After eating it was time for another rapid readathon, choosing to read through the remainder of the book I started the night before, as well as the thinner books I had set aside previously. I open up the books, making sure that none of the books that contain the same subject matter are next to each other. The book on the ethics of spirit beast taming being moved away from the the book on financial impact of selling spirit beast parts, as they shared similar content. With everything set up, I began reading for several hours, only really pausing every so often to write questions for the reading with both hands. Despite the fact that I was ambidextrous, I still had made a habit of adding a bit of a flourish to what I wrote with my right hand, as I just wrote a bit faster than my left hand. If I didn’t add that flourish, it wasn’t hard for get too far ahead of my left hand, which tended to make me lose my train of thought. I had found out early on that I couldn’t use split focus when solely writing two sets of questions, even if the questions were about completely different things, I was still just writing questions, and often time I would autopilot writing basic questions, meaning there was even more bleed through on what each “screen” would be doing. Ultimately I found I had to either do it while reading, so I had a buffer “screen” in between, or just not use it at all. This is how I came to needing to write at the same speeds with both hands, as the tendency to autopilot similar questions for both hands made this easier.

After the sun started to go down for the day, an hour or so before I would’ve stopped to eat and finish up my studying for the day, I got a knock at the door. I walk over to answer the door, when I open the door, I spot a servant who was looking all shifty, as he kept glancing over his shoulders.

“Young Master Mingzie, I have been sent by Young Master Zhonglei to summon you to battle. He mentioned something about your last fight being only a practice round compared to the glory of this battle” the servant went on to say. Thinking that our rock skipping fun was being misinterpreted, I tried to step up and correct the servant, but he only motioned me to follow him.

Deciding that I may as well play along, and correct Zhonglei myself, I hurry to put on a more formal robe over the more casual clothes I had changed into after eating. Following along, we hurrry through a few corridors, a zig zag of paths I quickly lost track of, until we suddenly came into a room that looked a lot like a dojo. Walking in I noticed Zhonglei, his sister absent, as she would’ve stopped the fight, but accompanying him were several older men. When he motioned in the direction of the sparring area, I grew concerned, as this seemed to have crossed the line that I couldn’t reject an actual fight without serious consequences. I hesitantly walked into the sparring arena, turning and getting ready to fight.

“What are you doing Zhou Mingzie, come over to the table, I have prepared all afternoon for a battle of dad jokes, it will be so glorious, especially since my sister can not stop us this time” Zhonglei says, which causes me to breath a sigh of relief. I walk over to the table, where some drinks are placed at the ends of the table, taking my seat at one end, where Zhonglei sat opposite. One of the older men started saying a bunch of stuff, talking about “clean fights” and “first one to smile loses”, I barely noticed, to focus on coming up with as many sad jokes in my head as possible.

Everyone begins to look at me, and I take this as my cue, “what do you call a depressed bear cub after the death of its father?” I pause for a second while I let the moment build up, looking both ways for dramatic effect, “just bearly hanging on”. Several of the older men grin, even several of them smiling, but Zhonglei only let the smallest upturn of his lips show.

Zhonglei responds nonchalantly, “that wasn’t even funny, I can go to the pig pen if I want to hear something boaring”, I don’t even give him the satisfaction of an upturned lip, as I had long ago disciplined myself against someone else’s dad jokes. “Oh you wild animal, but I have one better” I say before starting in the lead up to the joke. “A young boy spent every day in the woods looking for the tallest stag, and when the local hunters asked why he was so dedicated in his hunt, the boy responded ‘the stag is my dearest friend, all my other friends are humans”. This sets off several of the older men, making the laugh hysterically. Zhonglei still did not even let his lips move this time, but before he could get his dad joke in, there was a commotion at the entrance to the dojo. Walking into the dojo is Zhou Baoli and my somewhat famous Young Master Crushers. Baoli starts yelling pretty loudly, “what did I say yesterday brother? These childish fights are beneath all of us” to which Zhonglei answers, saying we were just having a dad joke battle, which immediately causes Qiang’s head to swivel. Baoli just groans at the sound of this, to which Zhonglei seeing the perfect moment, responds. “ with an attitude like that, you’re not gonna be the nicest person around” he says, emphasizing the ice in nice. I give Zhonglei a thumbs up, saying nice one, before following up with my own dad joke. “You know people don’t like it when you give them the cold shoulder” which sets off the older men yet again, this time managing a smile on Zhonglei’s face. Seeing this I proclaim myself victor, but it is short lived when the Crushers sprint to me, grabbing me before anything else could be said, going as far as to cover my mouth, before sprinting away with me in their tow.

They set me down, and begin scolding me on the “idiocy” of engaging a “dad” with dad jokes. I try to explain to them how nothing bad could happen, it was just some jokes, that’s all. They keep going on all about the dangers of a “true dad” before eventually just escorting me back to my room, where they ensure I have food and everything I’d need for the rest of the night, waning me not to leave my room tonight.

In another part of the compound, one could hear someone talk to Baoli, “Hello Baoli, I’m Dad” followed by some maniacal laughter.