Chapter 76

Chapter 77: I Got Beat Up, How Could You Not?

Qian Qi studied the short, round dean and smiled a little as she said: “So you’re the Dean of the Skills Department? Perfect. As a student of this university, I think I have the right and the duty to question your level of education.”

“Nonsense,” Fan Jing Hai barked, half laughing from anger; no student had ever challenged him like this: “When I became dean, your parents might not even have been born. What gives you the right to question me?”

Qian Qi’s eyes cooled as she asked: “Then let me ask you, are you the one who turned a blind eye and let the Skills students use our Magiplants for target practice?”

He froze, then understood: “All this just because of that?”

“Just because of that?” Qian Qi tightened her grip on the back of Xu Jing’s collar and gave a short, cold laugh as she echoed him: “You really said, just because of that?”

“So what?” Fan Jing Hai’s tone went flat now that he saw the root of it: “Skills students can’t go into Dungeons often. Most days they can only spar with classmates. If they don’t get live practice, they’ll panic when they meet a real Monster. So they practice first on Magiplants.”

“They’re trying to get strong enough to protect you ordinary people. Training on Magiplants may harm your interests, but I hope you can understand.”

Zhang Feng surged forward, furious, but Qian Qi stopped him with a hand.

She paused for two seconds, then sneered: “So your students are that weak? They’ll freeze up before real Monsters? Sounds like your teaching really isn’t good.”

Fan Jing Hai’s face darkened. He had said all that to get her to drop it, since the school had always tolerated this and making a fuss would only make the Magiplant side look foolish.

“No matter what you say, training on Magiplants helps us and helps you,” he snapped.

“Did you hear that, Qian Qi?” Xu Jing couldn’t help gloating as he chimed in: “Magiplants are Monsters. What’s wrong with us practicing on them? We get stronger, and in the end we protect you.”

Qian Qi shot him a look, then clicked off the amplifier. She leaned close and whispered in his ear: “You’re right. But when I smashed a classmate’s Magiplant back then, they at least beat me up. You guys walk away without a scratch, and that annoys me.”

[If I got beat up, how can you be left out?]

Xu Jing stared at her, stunned and speechless.

Qian Qi flicked the amplifier back on and faced the furious Magiplant students: “My fellow Magiplant students, did you hear that? The Dean of the Skills Department hopes we can understand them and give our Magiplants for free so their students can train, because they will protect us one day.”

Rage rose in the Magiplant crowd. They were about to curse him out when Qian Qi lifted her voice and kept going: “He’s right. We should understand them. They hurt our Magiplants to improve their strength. In the end, that sounds like a fair trade.”

Fan Jing Hai nodded, pleased that she seemed to be backing down.

“But what about us?” Qian Qi turned, eyes full of pity as she looked at the Skills students: “We work hard to make potions to protect them too.”

“We spend long days and nights in the test fields, pushing through hard problems, swallowing mockery and bullying, searching for Magiplants like the Defense Fruit that can be eaten directly, and developing medicines like the Hemostasis Potion that can save people with serious wounds. Why do we do this?”

“We do it so the students of the Skills, Beast Taming, and Commander Departments will have a better chance to live when they fight in the future.”

“If this is a fair trade, then where is our pay?”

“Yes, where is our pay?” the Magiplant students roared back at once. “You say you protect us, so you can smash our Magiplants. When we protect you, what do you give us?”

Qian Qi threw her arms wide and called out, voice full of fire: “Fellow students, we are not the same as the Skills Department.”

“We don’t ask for pay. We never saw this as a cold trade. We give our time and even risk our lives to research Magiplants that help humans, so people can survive the Dungeon crisis as much as possible.”

“But what about those who destroy our Magiplants? They destroy not only our work, but also the lives of soldiers and innocent people outside. They even endanger their own lives.”

“How can we sit and do nothing?”

“We can’t sit and do nothing!” The Magiplant students knew this speech by heart and took up the cry. Nearly a thousand voices shook the entire Skills campus. Many Skills students went pale. They had not thought that smashing a few plants would be turned into proof that they were selfish people who did not care about life.

Xu Jing was so angry his scalp tingled. What Qian Qi had whispered in his ear a moment ago was not this kind of noble, selfless talk at all.

Breathless now, Qian Qi drew in a deep breath and shouted again: “So today, we came to the Skills Department for one thing. We want you to apologize to yourselves for not valuing life and for ruining your own future.”

“We also want you to apologize to the Magiplant students who work in silence to protect you.”

“And you must apologize for delaying the research schedule of medicines that could save and extend lives, medicines for the warriors on the front lines, for the parents who pay your tuition, and for the classmates who learn at your side.”

“I ask you, Dean of the Skills Department, will you apologize?”

The Principal, arriving just then, heard this bold question first and felt a twitch at the corner of his mouth. This scene felt familiar.

Fan Jing Hai’s face had gone green. He had not expected Qian Qi’s sharp tongue. In a few short sentences she put the Skills Department on the side of injustice, and he could not find a clean counter.

“You, you,” he sputtered, spitting with rage: “Since when are you Magiplant people so selfless? You’re useless, living off school funds. Hemostasis Potion, Defense Fruit, what nonsense.”

The Principal’s heart sank the moment he heard that.

Qian Qi gave a short, harsh laugh and shoved Xu Jing toward Fan Jing Hai as she said: “Fine. Fine.”

She turned to the Magiplant students and announced in a steady, cold voice: “From today on, every Hemostasis Potion we make, every Defense Fruit we grow, and all future medicines from our department are not allowed to be sold to the Skills Department.”

“If you sell to them, you stand against all Magiplant students.”

She lifted her chin and asked: “Can you promise me?”

She looked at this crowd, her future employees, with dark, deep eyes that hid an ambition no one else could see. She was starting to build her own force.

“We can!” the Magiplant students answered, shouting with shaking voices. “We are not cowards. If they won’t admit they’re wrong or change that rotten habit, then they can stop coming to our department to buy potions.”

Hearing this, Fan Jing Hai and the Principal kept their calm, but the Skills students panicked first and yelled in a hurry: “Don’t do that!”