111: Chapter 111 Chu Youwei: I really didn't mean to punish him!
The black letters crawled with incredible speed.
A moment ago, they were wrapped around Su Yun, but in the next second, as if they had suddenly found a long-lost master, they swarmed densely up Chu Youwei's fingertips and onto the back of her hand.
Chu Youwei's expression changed, and she immediately tried to pull her hand away.
It wouldn't budge.
The letters were like ants activated by hot oil, biting tightly into her skin, crawling up her wrist, and wrapping around those few black paper strips that hadn't yet dissipated.
The paper strips snapped taut.
A rustling sound of pages turning echoed through the living room, as if countless English test papers were being flipped open at the same time.
The look of schadenfreude on Su Qing's face vanished instantly.
She stepped back half a step, her eyes guarded.
This thing was just disgusting before.
Now, it seemed to have come alive.
Su Jianguo stopped pretending to be weak; he didn't even bother holding his waist anymore, and a flash of fierce Black Flame crossed his eyes for an instant.
But the next second, he saw that Lin Wanqing hadn't moved.
He put his hand back on his waist.
The head of the household re-entered his "work-related injury" state.
Chu Youwei gritted her teeth and raised her other hand to try and tear the letters off.
But as soon as she touched them, the letters, as if having found their true home, all lit up with a faint ink-colored glow.
A string of distorted comments appeared on her wrist.
[Invigilator Compatibility: Extremely High]
[Teaching Will: Stable]
[Discipline Maintenance Tendency: Excellent]
[Punishment Execution Desire: Strong]
Chu Youwei froze.
The living room froze too.
Su Qing's eyes slowly lit up.
Just as she was about to speak, Chu Youwei looked up at her sharply.
Her gaze conveyed two words clearly: "Shut up."
Su Qing held back her laughter.
It was very painful.
Su Yun looked down at the lines of text, his expression subtle.
"Punishment execution desire: Strong."
His tone was very serious.
"Classmate Chu, you usually hide it quite well."
Chu Youwei's face turned bright red instantly.
"It's not!"
Her voice changed from anxiety.
"This is just the Strange Tales writing nonsense!"
Su Yun nodded.
"I believe you."
Chu Youwei just let out a sigh of relief.
Su Yun added: "After all, Strange Tales generally don't write too conservatively."
Chu Youwei: "..."
The teaching pointer in her hand snapped and bent with a pop.
It wasn't because she bent it.
It was bending on its own.
That black teaching pointer, originally formed by rules, suddenly shattered, turning into rings of black letters that wrapped around her wrists, waist, and collar.
Panic finally appeared in Chu Youwei's eyes.
She tried to shake them off.
She couldn't.
The more she shook, the tighter the letters became.
It was as if they were regrading her paper, or perhaps reformatting it.
The next moment.
The living room lights dimmed abruptly.
A gust of inky black wind swirled up from the floor.
Su Qing instinctively raised her hand to shield her face.
Su Jianguo almost threw a punch by instinct.
Lin Wanqing set her teacup down gently, pressed her fingertips to the tabletop, and a faint layer of golden light flashed beneath the dining table.
The inky wind didn't spread.
It only swirled around Chu Youwei.
A few seconds later.
The wind dissipated.
Chu Youwei stood where she was.
Her school uniform was gone again.
In its place was a sharp, impeccably tailored black teacher's uniform.
The white shirt was buttoned to the very top, with a dark red thin tie knotted at the collar.
A black cropped jacket hugged her waistline, the skirt hem hung straight, and her legs were once again covered in black stockings.
Her blonde hair fell to her shoulders, the tips looking as if they had been dipped in ink.
The broken teaching pointer in her hand reformed into a black fountain pen gleaming with a cold light.
A drop of scarlet ink hung from the nib.
She looked cold, proper, and dangerous.
Like the final Invigilator who had walked out of the Strange Tales.
Su Yun's eyes lit up.
Very brightly.
He sat inside the ink cocoon, his gaze becoming quite proper.
"This one is also not bad."
Chu Youwei's eyes turned red instantly.
She was genuinely on the verge of crying from anxiety.
"Su Yun!"
Her voice trembled.
"Can you stop evaluating!"
Su Yun was silent for a second.
"Then shall I record it objectively?"
The black fountain pen in Chu Youwei's hand began to tremble violently.
Su Qing, standing nearby, was shaking her shoulders from holding back laughter.
She had wanted to mock her a bit, but seeing Chu Youwei looking like she was about to cry, she swallowed the words.
This time was different.
Before, it was just social death.
Now, something real was happening.
Chu Youwei looked down at her hands.
The black letters arranged themselves into dense English comments along her palms; each letter seemed alive, gently wriggling in time with her heartbeat.
Her breathing was rapid.
"I can't shake them off."
She rubbed her wrist hard.
Her skin turned red, but the letters didn't budge.
"They are burrowing into my body."
Su Yun's eyes flickered.
He could feel it.
Those residual rules weren't devouring Chu Youwei.
They were acknowledging her.
It was like a set of examination rules with no successor had found someone more suitable to be an Invigilator than the original Strange Tales.
They had no malice.
At least, not for now.
They were just overly enthusiastic.
So enthusiastic that it was like a Dean of Students discovering a natural-born Homeroom Teacher.
Lin Wanqing finally stood up.
She was wearing a light-colored lounge dress, her dark hair tied loosely behind her head, and her expression was gentle, yet she possessed a power that could make the entire living room fall silent.
She walked up to Chu Youwei.
Chu Youwei stood straight instinctively, like a student seeing a real principal.
Lin Wanqing reached out and gently pressed her hand onto her wrist.
The black letters shuddered immediately.
As if they had detected some higher-level holy aura, their crawling speed slowed down instantly.
Chu Youwei looked at her nervously.
"Auntie, have I... been corrupted?"
She had seen those Strange Talk Sequence from Neon.
Tsukuyomi.
Yomi Boy.
Hundred Ghosts Parade.
Those people wore human skin, but there was nothing human in their eyes.
Madness, distortion, worshipping monsters, even treating destruction as glory.
She didn't want to become like that.
And she certainly didn't want to become like that in front of Su Yun.
Lin Wanqing looked at the letters on her wrist, her eyes darkening slightly.
A moment later, she spoke.
"Don't be nervous."
Chu Youwei was stunned.
Su Qing was also stunned.
Su Jianguo had an expression that clearly said, "And you say not to be nervous?"
Lin Wanqing's tone was steady.
"You are not being devoured by the Strange Tales."
"It is that this portion of the rules is acknowledging you."
Chu Youwei's throat tightened.
"Acknowledging me?"
Lin Wanqing nodded.
"The core of the Foreign Language Tribunal has been severed; these are just residual rules."
"They have lost their host but have found a new bearer."
"Simply put, you are not a Strange Tales now."
She paused.
"You have just become a Sequence holder who possesses a portion of Strange Tales abilities."
Chu Youwei was completely stunned.
The living room was silent for a second.
Then her voice cracked.
"And this doesn't require being nervous?"
She lifted her wrist.
The black letters seemed to understand her words and proactively arranged themselves into a line of neat, small text.
[Please Invigilator maintain calmness]
Chu Youwei almost broke down.
"It even told me to stay calm!"
Su Qing looked at that line of text, her expression complex.
She suddenly felt that this rule was quite brave.
To actually dare to advise someone to stay calm at a time like this.
It was on par with Su Yun.
The ink cocoon on Su Yun had loosened quite a bit.
He looked down, then spoke slowly.
"Actually, there's no need to be too pessimistic."
Chu Youwei looked at him.
Su Yun said seriously: "You see, those Strange Talk Sequence from Neon are very crazy, but that's not necessarily the problem of the Strange Talk Sequence."
Chu Youwei was taken aback.
Su Yun's tone was extremely objective.
"It's also possible they were that crazy before they even became Strange Tales."
The living room fell silent.
Su Qing's mouth twitched.
She actually thought this made some sense.
Su Yun continued: "After all, look at our Great Xia Executive Jiang Xu."
"Even after possessing a Strange Talk Sequence, isn't he still just as rational?"
Su Jianguo almost lost his composure.
Executive Jiang Xu?
Rational?
Did this kid have some misunderstanding about what "rational" meant?
Lin Wanqing glanced at Su Yun.
She didn't refute him.
Because from a certain perspective, Executive Jiang Xu was indeed rational.
Rational to the point of not seeming like a normal person.
Upon hearing Executive Jiang Xu's name, Chu Youwei's breathing steadied slightly.
Executive Jiang Xu was a Great Xia Executive.
Even if transformed by abyssal power, he still stood on the side of humanity.
At least for now.
Seeing her expression soften, Su Yun added another sentence.
"Besides, this ability of yours is quite practical."
Chu Youwei was guarded.
"How is it practical?"
Su Yun looked down at the letters on his body.
"In the future, you'll know at a glance who isn't studying well."
Chu Youwei: "..."
Su Qing's expression changed instantly.
She took a step back.
This ability was an asset to others.
To her, it was a natural enemy.
Chu Youwei also looked at Su Qing.
The black letters on her wrist suddenly glowed gently.
The next second, a line of small text appeared.
[Target: Su Qing]
[Vocabulary Reserve: Suspected Negative]
Su Qing exploded.
"Are you two done yet!"
She pointed at the line of text, her face flushed with anger.
"How can vocabulary reserve be negative!"
Su Yun comforted her.
"Don't be angry."
Su Qing was about to let out a sigh of relief.
Su Yun continued: "It says 'suspected,' which means it hasn't been definitively confirmed yet."
Su Qing grabbed a sofa cushion and threw it.
The cushion flew halfway before being intercepted by a string of black letters.
The letters automatically formed a comment.
[Throwing objects is prohibited in the classroom]
Su Qing looked at that line of text, feeling completely numb.
"Does this thing really treat my house as a classroom?"
Chu Youwei was even more panicked.
"I didn't control it."
Lin Wanqing gently pressed her shoulder.
"That's why I said, don't be nervous."
"The power is out of control right now only because you aren't skilled at controlling it yet."
Chu Youwei's eyelashes trembled.
"Can it be controlled?"
"Yes."
Lin Wanqing's voice was very steady.
"Rules will instinctively execute the logic they are most familiar with."
"The more panicked you are, the more it will think the examination hall order is chaotic."
"The more you try to shake it off, the more it will strengthen the binding."
"What you need to do is not resist."
She looked into Chu Youwei's eyes.
"It is to command it."
Chu Youwei's breathing stalled slightly.
Command it.
Not be dragged around by it.
But like a real Invigilator, issue rules.
She looked down at her wrist.
The black letters were still slowly wriggling.
Like a group of students waiting to be graded.
Chu Youwei closed her eyes.
When she opened them again, the panic in her eyes had subsided significantly.
She spoke softly.
"Release the binding."
The surroundings fell instantly silent.
The ink cocoon wrapped around Su Yun didn't move.
The ink cocoon wrapped around Su Qing didn't move either.
Chu Youwei's ear tips turned red again.
The situation was momentarily very awkward.
Su Yun kindly reminded her.
"Maybe your tone isn't teacher-like enough."
Chu Youwei bit her lip.
She took a deep breath and gripped the black fountain pen tightly.
The faint glow of residual rules in her eyes lit up again.
This time, her voice turned cold.
"I said."
"Release the binding."
Pop.
The letters wrapped around Su Qing instantly loosened.
Su Qing stumbled, almost falling to the ground.
She looked down at her hands and feet, which had regained their freedom, and her eyes lit up.
It really could be controlled.
The next second.
She looked at Su Yun.
The ink cocoon on Su Yun was still there.
It didn't move.
The living room was quiet again.
Su Yun looked down at the letters on his body.
Those letters had even wrapped themselves more properly.
As if they were afraid he would run.
Chu Youwei was stunned.
She tried again.
"Release the binding on Student Su Yun."
The letters didn't budge.
They even spelled out a line of text on Su Yun's chest.
[Key correction object, release not granted]
Su Yun: "..."
Su Qing was stunned first, then burst into laughter.
"Hahahaha!"
She held onto the sofa, laughing until she couldn't straighten her back.
"Su Yun! It's targeting you! It's actually targeting you!"
Su Yun looked at the line of text on his chest with an expressionless face.
This thing really had a death wish.
Chu Youwei's face turned slightly pale.
"I really didn't mean to trap you."
Su Yun looked at her.
"I know."
Chu Youwei just let out a sigh of relief.
Su Yun looked back at the line of text.
"But it doesn't quite know that."
The black letters suddenly shuddered.
It was as if they had detected some indescribable chill.
No aura exploded from Su Yun.
He still looked like an ordinary high school student wrapped up like a zongzi.
But those letters began to instinctively shrink.
They had no eyes.
But they seemed to have seen something extremely terrifying.
Lin Wanqing's eyes flickered, and she gave a light cough.
Su Yun immediately restrained himself.
The living room temperature returned to normal.
Chu Youwei didn't notice the anomaly in that instant.
She only saw the letters loosen a bit.
So she thought her control had taken effect.
She gripped the fountain pen and spoke again.
"Release."
This time, the ink cocoon wrapped around Su Yun finally dissipated.
The black letters fell to the floor, then, like startled little insects, quickly crawled back to Chu Youwei's feet.
They dared not approach Su Yun again.
They only dared to circle around the tips of Chu Youwei's shoes.
Su Yun stood up and brushed the wrinkles off his clothes.
He looked at the group of letters, his eyes calm.
"Quite obedient."
The letters on the floor trembled.
Chu Youwei finally let out a sigh of relief.
But before she could fully relax, the rules on her wrist lit up again.
A new line of comments slowly appeared.
[Invigilator attire not set]
[Save current form?]