"Boom—!"
Inside the training ground, an Iron-Clad Berserk Bear standing three meters tall let out the final roar of its life.
Its massive body crashed heavily to the ground, kicking up a sky full of dust.
On the incredibly thick bone armor between its brows, a hole the thickness of a finger was extremely glaring.
The hole was perfectly clean, and spiral scorch marks remained on its charred edges.
This strike not only cleanly pierced through its hardest skull,
but the unabated force also plowed a bottomless, pitch-black spear scar into the ground behind it.
Amidst the dust, Lin Qingyue withdrew her staff, [Beloved].
The pink tip of the staff traced an elegant arc in the air. The body of the staff remained spotless, completely untainted by blood.
That spear strike just now was a new move she had created by fusing the steadiness of the Millelith Spear Techniques, the sharpness of Dawnstar Piercer, and the "force transmission" technique taught by Teacher Chen Jing.
No longer pursuing exaggerated destruction with wide, sweeping motions, she instead compressed all her power into a single point, violently detonating it with a spiral inch-force the moment it made contact with the target.
Using pure skill, she achieved the effect she once needed to use "Geo Spear Intent" to accomplish.
She named this thrust "Rainbow Piercer".
"Sis, awesome!"
Lin Xiyue ran over from the other side, carrying the [Immovable Mountain] on her shoulder, her pretty face flushed red with excitement.
"Your spearmanship is really getting harder and harder to understand. It feels like you didn't even use much force, and this level 35 elite monster is just gone?"
"Just practice makes perfect."
Lin Qingyue replied casually, but her mind was completely clear.
Over the past month, her greatest gain was not the increase in level, but a brand new understanding of the word "power".
She had begun to create things that truly belonged to her.
This feeling made her incredibly intoxicated and fascinated.
"Alright, today's training volume is enough, let's call it a day."
Lin Qingyue glanced at the time and clapped her hands in satisfaction.
Su Wan and Xia Lian also walked over from a short distance away.
Su Wan still had that aloof look, but there was a somewhat strange meaning in the way she looked at Lin Qingyue.
Xia Lian trotted over to Lin Qingyue, skillfully handing her a bottle of water and a towel, and quietly reported the team's good news.
"Sister Qingyue, my level has also reached 32. Our squad is now all level 32!"
"Mm, good progress."
Lin Qingyue took the water and nodded in satisfaction.
A month of high-intensity training had not only steadily increased their levels.
More importantly, the teamwork between the four of them had reached a level of tacit understanding where a single look was enough to comprehend each other's intentions.
"Let's go eat. My treat today, third floor of the cafeteria, order whatever Spirit Food you want!"
Lin Xiyue waved her hand grandly, acting exceedingly generous.
"Save it, do you even have enough Credits?" Lin Qingyue exposed her with a single sentence.
"Hehe, don't we have Su Wan here?"
Lin Xiyue immediately changed targets. Like a clingy large feline, she instantly leaned close to Su Wan, grabbed her arm, and affectionately rubbed her head against her fair, graceful shoulder.
"Our Su Wan is a wealthy little lady, right?"
Su Wan's body visibly stiffened for a moment.
A month ago, she would have thrown off Lin Xiyue, this clingy octopus, without a second thought.
But now...
She just turned her head slightly, a suspicious blush creeping up her ears, though her words remained as unforgiving as ever.
"Get your paws off me, it's boiling."
Despite her words, her body honestly showed not a hint of resistance.
Even when Lin Xiyue's hand naturally slid down to interlock their fingers, she only curled her fingers symbolically before allowing the other girl's warm palm to envelop her own.
Watching this scene, Lin Qingyue silently took a sip of water.
Holy crap, it's only been a month, and the progress bar has shot up this fast?
This sister of mine really knows how to melt an iceberg with warm water.
Every night I'm working overtime in another world, toiling away at "cross-border communication." Yet she just sweeps her teammate off her feet at school?
And Su Wan's reaction... it's a textbook tsundere. Her mouth says no, but her body is as honest as can be.
Looking at Lin Xiyue's smug face, and Su Wan's awkward expression that practically screamed "I'm not, I didn't, don't talk nonsense," she suddenly felt that there was a serious problem with the composition of her team.
She herself even had a "child" with Ilanier.
Her younger sister, by the looks of it, had already conquered the iceberg Young Mistress.
What is going on with our Quantum Battleship Squad? Out of four people, two are bent, and another one is in the process of being bent... The yuri concentration is a bit over the limit here.
Her gaze couldn't help but drift toward Xia Lian, who was standing quietly to the side, seemingly already used to such scenes.
Xia Lian shuddered under her stare and subconsciously took half a step back, her eyes full of panic and wariness.
"S-Sister Qingyue, why are you looking at me like that?"
Oh boy, this kid has a "don't come over here" expression on her face.
A highly entertaining thought suddenly popped into the mind of Lin-the-Troll-Qingyue.
She suddenly leaned close to Xia Lian, lowered her voice, and spoke in a serious tone as if discussing an academic problem:
"Xia Lian, don't you feel that the internal composition of our team suffers from a subtle lack of symmetry?"
"Ah? Wh... what?"
Xia Lian became even more nervous. She felt she could understand every individual word, but when strung together, she had absolutely no idea what they meant.
Lin Qingyue pointed a finger mysteriously, first at herself, then at Lin Xiyue and Su Wan over there, who were already holding hands as if no one else were around, discussing what to eat for dinner.
"Look, I like the Elf Queen, you know that."
Xia Lian nodded vigorously to show she was an insider on the matter.
"My sister got together with Su Wan."
Xia Lian nodded again. She knew this too; the way those two had been acting so lovey-dovey lately, they were practically one step away from kissing in public.
"And that one," Lin Qingyue tipped her chin toward Su Wan, "is going through the critical transition from 'absolute zero' to 'liquid'. So, the question is..."
"Out of the four of us, three are already... you know." Lin Qingyue coaxed step by step.
"So... so what?" Xia Lian felt like her brain's CPU was about to fry.
"Think about it," Lin Qingyue's expression grew increasingly suggestive. "We're a unit, a team. Shouldn't we... keep our formation perfectly uniform?"
Xia Lian's brain crashed.
She stared blankly at Lin Qingyue, then at Su Wan, before her horrified gaze finally fell back onto herself.
Four people: two liked women, and one was neither proactive nor resistant.
Then didn't that just leave...
Me?!
"I... I'm not!"
Xia Lian's face flushed bright red in an instant, the color spreading from her cheeks all the way to the base of her neck. She waved her hands frantically in front of her chest, so anxious she was on the verge of tears.
"I like boys! The tall, handsome kind who give you a sense of security!"
"Pfft."
Lin Qingyue finally couldn't hold it in and burst out laughing.
"I'm just teasing you." She reached out and affectionately rubbed Xia Lian's head. "Let's go eat, or else the braised pork will be all gone again."
Only then did Xia Lian realize she had been played. Her small face flushed red, and she stomped her foot in a mix of embarrassment and indignation.
She grabbed Lin Qingyue's arm and shook it vigorously, letting out a completely unthreatening protest: "Sister Qingyue, you're so mean! You just love making fun of me!"
On the other side of the group, Su Wan had her ears perked up the entire time, even though she was chatting with Lin Xiyue.
When she heard Xia Lian blurt out "tall, handsome, and gives a sense of security," her heart inexplicably skipped a beat.
Almost subconsciously and uncontrollably, her gaze flicked toward Lin Xiyue beside her.
One meter seventy-five, tall and handsome—a perfect match.
Her class was Paladin, wielding a heavy shield and always blocking at the very front; the sense of security was absolutely maxed out.
Every single word Xia Lian said was like a precise key sliding perfectly into the lock that was Lin Xiyue.
Holding Lin Xiyue's hand, Su Wan's fingertips suddenly turned cold.
Deep within her heart, a sudden surge of something she couldn't quite understand welled up...
A stormy sea named "sense of crisis."