’t been wrong.  She’d pushed too hard.  Now her wound had reopened and there was pain, even in her semi-numb state.

——It could be borne.

Underneath her black rags, white cloth was stained by red blood.  Until eventually the stain spread out onto the black, dying it unnaturally dark, like an almost imperceptible shadow.

Aware of about a thousand people watching, Xia Ge held her back straight and nonchalantly made her way to her furnace.

Her little injury, it was nothing.

……she just had to endure a little longer.

Watching the boy walk, Gu Peijiu noticed that there was something slightly wrong with the way he was moving.

Stiff and sluggish.

——Like he’d been injured.

Had he……gotten hurt somehow on the back mountain?!

Gu Peijiu’s pupils shrank, and her lips twitched.  She was about to speak when she overheard Ye Ze murmuring to himself.

“……he’s worthy.”

——Surely, Ye Ze thought to himself, Xia Wuyin would always be worthy of his trust.

Shifting in her seat, Gu Peijiu said nothing.  She sat reticent on the stage, merely observing as Xia Wuyin made his way to a furnace.

——So, Xia Wuyin could be worthy of Ye Ze’s trust after all.  Did that mean others could trust in Xia Wuyin as well?

Gu Peijiu saw clearly the pride in Xia Wuyin’s straight back.

——So be it.

After glancing down at the [special recruit-Xia Wuyin] she’d written earlier, Gu Peijiu slowly set her papers aside.

Such a proud child——his back was so upright, perhaps he was showing off to everyone that he needed no consideration.

The corners of Gu Peijiu’s mouth tightened.

……well then, let the boy show his strength, let everyone see if his self-confidence was justified.

Meanwhile, Xia Ge, completely unaware of Gu Peijiu’s musings: {this body will fight for old-age insurance and won’t care about death, even if it comes 9 times over.  no regrets!}