The sun was shining brightly in the sky.
Compared to the gentle wake-up music from his mobile phone in his previous life, the sound of the old-fashioned alarm clock was nothing less than terrifying noise.
At exactly seven o'clock, Bufan was startled awake and sat up immediately.
Right after that, a wave of sleepiness hit him, and he fell back down again.
His head hurt so much.
He had slept quite a lot, though.
Maybe it was because of the alcohol that had gone to his head, or perhaps it was because of being scared by this lousy alarm clock.
Bufan didn't dare to lie down again, afraid that he might accidentally fall asleep again.
He'd heard that there would be an anatomy class of monster beasts in today's experimental class.
Just after he finished washing up, Mu Lan had already come to knock on the door.
When the two of them walked to the entrance of the alley, they happened to see an old lady whose house had been burglarized. She was shouting curses in the street, sometimes scolding the thieves for being immoral and sometimes blaming the city guards for not doing their jobs properly.
In her anger, she accidentally smashed down the wall of her own house and then started scolding the bricklayers.
...
It was half past eight.
There was still half an hour before the experimental class. The classmates were quietly having their morning self-study.
Suddenly, a hysterical burst of wild laughter came from outside the window.
If this noise had happened at night, the timid classmates would probably have fainted from fright.
Bufan and a few boys rushed to the window at once and leaned on the windowsill, looking down.
They saw a long-haired girl staggering along. Her clothes had been torn to shreds.
She was giggling strangely, then suddenly tore off the left sleeve of her clothes, took out a bottle from her bosom, unscrewed the cap, and poured some unknown liquid onto her left arm.
Her snow-white arm instantly billowed with thick smoke. The flesh and blood seemed to be boiling as countless blood blisters appeared, and then visibly began to fester and fall off in chunks.
With another shrill scream, the girl smashed the empty bottle to pieces on the ground, and then burst out into a burst of silvery laughter, with an extremely intoxicated look on her face.
It made Bufan and the others shudder.
Several teachers and security guards rushed over from a distance, trying to restrain her.
But then she suddenly showed a stiff and horrified expression.
Right after that, her stomach swelled up violently and then exploded with a bang.
Looking down from upstairs, Bufan saw that it seemed as if a flower made of flesh and blood with a diameter of three meters had bloomed on the ground.
He couldn't help trembling all over, and big beads of sweat appeared on his face.
From the beginning to the end, it didn't even take half a minute.
"Probably another one who took in monster beast poison..." someone murmured.
Soon, this boy's guess was confirmed.
"You should have all seen what just happened. On behalf of the school, I'm warning you all again, seriously. You are absolutely not allowed to touch monster beast poison! Alright, no more talking. That girl who was blown to pieces outside is a living example."
Teacher Liu, who was in charge of the monster beast teaching, gave everyone a brief warning and then led the team to the experimental building.
The sky was especially clear. If it weren't for passing by that shocking pile of flesh and blood, many people would have thought that what had just happened was just a terrifying illusion.
...
In the shadow outside the experimental building, a moon-white rat was tied up. It was a meter tall when sitting on the ground.
It had been happily sucking on a sorghum stalk. When it saw a group of students coming, it suddenly froze, then turned its head in a silly way, staring at everyone with its ping-pong ball-sized eyes.
Suddenly, as if it had seen something, it stared blankly and shed a tear.
It looked so pitiful yet cute.
"Ou Yan, Cui Yu, you two are responsible for leading the soul-controlling rat to the laboratory. I'll take the others there first."
Seeing the two students looking hesitant and scared, Teacher Liu smiled and said, "Don't be afraid. Its teeth have been pulled out already."
After giving the instructions, Teacher Liu took the others and walked ahead.
"Many classmates may not be very familiar with the history of monster beasts. Let me give you a brief introduction."
While tidying up the experimental tools like knives and pliers, Teacher Liu was spreading knowledge.
"As you all know, our world is full of mountains, rivers, and plains. Just ten thousand years ago, this world was dominated by monster beasts. Humans were just small tribes scattered in the mountains, living in the shadow of the sharp teeth and claws of monster beasts.
Later, humans established a unified civilization on this great river plain and finally got rid of the nightmare of monster beasts.
However, until three hundred years ago, the territory of the Shang Kingdom was only one-fifth of the continent. With the accelerated development of technology, the average lifespan of humans has been greatly extended, and the population has exploded.
Today, the Shang Kingdom has covered more than half of the continent.
On the one hand, for safety reasons, and on the other hand, we need the fur and crystal cores of monster beasts, so the number of wild monster beasts within our territory has become scarce.
Most of the monster beasts have gathered in the ten thousand miles of wild land on the east side of our border city.
Very few monster beasts have developed intelligence during the long process of evolution, but it's at a very low level. The vast majority are still in an uncivilized state.
Today, what we are going to dissect is an uncivilized wild soul-controlling rat."
"Teacher, why don't we use captive-bred monster beasts? This big rat was living happily in the mountains. It's so pitiful to dissect it!"
Mu Lan looked at the guy sitting stupidly on the one-meter-high display platform and sucking on the sorghum stalk with a bit of heartache.
"There's no way. Because after generations of selective breeding, captive-bred monster beasts have lost their innate abilities and can't be used to demonstrate to you all."
Mu Lan nodded disappointedly and pursed her lips without saying a word.
There was quite a lot of information today. From what the teacher said, it seemed that there was only one country in the whole world, the Shang Kingdom!
And it occupied more than half of the land!
Was it that this country was too big or that the world was too small?
"Alright, let's first take a look at the innate ability of this monster beast. Everyone should experience it carefully. Humans rarely awaken soul-controlling talents, but it's not uncommon among monster beasts."
After saying that, Teacher Liu slapped the sturdy rat.
The soul-controlling rat's whole body trembled like waves, looked at her, and then stupidly stuck out its tongue to lick her hand.
Teacher Liu smiled and said, "The soul-controlling rat is very gentle, and an attack of this level is just like scratching an itch to it. So, how can we stimulate its innate ability?"
She picked up a sharp surgical knife and made a long cut on the rat's leg.
With a "click" sound, the rat bared its teeth in pain, and the sorghum stalk it was sucking on fell onto the display platform. Its eyes instantly turned bright red, and it let out a scream.
The energy barrier around the display platform was activated and lit up, shining brightly.
Since there was no uncomfortable feeling, the students became a bit restless.
"It's nothing special. It seems..."
"Isn't this big rat able to control..."
Without any warning, all the students suddenly shut their mouths and sat there motionless, with dull expressions in their eyes. They didn't look much better than the soul-controlling rat before.
Even Teacher Liu was the same!
The only slight difference was that there was some confusion and struggle between her eyebrows.
This monster beast had just stepped into the Monster Warrior Realm and had its teeth pulled out. Even in a head-on duel, even if it used its soul-controlling ability first, for Teacher Liu, who was at the peak of the Warrior Realm, it would be a problem that could be solved in just two or three rounds.
With absolute certainty, Teacher Liu had controlled the energy barrier to lower the defense and let one-tenth of the rat's soul-controlling ability leak out.
The duration wouldn't exceed five minutes, just to let the students experience the soul-based talent of monster beasts.
Moreover, the soul-controlling rat was one of the gentlest and most common monster beasts. Teacher Liu never expected that something would go wrong with it.
She stood there blankly, and a look of horror suddenly appeared in her eyes.
Could it be a mutated monster beast?!
There was only a one in ten thousand chance! Why did I have to come to class today? Why didn't I go buy lottery tickets?
At this time, under the furry skin of the rat, it seemed as if lumps of knotted muscles were bulging. It let out another shrill scream towards the front.
A hint of struggle flashed in the dull eyes of the students.
A female student struggled to raise her hand and knocked on the head of the classmate beside her.
Another male student stiffly lifted his foot and kicked his deskmate.
The students soon got into a melee, but they didn't use their spiritual energy. They just attacked and dodged stiffly and slowly like shrews among zombies.
Teacher Liu was already surrounded by seven or eight students. Although she could use a bit of her spiritual energy, she couldn't withstand so many people who were so desperate. For a while, they were in a fierce struggle.
Bufan was also caught in the chaos, but only for an instant. Then his eyes became clear and cold, with the air of a killer.
At the moment when Bufan's soul was about to lose control completely, he took the initiative to retreat into his body, and Xiao Li Heya took over.
In the middle of the enclosure, there was a single bed. Several people were struggling to hold down Bufan's restless hands and feet. Qiu Tianlin tied him to the bed with ropes round and round.
He wiped the sweat off his forehead and complained, "Is this being possessed by evil spirits?"
After several people controlled Bufan, they then looked up at the sky screen above.
They saw a little girl with her eyes fixed straight ahead, stretching out her hands and reaching out to pinch them.
Xiao Li Heya knew that this was a little girl who was close to Bufan, so of course he wouldn't use too much force. He just grabbed her arms and pushed her aside.
Seeing that a group of people couldn't defeat Teacher Liu for a long time, the rat became furious. It stretched out its two paws, struggled to tear open the energy shield, and pounced fiercely at Teacher Liu.
Could it actually tear open the energy shield? Teacher Liu's thinking was a bit sluggish now, but she instinctively felt the danger.
The rat bit Teacher Liu's neck, but it forgot that it didn't have teeth.
It just left a few blood marks on Teacher Liu's neck, and the blood was actually its own.
It landed on the ground and was a bit dazed for a moment.
Without its big front teeth, it didn't figure out how to fight for a while.
After a full five seconds, it remembered that it still had its claws. Although the tips of its toenails had been cut off, they were still enough to cause serious harm to its opponent.
It leaped up again with great effort, showing its blunt toenails and scratching at Teacher Liu's left face.