Ye Rong suddenly shot to her feet. Her aura billowed out, terrifying the surrounding pixies. They carefully peered out of the flowers and stared at her. The way they saw it, this seemingly-gentle woman was the most terrifying person here.
“Ye Zichen!” Ye Rong was so angry that she called out his full name. Her gaze was sharp as could be. Ye Zichen hadn’t anticipated her to get so angry. In his memories, Ye Rong had always been a gentle, kind loving mother, always laughing no matter what was happening around her. Even when he was naughty, she just pretended to get angry to scare him. In the end, she’d always pat him on the head and give him a few pieces of candy.
Finally, she’d give him a solemn warning about what behavior was acceptable and what behavior wasn’t.
And yet, based on her billowing, terrifying aura, she was truly angry.
“Mom.”
“Go to your room and wait for me. Without my permission, you are not to take a single step outside,” said Ye Rong, her eyes wide with anger. She pointed at the room behind her.
“I….”
“Go!” In the face of her fury, even Yang Jian and the Great Sage shrunk back
At the same time, they noticed Pu Jingwan and Xiao Yumei. They’d come here looking for Ye Zichen, but they were now standing behind the pagoda and beckoning towards Yang Jian and the Great Sage.
“Mom….”
“Go inside!” Ye Zichen had already lost track of how long it had been since she’d last scolded him like this.
He licked his lips, bade the Hermit Emperor farewell, bowed to Ye Rong and Xuan Ji, then stepped inside without so much as another word.
He almost opened his mouth to speak, only for Ye Rong to glare at him, scaring him into silence.
Beneath the weight of her gaze, he had no choice but to obediently go to his room.
Only then did Ye Rong’s gaze soften somewhat. However, when she looked at the Hermit Emperor, there was no trace of friendliness in her eyes whatsoever. “If you’re here to play lobbyist, you might as well just forget it.”
“Lobbyist? It’s nothing like that. You might have misunderstood me; your son and I bumped into each other en route, but I didn’t deliberately go looking for him,” said the Hermit Emperor with a calm smile. “I’m actually here because I wanted to discuss something with you.”
Ye Rong knit her brows.
At first, she’d assumed that the Hermit Emperor had gone looking for Ye Zichen deliberately, or alternatively, that this son of hers was unwilling to obey and had brought the Hermit Emperor here to try and change her mind.
He was a long-famous senior of the God Race. Ye Rong trusted that, given his ill.u.s.trious reputation, he wouldn’t lie to her about this.
Since he said that, odds were he really was just here to say a few words to her.
“Please, go on.” With that, Ye Rong sat back down in her chair and gestured for the Hermit Emperor to follow suit.
….
“Wah, Ye Zichen, your mom is quite vicious!” Pu Jingwan blinked and exclaimed. Even this far away, and even facing away from Ye Rong, she could still sense her ferocity.
Afterward, she nudged Xiao Yumei’s arm. “You’ve got hard days ahead of you.”
“Aunt Ye is actually quite gentle,” said Xiao Yumei. She remembered how Ye Rong had behaved back in the Modern Realm. “She’s lost her temper, but that’s to protect Ye Zichen.”
“That really scared the crap out of me.” Yang Jian rubbed his hands together repeatedly. Even now, just thinking about Ye Rong’s expression made his scalp go numb.
“Right, how did you two get here? We didn’t see you on our way here,” said Pu Jingwan.
“Ah, I see.” Pu Jingwan nodded, then glanced toward the room Ye Zichen had slunk into. “For now, we’d best not go looking for him.”
As soon as she spoke, something buzzed in the Great Sage and Yang Jian’s pockets. They pulled out their phones, then saw:
Only Idealism has invited Erland Shen and the Monkey King to join a chat group.
“Is that a message from Ye Zichen?”
Both Pu Jingwan and Xiao Yumei had used cell phones before. They knew what chat groups were. The four of them gathered in a circle and saw….
Ding dang!
Only Idealism: You two have no conscience. How could you run off and leave me on my own like that?
“Is ‘Only Idealism’ Ye Zichen?” asked Pu Jingwan.
Yang Jian and the Great Sage couldn’t help but nod.
Yang Jian and the Great Sage both laughed along.
It was specifically because of this name, combined with Ye Zichen’s mysteriousness, that the entire group chat had been so curious about him all those years ago.
Only Idealism: Quit playing dead! Get out here and talk to me! @ Erlang Shen @ Monkey King
“Can you pull us into the group too?” asked Pu Jingwan.
“You have cell phones too?”
As soon as they heard the question, both Xiao Yumei and Pu Jingwan pulled out a cell phone each. “What do you think?”
….
“Some friends they are, just running off like that and leaving me on my own! And after all that talk about bros sticking together through thick and thin!” Ye Zichen leaned against the doorway and glanced intermittently at his phone. Sometimes, he put his ear to the door in an attempt to eavesdrop on Ye Rong and the Hermit Emperor’s conversation.
There was nothing else he could do. After he entered his room, Ye Rong placed a seal around the perimeter.
Ding!
Erlang Shen invited the Invincible Adorable Beauty and the Ultimate Charmer to the chat.
The Invincible Adorable Beauty: Hee hee, Little ChenChen!
What the heck?
When Ye Zichen saw this message pop up on the screen, he couldn’t help but complain.
If he weren’t mistaken, these two new additions were Xiao Yumei and Pu Jingwan, but their usernames….
Ultimate Charmer?
What unconventional names!
If someone with a username like that tried to add him, Ye Zichen would definitely refuse their friend request. But the characters in the name “Ultimate Charmer” sounded a bit like Xiao Yumei’s name, so Ye Zichen guessed it was her. He didn’t know why she wasn’t using the same account as before, though.
Given her shameless personality, choosing such a name wasn’t really out of character.
“Wah, Yumei, this username….” Pu Jingwan pointed at the name on the screen, then burst into exaggerated laughter. Xiao Yumei blushed. This was the username she’d used long ago, back when she first started using social media. She later created a different username for work, but for some reason, she couldn’t access that account anymore.
When she heard Pu Jingwan laugh at her, Xiao Yumei bit her lip. “Mine? Yours is even worse. The Invincible Adorable Beauty….ugh….”
“What’s wrong with it? Am I not adorable? Am I not beautiful?” Pu Jingwan scrunched up her little nose and snorted. Don’t be fooled; she might be a ruler, and a powerful one at that, but in private, she had a side no one knew about. It was similar to how when Ye Zichen first entered the group: he’d been shocked to discover that the so-called “War God” Yang Jian loved nothing more than online flame wars!
