Demons Beside You

Translator: Larbre Studio  Editor: Larbre Studio

When Normans and Eveleigh were eating, Kanter walked in. Today, he was covered in injuries and even had a cane.

 “Mr. Chen, I"m here to pay you back.”

 He finally learned that it wasn"t easy to owe Chen Zhao money. His biggest mistake wasn"t owing the money but being unwilling to accept the fate and cause a bunch of trouble for himself.

 He couldn"t even stay in L.A. anymore. Sieli had announced that if Kanter appeared in L.A. anymore, Sieli would chop him up to feed the sharks.

 After Kanter left, Eveleigh and Normans looked at Chen Zhao with strange eyes.

 “You beat him up?”

 “Nonsense. I don"t do that kind of thing. I"m a pacifist.”

 The girls rolled their eyes in unison. Pacifist? If this *sshole was a pacifist, then Kim Jong-un could get the n.o.bel Peace Prize.

 After drinking, eating, and resting enough, the two stood up again to keep training.

 “Okay. Normans, you first, 50-meter freestyle. Your record yesterday was 24.12 seconds.”

 “My best record is actually 23.98.”

 “Then put on your best performance. If your result isn"t good today, I"ll have you train more.” Chen Zhao clapped his hands. “Go now.”

 Chen Zhao and Eveleigh both held up stopwatches. One person recording might not be accurate enough.

 “Ready!”

 Splas.h.!.+

 Normans dove into the water, creating a pretty splash.

 She reached the end!

 Eveleigh looked at the stopwatch, her expression changing slightly.

 “Twenty-three point nine seconds,” Chen Zhao said. “How about you?”

 “Twenty-three point ninety-one.” Eveleigh couldn"t believe this.

 With this speed, Normans could attend the Olympics with the national team. If she was lucky, she could even win gold.

 Of course, they were using manual stopwatches, so mistakes were possible. However, the error couldn"t be more than 0.01 seconds.

 Normans slowly swam back to the starting point. “How was it? What"s my time?”

 “Your final time, 23.90 seconds.”

 “I improved that much?” Normans was shocked. She knew that Chen Zhao"s training was effective, but she didn"t think it could be so obvious in only a day.

 “Come up. Eveleigh, go down. You take a break and try the 100-meter later.”

 Eveleigh took a deep breath and went to the diving platform. “I"m ready.”

 “Ready!”

 Splas.h.!.+

 Eveleigh didn"t like Chen Zhao, but she was still serious about swimming.

 One lap, two laps, three laps…

 Seven, eight!

 Chen Zhao and Normans stopped the watch at the same time. “Eight minutes, 25 seconds.”

 “How much?” Eveleigh just got out of the water and couldn"t hear clearly.

 “Eight minutes and 25 seconds.”

 Eveleigh gasped. She was at eight minutes and 40 seconds yesterday. Her best time was eight minutes 38 seconds. She kept wavering around this time without any changes.

 But in one day, she actually reached 25 seconds.

 This was a miracle! Or was she just performing exceptionally well today? It was possible for athletes to perform extraordinarily, but the possibility was too small.

 This kind of speed was a professional athlete"s level.

 “You didn"t give me any steroids, right?”

 “If you want to think that, I don"t care.” Chen Zhao shrugged. “Normans, are you done resting?”

 “Yes.”

 Next, Normans tested her 100-meter freestyle. It was better than yesterday.

 Yesterday, her time had been 54 seconds. Today, it was 53.90 seconds. The improvement wasn"t as big, but she"d just done the 50-meter freestyle and hadn"t recovered fully yet.

 “Okay. Next, start training.” Chen Zhao started giving out instructions again. “Normans, practice kicking in place for 20 minutes. Eveleigh, swim at a regular pace for 20 minutes.”

 The two had different events, so their training was different too.

 Eveleigh was much more cooperative in the following training. Chen Zhao also planned more things for them today. The training lasted for five hours.

 He didn"t leave the pool until the medical cla.s.s that Wright arranged for him in the afternoon.

 Chen Zhao didn"t prepare any material. After all, he was only the subst.i.tute. When he walked into the cla.s.sroom, there were only a dozen students there.

 “Sir, did you walk into the wrong room?” a student asked when Chen Zhao got onto the lecture podium.

 “No, I"m the subst.i.tute today,” Chen Zhao said. “Your professor is sick, so I"m here in his place. It"s about time, so let"s start cla.s.s. Let me introduce myself first. My name is Chen Zhao. You can call me Chen. I"m Chinese and I"m mainly responsible for Traditional Chinese Medicine and Acupuncture cla.s.ses. This is my first time lecturing. If you"re not interested, you can sleep. Just don"t make any noise.”

 Normans and Eveleigh were both sitting in the cla.s.sroom. They knew that Chen Zhao would teach here.

 Normans had already graduated. She wasn"t even a med student.

 “Compared to other times,” Normans whispered. “He doesn"t seem that confident on the podium.”

 “I doubt he"s qualified to even stand there,” Eveleigh replied.

 “The two ladies in the back, if you"re here for cla.s.s, please keep quiet.” Chen Zhao directly called Normans and Eveleigh out.

 The two girls glared at him and fell silent.

 “In Chinese medicine, we focus on the yin, yang, and five elements. It sounds like magic. Of course, in the east, it"s referred to as mystical studies. But Chinese medicine has a history of thousands of years. Yin and yang are actually the veins and arteries. The five elements refer to the heart, lungs, spleen, liver, and kidney…”

 “Teacher,” Eveleigh called out. “Are you sure this isn"t a magic cla.s.s? You should go to Hogwarts instead of UCLA.”

 “Eveleigh, perhaps your swimming training is too easy. I"ll multiply your intensity tomorrow and cut down your meal.”

 “Are you threatening me about another major?”

 “This is my authority. You can be angry, but you can"t do anything about it.”

 “This just shows your unprofessionalism. Look at the other students in the cla.s.sroom. Some are playing on their laptops, some reading books about other fields or just sleeping…”

 Thud.

 The student sleeping on the table suddenly slid onto the ground.

 “Look how deeply he"s asleep.”