Ye Bai slapped Liu Long across the face.
The slap count didn't move, it remained unchanged, meaning the system had judged it ineffective.
With a dull wave of his hand, Ye Bai said flatly, "That's enough. Go back."
Liu Long, as if suddenly pardoned, hurriedly pulled his brother Liu Hu along and vanished from Ye Bai's sight.
After a moment of silence, Ye Bai glanced back at the counter. It was still fixed at 23. His gaze then shifted to the new button, the option to increase his innate soul power.
At this point, he could raise it by two levels.
And if he could reach 100 slap counts before the Spirit Awakening Ceremony, his innate soul power would directly reach level 10.
Ye Bai clenched his fist, forcing down the excitement bubbling inside him. He was worried the button might be a one-time use. Better to hold back, wait until he'd gathered all 100 slaps, and then press it in one go.
He was crossing the lawn and about to step into the grove when a voice reached his ears. It was a young man's.
"Sisi, I'm going to the village tomorrow to help the children with their spirit awakening rituals. I might not be back for a week or two."
The voice paused briefly.
When it sounded again in the still night, Ye Bai could clearly catch the urgency, and even passion, in its tone.
"Sisi, just give it to me."
"How hateful."
Hearing this exchange, Ye Bai was stunned. 'Sisi? Village children? Spirit awakening? Could this be… Su Yuntao?'
He recalled that in the Douluo Dalu storyline, Su Yuntao once pursued a woman named Sisi. She never appeared much in the original tale and certainly wasn't as famous as Su Yuntao himself.
And Su Yuntao... Well, he had become something of a legendary figure in countless fanfictions, the so-called Blind Douluo.
That being the case, Ye Bai had every reason to believe the scene unfolding in the grove was none other than a secret tryst between Su Yuntao and Sisi.
Ye Bai wasn't particularly concerned about how quickly Su Yuntao and Sisi had gotten together.
What mattered was the information Su Yuntao had just revealed: he would be heading to a village tomorrow to awaken the children's spirits.
This was crucial to Ye Bai.
He wanted to personally witness Tang San's spirit awakening.
"It seems I'll also be leaving for Holy Soul Village tomorrow morning." Ye Bai murmured to himself. Just as he was about to slip away quietly, the voices continued.
"Sisi, just give it to me. I won't be back for a week or two, I can't hold it in any longer."
"Damn it! What if someone sees us?"
"Sisi, it's so late. There isn't even a ghost around. Heaven knows, you know, I know, don't worry, no one will see us."
Hearing Su Yuntao's reassurance, Ye Bai's eyes gleamed. A thought stirred in his heart:
'If Su Yuntao's expectations turn out completely different from reality… wouldn't that count as a perfect slap in the face?'
Thinking of this, Ye Bai drew in a deep breath and deliberately lowered his voice before shouting:
"Meeting in the woods at night, corrupting young students, such scum, heaven itself will not tolerate it!"
In the still night, his distorted voice struck like a thunderclap, slamming straight into Su Yuntao's heart.
Su Yuntao froze in shock.
Beside him, Sisi was so startled her mouth gaped wide enough to fit a goose egg.
Without looking back, Ye Bai bolted, sprinting all the way home.
As for whether the sudden fright would leave some… unspeakable hidden shadow in Su Yuntao's future pursuit of happiness, that was none of Ye Bai's concern.
What concerned him was his experiment.
During the fight with Liu Hu, he had vaguely grasped the essence of the sixth rule of face-slapping: striking with the hand was merely the narrow definition of a face-slapping.
If there was a narrow definition of face-slapping, then naturally there should also be a broad definition.
In the broad sense, face-slapping referred to when someone confidently predicted an outcome, only for reality to turn out completely opposite—or at least vastly different.
Hard to put into words, yet easy to understand.
"Forty-three," Ye Bai muttered under his breath as he glanced at the system panel. The slap count had already climbed to 43—an abrupt increase of 20.
His theory was correct.
The night passed in silence.
At dawn, Ye Bai rose early, stepped outside, and bought two egg pancakes from a street stall. Eating as he walked, he made his way out of town.
Holy Soul Village was incredibly famous.
Not because a Soul Sage was born there, nor simply because the protagonist Tang San grew up there.
Its true fame came from outside the story itself—from countless Douluo fanfics that used Holy Soul Village as the novice village, the birthplace of reincarnators and transmigrators alike.
So when Ye Bai discovered he had been reborn in Nuoding City instead, he couldn't help but feel a little confused.
'Why couldn't I have been reborn in Holy Soul Village?'
Sadly, no one could answer that question.
The only person who might have been able to… was his father.
But his father had already left Nuoding City.
Ye Bai boarded the carriage to Holy Soul Village and, along the way, drifted into memories of his father.
In Ye Bai's recollection, his father had always been a little funny, lacking much of the steadiness one would expect from an adult.
More than once, Ye Bai had suspected that their roles were reversed—that he was the father, and his father the son.
But no matter what, his father had left him with enough money.
That was also the reason Ye Bai could afford to travel by carriage now.
The carriage finally came to a halt. They had arrived at Holy Soul Village. Ye Bai hopped down, his eyes falling on the massive stone at the entrance, where the three bold words Holy Soul Village were carved. Beside them was a single handprint etched into the surface.
Ye Bai stepped into the village.
Coincidentally, at the same time, a boy in dark blue clothes entered as well. His eyes shone like twin sapphires, and though he wore simple linen, there was an extraordinary air about him.
'Judging by his demeanor and attire, this must be Tang San.' Ye Bai thought.
From his appearance, he had likely just returned from training at the mountaintop.
"Hello, may I ask how to get to Old Jack's house, the village elder?" Ye Bai inquired.
Tang San stopped and looked at him.
The one speaking was a boy in gray, about the same age as him. His clothes didn't suggest poverty, yet he carried no trace of arrogance.
His eyes were clear, untainted, and his young face already held the promise of striking handsomeness. What startled Tang San even more was the boy's silver hair, it stood out brilliantly against his plain attire.
"Follow me. I just happen to be passing by Grandpa Jack's house." Tang San replied.
——
Go to → pa treon.com/SmutCriminal69 (remove the space) for advanced chapters.