Meanwhile, in the office, Yuan Hanshuang stood before Xiao Yunmeng, who pointed to a chair. “Sit down.”

Looking at the seemingly well-behaved blonde girl in front of her, Xiao Yunmeng’s eyes flickered with complexity.

A few hours ago, she and Hong Nian had come up empty-handed, but they did discover students skipping class without reason.

After several years of teaching at the Junior Academy, they had never encountered such a rebellious student.

However, if they were to give up so easily, it wouldn’t be consistent with Xiao Yunmeng’s character.

So she and Hong Nian knocked on the door of their neighbor.

“Oh, that household.”

The neighbor poked their head out. “I remember it’s a single-parent family. The adult has an intellectual disability, and the burden falls on their nine-year-old daughter. She’s hardly at home during the day and is probably working outside.”

Following the lead provided by the neighbor, Xiao Yunmeng and Hong Nian arrived at a bar.

“We’re looking for someone, someone who has had facial disfiguration. Oh… we do have someone like that here.”

The bartender readily replied, “He works as a security guard at our bar. However, he usually goes out for a walk after lunch and only comes back during work hours in the afternoon.”

Unfortunately, at this moment, the Imperial Legion suddenly sealed off the nearby blocks, and the two couldn’t proceed, so they had to turn back.

To be honest, their mindset had undergone several shifts during their pursuit.

At first, they wanted to help a promising seedling. Then they discovered that this child had fooled the teacher, which inevitably made them angry. However, after truly understanding the background of the student’s family, their anger dissipated completely.

Living in a poor district, from a single-parent family, with a disfigured and intellectually disabled father, the burden fell heavily on the nine-year-old girl.

“It’s not fair to blame the child.” Hong Nian lit a cigarette in the floating car. “With the family’s circumstances, if she didn’t come to class today, she probably went to work part-time to earn money.”

“You should know that a poor student like her at such a young age can barely afford to eat. How could she possibly have money?”

“She wears the same few clothes every day. I should have realized it earlier.”

Xiao Yunmeng looked at the star trails below. “Before, when she said the patches on her clothes were a fashion statement, I was wondering if it was just a child’s vanity…”

When she thought about her previous thoughts, she couldn’t help but feel ashamed.

“Dirty adults.”

Hong Nian smiled wryly. “She’s only nine years old, but we always try to understand them based on our own thoughts.”

“Sigh, we’ll go back and discuss the subsidy with Principal Song. Let’s see if we can exempt her from tuition. If that’s not possible, we’ll deduct it from our own salaries.”

“Okay.”

The flashback ended.

Xiao Yunmeng opened the cabinet and took out a nanobag.

When Yuan Hanshuang looked down, she saw several brand new clothes neatly packed inside, enough for four complete sets.

“These are temporary school uniforms issued by the school. You can wear them for now.”

Although Xiao Yunmeng said this, Yuan Hanshuang could still sense something.

The fabric of these clothes was of high quality, and there were four sets of different colors for her to change and wash. They didn’t look like they were specially tailored for her alone.

“Don’t worry.” Her silence made Xiao Yunmeng realize something. “It’s free.”

Since it had come to this point, Yuan Hanshuang could only accept it. “…Thank you, teacher.”

As the saying goes, when you borrow someone’s hand, you have to pay it back.

Since she accepted the clothes, Yuan Hanshuang couldn’t pretend to be oblivious. “Teacher, I shouldn’t have skipped class. I know I was wrong.”

Acknowledging her mistake readily but refusing to change her ways.

Based on Yuan Hanshuang’s years of experience, when a student makes a first-time mistake and shows a good attitude, teachers generally don’t hold it against them.

However, instead of forgiving her, Xiao Yunmeng sighed softly after giving her a brief glance. “Our 1999 star is just an ordinary remote planet among thousands of star clusters in the empire. You’ve never been to the central star system, so you don’t know how abundant the resources are there and how many exceptional individuals there are. The college entrance exam is like crossing a single-log bridge amidst a thousand troops and horses. You must fight your way out among these people.”

She spoke with great emphasis. “You’re still young, maybe you don’t know. But I can tell you for certain that for ordinary talented individuals from remote planets like us, the college entrance exam is definitely an important shortcut to success. It’s related to your life and future. Frequent truancy like you’re doing now will be extremely detrimental to your future development as a person.”

“Also, if you have any difficulties, you can come to me. We are more than willing to help you.”

Yuan Hanshuang was momentarily stunned. “Thank you, teacher.”

Her tone carried a sincerity that was absent before.

The office fell silent.

After a moment, Xiao Yunmeng spoke again. “The school has recently established a scholarship. If you rank in the top three in the final exams, your tuition fees will be reduced. If you rank first, you can choose whether or not to attend classes. If you want to skip class, fine, but I hope you can demonstrate the confidence to do so.”

In fact, there was no such scholarship. It was a motivational plan specifically designed for Yuan Hanshuang by Xiao Yunmeng and Hong Nian after discussing it with Principal Song.

“Yay!” As expected, the golden-haired child’s eyes lit up. “I promise not to let the teacher down!”

Seeing her shining eyes, Xiao Yunmeng’s heavy mood finally cleared up like cloudy skies giving way to sunshine.

Perhaps this is the meaning of being a teacher, she thought.

“Oh, by the way… Teacher, one more thing. Does the level of manifestation increase with practice?”

“No, it doesn’t.”

As a teacher of psychic power courses, Xiao Yunmeng had a much deeper understanding of this aspect than others. “The quality of manifestation is determined at the moment of awakening and cannot be changed.”

“So there’s no possibility of promotion for ordinary manifestation?” Yuan Hanshuang was unwilling to give up.

“No.” Xiao Yunmeng shook her head. “The level of ordinary manifestation has no chance of promotion. It’s a world that is inherently unfair. Ordinary manifestation of lower levels requires much more effort than rare manifestation to reach the same level.”

“But Young Master Gu from our class has recently shown a rising trend in her psychic ability test.”

This was something Young Master Gu boasted about herself, so it couldn’t be false.

“But it’s different.”

Xiao Yunmeng smiled bitterly, “The level of Manifestation doesn’t increase with cultivation unless it already has the potential for growth.”

“Gu is exceptionally rare in terms of manifestation and is well-known on the interstellar manifestation rankings. Those gifted with the talent of the Fiery striped Tiger have reached the S level, indicating that this manifestation itself has the potential to reach S level. Currently, only a C level has been detected in Gu because he is still young and his psychic power is unstable, preventing him from fully unleashing his manifestation’s strength.”

However, ordinary koi fish… obviously don’t have this potential for advancement.

She looked at the blond little girl and earnestly advised, “So, don’t be complacent just because you defeated Young Gu. If you don’t bridge the talent gap with more effort, he will easily catch up with you sooner or later.”

Yuan Hanshuang left the office with a heavy heart.

The world is always unfair, and the unfairness lies in  Gu’s certain future high manifestation level.

Of course, her unfair advantage lies in her precious martial arts memories from her past life. If we really count, her advantage is even greater as the one with a cheat code. But let’s not talk about that.

The reason she felt heavy-hearted was because of something unusual about herself.

Due to a peculiar and mysterious premonition, Yuan Hanshuang vaguely sensed that although Xiao Teacher said manifestation levels were fixed, her own manifestation level seemed to be still increasing.

This had already been confirmed a few months ago.

She was at the D level when she awakened her psychic power, but after intense cultivation for over a month, her entrance exam result jumped to C level.

If someone found out, they would probably take her to a research institute for dissection. After all, there had never been such an astonishing precedent in the entire interstellar.

According to teacher Xiao Yunmeng, only powerful manifestation would be limited by the body’s age. But her koi fish and little black bird were both ordinary, and the word “powerful” didn’t apply to either of them.

Could it be because of the dual manifestation?

Unable to figure it out, Yuan Hanshuang simply put this matter aside and started pondering another more important matter.

If she guessed correctly, Teacher Xiao yunmeng’s final words meant that as long as she could rank first in her year, not only would she be exempt from tuition fees, but she could also freely skip classes.

Was there such a good thing?

Author’s Note: Shuangshuang has not yet realized how miraculous her two mimicries are _(:з」∠)_

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Thank you all for your support. I will continue to work hard!