Dragon Raja: Lu Mingfei finds a Freylian

Seeing this, Lu Mingfei quickly put aside his embarrassment and helped collect money and give change. The young girl also cleverly took charge of picking up and packaging the goods. The three of them worked together quite well, and a small crowd quickly gathered in front of the small stall.

Taking advantage of the lull in customers, Lu Mingfei chatted with the young girl while sorting through his change.

"Little girl, what's your name? What grade are you in?"

"My name is Lin Xiaoxiao, and I'm in the first year of junior high school," the little girl answered while wiping the glass cover.

"You're in seventh grade, is the workload heavy? Are you keeping up with your studies?"

"It's alright," Lin Xiaoxiao thought for a moment, "Math is a bit difficult, but I quite like English."

"You like English? That's great!" Lu Mingfei said, intrigued. "Have you made any friends from other countries at school?"

Lin Xiaoxiao shook her head: "There are quite a few Chinese students at our school, and most of the people I hang out with are from China. There are also foreign students, but it seems like it's not easy to get along with them. Sometimes we don't know what to talk about."

Lu Mingfei understood after hearing this. This was probably the common situation for many newly arrived international students. "I see. Are there many students like you who came from China to study here?"

“There are many!” Lin Xiaoxiao nodded vigorously. “There are several in my class, and they don’t live far away. Sometimes we go to the library or park together on weekends.” As she said this, a smile appeared on her face. Having familiar companions made her feel much more at ease.

Lu Mingfei recalled his own experience when he first arrived in Kassel. Although the circumstances were different, the feeling of being in a foreign land and searching for kindred spirits was probably the same. He smiled and encouraged him, "It's good to have friends with you. Take it slow. There will be more opportunities in the future. You can also take the initiative to chat with foreign students, such as talking about your favorite cartoons or games. Maybe you'll find common ground."

"Okay!" Lin Xiaoxiao nodded seriously.

Just then, another couple was drawn over by Frillie's sign and the bright red candied hawthorns. Frillie once again used her straightforward and effective sales pitch to complete the sale. Lu Mingfei quickly collected the money, and Lin Xiaoxiao deftly handed over the candied hawthorns.

With the combined efforts of the three, the candied hawthorns on the cart were visibly decreasing. The setting sun gradually sank into the city skyline, the streetlights came on, and night began to fall.

The last skewer of candied hawthorns was bought by an office worker passing by on his way home from get off work. Lin Xiaoxiao looked at the empty cart and almost jumped for joy: "Great! It's all sold out! Thank you, brother, thank you, sister!"

She quickly began packing her things, her little face full of relieved joy.

Lu Mingfei and Frilian also helped her tidy up her coin box and other odds and ends. Looking at the little girl's excited expression, Lu Mingfei felt a warmth in his heart. The sense of accomplishment from this small act of help was more real than watching fish at an aquarium.

"Go back quickly, it's getting dark, be careful on the road," Lu Mingfei instructed.

"Okay! Goodbye, brothers and sisters! Thank you!" Lin Xiaoxiao pushed the cart and waved vigorously at them. Her figure quickly disappeared into the deepening night and lights.

Lu Mingfei and Frilian stood there, still holding the bare bamboo sticks left after they finished eating the candied hawthorns.

"I never thought selling candied hawthorns would be so interesting," Lu Mingfei said, throwing the bamboo skewers into the nearby trash can, clapping his hands.

Frillie looked in the direction where Lin Xiaoxiao disappeared and said softly, "It wasn't easy."

“Yes, it’s not easy for anyone,” Lu Mingfei sighed with deep empathy, then smiled. “But candied hawthorns are still very sweet.”

Chapter 317 The Muggle Family

Lu Gucheng's house, living room.

The smell of the food, mainly the greasiness of braised pork and the slightly sour smell of leftover rice reheated, mixed with the cheap perfume on my aunt, formed the keynote of this family.

Lu Mingze shoveled rice into his bowl, avoiding the fatty, suspiciously colored pieces of meat with his chopsticks, only picking at the green pepper strips on the edges. His uncle, Lu Gucheng, took a sip of his loose-batch liquor, making a satisfied, subtle hiss, trying to create a ripple of relaxation in the oppressive atmosphere.

The topic, as if manipulated by invisible fingers, inevitably slid towards that name—Lu Mingfei.

"Tsk," Auntie put down her chopsticks, her voice high-pitched, like fingernails scraping glass, "A couple of days ago, there was that Sister Zhang from our workplace, you know her, her son-in-law works at some international express company, and they say he's doing really well now, with an annual salary of this much."

She held up a few fingers and waved them above the greasy dining table, her gaze drifting towards the window, as if the word "good" had a hook, specifically designed to salvage the imbalance in her heart. "Thinking about our family, sigh..."

The uncle smoothed things over, picking up a piece of green vegetable with his chopsticks: "Everyone has their own way of living. Mingfei, isn't he doing just fine now? Last time I called, didn't he say he was doing research at a university abroad?"

His tone was uncertain; the word "research" was as distant to him as a lunar crater.

"Research? Research what? Research how to spend money!" Auntie's lips curled into a sarcastic smile, her carefully applied lipstick unable to conceal the bitterness in her words. "Lu Gucheng, you're too honest! I've never even heard of his school, what's it called, Kassel? It's not even a diploma mill! It's probably some backwater place where you can buy a degree. Do you think he's really that successful? He just got lucky, climbed some strings, and went out to fool around."

She paused, lowered her voice, and leaned forward slightly: "Let me tell you, Lao Lu, people who suddenly become rich are never clean. Look at him, so sluggish, what real skills could he possibly have? Maybe he's doing some shady business overseas, working as someone's lackey, or maybe he's found a rich, old woman old enough to be his mother! Otherwise, where did his money come from? Did it fall from the sky?"

"Hey, shut up," the uncle frowned, took another sip of his drink, the alcohol giving him a little courage to retort. "The foreign specialties Mingfei sent back last time had pretty fancy packaging."

"High-class? Humph, just putting on a show!" His aunt immediately interrupted him. "The more insecure a person is, the more they like to show off. He's afraid we'll look down on him! I bet he's living a very frugal life outside, living in a basement, eating the cheapest bread, just to save money to buy some things to put on a show. He's suffering for the sake of saving face! His personality is just like yours, a complete wimp!"

Lu Mingze, who had been silent all along, felt a mix of emotions swirling in his heart as his mother vividly described the scene. The strongest emotion was jealousy, which burned in his throat. However, the image that surfaced in his mind was not the destitute and miserable Lu Mingfei that his mother had described.

He recalled a moment from long ago when his hapless cousin occasionally showed signs of being out of place with his surroundings.

Lu Mingfei is definitely not the kind of person his mother described as eating cheap bread and living in a basement.

Why?

These three words gnawed at Lu Mingze's heart like a venomous snake. Why could that loser, who felt like an unnecessary burden even to breathe at home, have such a life? How could he escape this suffocating home filled with cooking fumes and complaints? How could he go to such a distant, dazzling place?

As for him, Lu Mingze, he had always been considered better than Lu Mingfei, at least in terms of academic performance. Yet now he was sitting here, listening to his mother's nagging, his future as bleak as the leftovers in front of him, offering no fresh hope.

He was envious of Lu Mingfei's incomprehensible fortune, and even more resentful that after possessing all this, Lu Mingfei remained almost silent, making their family's current speculations seem like the clamor of clowns. He would rather Lu Mingfei were truly as destitute as his mother said, because that would at least prove the fairness of the world.

Waste should behave like waste, not rise silently to a level they can only speculate about maliciously.

"Mingze," his aunt's gaze suddenly shifted, piercing his face like a searchlight, "How have you been lately? Are there any suitable girls in your class?"

Lu Mingze's heart sank, and he lowered his head even further, mumbling, "No, I've been busy with my studies and haven't had time."

"Busy, busy, busy! All you ever do is talk about being busy! Look at you! How old are you? You can't even find a girlfriend! Old Wang's son next door is two years younger than you, and his kid is already old enough to run errands! And you? As for looks, Mingze isn't bad either, so why are you so useless?"

Useful and useless were her aunt's simple yardstick for measuring the world. Clearly, not being able to secure a girlfriend on the surface, Lu Mingze was categorized as useless. He could even feel his father's gaze, a gaze filled with concern, but even more so with silent approval and pressure.

"Look at Lu Mingfei!" The aunt was probably so angry that she brought up the person she had just been belittling as a comparison. "Someone like him probably managed to fool a couple of blind girlfriends with his sweet talk! And you? You don't even have that much skill!"

These words were like a poisoned dagger, piercing Lu Mingze's most sensitive and vulnerable spot. He jerked his head up, his cheeks flushed red with anger and shame. He wanted to shout back, to tell his mother that Lu Mingfei might be surrounded by people she couldn't even imagine, to yell that the loser had a girlfriend far more complex than they could comprehend. But all of that was stuck in his throat, ultimately turning into a suppressed, almost sobbing gasp. He clenched his fists tightly, his nails digging deep into his palms.

Why? That loser not only escaped from here, but may also have everything he's ever dreamed of: freedom and power.

Seeing his son's red eyes and his wife's indignant expression, the uncle sighed and tried to ease the tension: "Alright, alright, let's eat. The food's getting cold. Children and grandchildren have their own destinies. Mingfei is out there, but he'll have to walk his own path. Mingze is still young, no rush, take it slow."

"Take your time? If you take your time, all the good stuff will be taken!" Auntie persisted, but her anger subsided a bit because of Lu Mingze's near-collapse. She turned her attention back to Lu Mingfei. "I'm just so angry. That kid Lu Mingfei doesn't even know how to introduce some resources to our Mingze. He's become successful and then he forgets his roots. What an ingrate! If we hadn't taken him in back then..."

To take in. This word is like a heavy stone, repeatedly used to solidify their moral high ground, even though beneath this high ground lies day after day of neglect and verbal abuse.

Dinner drew to a close in an even more awkward silence. Lu Mingze hastily ate the remaining rice grains, practically leaped off his chair, and rushed back to his cramped bedroom as if fleeing, slamming the door shut behind him.

Outside the door, the faint sound of auntie's incessant complaints could still be heard: about Lu Mingfei's possible downfall, about Lu Mingze's lack of ambition, about who in the neighborhood had bought a new car, and about the pork price going up again at the market. These sounds mingled with the clinking of bowls and chopsticks and her father's helpless sighs, forming the most familiar background noise of Lu Mingze's childhood.

He slumped at his desk, the computer screen black, reflecting his own face contorted with jealousy, resentment, and helplessness. Outside the window, the city's neon lights lit up one after another, near and far, merging into a dazzling yet cold sea of ​​light. Beyond this sea of ​​light lay a wider world. Lu Mingfei was in that world, a world he could not reach.

Lu Mingze had no idea what his cousin was doing or what kind of life he was living. All he knew was that the loser he had once trampled underfoot had now gone to a place so far away that he could no longer even see his back.

Chapter 318 Change

In the dead of night, all was quiet. Fingel's bed was empty. This nominally G-level student was most likely enjoying the sun in Cuba, or more likely, on the beach with rum, while carrying out a mission that only he himself knew whether he truly cared about it.

Lu Mingfei was the only one left in the dormitory.

He was fast asleep, lying sprawled out on his back, the thin blanket kicked off and rolled up around his waist, traces of drool still clinging to the corner of his mouth. His snoring wasn't deafening, but it was enough to prove how soundly he slept. His unguarded, somewhat clumsy sleeping face looked exceptionally peaceful in the faint moonlight seeping in from the window.

Right at his bedside, a figure sat silently. It was a very handsome young man, dressed in a well-fitting black suit, with a depth in his eyes that seemed completely at odds with his appearance. He was Lu Mingze, the "little devil" whose fate was inextricably intertwined with Lu Mingfei's.

Lu Mingze tilted his head slightly, gazing at Lu Mingfei's silly expression with a complex look in his eyes. There was none of his usual mischievous mockery, nor any deliberate, clingy dependence. At this moment, he was more like a detached observer, scrutinizing a painting whose appearance had been completely altered by an accidental spill of paint.

"It's incredible, brother," he whispered, his voice so soft that only he could hear it.

Thoughts drifted away. The threads of fate, on the boy named Lu Mingfei, should have woven a pattern of despair and tragedy. It should have been a grand lament for the dragon race, destined to end in tragedy, drawn with blood, flames, betrayal, and sacrifice.

Norton and Constantine, the twin sons of the Bronze and Fire Lords, should have been utterly destroyed and perished with immense resentment amidst their violent awakening and endless sorrow. But what about now? Lu Mingze's gaze pierced through space, landing on a quiet orphanage across the ocean.

Old Tang, representing the human side of Norton, clumsily tries to braid the hair of a snotty-nosed little girl, a helpless yet gentle smile on his face. Constantine, the clingy little boy who depends on his older brother, sits quietly on the swing beside them, watching this scene with pure contentment in his eyes. They survived, miraculously integrating into the world they were supposed to destroy.

And then there were the two kings of the earth and the mountains. Jormungandr, the younger sister, still played the role of a bright and charming Chinese girl at Kassel College, her secret preserved, no longer needing to fight her only cherished brother. Fenrir, with the intellect of a child yet possessing terrifying power, was now peacefully at home in BJ, disguised as an ordinary residence, perhaps watching the cartoons Xia Mi had brought him, grinning foolishly. They would never again experience that tragedy of fratricide, never again witness the despair that consumed them in the Nibelungen.

The source of all this change...

A figure flashed through Lu Mingze's mind: Frilian. From another world, she appeared as an elven girl, yet possessed immeasurable magical power and the wisdom of a long lifespan. Her appearance was like a boulder thrown into the river of predetermined destiny, the ripples spreading and amplifying, ultimately altering the course of the river.

She intervened at several key points in a way that even Lu Mingze couldn't fully comprehend, cleverly resolving what was originally a life-or-death conflict with seemingly non-violent means, turning a tragedy destined for destruction into what now appears absurd yet is full of warmth—a "comedy."

“Bad things have turned into good things,” Lu Mingze silently pondered the words.

Indeed, in the end, everyone the brother cared about survived, and he himself did not follow the original trajectory of repeatedly trading with himself for power, for salvation, or for something ephemeral, sacrificing a quarter, a half, or ultimately his entire life.

Lu Mingfei's life is still complete. He doesn't have to bear such heavy sins and punishments, doesn't have to be awakened by nightmares in the middle of the night, and doesn't have to lick his wounds that never heal in solitude.

This seemed perfect, a prototype of a "Happy Ending" that Lu Mingze had never imagined in his countless calculations over the years.

however.

Lu Mingze's lips slowly curled up.

"However," she continued, changing the subject, "facing that white emperor, Frilian, do you still have the power to change your fate?"

The White Emperor. A supreme being originating from antiquity, she is an existence above the four great monarchs, a colossal shadow looming over the entire world before the return of Nidhogg, the Black King. Her awakening, her will, her power are unshakeable chapters already etched into the cornerstone of destiny.

It was a sweeping, all-encompassing tidal wave, a grand destiny that rendered all individual efforts insignificant and powerless. Frilian's power might change a local situation, might save a few specific individuals, but before that white, all-encompassing imperial power, could the magic of this other world still create miracles?

Lu Mingze's gaze returned to Lu Mingfei's sleeping face.

"And," he seemed to suddenly remember something extremely important, yet temporarily forgotten, "the red-robed shrine maiden, Erii Uesugi, she's still waiting for you in Japan, brother."

The moment Erii's name was uttered, Lu Mingfei, even unconsciously, tensed up instinctively. He shifted restlessly in the blankets, his brows furrowing slightly, and a muffled murmur escaped his throat, as if he had encountered something unsettling in his dream.

Seeing Lu Mingfei's subtle reaction, the pitiful warmth on Lu Mingze's face completely vanished, leaving only a mocking smile filled with deep pity.

"How stupid."

Even after all these changes, does Lu Mingfei still subconsciously feel fear and a desire to avoid certain people and things? Or is he mocking the seemingly perfect situation, where a deeper, more inescapable tragedy lies hidden? Or is he mocking himself for knowing everything yet still being able to act as a bystander, waiting for the inevitable end, an ending that even Frilian might not be able to reverse?

He didn't know. Or rather, he knew, but was unwilling and unable to say it.

The White Emperor will eventually return; this is a calamity for the world.

The red-clad shrine maiden awaits in Japan, a sweet yet deadly calamity for Lu Mingfei.

Frillian changed many things; she saved many people and reversed the inevitable tragedy. But some things are deeper, they are the cause and effect that are entangled in the essence of Lu Mingfei's soul, shackles that even the elves of the other world cannot easily break.

Lu Mingze sat there quietly, like a demon statue guarding a sleeping hero. The moonlight shifted, casting his shadow long, very long. In the dormitory, only Lu Mingfei's breathing, sometimes steady, sometimes slightly uneasy, could be heard.

Chapter 319 The Madmen of the Equipment Department (Part 1)

Angers slammed his laptop shut, the sound jarring in the empty conference room. He looked around, feeling a throbbing pain in his temples. The scene before him was simply too surreal.

He, Hilbert Jean Angers, the principal of the Kassel College, dressed in a suit and tie, his silver hair neatly combed, was sitting among a group of extras in bright yellow protective suits who looked like they had just escaped from the set of Resident Evil.

This is quite different from his publicly stated itinerary. This morning, he was having breakfast at the Ritz Hotel on the Left Bank of Paris, telling several school board members that he was going to attend a Christian Dior fashion show. In fact, he did have a few photos taken by photographers at the hotel entrance and even gave a speech to a reporter from Paris Match, making the profound statement that "fashion is an extension of contemporary chivalry."

However, two hours later, he was already 120 meters underground at Kassel College, sitting in a conference room filled with the smell of disinfectant.