Chapter 77
Chapter 77: Sleep Together, Party Together—Drive Them Crazy
Across Planet M31_1137, more than 1.8 million cadets heard the rules and lit up with excitement.
Same academy: allies.
Other academies: enemies.
That meant fighting was finally going to feel satisfying.
The broadcast paused briefly, then continued.
“Dear classmates, little darlings: additional rules.”
“Mark an instructor’s neck: personal score plus fifty.”
“Mark a legion commander’s neck: personal score plus one hundred, and squad score plus one hundred.”
“The instructor group total is nearly three hundred thousand people.”
“We hope you cooperate, work together, and kill three hundred thousand instructors—then split the instructors’ points among yourselves.”
“Of course, be cautious: the instructors assigned to your academy are forbidden from marking your necks. But instructors assigned to other academies may strike you without mercy.”
“Instructors receive five points for marking one of you.”
“Classmates, survive to the end. Don’t let the instructor group mark your necks.”
The instructors listening to the broadcast went quiet.
This was Commander-in-Chief Chong Ming’s work, all right.
On the surface, it looked like they were training 1.8 million cadets.
In reality, it was 1.8 million people being encouraged to siege three hundred thousand instructors.
The instructors couldn’t mark their own academy’s cadets—but those cadets could mark them.
And on top of that, the instructors weren’t allowed to form alliances. They had to operate independently while still ensuring cadet safety.
Cheng Xiao Ting pulled out the weapon clipped to his waist—a blade less than forty centimeters long, soft and flexible.
“So that’s why they gave everyone this weird soft ‘blade’ during the parachute drop,” he muttered.
He dragged it lightly over his wrist.
A bright red line appeared, like blood. The mark dried instantly and wouldn’t wipe off.
Others clicked their tongues.
“Only neck marks count. Stabbed hearts and guts don’t matter.”
“This round’s harder than it looks.”
Someone asked, “Should we unite with our academy’s classmates? Better odds, more points.”
Jiang Tea Tea yawned so hard her eyes watered.
When she finished, she realized the others were staring at her like she was the squad’s brain.
She spread her hands. “Don’t ask me. I don’t know anything.”
Then she yawned again, deadly serious. “I want to sleep. Do you want to sleep?”
Huang Da Zhuang leaned in, frantic. “Sister Tea, ten points per cadet!”
“Subtract our seventy thousand cadets—there are over 1.7 million cadets from the other twenty-nine schools. That’s points everywhere!”
Cheng Lin Yue nodded eagerly. “The instructor group is nearly three hundred thousand too! And thirty legion commanders! They’re all points!”
Ju Que’s eyes shone. “Then let’s go after the instructors assigned to our school. Over ten thousand of them—that’s half a million points!”
Jiang Tea Tea stared at him with genuine admiration and raised a thumb.
“You’re incredible,” she said. “Starting with ten thousand people. Respect.”
Ju Que scratched his head, embarrassed. “I was exaggerating. We’ll take what we can. We’re not picky, as long as we don’t get killed.”
The others nodded quickly.
“Right. Even if we don’t mark anyone, we can’t let other people mark us.”
Jiang Tea Tea lowered her thumb and flipped her palm upward.
“Save strength. Don’t get killed. That’s easy.”
“We hide here,” she said decisively. “We camp. We survive until the end.”
She turned to Sui Xuan Chu. “Go. Break some flower branches and block the entrance. We rest first.”
Sui Xuan Chu hesitated. “Rest? We’re really not going to strike while people are excited?”
Jiang Tea Tea’s answer came fast and blunt.
“Strike what? Our landing zone is full of our academy’s cadets.”
“We can’t mark our own academy. To go hunting, we’d have to spend time and energy tracking other schools.”
“Why bother? Let them come to us. Save energy.”
She didn’t say the rest out loud, but she felt it in her bones.
The soil here was rich. This mountain didn’t feel quite natural—it felt engineered, packed with dense earth.
Fertilizer.
A perfect environment for a tree demon.
If she found a place like this and didn’t root down and absorb it, she’d be betraying her own nature.
The squad accepted her logic and divided tasks.
They pitched tents in the cave. They sprayed insecticide. They went farther out to cut flower branches and collect dry wood and dead grass. They camouflaged the entrance.
They placed three signal jammers to block detection.
Then they crawled into their tents like they were on a lazy camping trip.
Jiang Tea Tea took the innermost spot and set up her own tent.
She slipped off her shoes and socks, covered her legs, and lay down.
To anyone watching, she was sleeping.
In reality, her feet transformed into roots. Her root system drilled through stone and spread into the mountain, searching for fertilizer.
She was a tree demon.
A powerful tree demon.
In a mountain full of flowering trees and grass, no one could compete with her for nutrients.
Her roots spread through hills, through soil, through streams.
Anything that could nourish her, she took.
Days passed.
In the monitoring room, the thirty legion commanders couldn’t find Jiang Tea Tea’s squad on surveillance.
All thirty had quietly ordered their subordinates to locate and hunt them.
But even with Beast God perspective, they couldn’t.
The instructor group’s lightbrain displays only showed red dots—cadet locations. With 1.8 million dots, it was impossible to tell who was who.
Even stranger, the Royal Military Academy landing region had been a sea of flowers and fresh green leaves.
Now blossoms fell constantly. Leaves turned yellow. Entire stretches of plant life withered visibly.
“Commander-in-Chief.”
Cai Xi Chao hurried over with her lightbrain board.
“The unknown energy has appeared again. This time, the energy fluctuation is unprecedented.”
Chong Ming lifted his gaze to the projection she displayed.
“Is it on our ship?”
“No,” Cai Xi Chao said, pointing down. “It’s beneath us—around two thousand five hundred meters down. Where the Royal Military Academy cadets parachuted.”
“Possibly due to the appearance of this unknown energy, all plants within five hundred li are rapidly withering.”
The projection showed it clearly: days ago, the flower sea was brilliant. Now petals fell like rain, leaves yellowed, branches cracked.
Chong Ming’s voice stayed even. “How many cadets and how many instructors are within five hundred li?”
Cai Xi Chao tapped quickly and read off the data.
“Reporting, Commander-in-Chief: within five hundred li, there are cadets from twenty-one academies—around five hundred fifty thousand.”
“Fifteen legions’ instructor groups are within range as well—about fifty thousand instructors.”
She hesitated, then added, “And the squad known as ‘Wipe Out the Other Twenty-Nine Military Academies’ has not emerged since they entered that cave.”
Chong Ming fell silent for a moment.
“Adjutant AI,” he said at last, “send Director Li down. Tell him: if there’s any movement, report to me immediately.”
“Yes, Commander-in-Chief.”
Li Ao heard “unknown energy” and “beneath us” and practically vibrated with excitement. He grabbed his equipment and went down.
Back in the cave, pounding and frantic voices dragged Jiang Tea Tea out of sleep.
“Sister Tea! Sister Tea! Something’s wrong—something huge! Wake up!”
Jiang Tea Tea sat up, still half-asleep, and asked with complete seriousness, “How many people in our squad died?”
Huang Da Zhuang choked. “Uh… none.”
“It’s not us,” he blurted. “It’s the plants outside. They’re dying. Everything’s dying!”
Jiang Tea Tea shot upright, pulled on socks and shoes, tore open her tent, and tied her hair into a high ponytail with fast, practiced hands.
Then she rushed to the cave entrance.
Outside, as far as she could see, dead flowers carpeted the ground. Leaves spun through the air like broken wings. Branches cracked dry.
She stared.
Her stomach dropped.
She’d overdone it.
She hadn’t just eaten the fertilizer in the ground.
She’d almost eaten the entire mountain’s plants.
Cheng Lin Yue pointed anxiously. “Two days ago it was fine. Just the last two or three days—everything turned into this. Isn’t that weird?”
Weird?
It wasn’t weird at all.
Jiang Tea Tea couldn’t exactly say, Sorry, I was snacking.
So she nodded solemnly and shoved the blame onto the nearest convenient monster.
“It is weird,” she agreed. “Could Commander-in-Chief Chong Ming be doing this on purpose?”
She turned to Sui Xuan Chu. “What do you think?”
Sui Xuan Chu, as Chong Ming’s big nephew, understood his uncle’s tactics better than anyone.
“It’s possible,” he said seriously. “He’s best at surprise strikes. He never follows the script.”
“I suspect he’s been watching us from the command ship. We stayed in the cave for five days without leaving, so he’s forcing us out.”
“Otherwise,” Sui Xuan Chu added grimly, “who else could erase a flower sea like this overnight? Only him.”
Perfect.
Jiang Tea Tea accepted the scapegoat happily.
“So,” she said brightly, “if he’s sacrificing the entire flower sea just to force us out, do we go out… or keep hiding?”
Sui Xuan Chu looked at the dead mountain and shivered. “Go out. If we don’t, I’m afraid he’ll drop bombs next.”
Jiang Tea Tea raised a thumb. “Good point. Pack up. We go farm points.”
They agreed instantly. In under ten minutes, everything was stuffed into storage buttons.
They emerged from the cave and stepped onto dead petals and brittle leaves.
They opened their lightbrains, checked the shared signal map, and searched for the nearest other-school cadets.
Once they locked onto coordinates, they moved.
They ran through the hills. Wind shook dead leaves off branches, swirling them through the air.
Jiang Tea Tea had absorbed enough fertilizer to recover to about a quarter of her magic power. As she ran, she deliberately released a thin thread of it, feeding the plant life she’d nearly drained.
Leaves that had been about to die began to green again in her wake.
They were nearing their target when Jiang Tea Tea raised a hand.
“Stop.”
The squad halted instantly and gathered around her, alert.
“What?” Sui Xuan Chu demanded. “What’s happening?”
Jiang Tea Tea stared northwest. “Someone’s running toward us from a few dozen meters away. Fast. Doesn’t look like instructors.”
Cheng Xiao Ting and Huang Da Zhuang dropped to the ground at once, ears pressed to the soil—wolf and dog instincts sharpening.
“Yeah,” Cheng Xiao Ting said, eyes narrowing. “Not instructors.”
Huang Da Zhuang sniffed the wind. “Feels like Ability Institute people. Heavy equipment.”
Jiang Tea Tea glanced around. The trees here were neither too tall nor too short—perfect for an ambush.
“Everyone up a tree,” she ordered. “Wait for them to get close. Drop them. Take their gear.”