"Tsk... A fight's about to break out." Playing the part of a curious bystander, Lin Li stood at the very edge of the crowd, watching two young men whose bodies were glowing with a faint golden Spiritual Light as they prepared for a major brawl.
'Sigh, fighting over something so trivial. Just wait until the Investigators from the Superpower Administration Bureau show up. We'll see what you do then.'
The Superpower Administration Bureau was the law enforcement agency responsible for managing the world's Cultivators. Their jurisdiction covered everything from minor incidents, like brawls sparked by arguments, to major criminal cases, so long as a Cultivator was involved.
Just as the two young men, both at the First Rank Initial Stage of cultivation, were about to come to blows, a sharp yell suddenly echoed in their ears.
"What do you two think you're doing? Stop it, right now!"
The surrounding crowd parted to form a path, and a man in his early thirties wearing a black uniform walked up to the two young men who had been on the verge of a brawl.
"It's an Investigator."
The moment everyone present saw the man's uniform, they immediately recognized his identity.
As for the two young men who had been about to throw down, the moment they saw the Investigator, the faint golden Spiritual Light erupting from their bodies vanished, replaced by friendly smiles.
"According to regulations, Cultivators are prohibited from fighting in public places. You two..."
Before the Investigator could finish, the two young men who had been ready to fight hastily cut him off.
"Sir, we weren't about to fight! We just had a small disagreement, got a little heated, and raised our voices a bit..."
After the two young men finished speaking in unison, they simultaneously reached out and shook hands.
"It was my fault. I won't ride my electric scooter on the sidewalk on this street again."
"Bro, I was in the wrong, too. I shouldn't have darted out of that alley so suddenly. You didn't have time to react, and that's why you fell..."
The two young men, who had just been about to tear each other apart, were now acting like bosom buddies, leaving the surrounding crowd of onlookers utterly dumbfounded.
Lin Li, however, wasn't the least bit surprised to see them acting this way.
After all, if a Cultivator was caught brawling in public by an Investigator, they would be detained for at least a day.
Seeing that the two young men were so quick to admit their fault, the stern expression on the face of the Investigator, who had rushed to the scene after a report was filed, softened slightly.
"In the future, don't think about resorting to violence over such petty matters. Force is not the only way to solve a problem.
You're both at the First Rank Initial Stage. If you had actually fought, you could have easily injured the ordinary people around you."
The two young men nodded repeatedly in agreement as they listened to the Investigator's lecture.
Seeing that the entertaining fight was off the table, the crowd of onlookers began to disperse.
Lin Li watched the two Cultivators leave, feeling a pang of envy as he thought to himself.
'Seriously, even people like them can become Cultivators, while a law-abiding, model citizen like me can't. It's so unfair!'
...
「Happiness Garden District, outside Su Yue's apartment.」
KNOCK KNOCK KNOCK...
Not long after Lin Li knocked, the sound of hurried footsteps came from inside the apartment.
TAP TAP TAP...
"Coming!"
The person inside first peeked through the peephole to see who it was, then with a CLICK, opened the door.
A buxom, beautiful girl appeared before Lin Li.
Standing at five-foot-eight, with a delicate, beautiful face and a stunning, curvaceous figure, she was the kind of woman that would make any man's heart race.
Of course, Lin Li was not among the men whose hearts would race at the sight of her.
He had known her for so many years that he had long since built up a degree of immunity to her charms.
"Come on in!" Su Yue said with a grin, ushering Lin Li inside. She bent over to grab a pair of men's slippers from the shoe cabinet and placed them in front of him.
'I can't take this!' When Su Yue casually bent over, a flash of white from her neckline made Lin Li, who had just been so confident in his immunity, immediately begin reciting the Purifying Heart Spell.
"Prosperity, Civility, Freedom, Equality, Justice, Integrity..."
After reciting the six-word Purifying Heart Spell twice in a row, Lin Li felt as if the beautiful woman before him had transformed into a painted skeleton. She could no longer distract him in the slightest.
"Lin Li, why are you just standing there frozen? Hurry up and put on your slippers!" Su Yue said, urging him on when she saw him standing motionless at the door.
"Ah... Oh..."
Su Yue's shout instantly snapped Lin Li out of his Zen-like state.
He put on the slippers and walked inside. As he watched the sway of Su Yue's body in her thin, spaghetti-strap nightgown, he immediately averted his eyes and started reciting the Purifying Heart Spell in his head again.
"Sorry to call you so early in the morning and make you come unclog my drain. It's a real pain, I know..." Su Yue said as she poured Lin Li a glass of his favorite soda and handed it to him.
"Don't worry about it. I was free anyway..." Lin Li said, taking the soda she handed him and taking a small sip.
"So, what's the deal with your kitchen drain? Didn't I just unclog it for you last week? How is it clogged again?"
Hearing Lin Li's question, Su Yue looked a little embarrassed. She raised her right hand and scratched her cheek with a slender finger. "I accidentally washed a handful of vegetables down the drain when I was washing them."
"Alright, got it." Lin Li nodded, then downed the rest of his soda. He headed to Su Yue's kitchen to get to work on the drain.
As they say, practice makes perfect. After unclogging Su Yue's drain so many times over the years, Lin Li's skill level in this particular area was already quite high.
A few moments later, Lin Li had the clogged drain cleared with just a few quick motions.
"All done. Try to be more careful so it doesn't happen again," Lin Li said as he walked out of the kitchen after washing his hands. He went into the living room, where Su Yue was sitting on the sofa watching TV.
"Thanks a bunch!" Su Yue said with a radiant smile. She then got up from the sofa and went into her bedroom to change her clothes.
When she emerged from her bedroom in a pretty, floral-print dress, Lin Li looked at her, confused.
"There's no food in the fridge. I'm going to the market to buy groceries for lunch."
'Oh, she's going grocery shopping,' Lin Li thought. He nodded. "Need me to come with you?"
"Nope, you can just stay here and watch TV." Su Yue shook her head, grabbed her bag from the sofa, and headed out the door.
...