[GL] I'm Just A Side Character... So Why Is The Heroine Chasing Me?!-Chapter 43: New Power

Zhao Lingxi started Bai Xuelan’s cultivation method the next morning.

They used the private training courtyard behind the East Pavilion, the same one where Lan Yue and Zhao Lingxi had sparred. Bai Xuelan arrived at dawn carrying a leather journal and enough measuring instruments to fill a small laboratory.

"Sit in the center," Bai Xuelan instructed. "Cross legged. Palms on your knees. Close your eyes."

Zhao Lingxi obeyed.

"Standard cultivation focuses energy through the twelve primary meridians. Forget all of that. Your energy doesn’t want to be funneled. It wants to spread." Bai Xuelan circled her slowly, voice calm and precise. "Instead of pulling spiritual energy inward, I want you to push it outward. Let it flow into your muscles, your bones, your skin. Every part of your body equally. Like water filling a cup from every direction at once."

Zhao Lingxi inhaled deeply.

For several minutes, nothing visible happened. Then Lan Yue noticed something. A faint shimmer across Zhao Lingxi’s skin, like heat rising from summer stone. It started at her hands and spread up her arms, across her shoulders, down her spine.

Golden light, so faint it was almost invisible, pulsed beneath her skin.

"That’s it," Bai Xuelan breathed, scribbling furiously in her journal. "The energy is distributing naturally. Even spread across the skeletal system, muscular tissue, and dermal layers. This is exactly what the theory predicted."

The glow intensified slightly. Zhao Lingxi’s hair lifted, moved by energy rather than wind. The stone tiles beneath her hummed.

Then her eyes snapped open.

They were gold.

Not her normal dark brown. Pure, liquid gold, like molten metal had replaced her irises. The color lasted for three heartbeats before fading back to normal.

Zhao Lingxi exhaled slowly. "That felt... different."

"Different how?" Bai Xuelan leaned forward, journal ready.

"Like being full. Not in one place, but everywhere. My fingers, my toes, the back of my skull. Everything felt alive." She looked down at her hands, flexing her fingers. "Stronger."

"Your cultivation base just jumped." Bai Xuelan checked a small crystal instrument she had placed nearby. "Mid fourth level to peak fourth level. In one session."

Lan Yue, who had been watching from the courtyard wall, let out a low whistle.

Zhao Lingxi looked at Bai Xuelan. "When can we do it again?"

"Tomorrow. Pushing too far too fast is how mountains disappear."

Fair point.

---

While Zhao Lingxi trained her golden energy, Lan Yue had her own project.

Tang Xiaoli’s alchemy workshop had become their unofficial second headquarters. Every afternoon, Lan Yue came to help with pill refinement, and every afternoon, the gold pills they produced grew slightly more potent.

But today, Tang Xiaoli had a different idea.

"I want to test something," she said, pulling a clear crystal sphere from her bag and setting it on the workbench. "This is a Spirit Analysis Orb. It measures the composition of spiritual energy. I want to see what makes yours different."

"I told you, it’s complicated."

"Everything is complicated until you measure it. Then it’s just data." Tang Xiaoli pushed the orb toward her. "Put your hand on it and channel a small amount of energy. I’m not asking you to explain anything. I just want to see the numbers."

Lan Yue hesitated. Then she placed her palm on the cool crystal surface.

The orb lit up.

Normal spiritual energy registered as blue on the orb. Cultivation energy showed blue with traces of white. Elemental energy carried specific color signatures depending on the element.

Lan Yue’s energy was black.

Not dark blue. Not deep purple. Black, threaded with veins of iridescent silver that pulsed like a heartbeat.

Tang Xiaoli stared at the orb with her mouth open.

"That’s... I’ve never seen that color before." She grabbed her journal and started sketching frantically. "Black usually indicates void energy. Emptiness. Absence. But those silver threads are something else entirely. They look almost like... consumption pathways?"

"Meaning what?"

"Meaning your energy doesn’t just exist. It eats." Tang Xiaoli looked up from her notes, eyes wide. "Your spiritual energy has a digestive system."

Lan Yue pulled her hand back. "That sounds horrible."

"It sounds fascinating. You’re like a spiritual energy predator. You don’t just absorb energy, you break it down and convert it. That’s why the pills turned gold. Your energy consumed the impurities in the ingredients and left behind pure essence."

She paused, tapping her brush against her chin.

"If we could figure out how to channel that ability deliberately, you could purify anything. Medicines. Poisons. Corrupted spiritual energy." Her eyes lit up. "You could literally eat curses."

"Please stop saying eat."

"Devour. Consume. Ingest. Metabolize."

"Those are all worse."

Tang Xiaoli cackled.

---

The trouble started during evening meal.

The dining hall was crowded as usual. Lan Yue sat with Tang Xiaoli near the servant’s section while Zhao Lingxi ate at the student tables. They were close enough to see each other across the hall, which had become an unspoken arrangement.

Lan Yue was not watching Zhao Lingxi eat.

She was surveying the room for threats. That was completely different.

"You’re staring again," Tang Xiaoli said through a mouthful of rice.

"Security assessment."

"Is that what we’re calling it now?"

Before Lan Yue could respond, a commotion erupted near the entrance.

Shen Zhiran had walked in. That wasn’t unusual. What was unusual was the person walking beside him.

A young man in expensive silk robes, broad shouldered, with a face that might have been handsome if it wasn’t twisted into a permanent sneer. He walked with the swagger of someone who believed the ground should be grateful for carrying him.

Lan Yue recognized him instantly from the novel.

Shen Yiming.

Her blood went cold.

"He’s banned from the palace," she hissed to Tang Xiaoli. "But nobody said anything about the Academy."

Shen Yiming’s eyes scanned the hall and found Zhao Lingxi immediately. His sneer widened into something ugly and satisfied.

He walked straight toward her table.

Students parted like water. Nobody wanted to be near whatever was about to happen.

Shen Yiming stopped in front of Zhao Lingxi and looked down at her with open contempt.

"Well, well. The famous First Miss." His voice was loud enough for half the hall to hear. "I heard you’ve been causing trouble. Refusing engagements. Disrespecting your father. Making a fool of yourself at this little school."

Zhao Lingxi continued eating. She didn’t look up.

"I’m talking to you," Shen Yiming snapped.

"I noticed." She picked up a piece of pickled radish with her chopsticks. "I’m choosing not to care." 𝑓𝘳𝘦𝑒𝑤𝑒𝘣𝘯ℴ𝘷𝘦𝓁.𝑐𝑜𝑚

His face reddened. "You ruined my life. I was stripped of rank. Whipped. Banned from court. My family name is destroyed because of you."

"Your family name is destroyed because you drugged and assaulted a woman at the Empress Dowager’s banquet." Zhao Lingxi finally looked up. Her expression was ice. "That was your choice. Not mine."

"You lying little..."

He grabbed her wrist.

The hall went silent.

Lan Yue was already moving. She crossed the distance between the servant section and the student tables in seconds, her body running on pure instinct.

But someone else got there first.

Bai Xuelan appeared from nowhere. One moment she was at her table across the hall. The next she was standing behind Shen Yiming, her hand clamped on his shoulder with enough force to make him wince.

"Remove your hand," she said. Her voice was winter.

"This doesn’t concern you," Shen Yiming growled.

"You are touching a student of the Imperial Academy inside Academy grounds. That concerns every person in this room." Her grip tightened. Ice crystals formed on his shoulder, spreading across his expensive silk robes. "Remove your hand. I will not ask again."

Shen Yiming let go of Zhao Lingxi’s wrist.

Bai Xuelan released him and stepped back. "You are not a student here. You have no authorization to be on Academy grounds. I suggest you leave before I inform the elders."

"You think I’m afraid of some..."

"Yes," Bai Xuelan said simply. "You should be."

The ice in her voice carried more threat than any shout could have. Shen Yiming looked around the hall. Every student was watching. Every face was hostile. He had no allies here.

Shen Zhiran grabbed his cousin’s arm. "Let’s go. This isn’t worth it."

Shen Yiming shook him off violently, but he turned and walked toward the exit. At the door, he looked back at Zhao Lingxi.

"This isn’t over," he spat.

"Original," Zhao Lingxi said, and went back to eating her radish.

The hall erupted in whispers the moment the door closed.

Lan Yue reached Zhao Lingxi’s side, breathing hard. "Are you okay? Did he hurt your wrist?"

"I’m fine."

"Let me see."

"Lan Yue, I’m fine."

"Let me see."

Zhao Lingxi sighed and held out her wrist. There were red marks where his fingers had gripped her. Lan Yue held her hand gently, examining the skin with careful fingers.

She was aware that the entire dining hall was watching them.

She did not care even slightly.

"Bruising," she said. "I’ll put salve on it tonight."

"You and your salve."

"My salve has never let you down."

Zhao Lingxi looked at her. Soft. Warm. That expression she only wore when nobody else was supposed to be watching, except right now everyone was watching and she wore it anyway.

"No," she said quietly. "You haven’t."

Lan Yue’s ears caught fire.

From across the hall, Tang Xiaoli gave her a thumbs up that was visible from space.

---

Later that night, after the salve had been applied and the wrist had been wrapped and Lan Yue had fussed over Zhao Lingxi for approximately forty five minutes longer than necessary, they sat together at the desk drinking tea.

"He’ll come back," Zhao Lingxi said.

"I know."

"And next time, he won’t just grab my wrist."

"I know that too." Lan Yue set her cup down. "Which is why we train harder. You master the golden energy. I learn to control the Spirit Devouring. And when he comes back, or Zhao Ruoqing, or Qin Wen, or anyone else who thinks they can touch you..."

She met Zhao Lingxi’s eyes.

"We destroy them."

Zhao Lingxi studied her for a long moment. Then her lips curved.

"Bloodthirsty."

"Protective."

"Same thing, coming from you."

Lan Yue grinned. "Is that a compliment?"

"Take it however you want."