Chapter 148

Chapter 148

Bai Xingshu was completely unprepared to see this many people. He’d figured he’d be among the last to arrive.

After all, he still had to climb a 20-meter cliff.

Even with the metal assist, it wasn’t exactly hard for him, but he still milked it for 2-3 minutes to put on a show.

What could he do? Bai Xingshu remembered he was under the teachers’ surveillance and couldn’t act too flashy.

Two or three minutes was plenty of time for military academy students to gather.

But now…

He glanced left and right, getting the distinct impression that everyone was waiting specifically for him.

Being stared at by one person? No big deal.

Being stared at by a crowd? Still nothing much to worry about.

But being stared at with resentment by a whole group? That gave him the creeps.

“Aren’t any of you going back to the ship?” Bai Xingshu tentatively asked.

His voice broke the weird tension.

No one paid attention to what he said. Instead, his classmates went nuts.

They lunged at him, yelling their heads off: “I don’t care!! I’m catching you today no matter what!!!”

Seeing them lose it, Bai Xingshu’s expression shifted, and he made a break for the ship.

Retreating back down the cliff would’ve been smarter, but Bai Xingshu worried his classmates who’d clearly lost it might do something reckless in pursuit.

So the ship was his best option.

The only problem? The path to the ship was packed with his ‘lovely’ classmates.

Straight-up zombie apocalypse.

Bai Xingshu weaved through their grabby hands, but you can’t fight a mob.

With no real way to retaliate against his classmates, he only got halfway before being overwhelmed by the human wave.

Countless hands seized his limbs, and those who succeeded in capturing him whooped: “We caught Bai Xingshu!”

But they weren’t done. To prove their victory, they howled with laughter, chanting in unison as they lifted him high into the air and tossed him upward like some prized catch.

Bai Xingshu just went along with his overexcited classmates.

As they cheered and tossed him, he was carried all the way into the ship.

…At least he didn’t have to walk.

He took what little comfort he could from that.

And his classmates weren’t hard to satisfy. Even though they’d only caught him after training was already over, they’d take what they could get.

Students who had never experienced getting beaten up by Bai Xingshu in the arena finally got a taste of that infuriating feeling during this training session.

So they knew enough to quit while they were ahead—that much they understood.

Thus, the final deep-sea survival training turned out to be weirdly peaceful.

The students didn’t target Bai Xingshu anymore, and Bai Xingshu stuck to the basic survival drills expected of any student.

By the end, both the students and instructors were kinda spaced out.

What was going on?

Why didn’t they sense Bai Xingshu stirring up trouble?

If Bai Xingshu knew his instructors and classmates were thinking this way, he would definitely yell "That's not fair!"

He picks his moments to mess around, okay?! Rainforests, swamps, and caves were relatively safe environments for him.

His metal powers could handle most problems, and if his classmates got into trouble, he could pull their bacon out of the fire. But in the deep sea… his metal powers were pretty much useless.

No matter how strong metal-based powers were, they couldn’t let him breathe underwater!

The risk was just too high for Bai Xingshu, so he knew to keep his head down.

With the disciplinary drills of their sophomore fall semester over, the students returned to campus walking around like zombies.

Somehow, it felt like they had been reborn.

Meanwhile, the junior-year students had also finished their disciplinary training.

Since dorm buildings for different grades were adjacent, the juniors clearly saw the thousand-yard stares on their sophomore juniors’ faces.

They froze for a moment, and some cautiously approached to ask, "What happened during your training?"

Compared to the freshman and junior-year disciplinary training, the sophomore survival training was legit dangerous.

On the first day of the semester, instructors from each academy would hammer this home during orientation, even citing past incidents as warnings.

Most sophomores didn’t grasp the implication behind their seniors’ question.

Dying to spill the tea, they immediately launched into wild war stories, leaving all the juniors stunned.

The sophomore disciplinary training was that insane?!

Now it was the sophomores’ turn to be surprised.

"Wait… you didn’t have anything like this during your disciplinary training?"

Both sides stared at each other before rapidly exchanging another wave of information.

After the exchange, the sophomores still couldn’t believe it.

"What?! Your entire grade had thousands of people, and not a single one knew how to raise some hell?!"

The juniors were speechless, feeling like they’d just been thrown under the bus.

Of course, there were troublemakers—plenty of them. What kind of military academy student wasn’t bouncing off the walls? Without raising some hell, how could they call themselves hardcore?

But no matter how much trouble they caused, it never went this hard!

Their reorientation training always ended pretty uneventfully no matter how much individuals messed around!

Freshmen's reorientation training was just a long-distance trek, while sophomores' was a bit riskier, but the overall difficulty was similar.

After all, this was just reorientation training. It wasn’t something the school designed to crank up the difficulty for students.

Its purpose was simply to help students who had enjoyed a long vacation refocus and get back into study and training mode—so the difficulty wouldn’t vary much.

Come on, think about it.

Sophomores' training was essentially just checking out different places, hanging around for a bit during the day—not even overnight.

Even if they couldn’t find food, they’d just skip a meal or two. Once it was over, they’d return to the ship where good food and drinks awaited them. Was that even hard?

Not at all!

The sophomores thought it over, then thought it over some more, before finally ending up in tears.

If they really thought about it, the only part of this training that somewhat matched what their third-years described was the deep-sea drill on the last day.

But!

Although nothing unexpected happened during that drill, they had all been freaked out, waiting for something to go wrong at any moment!

Bai Xingshu, who had successfully raised the difficulty for the entire group, remained completely clueless about his classmates’ misery. After comfortably returning to his dorm, he received a cry for help from a junior in the neighboring room.

While the sophomores were away for training, Luo Yu had been thinking about how to impress Bai Xingshu.

Then, looking at the gift of study materials Bai Xingshu had given him, Luo Yu had an idea.

The best kind of right-hand man was one you trained yourself!

Bai Xingshu’s gift was practically a clear signal!

Listening to Luo Yu explain how, after receiving the gift, he had many ideas he wanted to try—and how no one understood his grasp of the material better than Bai Xingshu, who had provided it—Bai Xingshu found the reasoning quite sound.

He was convinced.

Since he had given the gift, it was only right to offer some follow-up support.

In short...

"You want to spar with me, right? Alright, log into the platform. What’s your ID? Let’s add each other and just duke it out!" Bai Xingshu agreed without hesitation.

Hearing this, Luo Yu broke into a grin at his plan’s success. But once his excitement faded, he suddenly noticed Shen Geng’s gaze burning into him.

It wasn’t out of happiness for him, nor hostility—but rather...

Luo Yu carefully scanned the look in Shen Geng’s eyes.

The more he looked, the more he felt...

It looked like... pity?

Luo Yu: "Huh?"