Chapter 5

…My head hurts.

Chu Zhongyuan was awakened by the pain. He regained consciousness amid the severe pain in his brain. He tried hard to open his eyes, but found that his eyelids seemed to weigh a thousand pounds.

The sudden feeling of weightlessness completely enveloped his consciousness. Under the stimulation of extreme shock, Chu Zhongyuan finally saw the light again.

That was a scene that I will never forget in my life.

A long green wind was swirling around the young man's body, supporting Chu Zhongyuan's shoulders and floating the two of them in the air.

The clean and handsome face was even brighter against the backdrop of the night and the bright street lights. The fluffy black short hair was dyed with the color of the dark blue night, and the clean and transparent brown eyes, through the black-rimmed glasses, reflected Chu Zhongyuan and the endless distance.

The wind blew like a snake, carrying with it coolness and a mysterious fragrance, and the young man rode the wind like a god.

Gu Qingming at this moment was like the most magnificent summer day, frozen and engraved in Chu Zhongyuan's memory, never fading.

"Chu Zhongyuan? Chu Zhongyuan? Can you hear me?"

The young man who was controlling Changfeng changed his previous calm appearance and showed anxiety.

Chu Zhongyuan came back to his senses from his daze and wanted to answer, but his stiff body made him unable to move at all, so he could only remain silent.

Gu Qingming understood that the words "white chalk mist" that appeared on the notebook probably referred to the long wind that was surrounding them. Just now, he tried to control the long wind that was flowing around them, but found that they were like an extension of his own limbs, extremely obedient.

Gu Qingming, who had experienced a series of mental torture before, accepted the fact that he could suddenly control the wind well. Compared with those terrible strange events happening around him, the awakening of special abilities at least gave him some hope of fighting against the people behind the strange events.

After all, things that cannot be hit by fists always make people fear lack of firepower.

But... although he could control the wind, as the two of them floated in the air longer, the originally obvious green color slowly faded.

It seems that this ability to control the wind is not permanent and has certain limitations.

Gu Qingming didn't have time to be excited for the moment. The most urgent thing was to quickly get out of the air more than ten meters high with Chu Zhongyuan. He slowly controlled the green wind to lower the two of them to the ground, while checking whether Chu Zhongyuan's consciousness had recovered.

Fortunately, for some reason, the strange black paper man behind Chu Zhongyuan turned into ashes on his own as if it was ignited after coming into contact with the green wind. Otherwise, it would not be so easy to wake up Chu Zhongyuan.

"What's going on?"

The two landed safely with the help of Changfeng, which Gu Qingming controlled unskillfully. Chu Zhongyuan finally regained consciousness, but he still had a lot of words to say. After picking and choosing in his mind, he finally chose this classic question.

He had handled the situation with ease when Zhang Yiwei was chasing him before, but now he had a ferocious expression as if he had seen a ghost. He had fear, doubt, disbelief, and... a bit of ecstasy???

Gu Qingming felt that he might be blind.

What is a pie chart?

"Uh... I said, this situation is all caused by a strange notebook, do you believe it?"

Gu Qingming was speechless for a moment. Just now, he was only thinking about Chu Zhongyuan waking up quickly and getting rid of the influence of the paper man. He didn't think about how Chu Zhongyuan would explain this supernatural scene to the other party after waking up.

At that moment, Gu Qingming's brain was working frantically, searching for all the excuses that could be used.

However, unexpectedly, all the explanations that he came up with were blocked by Chu Zhongyuan.

"I believe it."

To Gu Qingming's surprise, Chu Zhongyuan did not scream or run away, but pronounced the two words word by word. His expression was as if he was thinking of an enemy from eight lifetimes, and he was gritting his teeth.

He took a deep breath, as if he was making up his mind, then turned and walked towards the bag that had fallen from the dormitory building with him, and took out a black, B5-sized package from the bag.

It was exactly the same outer packaging as the notebook Gu Qingming had just received.

"You, you won't tell me that there is also a notebook in here, right?"

Gu Qingming was shocked by what Chu Zhongyuan took out.

"Well... uh... this is really... a coincidence."

Chu Zhongyuan smiled bitterly. He did not explain directly, but took out the contents from the opening of the package and let Gu Qingming see it clearly for himself.

It was still a notebook, and its cover was exactly the same as Gu Qingming's. The notebook was a simple black color and was so old that it was almost falling apart. Only the six-digit metal combination lock was shining with a silver light, without a trace of old color - it was almost exactly the same as the one he received, the only difference was the place where the glue had loosened due to its age and the age of the entire notebook.

Gu Qingming looked at Chu Zhongyuan. His usually calm and transparent brown eyes were filled with calmness after surprise. Gu Qingming did not speak, but waited for the other party's next explanation.

"This was a courier that a friend of mine signed for me last week on his own initiative. The shipping address was my grandparents' house. I thought it was something from Grandma Shen, so I accepted it without thinking too much." The "hatred" on Allen Chu's face deepened.

Gu Qingming instantly understood who Chu Zhongyuan was gritting his teeth at. It was the man that He Song had introduced to him: the man of the hour, Zheng Qiuji, who everyone in the grade knew. Of course, he was also Chu Zhongyuan's famous bad friend. Because these two people were chased by Zhang Yiwei every day, they were also called "Lightning Twins, Lantai Twins" by the alumni who liked to watch the fun.

"Because of this notebook, I have strange dreams every night--" Having said this, Chu Zhongyuan angrily took out two crumpled blank self-review forms from his school uniform that was like a pocket.

"I was caught sleeping during evening self-study for two consecutive days by Emperor Zhang. How could I have ever violated such a common rule? This has ruined my reputation as Chu Zhongyuan. I'm like—"

"puff."

Gu Qingming couldn't help laughing out loud.

After noticing Chu Zhongyuan's glance, Gu Qingming suppressed his laughter and continued the old joke: "It's okay, I just remembered something happy."

"You also... were given two apology slips?" Chu Zhongyuan cooperated very well and continued to play the joke.

"No," Gu Qingming waved his hand, "I slept after class. I have nothing, not as rich as you. But I also had nightmares."

“Hahahahahaha—”

“Hahahahaha——”

The two looked at each other and laughed again, as if they could put the strange things that had just happened behind them and find a moment of relaxation in each other's cheerful and unrestrained laughter.

"Thank you." Gu Qingming's lips were still curled up. He stretched out his hand to wipe away the tears from the corners of his eyes. He could see that this was Chu Zhongyuan's deliberate rhetoric to ease the tense atmosphere, so he thanked him naturally.

"Why thank me? I should relax a bit. We are now in the same boat. And you just saved my life. I should be the one thanking you."

"After all, it's too scary for a person to go through such a weird experience, and I can't just tell others about it. Even if your reasons are not necessarily the same as mine, it's good to be able to share some of it."

Chu Zhongyuan shrugged as he spoke. He chuckled at Gu Qingming, as if relieved of a heavy burden. His narrow and handsome willow-leaf eyes curved into a crescent-shaped arc. The handsome long-haired boy tilted his head slightly, bathing in the golden light leaking from the street lamps, adding a bit of peace and tranquility.

No wonder all the girls in the grade are so obsessed with this guy. Even Gu Qingming, a handsome guy who has a mysterious buff as a transfer student and claims to have good looks, doesn't even take him seriously. This guy is really handsome from all angles.

Looking at the scene in front of him, Gu Qingming nodded in understanding. At the same time, he also understood why he saw ecstasy on Chu Zhongyuan's face before. It was like a latecomer seeing another latecomer while running on the way to school. He would also be ecstatic.

"Then let's go through it as a pair."

Chu Zhongyuan said this while pointing at his notebook.

"When you first encountered this notebook, did dark blue handwriting also appear? Was the content the three characters Jiuyoujing written in regular script?"

"Nine Nether Mirror? But what I saw was the green chalk mist?"

Gu Qingming frowned slightly, and he and Chu Zhongyuan looked at each other, as if they thought of a possibility at the same time.

"Could it be that these words that suddenly appeared symbolize the names of our abilities? And the ability you just used is the so-called: Chalk Storm?"

Chu Zhongyuan widened his eyes.

"I'm afraid so," Gu Qingming recalled. "When I used my wind control ability for the first time, the word that suddenly appeared in my head was Bai Ke Lan. Probably... the words that appeared when we first encountered the notebook were the names of our abilities."

"That's not right. Your Cretaceous Storm has a Storm in it that can be related to the Wind, but the Nine Nether Mirror has nothing to do with my ability."

Chu Zhongyuan looked very confused.

Gu Qingming looked at Chu Zhongyuan in confusion, only to see Chu Zhongyuan clapping his hands lightly. Translucent water waves mixed with deep blue, indescribable fluorescent spots appeared out of thin air and floated gently around him. The brilliance in between was like a mature, sparse starry sky, mysterious and noisy.

No, compared to the starry sky... there is a more appropriate natural scenery that is more suitable to describe the manifestation of Chu Zhongyuan's supernatural powers.

The "fluorescent sea" phenomenon occurs on coastal beaches due to the accumulation of plankton.

Those water waves emitting a faint blue glow surrounded Chu Zhongyuan, looking like the long green wind that emerged from his body when he controlled the airflow before.

It was so beautiful that Gu Qingming almost forgot to breathe.

"Your ability—"

"Oh, it's very simple, just -"

Gu Qingming saw that Chu Zhongyuan's originally smiling face suddenly twisted into extreme fear.

But he still rushed towards Gu Qingming as soon as possible, as if he saw something terrible appearing behind Gu Qingming, and he was determined to pull Gu Qingming over even at the risk of his life.

A sound of breaking air was heard, and Gu Qingming frowned slightly and looked back, only to see a huge black paper man as tall as a human approaching at some point in time, raising its sharp paper arms high towards him and slashing at him with all its might.

This paper man is so smart that he can pretend to disappear...

I was so focused on the conversation with Chu Zhongyuan that I ignored the subtle sound of the paper man appearing just now...

In the moment of crisis, Gu Qingming became even calmer. His brain worked quickly, trying to find a way to block the attack.

A swirling green wind appeared beside Gu Qingming, as if it were an extension of his limbs. He moved the green wind towards the attacking arm of the paper man, trying to shift the attack position of the paper man to increase the success rate of dodging.

But before he succeeded, Chu Zhongyuan had to move faster.