"Bang, bang, bang, bang"
It seemed someone had entered the house and was walking in the hallway outside the bedroom door. In the quiet of the night, the footsteps sounded clear and eerie. Moreover, the footsteps were getting closer and closer to the bedroom door.
Wang Youcai opened a drawer, grabbed a sharp knife, mustered his courage, slowly walked to the bedroom door, gritted his teeth, and suddenly pulled open the bedroom door.
The footsteps stopped abruptly, but the hall was empty; there was no one there.
Sweat beaded on Wang Youcai's pale face. Holding a sharp knife, he slowly walked out of the bedroom, his eyes quickly scanning the living room. The living room was empty, as always, with nowhere to hide.
But after what had just happened, Wang Youcai no longer believed it was an illusion. Something must have come, perhaps a ghost.
"Humans have their way, and ghosts have theirs. No matter what grudges you had with me in your past life, rest assured, as long as you let me go today, I will invite a high monk to hold a memorial service for you tomorrow. You can make any requests you have, and I will definitely fulfill them for you!" Wang Youcai was indeed a man who had made his way in the world. Although he was dark-skinned, he was clever and quick-witted, and quite bold.
After a long while, there was no movement in the living room; perhaps the ghost had already left.
Wang Youcai breathed a sigh of relief, turned around and closed the bedroom door again. Sleeping was out of the question. He should think about the memorial service tomorrow. In order not to be disturbed, he had to keep his word.
Sitting on the bed, about to make a phone call, Wang Youcai suddenly caught sight of something floating outside the window out of the corner of his eye. His face instantly turned pale—the ghost hadn't left!
A red paper was floating outside the window.
However, the words on the red paper changed—"Open the altar for sacrifice, repair the road in Mazhuang, if you fail to complete it, I will take your head."
Wang Youcai broke out in a cold sweat and hurriedly cupped his hands towards the window, saying, "Don't worry, I will definitely do what you ask. Tomorrow, just tomorrow, I will start doing these things tomorrow. Don't worry!"
No sooner had the words left his mouth than the red paper fluttered out of the Wang family's gate and disappeared into the night.
Wang Youcai actually wanted to secretly chase after it to see what was going on, but in the end he didn't dare, after all, that red paper had just floated away on its own! If it wasn't a ghost, then what could it be?
He sat back down on the bed and picked up his phone to make a call.
"Hey? Monkey, yeah, it's me. I have two things for you to do. First, I need to invite a high-ranking monk to perform a ritual for the departed tomorrow. Contact him for me, make sure it's a real monk, not some imposter. Huh? Damn it, your family member just died! Shut up, contact him right now, the sooner the better. Second, I'm planning to build a road for Ma Village. Yeah, don't ask why, I'm perfectly clear-headed right now. Just these two things. The ritual needs to be completed tomorrow, and the road construction needs to be finalized in the next couple of days. Yeah, thanks for your help. Let's get together sometime. Okay, that's all."
After hanging up the phone, Wang Youcai sat on the edge of the bed and lit a cigarette. The smoke swirled around him, casting shadows on his face.
...
The red paper left Wang Youcai's house and traveled quite a distance before stopping in a secluded corner. Then, the red paper suddenly fell to the ground and remained silent.
Ma Xiaoniu got home after 11 PM. He went into his bedroom and deactivated his invisibility. In about half an hour, it would be midnight. After midnight, he could draw the lottery again. What would he draw this time? What kind of mission would he get? Thinking about the mission, Ma Xiaoniu couldn't help but feel a headache coming on. If all the missions were like today's, that would be fine. But what if one day he got a mission like breaking into a women's bathhouse?
I shuddered and decided to stop thinking about it; things would work themselves out.
Before I knew it, midnight had passed, and the roulette wheel shrouded in dark smoke appeared right in front of me.
"The lottery has begun. Please complete the draw within two minutes, otherwise an automatic draw will be conducted and a penalty will be imposed..."
"Extract!" Ma Xiaoniu silently chanted in his mind.
The roulette wheel reached high speed in an instant and then slowly came to a stop. A beam of blood-red light shot out from it, and at the same time, Ma Xiaoniu knew the result.
Superpower: Demon's Eye
Quest: Use the Eye of the Demon to recruit a wicked servant for future evil deeds.
The Devil's Eye, as the name suggests, is the eye of a demon. It can hypnotize someone and change their mind through the eyes.
As for the mission, to be honest, Ma Xiaoniu breathed a sigh of relief when he saw it. Although Wang Youcai decided to perform a sacrifice and repair the road because of the ghost incident, Ma Xiaoniu believed that this person's nature was hard to change. Ma Xiaoniu had originally decided to teach him a lesson again, and the appearance of the Demon's Eye completely relieved Ma Xiaoniu of any worries.
Hehe, Wang Youcai, from now on you'll be my obedient dog.
I leave for school promptly at 7:30 every morning. Ma Xiaoniu's school is Caoxiang Junior High School. It's a small school, and because rural people generally envy city life and therefore believe that urban education is superior to rural education, there aren't many students—three grades, a total of six classes, with about thirty students in each class. This has resulted in the school's educational quality consistently being relatively low. It's not that the teachers aren't hardworking; it's just that the good ones have all left, leaving behind only the less capable. Teachers aren't gods; they can't turn bricks into gold.
In the past, Ma Xiaoniu was helpless about this. After all, it was a major social trend, and no matter how much he wanted to, he couldn't stop it, right? But now Ma Xiaoniu's thinking has changed. With the Demon System and countless superpowers, changing things doesn't seem so difficult anymore.
The first thing that came to Ma Xiaoniu's mind was his own class, Class 2 of Grade 9. A truly terrible class. Since taking over this class in Grade 7, Ma Xiaoniu had practically exhausted himself dealing with these students. But the frustrating thing was, these students remained defiant, acting like they owned the place. Over the past three years, Ma Xiaoniu had received countless complaints from other teachers.
Ma Xiaoniu rubbed his temples; just thinking about it gave him a headache. But today, hehe. Ma Xiaoniu revealed a sinister smile.
The school wasn't far, and Ma Xiaoniu arrived about five minutes later. Entering the office, he found several teachers already there, including Mr. Wang from Class 1, Grade 9. His full name was Wang Tiansheng, 40 years old, from Songzhuang. Mr. Wang wasn't exactly a bad person; he was generally quite decent in his interactions. However, he loved comparing his class to Ma Xiaoniu's, which infuriated Ma Xiaoniu. But there was nothing he could do; his own students were just too disappointing!
"Little Ma's here. The third mock exam is in half a month. So, what are your plans?" Old Wang's voice was loud, but there was a teasing smile in his eyes.
Damn, why does this guy have to bring up the wrong thing? There are only two classes in ninth grade, don't you know whether our class is good or not? Ma Xiaoniu smiled: "I do have a plan though."
"Oh? Then you really have to tell me, so I can learn from you." Old Wang's smile widened.
"My plan is that in the mock exam in half a month, all the students in my class will pass, and in the high school entrance exam in a month and a half, all 35 students in the class will be admitted to key high schools!" Ma Xiaoniu said calmly as he sat down.
"Um... Xiao Ma, are you still asleep? Just your class? If I remember correctly, there were quite a few students in your class who scored below 50 in the last mock exam. You know, the cutoff score for key high schools has always been above 550. Are you sure it's all of them, and not just one?" Old Liu, who was grading homework across the desk, pushed up his glasses in surprise.
Mr. Liu is the homeroom teacher and math teacher of Class 1, Grade 8. He is over fifty years old and has always been seen as a kind and gentle person.
Old Wang laughed heartily beside him, "Ambition knows no age! Very good, very good! I think it'll work! If you actually pull off your plan, I'll definitely treat you to drinks—we won't leave until we're drunk!" (The recent encoding issues are motivating us to update faster. Please exit reading mode if you're in the mood. Thank you.)
===Chapter Four===
"Hey? Old Wang, I remember you never drank a drop of alcohol, what happened?" Old Liu pushed up his glasses again; his glasses were rather large and always seemed to fall off.
"The whole class got into a top high school. This is an honor that our school has never had before since it was founded. If this happens, Xiao Ma will become a celebrity! Isn't that something to celebrate?" Old Wang's mouth was stretched to the back of his head.
"Huh? What? The whole school got into a top high school? What are you all talking about?" A fat man, about 1.6 meters tall, pushed open the door and came in. He was wearing a black suit with a white shirt underneath, had a big belly, and wore glasses on his fat face.
"Oh? Principal Chen, you're here. Just now, Xiao Ma was saying he wanted all the students in his class to get into top high schools for the high school entrance exam. We were just discussing that." Old Wang put away his smile and said seriously.
"Oh?" Principal Chen looked at Ma Xiaoniu with surprise and smiled, "Your ambition is commendable, but you still need to work harder. Your class's second mock exam results weren't very good. Alright, class is about to start, so get ready." As he spoke, he pushed open the door and walked out.
Ma Xiaoniu also knew that based on his second mock exam score, no matter how eloquently he spoke, it would be difficult for people to believe him. In the end, it would still depend on his grades and abilities.