Plus, with a contract with the Juxing Club and the support of its resources, as long as you can reach Body Cultivator Eighth Rank before the college entrance exams, the Three Heroic Academies might not be out of reach.
"Ya Ge, have you been to the Juxing Club yet? How was it, did you see Ye Xing? I'm a fan of his."
"Nonsense, Ye Xing is a core member of the Juxing Team—how could he possibly be in our Jiang City?"
"Ya Ge, how much was your signing bonus? I heard you bought a house—where is it?"
Everyone crowded around Ya Ge, firing questions at her. Some students' tones even carried a hint of flattery.
But when Lin Feng came near, the previously lively atmosphere suddenly fell silent, as if the air had frozen for an instant.
Everyone turned around and looked at him with a strange expression in their eyes—a mix of sympathy, disdain, schadenfreude, and pity.
Yes, pity.
Just like in his past life!
Lin Feng sighed in his heart!
In the twelfth grade, Class 7, where he belonged, there were about 600 students.
Because of a morning chat with Gao Hai, Lin Feng knew their class had only 83 people who had reached Body Cultivator Fifth Rank and could participate in Awakening Day.
Only 23 had managed to refine a demon spirit and become Demon Spirit Masters. In other words, in a class, nearly thirty people had to produce one Demon Spirit Master—a probability of about one in thirty.
After all, Demon Spirit Masters were the minority. Those who failed might have some regrets, but it wasn't enough to make them lose hope for the future.
In fact, many students had already found a clear path for their futures.
Those with poor martial arts aptitude but good academic scores planned to become ordinary white-collar workers or take the civil service exams.
Those with neither martial arts talent nor good grades planned to start their own businesses and be their own boss in the future.
Those with martial arts talent but only average aptitude also had their own career plans: becoming pharmacists, artifact refiners, or alchemists. Failing to become Demon Spirit Masters didn't mean much to them.
But just because Lin Feng and Ya Ge were a couple, once Ya Ge became a Demon Spirit Master, Lin Feng, who was once a top student, had become the epitome of failure.
In Lin Feng's memory, in his previous life, when Ya Ge refined the Seventh Grade Ice Heron, for those three months, his classmates all looked at him with that same pitiful gaze.
For students, the most painful thing isn't discrimination or ridicule—but pity.
It's not like he was missing an arm or a leg—what was there to pity?
Now, there were still three months left until the college entrance exams!
Three months. Ninety days!
Lin Feng still clearly remembered that time—every single day felt endless; nothing could lift his spirits; even the color of the sky seemed gray.
Whenever his classmates whispered and laughed, he would always think they were talking about him. Every casual glance felt like mockery.
The once confident and optimistic him had become self-conscious and sensitive.
Because when everyone around you believes you've failed, after a while, you start doubting yourself too.
In his past life, Ya Ge had refined only a Seventh Grade Ice Heron. Now, it was the rare Eighth Grade Enchanting Butterfly, and she'd even joined the Juxing Club—it was truly skyrocketing success.
This time, the pity was even worse.
Luckily, he didn't care about it anymore.
After so many years, Lin Feng had already forgotten his own place. Fortunately, in three years of high school, he always had Gao Hai as his desk mate, so when he saw Gao Hai sit down, he headed to the seat beside him.
"It still feels like a dream…"
Sitting in his chair, looking at the youthful, carefree faces around him, listening to their cheerful laughter, Lin Feng suddenly felt dazed.
Countless times in the dead of night, he'd dreamed of this scene. Now, actually sitting here, everything still felt a bit unreal.