Chapter 34

Chapter 34: Telling the Cub’s Dad You Want the Cub’s Mom—You’ve Got Some Nerve

“Fuck! This is insane. Broken limbs aren’t enough? They’re doing headshots too? Is this a championship?

No. They’re playing us. They’re fighting for our heads!”

“Yeah! Even if it’s not live ammo, it’s paint rounds. It explodes on your head—your whole head turns into a rainbow. It’s not pain, it’s humiliation.”

“That’s exactly it. The instructor team wants us running to the field with colorful paint all over our heads, humiliating us, reminding us we’re weak and useless.”

All across campus, students cursed while fumbling with clothes and shoes.

“Psychos. Total psychos. What kind of championship trains people in their dorms?”

“It’s not ‘run to the big field in thirty minutes.’ It’s ‘they beat us for thirty minutes, then deduct our credits.'”

“They’re deducting ten, twenty, fifty like it’s nothing. We only have two hundred credits total. We haven’t even earned them yet and we’re getting shoved into the negatives—how are we supposed to graduate?”

“Stop whining! Get dressed! Get out! Find a way to dodge and reach the field!”

Inside Jiang Tea Tea’s dorm, the teammates who’d gotten beaten at the training grounds earlier suddenly found religion.

“Sister Tea,” Ju Que pleaded, hands clasped like he was praying, “I’m sorry about our first meeting. I didn’t acknowledge you. Please be magnanimous and don’t hold it against a weak, pitiful little kitty like me.”

“Yes, Sister Tea,” Zhang Ting Zhou chimed in. “You’re better at scouting and information than me in the Information Department, than Old Wolf in Reconnaissance, than any of us. You’re sharp. You’re accurate.”

“We were blind before. If you’re still angry later, you can beat us again. We promise we won’t fight back.”

Jiang Tea Tea shot them a look, arrogant as ever. “If you know you’re weak, then next time keep your eyes in your sockets. Don’t stick your nostrils at the sky. Learn humility.”

Right now she only had twenty percent of her magic power. At night she had to hang her branches outside the window to absorb moon essence—and even soak up the trace nutrients drifting in the air.

Before the ships even stabilized over the academy, she’d already sensed them.

She’d hammered on Sui Xuan Chu’s door, told him what she felt, then immediately notified everyone else.

Aside from Huang Da Zhuang, the others had been skeptical—but they still had enough team spirit to move on half-belief. Within three minutes, they’d slipped out of their dorms and gathered in the bushes outside the school’s signal-shielding zone.

They’d barely formed up before the black sky above the academy split open with motion.

Two ships appeared.

One opened its bottom bay door. Avian instructors dove out in waves, and military flyers swarmed after them.

They went straight for the dorms.

The moment the dorms were surrounded, the alarm sounded.

If Jiang Tea Tea hadn’t warned them, they would’ve been trapped like fish in a barrel.

So when she called them weak, none of them got offended. If anything, they felt grateful. Praise by insult.

Cheng Lin Yue asked timidly, “S-so… what do we do now? Run to the big field?”

Cheng Xiao Ting answered quick and certain. “Straight-line distance is over fifteen thousand meters—about fifteen kilometers.”

“At my max speed I can hit two hundred kilometers per hour. Fifteen kilometers would be nothing, but—”

Sui Xuan Chu picked up smoothly. “But it’s not a straight line. There are obstacles. We’ll have to detour another five kilometers or so.”

“Given the instructor team’s habits, the main force is hunting students in the dorms. They’ll have people waiting in unexpected places for stragglers like us.”

“We need to think about how to break through with the shortest—”

Jiang Tea Tea cut him off. “Why think? Charge.”

Everyone stared at her. Someone snapped, “Charge? What if we run into instructors?”

Jiang Tea Tea clicked her tongue and mimed a fierce bite. “Then we fight. They didn’t say only they’re allowed to blast our heads, break our limbs, and deduct our credits. They didn’t say we aren’t allowed to beat them back.”

The six males—including Sui Xuan Chu—lit up like wolves smelling blood.

Beat instructors?

Exciting.

They nodded hard. “Sister Tea’s right. Why do we have to wait to get headshot? Why can’t we blast their heads?”

“Take one down, profit. Take two down, profit. If we want the championship, we have to hit first.”

“Fight, fight, fight. Whoever blocks us, we blast them. No mercy.”

Sui Xuan Chu started assigning roles immediately. “Yan Yu, you’re our 2S-rank blink. You lead and scout. If you spot instructors, warn us so we can jump them.”

“Cheng Lin Yue and Zhang Ting Zhou, your speed isn’t enough. Transform into beast form and shrink down. Cheng Xiao Ting, you carry one. I’ll carry one.”

He looked toward Jiang Tea Tea.

Jiang Tea Tea waved him off. “I don’t need anyone carrying me. Move. I can already hear gunfire and shouting and laughter.”

Outside, students were getting paintballed the moment they climbed out of windows or stepped through doors. Heads exploded into color. Some were so covered they looked like walking targets from head to toe.

Above them, instructors laughed like it was comedy.

No more hesitation.

They slipped out of the bushes. Everyone except Jiang Tea Tea and Sui Xuan Chu transformed into beast form.

Yan Yu’s tail flicked, and he blinked ahead. Cheng Xiao Ting grabbed Cheng Lin Yue’s tiny beast form in his jaws and raced after him. Huang Da Zhuang and Ju Que followed at a sprint.

Sui Xuan Chu grabbed Zhang Ting Zhou and kept up.

Jiang Tea Tea snapped off a thin branch—half a meter long, thinner than her pinky—from the bushes, leapt lightly, and landed beside Huang Da Zhuang, running with him.

“Oh?” a voice said, amused. “A few stragglers.”

In a command station packed with screens, the First Legion commander—wearing green combat gear—leaned closer to one monitor. His eyes fixed on eight figures cutting through the night.

“Stragglers are one thing,” he said, sounding impressed. “But one of them is a pure human female, running with a canine beastfolk. She isn’t even red-faced. She isn’t even winded.”

He licked his teeth and looked toward the man beside him.

“Commander-in-Chief, that’s talent. Real talent. Our First Legion wants her. I don’t care how she performs in the championship—we want her.”