Volume One, Chapter 109: Late-Night Snack

"Senior Mo!" Ivanoti stood on tiptoe, bouncing as she waved to Mo De.

Mo De smiled and waved back. It seemed the girl was full of anticipation for tonight’s late-night snack.

Behind Xiao Feng, Yu Jiuchuan stood at the doorway, waiting for Su Ziwen to pull out her room key and close the door.

With the four of them assembled, Mo De took the lead, and the group headed toward the dining hall.

They saw few people along the way, but once they stepped inside, they realized the dining hall was quite crowded.

"Over here, over here!" Yan Ruoting was standing amidst a group of people, holding a tray and chatting while he ate. Catching a glimpse of the four of them, he reached out to greet them.

The crowd around Yan Ruoting turned their heads in unison, looking Mo De and his companions up and down as they approached.

"Mo De, from Tianshui High School in Qin City," Mo De said, taking the initiative to introduce himself.

"The top-ranked in North China?" A young man leading the group looked at Mo De with interest, extending a hand in a friendly gesture. "In person, you don't look as intimidating as the rumors suggested."

"Haha, not at all..." Mo De shook the man's hand, while inwardly cursing the two old foxes, Cheng Shanhai and Feng Shichu.

When Ji Keqing had told him he topped the Grand Assessment, Mo De, being sharp, immediately realized there was something fishy about the list Feng Shichu had given him.

When he later asked Wu Fan and the others about their test items and evaluation standards, Mo De had stormed out, ready to settle the score with Feng Shichu.

The old man had simply spread his hands and shifted the blame onto Cheng Shanhai.

Cheng Shanhai, however, was cunning and sly. He started right off with, "Little Mo, let's put other matters aside for a moment—your current ability level at the late stage of the Body Acceptance Realm..."

Mo De was instantly silenced, as this was not something he could easily fool his own principal about.

To his surprise, Cheng Shanhai waved a hand and said, "I don't know what happened with Old Qiao, but he must have entered the wrong data for your ability level assessment. The school has already corrected your new ability record. Little Mo, check it and see if there are any other errors."

A perfectly forged ability record was placed before him, detailing the time nodes of his breakthroughs at every stage with extreme precision.

"No... no problems..." Mo De held the record, stunned by the school’s efficiency.

It was obvious that someone had tampered with the files to help him cover up the fact that he was advancing so rapidly.

"Any other questions, student Mo?" Cheng Shanhai asked with a broad smile.

"No, no questions." Mo De, who had arrived full of bluster to demand an explanation, instead politely said goodbye to Cheng Shanhai and Feng Shichu, and scurried away as soon as he closed the principal’s office door.

One had to admit, the older the ginger, the spicier it gets...

...

After some pleasantries, mediated by the overly talkative Yan Ruoting, the four of them introduced themselves to the twenty or so people present.

The man who had teased Mo De earlier was from the capital, with the compound surname Xuanyuan and the given name Kong. He was tall and slender with handsome, distinct features—the kind of beautiful man who could be plucked straight off a magazine cover. He wanted to chat more with Mo De, the top scorer of the assessment, but was dragged away by his female companion.

Meanwhile, the man with the buzzcut, An Rongbei, who was currently arm-in-arm with Yan Ruoting and chatting away, was from Anjie City in Jinmen. The two had hit it off immediately; after only a few words, they seemed ready to swear brotherhood under the witness of everyone present.

Excluding the capital and Jinmen, students from seven of the eight major Anjie cities in the North China region had arrived. The team from Feng'an City had been delayed by an incident on the way and was temporarily absent.

After finally finishing greetings with everyone, Mo De’s jaw felt stiff from smiling.

The girls had gone to get their food early, leaving him as the designated "male PR representative" to welcome guests and build rapport.

Mo De rubbed his cheeks, surveyed the dining hall, and spotted the three of them in a corner.

Turning toward the serving station, Mo De, having handled the overly enthusiastic peers, realized he was actually quite hungry now.

There were 27 students in the hall, with three others remaining in their rooms for various reasons.

Most Anjie cities had sent only two or three students; it was rare for a place like Qin City to send six people to the winter camp, especially since all four spots from Tianshui High School had been secured.

Even the capital, the largest Anjie city in North China, had only managed to get five students selected from its four top-tier ability high schools.

The reason Mo De was being treated like a tourist attraction was partly due to his top-ranking status, and partly because the stunning feat of Tianshui High School getting four students in was truly shocking.

"Oh, what a coincidence." In the middle of grabbing some food, Mo De heard a low mutter beside him. He glanced over and was so startled he nearly dropped his plate on the person's head.

He didn't know when, but Mu Qing was already standing behind him with a half-full tray, waiting for him to move forward.

Did this person use all of her Wish Realm cultivation just to mask her presence?

"Hurry up, people are waiting behind you," Mu Qing whispered, urging Mo De to keep moving so he wouldn't hold up the line.

Mo De hurried to the next food container and whispered, "Why aren't you done eating yet?" Logically, she should have arrived at the late-night dining hall long ago. How was she still in line when he had already finished greeting everyone?

"Fifth round. Oh, wait, leave me two fried shrimp!" Mu Qing’s hand moved with lightning speed, snatching two fried shrimp from Mo De’s tray before anyone noticed.

More than half of the golden fried shrimp that had filled the box earlier had been secretly swiped by her.

"That's enough, seriously." Looking at the increasingly high pile of food on Mu Qing’s tray, Mo De felt a genuine headache coming on.

"The chef here is actually quite good. You should savor it properly so you can update your own recipes when you get home," Mu Qing said, nudging him with her elbow.

"Qing, over here!" A teaching assistant spotted Mu Qing’s signature tinted sunglasses and waved her over.

"Coming, coming!" Mu Qing nodded, then trotted off with her bountiful harvest.

"This person, she never has a moment of peace," Mo De sighed softly as he watched her walk away.

Carrying his tray to the corner of the dining hall, Mo De went to find Su Ziwen, Yu Jiuchuan, and Ivanoti, intending to share the information he had gathered with the three girls.

Xiao Feng was currently devouring her food with great effort. The various fried items had piqued Ivanoti’s immense interest, while Senior Yu Jiuchuan had already finished her snack and was reading a book beside Xiao Feng.