Military Command.
The exercise was about to commence. Gu Changde was explaining the rules from the podium. “Red versus Blue. Divisions one through five are Red, six through ten are Blue. Whichever side’s command is fully annihilated is eliminated…”
The Marshal was speaking passionately from above, but the crowd below lacked the same enthusiasm.
“It’s the same every year. Doesn’t the side with Yama always win?” someone muttered.
“You can’t say it like that. Being on Yama’s side means there’s no room to shine at all.”
The 7th Division Commander, Qi Jiheng, was equally unenthusiastic. While changing his terminal’s wallpaper, he nudged Lu Mingjin.
The man himself, Lu Mingjin, had no reaction until he squinted, catching sight of Qi Jiheng’s new terminal wallpaper.
Wait.
Wasn’t that Bai Ruonian?
Soft, silver-white hair, clear blue eyes, chin raised, glaring at the pharmacy owner who was a head taller than him—utterly fearless, like a small beast.
Hadn’t those all been deleted? Where did he get this photo?
Sensing the sudden drop in air pressure around him, Qi Jiheng looked around warily and saw Lu Mingjin’s displeased expression.
He didn’t even have this photo.
Qi Jiheng assumed it was about the exercise and laughed sheepishly. “Don’t take offense, Yama. I have no complaints about the exercise. I’m very happy to coast to victory following you.”
“Who’s talking about that?”
Lu Mingjin’s gaze was still fixed on his terminal.
Following his line of sight, Qi Jiheng saw the lock screen he had just set and instinctively covered it.
He had gotten that photo from a technician he found on the Dark Net to restore it.
When he had first seen it, it was a shock—he’d declared it a destined find—but then it had vanished. He spent several Mental Stones to get someone to extract the picture.
A treasure acquired with such effort naturally wasn’t for others’ eyes, especially Lu Mingjin. That guy was more handsome than him.
“Move your hand,” Lu Mingjin said.
Qi Jiheng muttered to himself. Hadn’t this guy just been matched? How was he already coveting someone else? But with Lu Mingjin’s gaze currently like a knife, he struggled for a moment before finally, hesitantly, moving his hand away.
Still, his mouth had a mind of its own. “I heard your newly matched omega wife is quite pretty. How does he compare to this one?”
Lu Mingjin stared at the silver-haired, pretty omega on the lock screen, then glanced at him.
“My wife IS your lock screen.”
“Huh?”
“That’s right.”
His face was calm, but his tone carried a hint of gritted teeth.
“Hahaha, don’t be ridiculous. You say it’s your wife, I say it’s my wife…” Qi Jiheng started to joke, but seeing the look on Lu Mingjin’s face, the laughter stuck in his throat.
An SS-Rank Alpha, no matter how bad his eyesight, couldn’t mistake an omega. And he had heard that omega was very beautiful, with blue eyes like jewels…
No way…
It really could be his wife…
Realizing this, Qi Jiheng quickly tried to prove his innocence. “I just thought it looked nice and randomly saved it. I-I-I-I…”
“You specifically had it restored from the Dark Net, and you call that ‘random’?”
“So the previous photos were deleted on your orders?”
Damn, hiding a beauty away. Qi Jiheng ground his teeth. Lu Mingjin was really too lucky.
Seeing Qi Jiheng’s attitude, Lu Mingjin’s eyelid twitched. He hadn’t known this little omega was so popular.
“Change the lock screen back.”
Qi Jiheng attempted to struggle, but before the first word could leave his mouth, his terminal screen flickered into static.
“Or I can give you a new terminal instead,” Lu Mingjin said with a smirk.
“Change, change… I meant I’ll change the lock screen…” Qi Jiheng knew Lu Mingjin was serious. He glanced at the lock screen again, gritted his teeth, and reverted it to the default. Just as he was about to delete the replaced image, Lu Mingjin continued.
“Send me that photo of yours, then delete it.”
Bullying…
Qi Jiheng was filled with grief and indignation. He swore internally never to sit next to Lu Mingjin in a meeting again, but his hands obediently sent the photo over.
Lu Mingjin looked at the picture. Indeed, very beautiful.
=
At that moment, the various squads of the 10th Division had just completed thirty sets of extremely high-intensity gravity training. Their firepower and pheromones were at a peak of being out of control. Thinking about the next task—heading to the Training Ground to repel a thousand bugs, and oh yes, the practical combat research report—the group had zero energy left.
Second Squad Leader Zhao Lixin, a man who loved to liven up the atmosphere, said mysteriously, “Let me tell you guys, I was browsing the Dark Net a couple of days ago and saw a super pretty omega. Let me show you…”
“Old Zhao has no taste. He calls everything ‘super pretty’.”
Zhao Lixin was very indignant. “Damn! Not a single person could say he isn’t pretty!”
His words piqued the curiosity of the previously skeptical group.
“Really, is that true?”
“When have I ever lied to you? I’m the most sincere person.” Zhao Lixin said, scrolling through his terminal. “Let me find it… Wait, why is it gone?”
“Zhao Lixin, are you messing with me?” Having gathered around with full expectation only to see nothing, Squad Leader Hao Mingxu couldn’t hold back and wanted to spar him.
Zhao Lixin felt deeply wronged. “Damn, why would I mess with you? I even saved it to my favorites! How is it my fault it vanished! Look, tons of people online are asking what happened to the post!”
Hao Mingxu looked closely. It was true.
[Does anyone still remember that Dark Net post from before?]
[I remember. A very pretty omega. How come the post is gone?]
[Rumor has it… that omega is connected to a major case on the Capital Star. Someone put a bounty on him, and it got banned. Probably high-level intervention for protection.]
…
Not long after, that post also visibly returned a 404 error.
“See! That post was definitely deleted!” Zhao Lixin shouted. Then, suddenly remembering something, he added, “I think I saved the picture!”
“Hurry up and show us!”
After this buildup, they wanted to see it even more!
Saying this, he searched painfully through his terminal. As they say, hard work pays off. Under the wide-eyed stares of everyone, he finally unearthed the treasure.
The omega in the photo had eyes that seemed to contain a sea of stars, and his skin glowed white.
“Damn… so good-looking…”
“I didn’t lie, did I?” Zhao Lixin smugly waved his phone. “Set it as my lock screen.”
“Old Zhao, send me the photo.”
“You punk just wanted to spar me a second ago! I can send it, but you gotta call me Dad!”
Zhang Huaijin, who had leaned in to see the excitement, was utterly dumbfounded when he saw the picture.
On the screen was the side profile of an omega with downcast eyes, skin glowing white, the warm light gilding the edges of his silver-white hair.
Wasn’t that Little Bai?!
Major General Lu’s newly matched omega.
99 Compatibility Rate!!
What the hell were these big idiots doing?!?!?!
Help.
Zhang Huaijin’s expression changed drastically, and he quickly spoke up to stop them.
“Are you all done with training? The Major General just sent a message asking about our progress. If you get caught slacking off here, there’ll be trouble later.”
The group, who had been quite excited, were reminded of this and felt a bit hopeless.
There were still a hundred bugs and a report to write.
A few of them got up one after another, grumbling as they walked towards the Holo-Simulation Pods. Before connecting to the internal network, they didn’t forget to ask Zhao Lixin for the photo, but Zhang Huaijin unceremoniously blocked them.
“It’s for your own good,” he said earnestly.
==
Over the past few days, Bai Ruonian had been really engrossed in gaming. The player [Call Me Majesty Highness], whom he’d recently met, was quite formidable and occasionally ran dungeons with him.
That guy was filthy rich and had gifted him lots of items. Bai Ruonian, having been a cat before, was quite nimble and adapted quickly. With the Blue Snowflake’s effects, he played fairly smoothly. His ranking in the Arena was climbing daily, giving him a real sense of accomplishment.
According to Rui Rui, reaching the top hundred granted qualification for the Entrance Exam. Reaching the top ten on any leaderboard granted an exemption for direct admission—even for a marked omega.
At first, he hadn’t had a clear image of the Imperial Academy Rui Rui had described, but he couldn’t withstand Rui Rui’s daily bombardment of messages on his terminal.
“You’ve got real talent, Little Bai. You have to seize this upward path.”
On the other side of the terminal, Rui Rui was furiously typing. Bai Ruonian could almost picture her impassioned expression.
“Going to the Imperial Academy—this is the best chance to realize your life’s ambitions—”
The indicator showed she was still typing on the other end. Bai Ruonian tilted his head.
What ambition did he have? He was just a cat.
He didn’t quite understand what this meant. It was too abstract. But he also wanted to be a cat who could share his Master’s burdens. Ah, no… a person… After all, having become human, he couldn’t be as lazy and willful as a cat. In this current climate, his Master might end up not wanting him…
So he typed back, “I will work hard.”
Speaking of Master, he felt Master was getting stranger and stranger.
Every day when he waited for Master to come home, Master didn’t seem very happy. Instead, he always stared inexplicably at his legs, occasionally even touching them. It felt strange.
Every time, the base of his tailbone felt all numb and tingly.
It unnerved Bai Ruonian enough that he simply went to bed early.
And Lu Mingjin, who no longer had his omega pitter-pattering over to greet him, had been in very low spirits lately. The people of the 10th Division had been very unlucky recently.
Going to work every day felt like visiting a grave. Yama Lu was clearly wearing the sapphire cufflinks gifted by his wife, yet he hadn’t shown a smiling face for days. Today, he had assigned another extra training task: kill a thousand bugs.
This left the various squad leaders feeling hopeless.
“It’s not like bugs are cabbages. Do you really think it’s chopping melons and vegetables? A thousand—I can’t kill that many even if I use up all my Mental Power.”
“And this isn’t even connected to the Public Network. On the Public Network, I could at least show off a bit on the kill leaderboard.”
“Don’t remind me. I haven’t logged into my public account for a week. I’ve definitely been pushed out of the rankings.”
“I really don’t get you guys. What’s the use of climbing the leaderboards on the public network? People climb the boards to enter the Imperial Academy, join the Military Command, become officials. Why are you guys grinding this? For a second round of retaking exams?”
“What’s wrong with an Empire distinguished graduate helping their alma mater weed out the less distinguished? Besides, rather than criticizing us, why don’t you talk about Yama? His account hasn’t been logged into for three years, and he’s still Rank One. Rank Two has been grinding like crazy, even got first on the Star Exploration board, but kill count and combat power still aren’t higher than Yama’s…”
“He’s just too high up, others want to catch up but can’t. That’s fundamentally different from you guys seal-clubbing.”
The few of them were still muttering when they heard Lu Mingjin’s young, deep voice sound from behind them. “Muttering about what? Want extra training?”
“No, no!”
The group quickly shut their mouths, turned around with bitter faces, not daring to say another word, and filed into the training room.
At the same time, Bai Ruonian also logged into the game on his end.
[Call Me Majesty Highness] wasn’t online; he’d said his father sent him to another star system. So today, Bai Ruonian was running dungeons alone.
Hanging around the plaza, Bai Ruonian pondered for a moment, then decided to switch to PvE for a change. The Arena was getting tiresome.
As his eyes wandered, they suddenly lit up. On the holographic panel, there was a beautiful, glittering silver map.
No level restriction, no listed rewards—just a few words.
Military Training Ground.
