Meeting Xiao Wu

Chapter 5 Meeting Xiao Wu

Durand and Tang San reached the dormitory building soon. There was only one building for all the academy students and teachers. Old Jack had said it before, potential spirit masters were only a small portion of the whole human population and it showed especially in a remote city like Nuoding. There were fewer than forty students per year at Nuoding Academy. Durand and Tang San said their goodbyes when they reached their rooms. Though Durand had only met Tang San after he reincarnated, he had come to view Tang San as a brother. Tang San had guided him in cultivation and given Durand a sense of comradery and brotherhood when he had invited him into the Tang Sect.

When Durand walked into room eight, he was shocked to discover a small dust covered room with a single bed in it. What he didn't know was that this room had originally belonged to the teacher in charge of room seven. However, the teacher had come from a small aristocratic spirit master family and had been raised with a disdain toward the common people. The teacher had demanded to live in a different room. The principal could not prevent him from living off-campus and so he had compromised and given the teacher a room that was farther away but was still near enough that the teacher would have to interact with the other students. Durand's arrival to the Douluo Dalu world had caused the working student roster to increase by one. There was no more beds available in room 7 and Durand was assigned to the teacher's room for himself.

Durand decided to look at the situation positively. Though he would have a more difficult time making friends with the other students, his main goal was to join the Shrek Academy and it would not be too late to make friends at that time. Additionally, he would have much more privacy and his cultivation would be less likely to be interrupted by others. Most importantly, it was fortunate that Xiao Wu had not been assigned to this room. Otherwise, Durand's existence could have severely changed Tang San's relationship.

Even though the room was very dirty from years of neglect and it only took Durand half an hour to clean it. Not only was he used to doing chores, but his spirit awakening seemed to have increased his strength and endurance. By the time he was done, the room was neat and tidy and his belongings had been unpacked. As he cleaned, he could hear some odd thumping sounds from room seven next door. After a moment of confusion, Durand chuckled to himself as he realized that Tang San and Xiao Wu were fighting to be the "big brother/sister" among the working students.

Soon after, he heard a knock on the door. When he opened, a thirty year old teacher with pale green hair, carrying two sets of bedding, greeted him, "Durand, this bedding is a gift from Grandmaster to you and Tang San. Come with me, I don't want to repeat myself to you and the other working students."

Durand hurriedly left Grandmaster's gift on the top of his bed and walked to room seven with the green-haired teacher. As the teacher entered, he said, "Stand up for moment. I am Mo Hen, you can call me teacher Mo. Where is Tang San?"

Again, Teacher Mo delivered Grandmaster's gift and he began explaining to the new students their responsibilities as working students, "Tang San, Xiao Wu, and Durand, you are first year working students. From now on, Tang San and Xiao Wu will be responsible for sweeping the garden south of the sports ground. Durand, you will be maintaining the same garden by trimming the foliage and removing weeds and unnecessary grass. You will work each day and be paid ten copper spirit coins. All trash must be sorted out neatly, otherwise your wages may be deducted. If you are delinquent on your duties, the academy can expel you. Do you understand?"

The three of them nodded at the same time. Receiving their acknowledgement, Mo Hen continued, "Tomorrow is the opening ceremony. The day after, regular classes begin. First year classes are on the first floor of the main school building. Your work will begin on the first day of class. We may do non-scheduled checks to ensure that you are completing your job duties. For now, you can rest first."

Teacher Mo turned to address an older looking boy in the room, "Wang Shen, you're the oldest here, so tell them about the rules." Teacher Mo seemed to hurry out of the room as if he wished to spend as little time with the students as possible.

As the teacher left, Xiao Wu bullied Tang San into sharing his bedding with her. Durand and the other spirit scholars had cheeky smiles as they watched silently at the two. After the bed situation was settled, Xiao Wu stared at Durand as if she had found a new toy.

"Hey, doesn't our room have a rule where new working students have to show their spirit's strength? Let's exchange pointers!" Xiao Wu provoked. She seemed to have gained a lot of confidence after defeating Tang San earlier and wanted to cement her position as the "big sister" of the group after seeing another new face.

Durand grinned as he got into a serious fighting stance. He had little qualms about fighting with women. Tang San had come from a male dominant society and had initially looked down on Xiao Wu's fighting ability. However, Durand came from a much more progressive culture that valued gender equality. Even with his knowledge of Xiao Wu's fighting prowess, he had already been raised with an attitude to never underestimate people simply by their gender.

Xiao Wu dashed forward rapidly, aiming for a fast kick at the chest. Compared to Tang San, Durand was much slower. However, he made up for the difference in strength and endurance. Taking a step backwards, Durand drove his rear foot into the ground to transition into a bow stance. As Xiao Wu foot pushed into Durand's chest, He leaned slightly back to dampen the attack's power. By dampening the attack, he had successfully slowed Xiao Wu to a more manageable speed which allowed him an attempt to grab Xiao Wu and place her into a joint lock. However, Xiao Wu recovered quickly and retracted her leg by regaining her balance using her arm to touch the ground. This pattern repeated itself: Xiao Wu rapidly attacking with extremely fast kicks at Durand and Durand quietly rebuffing her attacks. Eventually, both Xiao Wu and Durand became tired.

Panting heavily, the two glared at each other like mortal enemies. However, Durand seemed to recover from the heat of the moment and said, "This should be my loss. Even with my larger size, I wasn't able to gain an advantages in the fight. If this were a real fight with weapons, you would have easily been able to wound me."

Xiao Wu also recovered and accepted Durand's admission of defeat. Tang San stared at Durand seemingly lost in thought. The other working students in the room however, looked at Durand enviously. His ability to shrug off the downpour of attacks from Xiao Wu seemed like a divine ability to them. Having to endure the taunts and physical attacks from the other entitled students had caused them a lot of pain. Being able to simply shrug those off would have improved their lives at the academy considerably.

The fight had worked up everyone's appetite and Wang Shen invited Tang San, Xiao Wu, and Durand to lunch. After promising to pay him back, the three freshman agreed.

When the group entered the dining hall, they were greeted rudely, "Oh? If it isn't Wang Sheng's group of charity cases." The voice was from the second floor. A handsome eleven to twelve year old male student taunted with disdain, "Charity cases are just charity cases, they'll probably never be able to eat on the second floor."

Durand watched as Tang San held Xiao Wu back from attacking the child. Like Tang San, Durand was a reincarnated adult and he felt nothing from being taunted by a child. These childish taunts were dismissed quickly by Durand as simple background babble. While they ate, Grandmaster came by to invite them to his first lesson after their meal. After quickly finishing their simple lunch, Tang San and Durand quickly made their way with Grandmaster back to his residence.

When the two entered, Grandmaster offered the two of them some food. Durand nearly cried tears of joy at the look at the chicken legs and steamed bun. The flat cake that he had gotten from the first floor cafeteria was like hard bread and could hardly be called food. Tang San and Durand wolfed the food down before Grandmaster began his lecture.

"The two of you have twin spirits. Release your other spirits and let me have a look," said Grandmaster.

The room seemed to split into two when Durand and Tang San released their spirits. On Tang San's side, a strong, tyrannical aura oozed from the small black hammer. In contrast, Durand's small glowing blue tree released a gentle and warm feeling filled with a vibrant life aura.

Seeing the hammer in Tang San's hand, Grandmaster suddenly shot up from his seat to his feet, his eyes exuding an extremely agitated light. Unwaveringly staring at the hammer, murmuring, "Tang San, Tang San, surname Tang… ok, you can put away the spirit. You must not reveal your second spirit easily to others. Also, without my permission, you absolutely cannot add any spirit rings to this spirit. This part you have to remember well."

Tang San rather surprised looked at Grandmaster, "Dad also told me this. Why can't I add spirit rings to this spirit?"

The agitated light in Grandmaster's eyes gradually dulled, "What does your father do?"

Tang San said, "He's a village blacksmith."

"Blacksmith?" Grandmaster's gaze became rather strange, heaving a sigh he shook his head, "Blacksmith and hammer, it's unexpectedly a perfect match."

"It's not the right time to tell you yet. You just need to remember: right now you are not to use this spirit and add spirit rings. This is very important for the sake of your future. You must properly keep this firmly in mind."

Since father said so, and Grandmaster also said so, this made Tang San's confidence in Grandmaster increase, "I understand."

Grandmaster turned to Durand and said, "Like Tang San, you should not get spirit rings for one of your spirits. However, you will be able to choose which spirit you wish to add rings to. This will rely heavily on which cultivation direction you wish to take."

He added, "I would strongly recommend that you begin with your Fifteen Ton Ant Emperor spirit. The Fifteen Ton Ant Emperor's advantage is that your body will greatly increase in physical strength and endurance. The endurance increase in particular will improve your ability to absorb stronger spirit rings. This will give you an advantage among your peers."

Durand replied, "I understand. I will cultivate my Ant Emperor first." (I also want to complete the mutation requirements for my spirit as soon as possible) he thought.

Grandmaster continued, "Tomorrow is the opening ceremony, the day after tomorrow the regular classes will start. Right now the most pressing matter is to make your spirit able to continue cultivation. Early tomorrow morning you will follow me from the academy and I will bring you to go look for a suitable spirit ring, to let you advance up to the next level."

Durand became excited. He was finally going to get his first ring! His mind couldn't help but imagine the many different potential spirits he could use for his first ring. Moreover, this was the first step to finally become a spirit master.

As Durand fantasized about 'his' spirit ring, Grandmaster patiently explained to Tang San the difference between beast and tool spirits as well as their cultivation directions. Soon, Grandmaster and Tang San came to the agreement that Tang San should cultivate his blue silver grass towards the control system direction.

Grandmaster's explanation of control system spirits was simple: control spirits rely on restricting the opponent with the goal of assisting an attack. Turning to Durand, Grandmaster said, "Durand, you have two choices with your spirit. Since the Fifteen Ton Ant Emperor has such incredible strength and endurance, you can choose between being an attack system or defense system spirit master. Personally, I recommend that you be a defensive spirit master. It just so happens that Tang San's hammer is suited to be an attack spirit and the two of you are already a team. More importantly, healers are usually attacked first in a battle between spirit master groups. Having a defensive spirit will make you nearly impossible to take you and your team down."

Durand asked, "Teacher, how common are attack and defense spirit masters?"

Grandmaster beamed at the question, "Great question! Attack spirit masters are very common since most beast spirits are attack oriented. Defense spirit masters are quite rare and are valuable team members among other spirit masters. However, your healing spirit already makes you very valuable by itself."

"Then I will be a defense spirit master," answered Durand. Even though Durand had already planned to become a defensive spirit master before his reincarnation, he had wanted a reaffirmation from Grandmaster. After all, Grandmaster was known to have the most extensive knowledge regarding spirit ring cultivation.

"Will I also not add any spirit rings to my healing spirit?" asked Durand. To Durand, it seemed somewhat wasteful to have such a valuable spirit but use it until much later.

Grandmaster gave Durand the same stern look and said, "Yes. You absolutely should not add a new spirit ring to your second ring without my permission."

Grandmaster looked to the both of them, "Do the two of you have any more questions? If not, we shall meet again tomorrow morning to look for an appropriate spirit ring for the both of you."

"No, teacher." Both Tang San and Durand left the room, excited for the next day.