Rushing downstairs, Chen Hao hailed a taxi on the first floor and sped off to Tianhong Hotel near Jingwen Middle School.
Ten minutes later, Chen Hao arrived at the entrance of Tianhong Hotel. Without waiting for the driver to make change, he got out of the taxi and strode into the hotel. Following Lin Xiaofan's instructions, he arrived at the doorstep of Room 302. Coincidentally, just as he was about to knock, the door swung open.
The person who opened the door was none other than Ye Yuqiao; and standing behind Ye Yuqiao, with a look of surprise on his face, was Xie Xiaofeng.
Seeing these two, Chen Hao felt as if the sky had fallen; his face instantly turned green with fury. Without saying a word, driven by anger and humiliation, he raised his hand and slapped Ye Yuqiao across the face.
With a "smack," five red finger marks appeared on Ye Yuqiao's fair face.
After taking a slap, Ye Yuqiao's eyes instantly moistened. She glared at Chen Hao with a look of sorrow and choked out, "Chen Hao, how dare you hit me!"
"So what if I hit you?" Chen Hao, blinded by rage, exclaimed as he slapped Ye Yuqiao's face again with a resounding smack. He simply couldn't accept the reality before him.
At this moment, Xie Xiaofeng, who was standing behind Ye Yuqiao, couldn't hold back any longer. Pointing angrily at Chen Hao, he shouted, "Chen Hao, don't go too far! Nothing has happened between us!"
Hearing Xie Xiaofeng say this only infuriated Chen Hao further. To him, even if nothing had happened, Ye Yuqiao's actions had already wounded his heart, and he couldn't bear it! He grabbed Ye Yuqiao by her left wrist, dragged her out of the room, and with a commanding tone said to the tearful Ye Yuqiao, "Wait for me outside; I'll deal with him first and settle the score with you afterward!"
Having said that, he threw off Ye Yuqiao's hand, walked into the room, and locked the door behind him. At that moment, without any need for activation, he felt a forceful and strong energy surging toward his bloodstream from his left eye, eager to be unleashed.
"Chen Hao, you're locking the door; are you trying to challenge me one-on-one?" Xie Xiaofeng looked at Chen Hao with disdain and said.
Chen Hao's eyes were full of fiery anger, his visage twisted as he bellowed at Xie Xiaofeng, "If I don't cripple you today, I'll take your surname!"
No sooner had he spoken than Chen Hao charged at Xie Xiaofeng, throwing a heavy left hook at his face with great force.
Xie Xiaofeng hurriedly raised his arm to block, but couldn't withstand the power of Chen Hao's punch. He was knocked back several steps and finally fell onto the bed.
As he lay on the bed, Xie Xiaofeng thought back to a few days prior in the school restroom when Chen Hao had knocked him out with a single punch.
Chen Hao let out a roar and lunged at Xie Xiaofeng with his fists raised again.
"Wait, wait!" Xie Xiaofeng exclaimed, making a stopping gesture with his hands.
Chen Hao paused mid-charge. Xie Xiaofeng hastily pulled out a sheet of paper from his pocket, opened it hurriedly, and displayed it to Chen Hao, saying, "Chen Hao, your grandfather borrowed a total of six hundred thousand from my grandfather, using your family's house as collateral. Here is the IOU he personally signed."
Chen Hao frowned, the anger on his face suddenly disappearing. He stepped forward, snatched the IOU from Xie Xiaofeng's hand, scrutinized it for a moment, then crumpled it up and threw it in Xie Xiaofeng's face. Then he leaned in close to Xie Xiaofeng, grabbed his collar, and gritted his teeth as he hissed, "Was it you who took this IOU to Ye Yuqiao, threatened her, and got her to come to the hotel with you?"
"That's right!" Xie Xiaofeng admitted, "I did go to see her just now. I told her that if she agreed to sleep with me, I wouldn't come after you for the debt."
"Despicable!" Chen Hao spat in Xie Xiaofeng's face. "Your grandfather is just as despicable as you. Your whole family is despicable."
Xie Xiaofeng glared at Chen Hao and said with a cold laugh, "Chen Hao, let me tell you the truth. I'm actually not that interested in sleeping with Ye Yuqiao. I just wanted to humiliate you and let everyone know that it was me, Xie Xiaofeng, who cuckolded you."
"What grudge do I actually have against you, for you to want to humiliate me like this?"
"No grudge!" Xie Xiaofeng shrugged, sneered, then explained, "It's just that from childhood to adulthood, I've always had you under my heel. That time Ye Yuqiao made me look foolish, how could I swallow my pride?"
"Do you believe I can slap you to death?" Chen Hao asked.
"Don't believe it!" Xie Xiaofeng shook his head, smiling confidently. "If you dare touch me again, I'll call people to come take your family's house, and I'll smash all those ancestral tablets you're keeping!"
As soon as Xie Xiaofeng's words fell, Chen Hao threw a punch at his right eye. Instantly, Xie Xiaofeng saw stars and felt the world spin around him.
Holding Xie Xiaofeng's hair, Chen Hao said coldly, "Tell that old fox in your family, I'm paying back the money tonight! Remember this, if you ever dare think about my woman again, I can teach you a lesson at any time!"
After speaking, Chen Hao slapped Xie Xiaofeng's face several more times, then turned and left the room. Xie Xiaofeng, who had been hit all along, had passed out on the bed.
Outside the room, Chen Hao saw Ye Yuqiao standing with her head down, leaning against the wall by the door, the slap marks still visible on her face. He walked up to her, his hand slowly reaching toward Ye Yuqiao's face. At that moment, Ye Yuqiao raised her hand and pushed Chen Hao's hand away.
Chen Hao didn't give up, swiftly caressing Ye Yuqiao's face. Ye Yuqiao snorted angrily, repeatedly slapping Chen Hao's hand away. Chen Hao, in return, grabbed Ye Yuqiao's wrist, suddenly pushed forward, pinning Ye Yuqiao against the wall, and angrily said, "Ye Yuqiao, listen well, you are my Chen Hao's girlfriend! You are not allowed to do such foolish things again!"
Only then did Ye Yuqiao lift her head; her eyes still brimming with tears, yet her face emotionless as she asked, "What did you do to Xie Xiaofeng?"
"Knocked him out!"
"You!" Ye Yuqiao's brows furrowed tightly, her eyes round and staring. "Then how is your family going to settle the debt with his? Isn't what you did too impulsive?"
"He already used it to threaten you, is what I did really impulsive?" Chen Hao felt a surge of anger rise in his heart, his grip on Ye Yuqiao's hand noticeably firmer.
He looked at Ye Yuqiao helplessly and said, "Ye Yuqiao, I don't even know what to say to you, aren't you oversimplifying things? Sometimes I really doubt if we come from the same world, I think your values are too skewed, and you need to spend more time with people like me for enlightenment. How could you agree to such an absurd condition? It's just too naive!"
"We're not from the same world to begin with," Ye Yuqiao grumbled quietly with a sullen face. After a pause, she continued, "He said that as long as I accompany him on this trip, the debt your family owes his would be completely written off."
"So you agreed just like that?" Chen Hao looked helpless. At this moment, the usually cool and composed Ye Yuqiao seemed to him like a naive and whimsical little girl, which made him both amused and annoyed. At the same time, he was puzzled, what kind of person was Ye Yuqiao, really?
"Actually," Ye Yuqiao lowered her head slightly, "I agreed to come here to teach him a lesson with the Yin Yang Arts, then bewilder him into thinking something had happened. In fact, nothing was ever going to happen."
Hearing this, Chen Hao's face immediately filled with guilt. He slowly lifted his hand and gently caressed Ye Yuqiao's face, touching the blemishes and scars that he had caused in his moment of irrationality, and said with heartache, "I'm sorry, did I misunderstand you just now and hurt you?"
Ye Yuqiao frowned in confusion as she looked at Chen Hao, silent for a long time before blinking her left eye. Then a thin line of tears fell from her eye.
Chen Hao was eager to know what emotions and thoughts were concealed in Ye Yuqiao's enigmatic eyes at that moment.
Chen Hao gently wiped away the tear on Ye Yuqiao's face with his thumb.
"The matter was going fine until you messed it up, what are you going to do if he comes back to ask for the debt to be repaid?"
...
As night fell, Chen Hao and Ye Yuqiao returned to her home.
Upon entering, Chen Hao immediately located the wood box of the ancient indigo from the Nether Hall and said urgently to Ye Yuqiao, "Didn't you say this piece of rotten wood can increase my Yin Qi Spiritual Power? Grind it into powder, I want to drink it now, no need to split it into servings, I'll drink it all in one go."
Ye Yuqiao looked at Chen Hao with confusion and asked, "Chen Hao, why are you in such a hurry to take this?"
Chen Hao opened the box, pulled out the ancient indigo from the Nether Hall, and thrust it into Ye Yuqiao's hands as if he would have chewed on the dry wood directly if he could.
"Is it true that after absorbing the Yin Qi and Spiritual Power from this piece of wood, I'll be able to use Nether Vision?" Chen Hao asked.
"Not necessarily," Ye Yuqiao shook her head blankly, "That also depends on your natural talent."
"I'm naturally intelligent, so there shouldn't be much of a problem," Chen Hao muttered to himself, the urgency on his face faded, replaced by a smugness.
Ye Yuqiao, puzzled, asked, "Chen Hao, why are you so eager to learn Nether Eye? What's it for?"
Chen Hao kissed Ye Yuqiao's forehead and did not respond to her question, instead, he smiled and urged, "Go and grind this wood into powder. I'll tell you why later."
Ye Yuqiao took the wood to the kitchen. Chen Hao immediately went upstairs to his home to find his grandfather's bank card. After turning the house upside down, he eventually found his grandfather's card behind the sofa cushion in the living room.
Having found the bank card, Chen Hao went downstairs and returned to Ye Yuqiao's house. By then, she had just finished grinding the wood into powder and steeped it in a cup of hot water, which she handed to Chen Hao.
Chen Hao took the cup, and without a second thought, he downed the full cup of scalding, foul-tasting water.
After drinking, he twisted his face and bemoaned, "That was horrid! Now what do I do to use Nether Vision?"
"Close your eyes and sense the Nether Eye Power, then try to transfer the Nether Eye Power to your left eye. As long as you feel like a layer of purple membrane has covered your left eye, that means Nether Vision has been activated."
"Okay, I got it, I'm off now!"
With that, Chen Hao dashed away.
Ye Yuqiao snorted coldly and muttered, "Don't think I don't know what you're up to!"
She glanced at the cup on the table, her eyes betraying her inner thoughts. Some things seemed to be silently changing, and it scared her.