Fifty Thousand Per Use
The bespectacled scholar and the smooth pretty-boy clearly hadn't expected a broke nobody like this to be so brazen. With Ai Tutu watching from the sidelines, neither of them could afford to lose face — they dropped all pretense and let their magical auras flood out without restraint.
The pretty-boy especially had abandoned every last trace of refinement. His collar fluttered as a scorching, blazing heat surged around him.
A Fire Element Mage — and an Intermediate-Level one, no less.
No wonder he was so arrogant. In the Blue District, reaching the Intermediate Level genuinely gave a person the standing to look down on ordinary students.
The question was: was Mo Fan ordinary?
*These idiots don't know where their eyes are — they can't even recognize me, the Great Demon King himself — and they still dare to throw their weight around in front of me?!*
"What do you think you're doing?"
Just as the two auras were about to collide, Mu Nujiao's sharp voice cut through from the second floor.
The pretty-boy's aura evaporated on the spot, and he stood there gazing up at Mu Nujiao in her white dress with a dazed, love-struck expression.
The bespectacled man held himself more composed — but the desire flickering in his eyes betrayed every bit of his carefully maintained calm.
He turned to Mu Nujiao with a courteous bow. "I am Han Luo. It is an honor to meet you here, Miss Mu Nujiao. We had no intention of causing trouble — this fellow simply refused to accept reality, claiming he lives here. He must be dreaming if he thinks he belongs in the same space as you, Miss Mu Nujiao. We only wanted to teach him a lesson."
Magical auras were perceptible to other Mages. The surge Jia Wenqing had just let loose must have reached Mu Nujiao in her room — that was what had drawn her out.
"That's right. And he was rude to us on top of it." Jia Wenqing chimed in, glancing over at Ai Tutu. "Tutu, you really shouldn't associate with people like him."
Mu Nujiao looked over at Ai Tutu, who was standing off to the side clutching a bag of chips. She didn't need to think twice — this had Ai Tutu's fingerprints all over it.
As if Ai Tutu didn't know perfectly well whether Mo Fan lived here or not.
"He does live here. Both of you should leave. There's no need to make a scene."
"...What?!" Both Han Luo and Jia Wenqing looked completely blindsided.
*They were... cohabitating?*
Mu Nujiao and Ai Tutu were sharing a place with a *man*? Was the rent really that unbearable?
No — these two would never care about something as trivial as money. And judging by this guy's clothes, he was obviously a poor student. How could he possibly afford an apartment like this? There had to be some mistake.
Their expressions cycled through a spectacular range of emotions. Whatever the reason, anyone who got to live with Mu Nujiao and Ai Tutu deserved to be struck by lightning.
Still, neither of them dared push things any further. They'd come here to move belongings out, and above all, they didn't want to leave a bad impression in front of Mu Nujiao.
"Well then, we'll be on our way. All just a misunderstanding — a misunderstanding." Han Luo's expression snapped from hostility to a pleasant smile with practiced ease.
"Get lost. You're annoying." Mo Fan didn't spare them so much as a scrap of dignity.
A perfectly good afternoon nap, ruined by two dogs barking at the door. His mood was shot.
Han Luo's mouth twitched. Jia Wenqing looked ready to explode — but in the end, both of them left. As they went, the cold, predatory look they swept over Mo Fan was barely disguised at all.
*Just you wait.*
"Tutu, you need to stop causing trouble!" The moment the two had gone, Mu Nujiao rounded on Ai Tutu.
"Sister Mu, I was just having a little fun. How was I supposed to know Han Luo and Jia Wenqing would have such terrible manners?" Ai Tutu raised her bag of chips like a shield, the picture of wounded innocence.
Mo Fan fixed her with a pointed look. "Sharing a place is fine — but we need to establish some ground rules first."
"What?" Ai Tutu blinked, thrown off.
*In every novel and drama she'd ever consumed, wasn't it always the female lead who laid down the law to her male roommate? So why was the Great Demon King getting there first? The script was completely wrong!*
"I agree — this is necessary." Mu Nujiao nodded. Letting Ai Tutu run wild simply wasn't going to work.
"No bringing strange men home to stay the night without the other party's consent." Mo Fan held up one finger.
"As if! *You're* the one who'd bring men home at night!" Ai Tutu huffed, puffing up indignantly.
"My room is off-limits. Under any circumstances whatsoever." A second finger went up.
Mo Fan was cultivating four elements simultaneously — if Ai Tutu barged in at the wrong moment and caught a glimpse of that, his secret would be exposed. That was something he had absolutely no intention of letting anyone discover.
"That one goes for me too! Hmph!" Ai Tutu declared fiercely.
"Third." Mo Fan continued. "I know you two are both stunningly beautiful with suitors crawling out of the woodwork. There'll always be flies like those two buzzing around. You're welcome to use my dashing, handsome self as a shield, or call me in to swat those flies — but I charge by the job. Fifty thousand per use."
"What do you think you are, a loan shark?! And *dashing*?! What dashing?!" Ai Tutu was already flailing her arms.
"Tutu. Language." Mu Nujiao said.
"He's the unreasonable one!"
"That's all for now. I'll add to the list as things occur to me." Mo Fan, as a man of principle and self-respect, required standards.
Ai Tutu made faces at his back. Fine, she could admit she'd deliberately used Mo Fan to drive off the insufferable Han Luo and Jia Wenqing — but fifty thousand a use was beyond shameless. As a future housemate, wasn't chasing away unwanted visitors just basic courtesy?
"Mo Fan, keep an eye on those two," Mu Nujiao said. "They're from powerful Noble Clan families. Watch out for them making trouble for you behind your back."
She knew those two looked refined on the surface, but their hearts were narrow and vindictive. Noble Clan heirs of their type couldn't endure even the smallest slight.
"Trivial." Mo Fan dismissed it without a second thought.
Truth be told, the Azure Sky Hunting Firm had been completely dead lately. Mo Fan hadn't taken down a single monster in ages.
Going a day or two without a fight left him feeling stiff all over these days. These arrogant Noble Clan heirs might be just the thing to get the blood flowing again.
Come to think of it, aside from his one match against Mu Nujiao at the tail end of term, Mo Fan had barely faced a real Mage opponent since starting school. That wasn't good — the Hunter Championship included Mage-versus-Mage combat as well.
"Great Demon King, could you maybe lower the price a little? My allowance is genuinely not that generous," Ai Tutu ventured quietly.
"Trust my expertise. I specialize in stubborn cases and I don't stop until the target is thoroughly put in their place. Fifty thousand per use, and honestly I'm barely breaking even, young miss." Mo Fan was dead serious.
These days, even his Azure Sky Hunting Firm commissions started at 300,000 minimum. As his strength had grown, he'd been taking on larger contracts — and those paid considerably more.
"Hmph. This one doesn't count. Complimentary trial run." Ai Tutu paused, then added, "Also — how did you even know I was trying to get you to drive those two away? They're insufferable beyond belief. Not even worth keeping on the bench. The problem is, our families have been friends for generations, so I can't just cut them off outright."
"Happens to handsome men like me all the time. I understand the struggle completely."
Ai Tutu burst out laughing and called him shameless.
After chatting for a while, Ai Tutu found herself thinking that this so-called Great Demon King wasn't nearly as monstrous as his reputation made him out to be. He was actually kind of fun — much more entertaining than those polished, pampered young lords.
So... should she tell him? That there were already people in the Main Campus quietly plotting to gang up on him during the next assessment?
She'd decide based on how he behaved going forward. If he impressed her, she'd quietly tip him off about who was gunning for him.
Not that the list would be short. After making half the student body his enemy during the freshman competition, even the gymnasium incident hadn't been enough to fully rehabilitate his reputation.