Daily life of a teacher in the martial arts department

However, this time, none of the three teams sent any news... which was very strange. While it wasn't impossible—for example, by placing a top-tier martial artist inside, or by using magic, a barrage of fire, or even a well-timed grenade—it could kill them before they could send any messages back, but...

That's the Black Dragon Ruins.

How could no messages be sent back? Even if they encountered some magical beast, they could run away. If they couldn't escape, they could still send out some messages. That's for sure. Unless there's some peerless master inside, or some magical beast that can create illusions has mutated.

This possibility... can only be described as tragic.

“So many troubles…” P.S. put his hand to his forehead.

An officer on the side asked, "Commander, shall we continue?"

“We definitely have to continue, otherwise it would be too disheartening. But our soldiers’ lives matter too, so perhaps we need to change our strategy,” P.S. said. “Let’s think about it carefully.”

-

"This is a golden opportunity."

The man who had lost an eye said this, paused briefly, and then denied it himself.

"No... it can't be considered a gift from heaven. It should be said that you might try to plant flowers but they won't bloom, while you might plant willows without thinking and they will thrive."

July, the height of summer, with its scorching sun shining down on the Anglia Islands, territory in the western part of the Holy Union, situated on the boundless sea. It's a desolate region, lacking money, people, beaches, and local specialties. While not exactly deserted, it's not far off; unsuitable for tourism and sparsely populated, its only fate perhaps being to be bought by some wealthy fool someday and transformed into a private island.

However, this is exactly what men want.

He stood atop the jumbled rocks, wearing a black trench coat that fluttered in the wind, gazing at the distant sea that had merged with the sky.

From here, the sea appears so calm, like a sheet of paper laid out on a table, ready for anyone to do with it. But once you set foot on it, it will overturn all your previous perceptions of it, but by then, it's usually too late.

A barking dog doesn't bite... This has always been the man's belief. He reveres blitzkrieg and believes the outcome of every war should be predetermined from the start. This belief stems from numerous external factors; he was born at a disadvantage, always at a disadvantage. Therefore, he must act swiftly and decisively, leaving no room for other variables to enter the fray, because if he does, he will essentially lose.

Including the initial attack on Southern Qin, although he crushed Southern Qin, his real opponent was the entire world. He needed to sustain the war through war before they could react, rapidly amassing an army from Southern Qin's legacy before he could even begin to maneuver. However, the appearance of the nameless swordsman from Southern Qin completely exposed the data of the Jue Tian Army. Although he managed to preserve Southern Qin's legacy through various means, he no longer had the opportunity to utilize it.

"Ye Jiaofang, the last gift you left me was that insignificant stab..."

The man sighed softly.

Ye Jiaofang had once left behind a strike, which, through an indiscriminate slash of consciousness in all directions, instantly killed Shen Jiu. Although he failed to kill him, he did cause Shen Jiu to fall into a prolonged coma.

This single strike brought the man far too many advantages. Otherwise, his path to becoming the progenitor would have been fraught with difficulties.

Ye Jiaofang, with his invincible aura, ventured deep into Yingman. He had too many tasks and pursuits: to become the progenitor, to defeat and even kill Ying Qinguan, and to explore the secrets behind the gate. But in the end, all of these failed, yielding no results. Instead, the casually left-behind slash became the only achievement of this legendary figure before his death, which cannot help but evoke a sense of感慨 (gǎnkǎi - deep emotion/reflection).

Shen-9's ability to foresee the future has many limitations, but it is an exception when it comes to the progenitor. If the progenitor is about to appear, Shen-9 doesn't need to activate her ability; it will automatically remind her. If Shen-9 is still awake, the man's ritual will inevitably be stopped and interrupted.

However, Shenzhou-9 collapsed.

The man's pupils were deep, like an endless galaxy in the sky; these eyes brought endless mystery and fear.

"Human calamity is inevitable, and someone will surely come to stop me. But with the descendant of the Son of Man in a coma and the military having lost Shenzhou-9, who can find me..."

"A beauty? No, the God of War is asleep. She is just a single ancestor and is not qualified to raise a team that can be called the Human Calamity."

"Who is qualified to be my nemesis..."

"Ying Qin Guan, or Cain, it can't be that rebellious brat Ying Man who hypnotized his brain by faking suicide and preemptively lured the will of the God of War to take over his body... No, he can't do that, he's not me."

He squinted, gazing into the distance as if he could see the future.

Chapter Twenty-Seven: The Fruit of the Imperial Court Is Not Ripe Yet!

In the early morning, a few drops of dew clung to the branches; summer is always hot and humid.

A wreath-like bird flew by and gently landed on a branch. However, its weight still affected the branch, and the leaves could not hold back the water droplets that were already at their fullest. It fell gently, crashed to the ground, shattered into countless pieces, and then disappeared without a trace, like the fragile dreams of a young person.

"The wreath bird...is it still alive?" Fu Feihan, wearing shorts and a short-sleeved shirt, glanced over and noticed the wreath bird. It was about to regress from a magical beast into an ordinary creature, and its appearance showed that it had almost completely adapted to its environment.

He didn't pay any attention, looked away, and continued his morning run.

It was July 28th. There weren't many people left inside the Imperial Palace. Fu Feihan ran through the two training grounds, "Lianxin" and "Tongliu," and when he turned a corner, he unexpectedly saw an acquaintance.

Good morning, Luoshui! You're up early too!

"Huh...?" Luo Shui, with dark circles under her eyes, hunched over, and feeling sleepy, hungry, and cold, was slightly taken aback before saying, "Ah... Let's encourage each other!"

"Oh!" Luo Shui replied, but Fu Feihan had already run far away.

"Wow...that's amazing! You and Hongyu must be main characters in some shonen manga, right? You both seem to have unlimited energy!" Luo Shui yawned and staggered towards the cafeteria. Although she wanted to go back to her dorm to sleep right away, she knew that if she didn't eat something now, she'd probably wake up hungry even after getting there.

"Damn it...it's all the iris's fault! What do you mean by 'no need to sleep if you can play mahjong'? You got me hooked too..."

Luo Shui's hands hung limply at her sides as she walked toward the cafeteria with the gait of a zombie.

But drowsiness kept attacking her brain... She hadn't slept for over forty hours and hadn't eaten in a long time. Now she was so tired and hungry that she was almost hallucinating.

Just like now... she seemed to see a large black rat dart across the poplar grove next to her.

Wait... a big black rat?!

Luo Shui stopped and slowly turned around to look at the poplar grove to the side. This was one of the plants cultivated within the Imperial Academy. The seeds of the poplar fruit contained a special component, a common ingredient in alchemy. Therefore, the Imperial Academy also planted some, about 300 square meters, for alchemy students to use in case of emergency.

Luo Shui had passed this road countless times, but none of them had felt as special as this one... She slowly gazed at the poplar grove, where towering poplar trees stood, dark and deep, utterly silent... The whole world seemed to have fallen silent as well. Apart from the courtship calls of the wren, there was not a sound.

"Gurgle."

Luo Shui swallowed hard. The deserted campus, the dark forest, the lone girl, and the strange bird call that kept repeating the same sound (she didn't recognize the wreath bird). If nothing unexpected happened, she might become the protagonist of a campus ghost story or a murder case.

"It must be my imagination..."

Luo Shui quietly took a step forward. There was no reaction from Yang Guolin, so she breathed a sigh of relief and took another step forward.

Boom!

Suddenly, a heavy thud echoed through the poplar grove. It sounded like fruit falling to the ground, which was normal, but Luo Shui's expression suddenly tensed up. Although she was uneducated, she wasn't Ying Qin Guan. Poplars wouldn't fully ripen and fall naturally until September. July... even premature birth wouldn't be this early!

"Who goes there!" Luo Shui shouted, then suddenly realized, "What the hell am I supposed to be, a champion of justice? I should just run!"

And so, this unusual scene unfolded... Luo Shui took the initiative, shouting with great force, "Who is it?" Then, without waiting for a response, she turned tail and ran away without anything happening. This turn of events, if it were in the book, would be utterly nonsensical... yet it actually happened.

Luo Shui is a dangerous person. When her alma mater faced such a crisis, she really turned tail and ran away!

"What's going on... you're going for a morning run too?"

As they rounded a corner, Ying Qin Guan's voice came. He had been discharged from the hospital a day earlier and returned to the Imperial Palace... Theoretically, it would have been better to stay in the hospital for another month or two for observation. But Ying Qin Guan could no longer stay there, fearing he would decay and gather ashes.

"Ah... Teacher Ying!" Luo Shui slammed on the brakes, suddenly gaining immense courage. She faced Ying Qin Guan, pointing backward, looking just like a car crash king.

"A mysterious creature has appeared in the poplar grove!"

"A mysterious creature?" Ying Qin Guan was completely bewildered. "What mysterious creature?"

"..." Luo Shui, of course, had no idea what mysterious creature it was, because she was easily frightened and had completely run away from it. She had no idea what was there, but that didn't stop her from exaggerating a bit, "Something absolutely terrifying! The Imperial Academy is in a huge crisis!"

"I don't believe it..."

"Seriously, otherwise why would I run? Would someone like me go for a morning run?!"

Luo Shui's words, though seemingly nonsensical, contained a hint of truth, causing Ying Qin Guan to fall into deep thought... It felt like Luo Shui was talking nonsense, yet also like he was making a lot of sense.

"I don't know what you're talking about... I'll go check it out."

"Ah...maybe we should just forget about it?" Luo Shui said anxiously. "Teacher, if you insist on going off on your own, straying from the group, you're usually the first one to die in a horror movie."

"Then what are you?" Ying Qin Guan asked as he jogged forward, "A big-breasted, brainless blonde?"

"I only give this criticism zero points. I only fit one of the four characteristics: gender!"

"I think there are two..." Ying Qin Guan walked away, his voice gradually fading into the wind.

He quickly arrived at the edge of the poplar grove... Just like Luo Shui, he saw a figure that looked like a large black rat. However, although Ying Qin Guan's eyesight wasn't as sharp as Shi Kui's, capable of detecting every wingbeat of a mosquito a hundred meters away, it was still far superior to Luo Shui's. He spotted the so-called large black rat at a glance.

"Really...?" He sighed, putting his hand to his forehead. "Why are you all here?"

Above the poplar tree, amidst its dense foliage, Yu Xietian appeared, his expression solemn, and said, "If I said that we are doing this to remember the bitterness of the past and appreciate the sweetness of today, so that even though we are living a good life now, we cannot forget the hardships we endured in the past, would you believe me?"

"Of course, I completely believe you!" Ying Qin Guan raised his hands and took a step back. "Then please continue reminiscing about the past hardships..."

He turned around, intending to leave, but couldn't move his feet. Looking back, he saw two Yorozuya staff, one big and one small, each hugging one of his legs.

"A lie! It's a lie! We've spent all our money! Meeting you is fate, Lord Ying, please treat us to a meal!"

Chapter Twenty-Eight: The God of Gamblers

During the summer vacation, many shops in the Imperial Academy's cafeteria were closed, not to mention that it was morning and even fewer shops were open. Fortunately, people who are extremely hungry are not picky and ordered some breakfast to have as lunch.

Ying Qin Guan rested his chin on his hand, somewhat curious, and asked, "How much money did you get last time? Did you run out so quickly?"

He felt the military was being a bit stingy... until Shenxin wrote a number on the blackboard.

"...Eevee?"

【"pound."】

Ying Qin Guan was truly shocked. He rarely used money. But having been in Qiyao for so long, he had a relatively clear understanding of the monetary system and knew what this money represented.

"You guys went to buy weapons?!"

Shen Xin's expression was deep as he was about to write something on the blackboard when suddenly another figure sat down beside him. Ying Qin Guan turned his head and saw Ye Qu, who was sitting to the side with a plate in her hand, also eating breakfast.

"It's a long story..." No wonder Ye Qu had overheard Ying Qin Guan and the Yorozuya's conversation. She continued, her voice different from usual, carrying the pain of carrying rice up to the second floor.

Ying Qin Guan was even more shocked. Ye Qu's face practically screamed "I've been humiliated!" She had never seen anything like it before. It wasn't that Ye Qu hadn't been humiliated before; for example, she would occasionally suffer a setback when facing Mu Nan Dong. But in the past, she had always been nonchalant, as if everything was under her control, and that she was only humiliated because she wanted to... This time, however, she covered her forehead with her hand, almost too ashamed to face anyone.

Ying Qin Guan couldn't help but ask, "What exactly happened?"

Shenxin was interrupted by Yequ and lost the mood to write. Yequ sighed and refused to speak, continuing to be her riddle teller. In the end, it was the honest Yu Xietian who spoke up.

"Oh... the day before yesterday, I went to the board game arcade again and played mahjong with the owner. We started with Xuanzhou mahjong, which is a small game. The three of us were winning, and the owner kept losing. Then... it's really shameful to say, Shenxin and I got greedy and wanted to win more. The owner didn't care, but Miss Yequ got dragged into it by us. So we played Seven Stars mahjong, and in the first hand, the owner won..."

Ying Qin Guan was completely bewildered and said, "You think you can just wipe us out in one go?"

—He was born in Nanqin and knows a little bit about mahjong.

Shenxin and Yequ's bodies trembled uncontrollably. Yu Xietian gasped. He spoke, his voice low and deep, like a call from hell, after making an indelible contribution to global warming.

"Big Four of the Best, All Honors, Four Kongs, Four Concealed Pairs, Three Years on the Stone, Six Treasures, No God of Wealth Reversing Fate, Double the Winnings Again."

"...?!!"

w（?Д?）w

Ying Qin Guan was so frightened he turned into an emoticon. Just hearing about the hand made him feel the terror of it; it was a winning hand that even science fiction writers wouldn't dare to use.

"...Although I don't think the boss would care about this small amount of money (it's actually a large sum, but it's small to the boss), and I also think that given the boss's character, he wouldn't do this, no matter how you look at it, this game seems like it was set up, right?"