Chapter 75
Chapter 75: Why Did They Work So Hard to Grow Magic Plants?
They had sweated and suffered to raise magic plants.
For what?
For their lives.
Was it so they could earn a diploma from Awakeners University, get into the magic plant research institute, and become a researcher making three thousand a month?
Or was it to learn how to grow valuable magic plants, then get rich reselling magic plant fruit as a magic plant dealer?
Or was it simply to find somewhere safe and make it through these four years alive?
Most of the students who entered the magic plant academy were from poor families stuck living near the instances. They couldn’t afford a regular university, and they sure as hell couldn’t afford an apartment in the city center, far away from the instances. Some of them had even lost both parents and were left with nothing but themselves. For all kinds of reasons, they had only one choice left: the magic plant college, and the protection it offered.
It was safe. It was cheap. If you studied and turned in your assignments, you could live on campus for four years without worrying about rent or raids.
Sure, magic plants were dangerous—but compared to being poor, a plant with fangs didn’t even rank.
Poverty was the real monster.
“For money,” someone answered.
“To survive,” someone else said.
“Right. For money, and to survive.” Zhang Feng looked like something finally clicked. “But they’re cutting off our way to live. We should hit back—before they decide we’re easy targets.”
Qian Qi paced on the platform, staring at the roomful of students. Then she shook her head, calm as a judge.
“Wrong.”
“We’re not doing this for money. And we’re not doing it just to survive.”
“Then what is it?” a classmate blurted.
Qian Qi looked at the speaker. Her face was serious—almost heavy—then that solemn expression lifted into something like righteous purpose. She set down the stool in her hands, drew a deep breath, and snapped her voice loud enough to hit the back wall.
“We—we’re doing it for their lives!”
The class froze.
Classmates: ?
?
?
What?
Whose lives?
“Everyone knows about hemostatic magic potion, right?” Qian Qi shouted. “Hemostatic magic potion is made from magic plants. You know that too, right?”
The students in the magic plant 101 class nodded. Of course they knew. The campus forum had been obsessed with it, and everyone had heard the rumors: it came from a magic plant recipe.
“Then you know defense fruit is a kind of magic plant fruit, right?”
More furious nodding.
Qian Qi slapped the desk like she was scolding a room of slow learners. “Then why do we study magic plants? Why do we grow magic plants? Isn’t it to make magic potions that help people—like hemostatic magic potion? Isn’t it to find magic plants that strengthen an awakener’s body?”
“Classmates—on the battlefield, how many awakened soldiers die because they bleed out before anyone can treat them? When magic beasts surge out of their nests, how many innocent civilians die? In the uncleared instances, how many awakeners die for nothing because they aren’t strong enough?”
“Are we supposed to watch our own university alumni graduate… and walk straight into the same grave?”
“Once you’re a student of Awakeners University, you spend your whole life worrying about Awakeners University alumni. Even if they’re from the skills department, the beast-taming department, or the commander department, we still hold a broad heart and a compassionate will. We stand behind them—quietly, selflessly—as their hard shield!”
“That’s why we endure mockery and misunderstanding, studying magic plants people have sneered at for centuries. That’s why we ignore our own safety and face magic plants baring their fangs at us!”
“All this sacrifice—this anonymity—this road that’s dangerous and miserable—what is it for?”
Her voice rose until it rang.
“It’s to find a way to protect their lives!!!”
The room went blank for a second. The students of the magic plant 101 class stared like they’d just discovered they’d accidentally joined a holy order instead of a major.
“So,” Qian Qi said, drawing a breath, “I’ll ask again.”
She raised her arm high.
“Classmates—why did we work so hard growing magic plants?!”
“For their lives!” someone shouted.
It spread like fire.
“For their lives!”
“That’s right!” Qian Qi snapped. “So they have one more chance to live when they fight in instances! So they can go to war without looking over their shoulder!”
“But what about them?!” Her anger flared, hot and sharp. “They destroyed their own future with their own hands. How can we let stupidity like that slide?!”
“Right! We can’t!”
“Good.” Qian Qi’s eyes shone. “Then after class, we grab our tools and go find them. We give them a serious lecture for not cherishing their own lives. We make them apologize—to themselves, and to us.”
“To our kind, selfless classmates!”
“Yes! Classmate Qian Qi! We’re going with you!”
“We won’t tolerate people treating life like trash!”
“Our magic plant department isn’t swallowing this!”
Before class even started, students were already messaging friends in other classes, pulling them into the coming crusade. Other classes heard the story and immediately fumed—because it had happened to them too. And because the other side was the skills department, they’d always been forced to swallow it.
Not today.
Even second-, third-, and fourth-year seniors came down to join. The magic plant department had always been at the bottom of Awakeners University’s major hierarchy. Poor. Weak. Easy to bully.
They’d endured it before. But now even Qian Qi—someone who had once smashed magic plants herself—couldn’t stand it.
That meant it was time.
In class, the teacher didn’t know why, but today the students felt… dangerously energized.
…
The skills department.
Xu Jing was in his dorm with friends, laughing about how hard those girls from the magic plant department had cried this morning, when the door suddenly exploded inward with a single kick.
“Who the fuck is Xu Jing?” a voice barked.
Qian Qi stood in the doorway with a face like thunder. Her eyes swept the room, cold and sharp, cutting through the laughter.
Xu Jing—still sitting in the middle, grin half-formed—turned around, scowling. The moment he saw Qian Qi, he froze, clearly not expecting someone like her to come looking for him.
“I am,” he said, forcing it. “So what?”
He barely got the words out before Qian Qi grabbed a fistful of his hair and yanked.
“Come outside,” she said, voice low. “It’s cramped in here.”
She dragged him out like he weighed nothing.
“What—?” Xu Jing panicked, clawing at her hand. But her grip was terrifying. He tugged once and the pain screaming through his scalp made him go rigid.
[Was this ever about our own way to live?]
[It was always about theirs.]
A beat.
Then the door shut behind them.