Chapter 167 Life is like a play!

During the banquet at the restaurant, Andy finally listened to them chattering away about the specific details of their former club, the "Abnormal Human Research Center."

Originally, this club had been established with Mark at its core.

Although Mark possessed only moderate mental power aptitude, his family had connections within Grim Academy, which secured his admission into the inner court.

As a second-generation wealthy heir, Mark had little interest in cultivation. Instead, he made a group of friends in the outer court, spending his days hanging out, chatting, and idling about with them. Because Mark loved to boast and exaggerate, he exaggerated his father's assets by dozens of times, which correspondingly attracted an increasing number of friends.

Eventually, someone suggested that they form a club. Since it was a rare chance for people from all corners of the land to gather together, having a club would make it more convenient to undertake tasks and organize activities in the future.

Mark was recommended as the president, and together they brainstormed a strange name: the "Abnormal Human Research Center."

They rarely undertook any actual missions, but they organized plenty of activities—and of course, Mark footed the bill for all of it. In truth, Mark was not a fool; he could see that some people were purely there for free food and drinks. However, these individuals had remarkably low standards of integrity. Their endless streams of flattery and sycophancy massaged Mark's ego until he felt supremely gratified. Eventually, their tactics became increasingly creative and elaborate, leaving Mark unable to tear himself away.

Since Mark could easily afford it anyway, he simply let things take their course. As the saying goes, money can hardly buy true happiness!

However, good times never last. A sudden upheaval occurred in Mark's family: his father disappeared, and the family business went bankrupt!

The matter was rather bizarre. His father had numerous business ventures in the royal capital and maintained a very close relationship with Steward Spick of the academy. Consequently, he also dabbled in the business of introducing newcomers to Grim Academy. Naturally, those with real wealth and strong connections were arranged straight into the inner court, but those with meager funds or weak connections were simply dumped into the outer court and left at that!

About a year ago—around the time Andy had first arrived in the royal capital—Mark's father had visited some relatives in Monlik City. Upon returning, he had boasted about his discerning eye and how business opportunities were everywhere. He bragged that he had sweet-talked the son of his nephew's neighbor into enrolling in Grim Academy's outer court, netting himself a handsome introduction fee. He added that he could collect yet another commission from Spick later on, effectively milking both the clients and the contacts!

Then, one day shortly after finishing a meal, while Mark's father was resting in his concubine's room, with a sudden "whoosh," a living human being simply vanished into thin air!

Mark's family searched for a long time and even reported the case to the royal capital's law enforcement team, but in the end, there was neither hide nor hair of him, dead or alive!

Mark's father had been the pillar supporting much of the family business. With his death, Mark was left completely at a loss. At that moment, one of his father's former partners seized the opportunity to swallow up the majority of their business. Hearing that his father had met with misfortune, various creditors also swarmed in one after another...

Mark managed things cautiously, exhausted both mentally and physically. In the end, even after liquidating their sprawling family estate, he still had debts left unpaid.

Driven to desperation, Mark sought help from his club members. The moment he asked for assistance, more than half of the club members vanished, dropping out with excuses like having no future following such a club.

In the end, only about twenty people remained. By pooling together whatever they could scrape up, they finally paid off Mark's family debts. However, their own savings were nearly completely exhausted.

After that, Mark began leading the entire club in a frantic scramble to make a living and cover their study expenses! Outside of their grueling daily grind, their greatest hobby was gathering together to brag and boast, which at least allowed them to feel that a glimmer of hope still remained in their lives.

Mark had constantly tried to find a way out for his old brothers in the club, but he never found a good opportunity. This time, when he saw someone looking to acquire the club, he recognized the buyer as the second young miss of the Barov family. Mark knew this was a rare chance, so he negotiated the price purely as a formality, and the club was annexed by the Azure Phoenix Society for next to nothing, practically given away.

Little did he expect that Miss Barov was not the actual president, and that someone else held the position. Regardless, anyone capable of bossing Miss Barov around must be an extraordinary figure. Therefore, they had to make a stellar impression on the new president.

Upon meeting the new president, Mark signaled his old brothers with a gesture only they could understand and counted silently to three.

Once the flattery machine fired up, it was invincible!

Indeed, the brothers were still seasoned experts at this craft. Hearing the new president's hearty laughter, Mark let out a long breath of relief. Since the new president liked flattery, everything would be easy to handle. He seemed to catch a glimpse of a bright future ahead!

During the subsequent banquet at the restaurant, Mark quietly gave his old brothers a series of instructions, and the entire feast proceeded amidst a rising tide of lavish compliments.

Some praised the new president as handsome, dashing, and extraordinarily heroic; others hailed the president as uniquely gifted and profoundly erudite; still others claimed the president was both scholar and warrior, possessed of grand strategies and boundless ambitions. Someone even went so far as to praise him for having boundless magical power and a lifespan matching the heavens.

Andy smiled cheerfully, accepting every single compliment without missing a beat. Whenever someone delivered an exaggerated and brilliant piece of flattery, he would raise a cup of drink with them. Encouraged by this seemingly appreciative approach, his new subordinates became even more uninhibited, racking their brains for increasingly novel and elaborate phrases that left Andy secretly thrilled.

Along the way, he even made an excuse to visit the restroom, where he entered his mental space to check on his status. The growth of his mental power was so immense that Andy felt it was roughly comparable to the effects of Catherine's entire day of meditation!

This revealed a magnificent highway to advancement for Andy, one that was at least ten times more ferocious than the grueling and bitter path of drug-assisted meditation. Excitedly, Andy returned to the banquet and declared to them that as long as the brothers remained as respectful to him as always, whenever he had a bowl of dry food, the brothers would certainly share a bowl of broth!

And so, thunderous applause erupted, accompanied by a blizzard of flattery!

At that moment, Andy noticed that Nicole beside him hadn't touched a single bite of food. In his high-spirited mood, he cared to ask her a word, inquiring whether the dishes weren't to her taste. He figured that after running around all day—handling flyers and acquiring the club—Nicole ought to be starving by now.

Hearing Andy's concern, Nicole rolled her eyes. She felt that the image of the Great Emperor Bill in her heart had completely and utterly collapsed.

As if a sudden realization had struck her, she buried her head in the food on the table and began eating ravenously.

She decided she might as well go back to her promising career of catching mice for the feline nanny. As for the chaotic mess of "Great Emperor Bill," she would leave it for future Empress Jella to clean up!

However, after the banquet ended, on the way back with Andy, Nicole still couldn't help but remind him. She asked if he truly believed in friendships forged into brotherhood overnight, and whether endless flattery and sycophancy equated to genuine respect.

Andy smiled mysteriously, and then his laughter grew louder and louder.

He shook off Nicole, unable to resist dancing and singing aloud:

"Life is like a play, relying entirely on acting! You perform the first half, I perform the second half. Who is trapped within the play, and who remains outside? Only gains and losses linger in the heart..."

Nicole thought to herself: "It's over, he's totally drunk. May Princess Catherine forgive me!"