Ye Xuan glanced around at the crowd, then looked down at his own blue-white robe. It occurred to him that by comparison, his appearance was actually rather understated. The youthful Wangquan Baye's outfit didn't look all that different from an ordinary period costume, and anyone who didn't genuinely know the character would never recognize it.
Shaking his head slightly, he walked through the school gate. His long robe shifted gently with each step, and the Wangquan sword at his hip caught the morning light, tracing faint lines of gold.
It was true that Ye Xuan's appearance was modest compared to the students around him. What he had forgotten, though, was that after merging the Wangquan Baye template, the swordsman's bearing that had settled naturally into him was precisely what made him stand out the most among a crowd of people who had dressed up on purpose.
As he walked in, two girls who had been debating Demon Slayer breathing techniques fell silent the moment they caught sight of him from the corner of their eyes. One of them dropped her folding umbrella styled after a Nichirin Sword, and it clattered to the ground. Nearby, a student who had been posing with a replica of Jean's Aquila Favonia from Genshin Impact felt his hand start to tremble, the glass bead on the hilt nearly coming loose.
Even the head of discipline reflexively lifted his Gojo Satoru blindfold a little and stared at Ye Xuan with a puzzled expression.
(Is that actually one of our students? This can't really be a character who wandered in from some other dimension, can it?)
(That face, that bearing, that posture. There's nothing performative about any of it.)
"Which anime is that character from? I don't think I've seen him before." Someone murmured nearby.
"Good grief, how can anyone actually look that cool?"
"I always thought 'aura' was just something people made up. But looking at him, I feel like even without the sword on his hip, I'd still assume he was a swordsman."
"Wait, I can see something! There's writing on the hilt. It looks like... Wangquan?"
"Wangquan? Could that be from Fox Spirit Matchmaker?"
"So is he dressed as Wangquan Fugui or Wangquan Baye?"
"Doesn't look like Fugui to me. More like Wangquan Baye when he was young, around the time he first met Dongfang Huai Zhu."
"The seventh day of the seventh month, at the Huai River Bamboo Pavilion..." someone recited softly, voice tinged with a distant sadness, as if calling up something that still hurt.
"The Bamboo arc really was too heartbreaking."
"I still can't bring myself to watch it a second time."
"Same." Sighed the student beside them.
"When I watched Wangquan Fugui's story, I thought his father was just a bad person. But after seeing his past, I actually understood what the old man had been carrying."
"He was just a passionate, idealistic young man once."
Talking about it, none of them could help the sympathy that crept in. They were high school students, at the age where anime was everything, and Fox Spirit Matchmaker was one of the finest donghua out there. Of course they had watched it, and of course it hit them like this.
A love story that burned bright and ended in parting, in death, left a mark that ran especially deep in people who longed for something they had never yet known.
With his current senses, Ye Xuan could hear every word of those hushed conversations perfectly clearly. He simply didn't care.
As the system had noted before the merge, he had received only Wangquan Baye's talents and abilities, not his memories, personality, or emotions.
To Ye Xuan, Dongfang Huai Zhu was still just an anime character he had been fond of. He wasn't going to get emotional just because he overheard people talking about a story he already knew.
As he passed the fountain in front of the classroom building, there was a dull thud behind him. A girl carrying a Sealing Wand styled after Cardcaptor Sakura's had tripped and gone sprawling. Her phone arced through the air in a clean parabola, sailing straight toward the fountain.
"Watch out."
Ye Xuan reached out without urgency. The tip of the Wangquan sword's scabbard tapped the surface of the water lightly. The falling phone seemed to defy gravity for a moment, then settled neatly on top of the girl's head as she lay face-down on the ground.
"Ow, that hur... wait, it didn't?"
The whole thing was done without a single drop of water touching his robe. It would have been a perfect moment, if not for the girl pushing herself up and patting her head in confusion, clearly braced for pain that never came.
"Thank you."
She got to her feet. It was a little odd that her phone had landed on her head, but since it wasn't wet, she was grateful enough to say so.
"Sure."
Ye Xuan's tone was even. His gaze lingered briefly on the top of her head. No redness. His control had been exactly right.
He had done it deliberately. For someone who had merged the Wangquan Baye template, controlling his own strength was fundamental. There was no way he couldn't manage the force in his hand.
As for why he had aimed for her head specifically, it just seemed like the most sensible option. Anywhere else might have been awkward.
Besides, some people had sensitive spots on their bodies, places where an unexpected touch would make them flinch as though they'd been shocked. He didn't have that himself, but he knew some people did. He wasn't entirely sure about girls in particular, and if the phone had landed somewhere like that, it might have caused a problem.
So he'd gone with the head. He figured there probably wasn't anyone whose head counted as a sensitive spot.
And since a human head was somewhat delicate, he had consciously held back his strength. That was why she hadn't felt any pain.
All things considered, it had gone rather well.
Ye Xuan noted this privately and walked on. The girl seemed to want to say something more, but seeing him already moving away, she quickly called out.
"Wait!"
"Which class are you in?"
"Year twelve." Ye Xuan answered without turning around.
"I'm Lin Xue! Class eleven, group five!"
"I'll buy you milk tea sometime!" she shouted after him.
Ye Xuan didn't reply. He just raised one hand briefly in a small wave.
Not far away, a group of girls who had witnessed the whole thing gripped each other's arms in excitement. "That was incredible! Even the way he helps people is effortlessly cool!"
"Though it's a bit different from what I imagined. Why did the phone land on her head? It should have landed on her back."
"What do you know! That's the whole charm of it. Landing on her head makes it unique. And what's the difference between her back and her head anyway? It still landed on her."
"Hang on, something feels off. Did anyone notice he didn't say which class he was in? He just said year twelve."
"That's completely normal. Year twelve students are under strict supervision right now. If he gave his class and that girl came looking for him, what if they got caught? The teachers would definitely say something."
"He must have thought about that. He didn't tell her his class because he didn't want her to get in trouble. That's so considerate of him..."
"..."
Ye Xuan, catching all of this from a distance, felt the corner of his mouth twitch.
(Are you lot doing a close reading of a literary text right now?)
(If you're going to analyze it, the more reasonable conclusion would be that I said 'year twelve' as a polite way of signaling I'm busy and not interested, wouldn't it?)
(Worried she'd get scolded by a teacher? What kind of idol drama have you been watching? Do those shows really have plots that elaborate these days?)
(Are you not at all concerned about how generous that interpretation is?)
(All I saved was a phone. Not someone's life.)