"A bunch of worthless idiots! Dimwits! Garbage! Parasites! You can't even manage sothing as simple as a children's examination! If your parents hadn't paid their way in, would any of you be sitting here today? Besides your families having a little stinking money, what else do you actually have? Is your head sitting on your neck just to make you look taller?"
After calling the last na, Master Qin seed to still have so energy left over. He cleared his throat and continued his tirade.
"You people on the Second List, do you yourselves not know what sha is? I'll say this plainly here today. Every student on the Second List is not a student in my eyes. You don't even qualify as human beings. You are animals that happen to be shaped like people."
"This is the inner hall of the county school, not a place for you to co and enjoy yourselves. From today onward, all the hard and dirty cleaning work falls to you. Those who don't want to do it can go ho and cry to their parents. You don't have to co tomorrow. And you never need to co back again after that either."
Master Qin's voice rang out like a great bell, causing the ceiling beams to tremble faintly.
"All of you sit up straight. Class begins officially in one incense stick's ti."
Master Qin turned and walked out. Every student in the classroom let out a breath at the sa mont.
That had been absolutely terrifying.
Hu Caiyi sat with her lips pursed, still shuddering intermittently, not daring to cry out loud. She was quite a pitiful sight.
Miss Tang Xiaoxue patted her on the side and said, "Don't be scared. If he dares lay a hand on you, just hit him back. I'll help you beat him up."
Then she turned to look at Li Qiuchen.
Li Qiuchen said, resigned to his situation, "Just behave yourself and study diligently. The teacher won't discipline you without reason."
Hu Caiyi said with great grievance, "He said he'd skin
and make insoles out of !"
"He was frightening you."
"I'm scared. I want to go ho!"
"Hold on a little longer. If you run ho right now, aren't you afraid your father really will skin you?"
"Well... alright then."
It wasn't only Hu Caiyi who had been frightened. Nearly every student had been shaken by Master Qin's ferocity.
These young masters and misses who had been pampered from birth had never encountered anything like this in their lives.
On the very first day of school, Master Qin had used this blunt and violent approach to establish absolute authority in the minds of every student present.
What surprised Li Qiuchen, however, was that Master Qin's actual personality did not appear to be nearly as savage as all of that.
What had just happened was what had just happened.
When it ca to actually teaching, his temperant shifted entirely. He beca exceptionally patient, carefully explaining the allusions and references in the texts to his students, and didn't lose his temper even when a student asked a foolish question.
Master Qin taught the Five Classics.
Among the Five Classics, the "Faxiang" and the "Liji" were the most straightforward and accessible. The county school's outer hall also began its instruction with these two texts.
After completing the "Faxiang" and "Liji," students would move on to the "Shisong" and the "Lishu," and only then to the "Guiyi."
Mornings were devoted to the Five Classics, and afternoons to the Six Histories.
The teacher for the afternoon, Master Wang, was considerably older, appearing to be sowhere around seventy years of age, with hair that had gone fully white. His manner was warm and amiable, and compared to Master Qin he seed practically like a sage.
Master Wang wrote the nas of the six histories on the board.
The "Honghuang Ji," the "Renhuang Ji," the "Chunqiu Ji," the "Mofa Ji," the "Xinyuan Ji," and the "Guoshi Jiyao."
"The first several of these are things you'll be studying further down the road. I'll give you a brief overview so you have a general sense of things. Then we'll begin with the most recent, the 'Guoshi Jiyao'..."
Master Wang's mild temperant emboldened the students to start raising their hands with questions.
"Teacher, when do we get to learn immortal cultivation?"
The first to ask was the chubby little boy who had been beaten to a swollen pulp that morning and still had paper stuffed in his nostrils to stop the bleeding. It was Zeng Mingming.
He had only managed to stay quiet for one morning. The mont afternoon arrived and he sensed that Master Wang seed like easy prey, his old habits ca flooding back.
Master Wang narrowed his eyes and looked at Zeng Mingming, then couldn't help but smile, "You want to learn immortal cultivation?"
"I do!"
Zeng Mingming said with complete conviction, "My father paid to get
in here precisely so I could cultivate to beco an immortal!"
"Then do you know what an immortal is?"
Children were all like this. Ask a child if they knew who Ultraman was, and they'd definitely say yes. They could even tell you the difference between Tiga and Zero.
Ask them what Ultraman actually was, and they might not be able to answer that.
Isn't Ultraman just Ultraman?
Isn't an immortal just an immortal?
Zeng Mingming thought about it for a long while and ca up with an answer that was at least sowhat concrete, "Isn't it those people who live forever, can fly through the sky, and fight each other with all kinds of magical treasures making big explosions?"
Master Wang smiled and said, "Demons can fly too."
"I'm talking about people!"
"When demons transform into human form, they're indistinguishable from people. How do you know the one flying up there isn't a demon?"
Zeng Mingming was stumped.
What?
That question was far too deep!
"And that is precisely why we read books, and why we study history."
Master Wang said with a cheerful smile, "Everyone says immortals are wonderful, but if you ask them what an immortal actually is, most of them can't answer. They only know that once you beco an immortal, you have no more worries."
"Those who seek wealth think becoming an immortal ans they can turn stone to gold. Those who seek long life think it ans they'll never die. At the root of it all, they're simply looking for a shortcut to satisfy desires that have no grounding in reality."
"What is it that you yourselves are seeking?"
Zeng Mingming let out a great shout, "I want to beco the Supre Ruler of the Universe, the Overlord of Primordial Chaos! Covering the sky with one hand, holding dominion over the Three Realms!"
Master Wang smiled ruefully, "You really should cut back on the novels."
The whole room burst out laughing. Zeng Mingming's face went red.
"My dad told ... the county school has secret manuals of divine techniques!"
"Indeed it does!"
Master Wang knocked on the board, "Isn't this exactly that?"
"Really?"
"I am seventy-two years old this year. I taught in the outer hall for twenty years, and I have been teaching in the inner hall for twenty-five. The number of students I have taught runs into the thousands and tens of thousands. What reason would I have to lie to a little greenhorn like you on the very first day of class?"
"I don't believe it!"
Zeng Mingming stuck out his chin stubbornly, "Prove it. Show
sothing and then I'll believe you!"
"Ohhhh!"
The other students, happy to watch the commotion, all joined in egging him on.
Master Wang smiled and said, "I hear you already took a beating this morning. I guess the wound healed and you've already forgotten the pain?"
"What's so impressive about that?"
Zeng Mingming said with contempt, "I could hire two street toughs to beat soone just the sa. I want to see the techniques of an immortal. Just tell
whether you have them or not!"
"The techniques of an immortal?"
Master Wang stroked his beard and considered for a mont, then frowned and said, "Well, have you considered that if I truly possessed the techniques of an immortal, and you've co into my classroom and provoked
repeatedly, aren't you afraid of being punished?"
Zeng Mingming froze.
He had not considered this question at all.
"But... aren't you the teacher? Shouldn't you demonstrate sothing?"
"You are the student. You don't follow the rules. Shouldn't you be disciplined by the teacher?"
"Do you know who my father is?"
Master Wang shook his head, drew a slow deep breath, and blew gently in Zeng Mingming's direction.
In an instant, a fierce wind swept through the classroom. Brushes, ink, paper, and inkstones flew through the air in every direction.
Zeng Mingming was slamd flat against the back wall with a sharp crack and crumpled to the floor without another sound.
Master Wang sighed, "Your father is no immortal either. Otherwise, how could he have produced such a fool?"
He cleared his throat, and addressed the remaining students with earnest gravity, "This is a place of learning, a place for the pursuit of knowledge. Knowledge requires two things: studying and questioning. Questions are asked in order to find answers, not to stir up trouble."
"Now, let us begin class."
[NEXT CHAPTER]
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