Ye Bai walked back home.
The house wasn't large, and its emptiness was magnified by the fact that he lived there alone.
After closing the gate behind him, he quietly began his work.
Two short pieces of bamboo, one above and one below, were strapped to his left arm. Ye Bai was making an arm guard. The materials were simple, but it was better than nothing.
He gave it a shake, the bamboo held firmly. Then he tapped it lightly with the hatchet in his right hand. Not bad, the protection was just as he'd hoped.
Satisfied, Ye Bai put his clothes back on.
Night fell quickly. The sky wasn't too dark, the wind was gentle, and Ye Bai felt no trace of sleepiness.
He strolled slowly into the city square.
The square was a wide open space with a spring at its center. A stretch of lawn lay before it, and beyond the lawn stood a small forest.
At this hour, there were only a few people around.
In the darkness, two small figures appeared; it was Liu Long and Liu Hu.
"Brother, you have to help me teach Ye Bai a lesson later. He beat me up this morning. Look at my face, it's still a little swollen." Liu Long complained.
He had quietly woken his brother in the middle of the night, slipped past their parents, and dragged him to the city square, determined to get revenge on Ye Bai.
The only problem was… Liu Long wasn't sure if Ye Bai would actually show up.
So, when Liu Long spotted a small figure standing by the fountain in the center of the square, his heart leapt with delight.
He quickly reminded his brother again, Ye Bai had to be beaten half to death tonight.
Under the moonlight, Liu Hu took a closer look and saw that Liu Long's face was indeed a little swollen.
Fury surged in him. Ye Bai had dared to bully his brother. His brother had always been someone that only he was allowed to bully. Yet, Ye Bai had dared…
Liu Hu clenched his fists, already set on beating Ye Bai to a pulp.
"Ye Bai, you're here." Liu Hu called out, stepping in front of Liu Long.
His tone was gentle, without the slightest hint of the storm brewing inside.
Ye Bai felt a twinge of dissatisfaction.
According to the fifth rule of face-slapping, striking someone without hostility didn't count. And Ye Bai would never allow that.
After all, why go through the trouble if it didn't earn him any face-slapping points?
If that were the case, then what was the point of hitting someone? He might as well just go home and sleep.
"I'll beat you two idiot brothers." Ye Bai said flatly.
Liu Hu froze. He hadn't expected Ye Bai to be this arrogant, leaving him momentarily speechless.
"You idiot—Brother, Ye Bai is scolding you," Liu Long quickly pointed out.
"I…" Before he could respond properly, Liu Hu smacked Liu Long on the head with a loud slap.
"Brother, why are you hitting me…"
"Ahhh!" Liu Hu roared. "Ye Bai, you're too arrogant! I'm going to beat the shit out of you!"
With that, Liu Hu lunged forward. His build was sturdier than Liu Long's, and even his rush carried a faint breeze.
"Very good," Ye Bai said calmly.
Ye Bai's nonchalant attitude only stoked Liu Hu's fury further. With a sharp yell, he brought his hand down in a fierce knife strike.
At just eight years old, Liu Hu already carried a fair amount of strength, thanks to years of good food at home. Facing Ye Bai, who was much thinner than him, Liu Hu was brimming with confidence. This strike, if it landed, would cripple Ye Bai's arm outright.
A smile crept onto Liu Hu's face. He could already picture Ye Bai's expression twisting in pain.
But the very next moment, his own face contorted instead, warped by sudden, sharp agony.
"Aghh! What is that in your hand?!" Liu Hu cried out.
It was, of course, the bamboo arm guard that Ye Bai had crafted.
Liu Hu's hand knife had been aimed at Ye Bai's neck, but Ye Bai had no intention of letting him succeed. He raised his left arm, using the arm guard to block the strike.
Though crudely made, the bamboo still had a decent toughness to it.
Liu Hu's palm, on the other hand, was mere flesh and bone.
With the force he had put behind the blow, it wasn't hard to imagine how much pain surged through his hand upon hitting something so hard.
But force was reciprocal.
Liu Hu's hand throbbed with agony, yet Ye Bai also felt a faint sting in his arm. It wasn't much of a loss, but even so, Ye Bai found it irritating.
And then, his irritation vanished, replaced by delight.
In his mind, the slap count on the dashboard suddenly jumped to 13.
'This…'
Though ecstatic, Ye Bai was also puzzled.
After all, when he left earlier, the slap count had still been 7. Now it had suddenly risen to 13, an increase of 6.
What was even stranger was that he hadn't even slapped Liu Hu's face yet, and the counter had already gone up.
'Could it be…'
A thought struck Ye Bai. Perhaps face-slapping didn't necessarily require a literal hand striking flesh. If so, then the definition of face-slapping was far broader than he had imagined.
'Slapping someone in the face is a profound culture.' Ye Bai mused.
His eyes flickered as though he could already see a new path unfolding before him, one that led to ever more slap count.
But now, with Liu Hu's face so close, it would be a waste not to strike.
While Liu Hu was still stunned, Ye Bai swung his right hand in a sharp backhand.
Slap!
The sound rang out as his palm landed squarely on Liu Hu's cheek.
The slap count instantly jumped again.
At that moment, the system panel on the right shifted. A new button appeared beside the counter.
It read: [Innate Soul Power Boost]
Beneath it, a smaller line of text appeared: [For those with Innate Soul Power level 10 or below, every 10 slaps consumed will increase Soul Power by one level.]
Ye Bai, excited, slapped even harder.
"Ye Bai, stop hitting my face!" Liu Hu finally began begging for mercy.
He could fight Ye Bai in a brawl, sure, but Ye Bai was simply too ruthless. Even when Liu Hu's fists landed on him, Ye Bai didn't so much as grunt or flinch. He looked like a complete lunatic.
And what baffled Liu Hu even more was that Ye Bai never struck anywhere else, only his face.
'Why only the face?' Liu Hu was utterly confused.
But Ye Bai's heart was full of joy. 'Every slap to the face means more Soul Power. How could I not be happy?'
Pa! Pa! Pa!
After a while, the counter finally stopped climbing, halting at 23. That meant Ye Bai's innate Soul Power could be raised by two levels.
Liu Hu clutched his burning cheeks, tears welling up. He really couldn't take it anymore. "Don't… don't hit me anymore, Ye Bai! I give up!"
"Come again."
Liu Hu leapt back in panic. No way! If he let Ye Bai continue, he'd end up with a pig's head.
Seeing Liu Hu retreat in fear, Ye Bai's gaze naturally shifted to Liu Long. 'Right… I haven't tallied his slaps yet, have I?'
According to the previous slapping criteria, Liu Long should also be able to contribute some slaps to the count.
However, Liu Long was even more cowardly than Liu Hu.
Watching his brother get beaten so miserably, he quickly blurted out, "Boss Ye, please don't! I already accept you as the boss, so don't hit me!"
Ye Bai was stunned. 'Who wants to be anyone's boss? What I want are slaps to the face, yet this coward… sigh.'
"Do you listen to what the boss says?"
"Yes!" Liu Long nodded frantically.
"Then stick your face out!" Ye Bai ordered.
"Ah?"
Liu Long was dumbfounded. He thought bowing his head and calling him boss would spare him the disaster, but to his despair…
'Wuwuwu, Boss Ye, can't you be a little gentler?'
——
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