Dragon Clan: Avoid the College Entrance Examination to Slay the Dragon

Chapter 89 Snow

Vivian sank into the beige leather seat and tapped the walnut wood armrest with her fingertips: "No wonder it's an S-class, they even have a private jet for missions."

The clouds outside the porthole were dyed golden by the setting sun. Gu Yi glanced at the afterglow and said, "It has nothing to do with that. It's because this is an emergency mission."

"That's more like it." Vivian threw off the aviation blanket and pulled out a cartoon eye mask. "By the way, junior brother, what time do we land?"

"Local time 20:07".

"That's perfect, I'll catch up on some sleep. I don't know when I'll be able to sleep after landing."

Before she could finish speaking, SpongeBob's exaggerated smile had already covered most of Vivian's face. Gu Yi's lips twitched as she stared at the grinning SpongeBob staring right at her. "Senior sister, at least listen to what's going on?"

The blindfold was slapped off her forehead, revealing Vivian's emerald eyes, which shone brightly in the cabin. "Oh dear, I almost forgot, you're the team leader now. I'll follow your orders!" She straightened her back, pretending to be serious.

Gu Yi pushed the encrypted file onto the desktop. "Take a look first."

Vivian glanced at the documents. "Red Python Commander? Weren't they all in Baltimore?"

“He’s an exception.” Gu Yi pinched the bridge of his nose. “The Enforcement Bureau found the bodies of everyone else in the hotel ruins, but not his. That’s when they found out he hadn’t gone there. It took them two weeks to track him down in Mexico City. He’s now under the protection of the Venom Fang gang.”

"Are you crazy? The Sinaloa Group is about to be eradicated, and they still dare to harbor wanted criminals at a time like this?"

"He saved the life of the Poison Fang Gang leader when he was young," Gu Yi shrugged.

“Wow—” the girl drawled, “I thought this kind of life-or-death friendship was just something made up in gangster movies.”

"At 3 PM local time, we will raid the Venom Fang Gang's stronghold. I will lead the attack, and you can provide support."

Vivian immediately gave a thumbs up: "Wise! My Word of Power is indeed not suitable for direct confrontation."

“Actually, you and the logistics team can just wait in the safe house.” Gu Yi pulled up the building's structural diagram. “I’ll infiltrate alone.”

"I love going on missions with S-class soldiers!" SpongeBob's eye mask snapped back onto his face, and the girl sank into her seat. "Oh, and I'll write a report as a way of repaying this mission!" The last syllable was already laced with a yawn.

Gu Yi shook his head, observing the girl's crooked sleeping posture, and took out his laptop from his briefcase. The screen lit up, and Gu Yi expertly connected to the Wi-Fi signal. The encrypted communication interface had barely logged in when message notifications started flashing wildly.

"Junior brother? Out on fieldwork again?" Fingel's ID showed his real-time online status.

Gu Yi typed, his knuckles resting on his chin: "You're well-informed, Minister of Information. I was just about to inform you."

“This isn’t from the news department!” the other party replied instantly. “My stoic junior colleague told me about this half an hour ago.”

Gu Yi raised an eyebrow slightly: "Senior brother? I was thinking of asking you to tell him for me."

"You don't even know who Vivian has been hanging out with this week. She's had afternoon tea with Susie so many times. Oh, and Nono's with her too. They even have matching phone cases now."

Gu Yi rubbed her temples and glanced at her neighbor. A few strands of curly brown hair peeked out from the edge of the SpongeBob SquarePants eye mask. Girls really do form friendships at the speed of light. They were strangers just a few weeks ago, and now they can even change their phone cases to match their best friend's.

"Let's get down to business. Professor Manstein is giving a midterm exam in Chalongwen's class." He typed harder. "You're being watched!"

"Holy crap! Holy crap! You're only telling me now?!" The chat box suddenly exploded with exclamation marks all over the screen.

"Good luck to you." Gu Yi picked up his iced Americano and took a sip.

"No way! Who helped you cheat? Who supported you without asking for anything in return! You might not betray me now, junior brother!"

“When the professor questioned me, I insisted that I wrote it all myself,” he interrupted the other’s wailing, “but you know that other people in the class could be the breakthrough point. In my opinion, you’ve already been exposed, so you might as well take the initiative to confess and ask for leniency.”

The chat window remained silent for ten seconds.

“Junior brother…” Fingel sent a crying cat emoji, “I will remember this kindness, but it’s impossible for me to confess voluntarily. As the saying goes, ‘Confess and you’ll be lenient; resist and you’ll be imprisoned.’”

Gu Yi twitched the corner of his mouth and closed the chat window. He reclined his chair and closed his eyes, suddenly realizing that it was almost early winter. Calculating the days, the first snow in Chicago should be around in the next two weeks. The boy, who had lived on the southern coast for many years, was suddenly stunned. It turned out that he had never seen real snow in his seventeen years.

Memories, like thawing streams, seeped into my consciousness. Christmas trees adorned with plastic bells lined the middle school corridors, and foam snowmen wrapped in ribbons grinned crookedly. The headmaster always said it was to broaden international perspectives, but many parents complained it was cultural invasion.

After he finished explaining to his grandfather, he asked him which side was right. The old man just shook his head, "Neither is right. Chinese people don't care about the cultural connotations of Christmas; they just use it as an excuse to go out and have fun. That's why Chinese people are more resistant to Christmas the more they celebrate it."

He didn't understand the deeper meaning then, but now he understands what the old man meant.

He recalled that Lu Mingfei would always sneak gingerbread cookies during Christmas events, mumbling as he ate, "There aren't even any snowflakes at the seaside Christmas, it's completely different from what you see in TV dramas."

But the moment "Jingle Bells" started playing from the playground speakers, the first one to scramble to the top of the Christmas tree to hang stars was always this two-faced guy. Until one year, a rare cold wave swept through Jiangnan, and fine, salty snowflakes fell softly onto the boys' reddened noses. Lu Mingfei, excited to see the snow, chased him halfway across the playground with a half-melted snowball, and then insisted on dragging him to build a snowman. But there were just too many students on the playground, and the snowman they finally built looked like a matchstick with a mop head on it, much to Su Xiaoqiang's amusement.

But that time, Lu Mingfei unusually stood up for himself, "After we get into university, let's spend Christmas in a snowstorm big enough to bury people!" The boy, whose hair was dripping wet, pointed at the crooked snowman and declared, the ice crystals on his eyelashes reflecting the light like broken diamonds under the streetlights.

Gu Yi drifted off to sleep amidst his memories, the only sound in the cabin the constant hum of the engine, the leather seats trembling slightly with the airflow.

·
The boy trudged through the snow, his boots filled with snowflakes that melted into icy water from his body heat. He looked up at the girl skipping and jumping ahead; her red scarf resembled a dancing flame.

"Anya! Slow down, wait for me!" He shouted so urgently that he choked on the cold wind and coughed violently.

Icicles hung from the iron-gray buildings surrounding the square, and steam pipes spewed white mist from the snow. Under the cast iron lamps, several soldiers in dark green woolen overcoats were poking at the frozen drains with the tips of their boots, snowflakes clinging to their sheepskin lapels. One of them, with a mustache, turned around, the red star on his armband dimmed by the snowmelt.

"Where is the little lark going again?" the soldier asked, raising his vodka bottle. "Want your uncles to play with you?"

"I'm going to build a snowman!" The girl tiptoed over the snowdrift, her scarf slipping down to reveal her chin, red from the cold. "Maxim said he wants to build one bigger than last year's!"

The soldiers burst into laughter. The man with the mustache stroked his frosty sideburns. "We'd better be back before dinner! The cooks have borscht and cured pork fat today!"

"Okay!" The last syllable was carried away by the north wind.

The boy finally caught up with her, grabbed her arm, and said through trembling teeth, "You...you hate snow the most, don't you? Last month you said...snow is salt sprinkled by the Grim Reaper!"

"Shh—" the girl turned around, "I've changed my mind."

"But the snow is too heavy! Where are we going?" the boy asked, stamping his snow-filled boots.

"Liberation Square!" The girl's eyes curved into crescents, her breath swirling in the air. "They've all gone there."

The boy suddenly froze. "Everyone's going? The adults said so."

"What are you afraid of?" The girl suddenly leaned closer, her nose almost touching his frostbitten cheek. "If they ask, just say Comrade Dmitry sent you." "Coco." The boy shrank his neck, his boots sinking into the snow with a crunching sound.

"Coward!" The girl slapped him on the back of the shoulder. "Afraid of those fascists? Don't forget we're Young Pioneers! They should be afraid of us!"

The boy stared down at the worn-out toes of his boots: "Then why are the leaders so polite to them?"

“Our motherland still needs them now, but one day when she doesn’t need them anymore—” She made a throat-slitting gesture, chuckled, and backed away.

"Really? But...but they're not all bad people, some of them are very kind to us!"

"If you do good deeds and repent properly, you can live! Let's not talk about this anymore, let's go!" The girl suddenly grabbed his sleeve and dragged him towards the square without saying another word.

Turning the corner, a wave of noise hit me – hundreds of figures wrapped in cotton balls weaved through the snow mist, the arcs drawn by the snowballs intertwining into a net.

"Come here!" The girl said, her red scarf brushing against the boy's face as she turned around. "Don't always be so withdrawn!"

Before he could answer, the girl had already rushed into the fray. The boy stood outside, took a few deep breaths, and when he opened his eyes again, the red scarf had disappeared into the swirling snow.

He rushed into the crowd in a panic, his hoarse cry of "Anya!" was swallowed up by the laughter and chatter.

Ice shards crunched on the soles of his boots as he pulled back the layers of his padded coat. Suddenly, a sharp pain shot through his right shoulder, and he tumbled into the snowdrift. Looking up, he saw a towering shadow looming over him. A burly young man in a faded blue cotton coat was breathing on his chin, his thick eyebrows almost pressing into his sunken eye sockets.

"Maxim?" The other person sneered, revealing a gap-toothed grin. "Isn't he blind?"

"Ivan! You're the one who hit me!" the boy shouted angrily.

Ivan's large, bell-like eyes widened in shock: "What did you say? Are you looking for death?"

The boy struggled to his feet, supporting himself on the snow. "You're the one who crashed into me!" His voice trembled at the end, but he refused to back down.

Ivan grinned, revealing his gap-toothed grin, and looked around. "Looks like your guardian angel isn't here!" Before he finished speaking, a fist the size of a clay pot, covered in snowflakes, came crashing down.

The boy stumbled backward, his boot heels tracing chaotic arcs across the ice. The snowballs that had been spinning wildly plummeted to the ground, and countless felt boots surged in to the beat, accompanied by a chorus of cheers: "Hit! Hit! Hit!"

Two figures faced off in the snow and mist. Ivan struck first, his right hook aimed at the boy's cheek. The boy blocked with his elbow, but the moment his hand bone collided with Ivan's fist, the excruciating pain made his vision go black. He gritted his teeth and swung his left fist, striking Ivan's left cheek, but it felt like hitting a rock.

"Didn't you eat rye bread, you piece of trash?" Ivan spat out bloody saliva, and his right fist shot out like a cannonball, sending the boy flying backward.

Amidst the cheers, a few stray hisses mingled. The boy had barely managed to sit up when the toe of a boot slammed into his stomach. He curled up like a shrimp, gagging, the snow and stomach acid burning in his throat.

Seeing this, Ivan raised his leg to kick, when suddenly a clear shout pierced the snow: "Ivan, this is not a fair fight!"

Ivan glanced at the man, then reluctantly pulled back and said, "Get up! I don't want people to say I'm bullying a weakling."

The boy choked on snow, his back bent, and as he staggered to his feet, the onlookers burst into boos—his left cheekbone was swollen and shiny, and blood was flowing from his nose.

"Surrender?" Ivan cracked his neck.

"No!"

"You're asking for it!" Ivan's right fist came hurtling through the air, but the boy suddenly ducked to avoid it. Amidst the flying snow dust, the felt boot slammed into the boy's groin.

“Ahhhhh——!”

A piercing scream rang out as Ivan curled up like a shrimp, rolling around in the snow, his face covered in snot and tears: "Oh my god, it hurts! It's going to split open!"

After a three-second silence, three boys wearing patched cotton trousers rushed out of the crowd: "He used dirty tricks! Hit him!" They shoved the boy into a snowdrift and rained down punches.

"Stop it all!"

A red scarf swept across the room like a battle flag as Anya delivered a flying kick that struck the assailant squarely in the back. She grabbed a frozen snowflake and smashed it over a second man, then delivered a precise elbow strike to the chest of a third. The crowd of onlookers retreated in a tidal wave.

"How many times have I told you! If you get into a fight, run!" She grabbed the boy whose face was covered in blood.

“I don’t want to hide behind you forever!” The boy shook off her hand, and blood dripped onto the snow.

Anya froze. Suddenly, she stood on tiptoe and ruffled his hair. "The little wolf cub's got teeth, huh?" She turned and stomped on Ivan's back. "If you keep playing dead, I'll kick you again!"

The burly boy, who had been wailing, sprang up as if electrocuted, yellow ice crystals forming on the crotch of his cotton trousers. Anya swept her gaze around, her woolen gloves pointing at the crowd: "What are you still looking at?!" She bent down and grabbed a blood-stained snowball. "Waiting to eat this?"

The crowd dispersed with a roar.

The girl cupped the boy's bruised chin and said, "How can I leave you alone? If I hadn't come back in time, you would have been beaten to a pulp."

The boy pulled his hand away from hers, a stubborn smile curving his lips, which were covered in scabs. "I won! Did you see how stupid Ivan looked?"

"Yes, that was a beautiful win. If we had been half a minute later, the stretcher would have been ready. Come on, let's go to the infirmary." Anya slowly wiped the bloodstains from his face, and the boy flinched when her cold fingertips touched his cheekbone.

"I'm not going to the infirmary!" the boy shook his head. "Dr. Valentin always pokes people's wounds with alcohol swabs!"

Anya slowly rewound the scarf, then raised her index finger. "Two choices: either come with me now, or—" followed by a flick of her middle finger, "I'll knock you out and drag you there."

The boy stared at the girl's fingers. "You promise you won't tell the adults."

"That depends on what the doctor says." Anya grabbed his collar and dragged him towards the alleyway. "But if you don't listen to me now, I'll call someone to arrest you!"

"Don't shout! I'm leaving!" The boy covered her mouth in a panic.

Anya slapped his hand away, "Stay close to me!"

She pulled the boy into the alley, and the white steam billowing from the steam pipes instantly engulfed them. Scattered snowflakes fell from the sky, but instantly turned into water droplets upon touching the steam and fell.

·
"Gu Yi! Gu Yi!"

Suddenly, a fingertip poked his cheek.

He slowly lifted his eyelids and saw Vivian leaning against the armrest. The girl pushed her eye mask up to the top of her head, her emerald pupils gleaming faintly in the night lights: "The captain told me to tell you, we're almost there!"

She gestured towards the window, and Gu Yi looked up. The lights of Mexico City outside the porthole resembled scattered gold dust, gradually emerging below the clouds.

(End of this chapter)