Back at Madam Cho's 'Heavenly Haven,' a number of the more resilient students were gathered, mostly third, fourth and fifth-year students. Generally, the third and fourth-years were either in the latter stages of the Energy Gathering Realm or the early stages of the Inner Core realm, while the fifth-years were either in its latter stages, or preparing to enter the fourth and final realm of natural cultivation.
The Dao Integration Realm.
So, it stood to reason that these students could better deal with Madam Cho's food, however they were still expected to eat more than one serving. To get away from this, students took to surreptitiously leaving their spirit stones and then running away from the cafeteria as quickly as they could.
Luckily, neither Madam Cho nor her staff tried to stop them from doing this.
Currently, Madam Cho was sitting beside the worker at the counter on a wooden stool, her white uniform slightly muddled by various ingredients. She held a bamboo cup in hand and took sips of the warm jasmine tea inside every now and then.
"That boy," said the counter worker, Na Lanran. "He said he was having his first class today, not so?"
Madam Cho nodded, "That's right. I suppose whoever his teacher wound up being would have found a way to test his body a bit. I wonder how he did... and who his teacher is."
The counter worker cleared her throat and jerked her head subtly in Madam Cho's direction.
"Oh yes, that's right," Madam Cho said, suddenly reminded of something. Then, she reached into the pocket of her apron and pulled out a stone talisman. After focusing some energy into it, the talisman lit up before dimming, then it lit up on its own about half a minute later.
Focusing on it again, Madam Cho smiled. "He was actually placed in Class 4, and his teacher turned out to be the ancient, Nagira. How fitting that an ancient would oversee this year's Class 4. They always manage to pull off some remarkable feats."
Na Lanran chuckled, "So its Nagira, eh? That ancient is truly something else. The only person I've seen eat more of your food than Young Huang would have to be him. Oh, and that criminal. Peh!"
It seemed that the so-called 'criminal' left a bad taste in Na Lanran's mouth, so she spat on the floor.
"Ah, ah. Come now, Lanran. I've told you about spitting here."
Na Lanran immediately apologized for her emotions getting the better of her and started cleaning.
"You are right though. I wonder just what kind of relationship those three will have in the near future. I'll have to ask Nagira and the 'criminal' to keep me updated."
"Then you'll have to be ready to prepare some more free heaven-grade pizzas. Those are the only things that can get that boy talking," Na Lanran chuckled again, then saw a group of students approaching the counter.
While she left to take their orders, Madam Cho looked at the stone talisman before using it to send another message. Not waiting for a response, she finished her tea and went back into the kitchen.
. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
After Mr. Nagira's class, Jin Huang followed Qi Shuyue to a food vendor that she highly recommended. Although Madam Cho's food was the best in terms of energy-infusion, there were some other establishments and vendors that prepared entirely different kinds of meals, using some truly remarkable ingredients.
Madam Cho's cafeteria was essentially forced to only focus on things the student body was known for enjoying, and so she could not waste time and energy preparing something that only one or two students would want.
After all, most of the students and staff chose to eat her food, even if they were unable to finish all of it most of the time.
Following Qi Shuyue, watching as her short violet curls bounced, Jin Huang caught a whiff of a familiar scent.
"This... !" He immediately recognized it as the same smell he had gotten back when he was walking around with Ms. Sinclaire. It was the most amazing thing he had ever smelled, and there was only one thought in his mind.
"I must eat its origin!"
Wandering off the path, Jin Huang stepped off of the stone brick road and onto the cloudy outskirts, marching off toward the rainbow-colored light at the very edge. If he went past that, he would surely fall off and head directly below, into the dark black pit that was the Academy's sacred realm.
Following only his nose and trusting nothing else, Jin Huang's hunger led him toward certain doom. Yet, he followed blindly. When he reached the very edge, he crouched and leaned over the edge, staring at the dark pit below. Taking a deep breath through his nose, he felt his nostrils fill up with that scent as it enriched his body.
Euphoria washed over him and he prepared to fully commit.
"Wait for me, delightful thing. I'm coming to swallow you."
Just as he was about to fully send himself over the edge, he felt a hand rest softly on his shoulder, and heard the voice of a young man in his ear.
"Although I'm certain the intricately crafted and carefully controlled nature of the spatial nodes down there would prevent you from falling to your death, I don't think first-years are permitted to go down there."
Shen Wuyou's friendly smile and streaks of white amidst black hair appeared in Jin Huang's vision, and he suddenly felt the scent fade. No matter how he sniffed, he could no longer find the aroma again.
"How odd," he frowned, looking at Shen Wuyou.
"You didn't happen to smell that, did you?"
"Smell? Smell what?" Shen Wuyou blinked as he watched Jin Huang stand.
"That smell. It was like everything good to eat in the entire world wrapped up into one scent. The most amazing scent ever. You didn't smell anything like that?"
The young man stood up and shook his head, "Unfortunately not. Are you saying you were following that scent and it led you to almost leap over the edge?"
Jin Huang nodded. "When I first came into the Academy itself, just outside of the Orientation Hall, I smelled it. I hadn't smelled it again until now. Then, as soon as you came, the scent vanished again. What could it mean?"
Shen Wuyou shrugged with an amused smirk, "Maybe your body itself is your spirit guide, and its leading you toward your destiny. Whatever it is, the only way your body can get through to you is by enticing you to hunger. Perhaps there's not even any food down there. Perhaps its something else entirely."
Jin Huang sighed, then gazed over the edge again. All of the colors in the grand void, the multicolored lights, the swirling starry clouds, the galaxies and the stars, the planets and so on. All of them seemed to just stop existing after a certain point, and only the shadow of that pit could be seen.
There was nothing inviting about it, but Jin Huang was absolutely certain that the scent had come from there.
"Maybe you're right. Whatever it is, it can't be a coincidence that I smelled it twice, and no one else seems to smell it but me."
Shen Wuyou smiled, "You're so right."
He came by Jin Huang's side, and stared down at the shadowy entrance to the Sacred Realm. "Do you trust your nose, Jin Huang?"
Jin Huang gave him a playful laugh, "Of course. It's never misguided me before."
Shen Wuyou gave Jin Huang a pat on the shoulder, his hand lingering on the latter's body.
"The same can be said about me and my dice. My father once told me there is nothing in all of existence that cannot be summed up in the roll of a dice. All things are encompassed in the toss, and the answer to all things is found at the end. My dice have guided me throughout my life so far, and have never led me astray."
Jin Huang was taken aback, "That's actually incredible. Is it related to the dao that Mr. Nagira mentioned? Chance and Luck and all that?"
Shen Wuyou nodded, then removed the pendant from his necklace: a simple, 6-sided die. "My path of cultivation is a bit special. The only way for me to move forward, past the natural realms, is to follow that path."
"That's why," he paused, rolling the die around in his hand, "It's time to toss the dice once more."
Following that, he tossed the die up and watched it land on the cloudy floor. The die then proceeded to roll... and roll... and roll straight off the edge, falling down into the dark pit.
With his hand still on Jin Huang's shoulder, Shen Wuyou leaned forward again to look at the falling die, still spinning around in the air.
Jin Huang looked at him, and Shen Wuyou tightened his grip on Jin Huang's uniform.
"Like I said," he fell forward, pulling a confused Jin Huang down with him, "time to toss the dice!"
Jin Huang was falling by the time he registered exactly what was happening, unable to comprehend how he had not seen it coming. Perhaps there were forces at play here that he truly did not understand, like Shen Wuyou suggested when he mentioned destiny.
Shen Wuyou was smirking confidently when he looked at Jin Huang, then he gave him an excited smile and a thumb's up. "Let's see whether both your nose and the dice of my life are wrong or not!"
Rapidly, the two young men fell past the many cloudy layers, heading directly into the faraway black pit. As they fell, Jin Huang was certain that he caught a whiff of that scent again.
Only, this time, it was steadily getting stronger.
Meanwhile, back in the Academy, Qi Shuyue was walking around and shouting out Jin Huang's name, confounded as to his disappearance.