Fire Hall's Number One

Mo Fan was genuinely baffled.

This teacher had way too short a fuse. All he'd done was transfer departments, and the man had called him a worthless waste in front of a lecture hall packed with a thousand students.

"I'll stay right where I am, then," Mo Fan replied, calm and unhurried. He wasn't the type to be pushed around.

With Dean Xiao having personally processed his transfer paperwork, Mo Fan refused to believe that this gorilla of a department head could actually throw him out.

Wei Rong's thick eyebrows shot up. This transfer student dared to talk back?

Every single one of the Fire Hall's thousand-plus enrolled students treated him with the utmost respect. Even the top ten on the rankings — no matter how powerful or well-connected — had never once dared to mouth off at him.

"You think you're something special?" Wei Rong demanded.

"I get by," Mo Fan said. "At least I'm not the waste you're calling me."

"This month's assessment is already over, so count yourself lucky," Wei Rong said bluntly. "Next month, if your ranking falls outside the top thousand, you can crawl back to whatever department you came from. I control how Fire Element resources are allocated, and I can strip them from you at any time on the grounds of poor performance."

Mo Fan actually laughed. "A thousand? Teacher, you're selling me a bit short, don't you think?"

"Hmph. Prove it first, then talk." Wei Rong's voice was ice.

"When I walked in just now, I had a look around," Mo Fan continued. "Honestly — the Fire Hall's left me a little... disappointed."

"What are you trying to say?" Wei Rong glared.

"You said you don't accept wastes here," Mo Fan replied. "Funny — looking around, I'd say there are quite a few of them. Or is this just the caliber of students you've trained?"

Mo Fan was in a foul mood today. Not only had his appearance been questioned twice already, but he'd barely stepped into the department before its head was calling him an unfocused, good-for-nothing waste.

What had he ever done to deserve this?

Back in his day as Pearl Academy's resident terror, he'd swaggered through the freshmen unchallenged. With Dean Xiao's backing, even the teachers had been unfailingly polite to him.

Mo Fan had always had a talent for dropping bombshells — and this one hit the packed lecture hall like a stone hurled into still water, sending shockwaves in every direction.

*There are quite a few wastes in this classroom?*

The remark hadn't singled anyone out by name, but it had managed to insult the entire Fire Hall all at once, dragging every last person into it.

Insulting the students was bad enough, but he'd pulled Wei Rong down with them — essentially calling everything the department head had ever produced worthless.

For a moment, the whole hall felt like it had ignited. If stares could truly become flames, Mo Fan would have been reduced to cinders by the thousand eyes boring into him.

Watching Wei Rong's face darken to somewhere between iron-grey and murderous, Mo Fan gave a helpless shrug.

*What was I supposed to do? He started it. I'm not going to roll over just because he holds a teacher's title.*

Back during the Hangzhou incident, Mo Fan had come to understand that age and rank alone didn't earn anyone's respect — it was wisdom and magnanimity that did. Wei Rong had come out swinging from the very first word. How was someone who'd always fancied himself a bit of a Long Aotian supposed to just take that lying down? ...Fine. Mo Fan could admit it: he was genuinely fed up with this insufferable department head and had utterly failed to keep his temper in check.

"Excellent. Excellent. *Excellent.*" Wei Rong repeated it three times through clenched teeth, his expression suggesting he was a heartbeat away from throwing Mo Fan out and pummeling him into the ground.

The lecture hall erupted.

"Who do you think you are, transfer student? You dare call us wastes? Step outside right now — I'll knock every tooth out of your head or I don't deserve my spot in the top four hundred on the Fire Rankings!"

"Nobody walks into Pearl Academy's Fire Hall and acts like this. If you're tired of living, you could at least use what little brain you have left."

"This transfer student is clearly looking to die. Zhao Ji — you're top one hundred on the Fire Rankings. Put him down in one move. I can't stand grandstanding like this."

Some in the hall looked ready to Blazing Fist Mo Fan into the wall on the spot. Others had already crowded around him, demanding he get on his knees and apologize. Most, however, simply sneered with contempt, too proud to take the ravings of a transfer student seriously.

Understandable, really. They were all students of Pearl Academy's Main Campus — a cut above the rest — and most carried enough inner cultivation to keep their composure.

Only two types of people fly into a rage from a single prod: those who genuinely are wastes and know it, and those too proud to tolerate such ignorance. Either way, the vast majority wore their composure like armor and couldn't be bothered to lower themselves to Mo Fan's level.

Surrounded by what felt like a thousand accusing stares, Mo Fan was quietly puzzling over something else entirely.

*That's strange — I said all of that and she still hasn't turned around?*

There she was — that same beautiful silhouette, that same immaculate hair. Mo Fan had just detonated a powder keg inside the hearts of half the Fire Hall. Even someone with genuine nerves of steel would at least glance back.

But the one sitting in front of him — Ding Yumian — hadn't turned around at all. Instead, it was the tough-as-nails Huang Xingli staring at him in pure disbelief, her eyes a mixture of indignation at being insulted and something that read unmistakably as: *Are you out of your mind?*

Huang Xingli didn't bear Mo Fan any real ill will — she was good-natured at heart. She just thought this transfer student needed to get out of the Fire Hall immediately, or he was going to end up in pieces.

"Quiet — all of you!" Wei Rong's voice crashed through the hall like a thunderclap.

His eyes fixed on Mo Fan like twin torches, and the air around him was thick with the pressure of his Fire Element aura.

The hall went silent in an instant. The only sound was breathing.

"This is Pearl Academy. This is the Fire Hall." Wei Rong's voice was iron. "I've seen no shortage of extraordinary talents in my time, but not one of them has ever stood in my Fire Hall and said what you just said. Fine. Let's see what you're actually made of. Every student in the Fire Hall has a score listed on the Fire Rankings — from first place all the way down to one thousand one hundred and forty-ninth."

Not a single person in the thousand-strong hall made a sound while he spoke. His authority resonated through the vast space as steadily as his voice.

Wei Rong's gaze swept across the crowd. "Zheng Jiahui. Stand up."

Among the crowd, a meek-looking young man slowly rose to his feet. Being singled out was clearly no source of pride for him — he looked like he'd rather disappear into the floor.

"He is the last-ranked student in the entire Fire Hall," Wei Rong said, his words directed squarely at Mo Fan.

"Dongfang Lie. Stand up," Wei Rong continued.

From the very back row of the lecture hall, a young man with a casually unbothered air climbed to his feet, as if hurrying were beneath him. He wore the grin of someone watching a spectacle unfold — but beneath it, a bone-deep pride leaked through no matter how little he seemed to try. The contrast with the meek Zheng Jiahui couldn't have been sharper.

Wei Rong pointed at Dongfang Lie and turned to Mo Fan.

"This is the Fire Hall's number one."