Lin Xiaohe was wearing a green dress hand-stitched by Grandma Lin, with a small crossbody bag containing the money she had collected at school. She knocked on the door of the Secret Prison’s administration office.
To make room for all those star coins, Xinbao and Doudou had shrunk down to the length of half a finger. They each extended a root thread that threaded through Lin Xiaohe’s ear holes, hanging upside down and swinging like little swings.
Tiantian was the well-behaved one, acting as a necklace pendant.
Fanfan had a personality all its own. It had coiled its branch full of small tomatoes into a wreath and stuck it on Lin Xiaohe’s head.
Red, green, yellow—Lin Xiaohe was looking pretty colorful.
The door creaked open automatically.
A blood-red eyeball the size of a basketball stared at the dopamine-dressed girl Lin Xiaohe, its pupils contracting slightly.
From behind it, a huge, gaping mouth emerged, opening and closing. “Lin Xiaohe, Stardust Plant Manipulator. Sentenced to three months.”
Lin Xiaohe pulled out a paper envelope and handed it over with both hands. “Hello, I’m looking for Babu.”
A deathly pale hand floated over, took the envelope, and unfolded it.
The gaping mouth spoke again: “A student of Chu Huai Zhi? ‘Take good care of her’? Heh heh heh. Okay, sure. No problem.”
Lin Xiaohe broke out in goosebumps all over. Her damn sixth sense was screaming alarms.
She had a feeling that the “connection” Chu Huai Zhi mentioned wasn’t quite as familiar as he made it sound.
The floating hand snapped its fingers. A whirlpool suddenly opened up beneath Lin Xiaohe’s feet, and in the blink of an eye, she vanished.
The administration office door slammed shut again.
From the dark, empty room, a rough, grating voice sounded. “Babu, Lin Xiaohe smells delicious. Are you really going to let her off?”
The gaping mouth gave a cold snort. “Of course not. I sent her to the Whale Sea Prison Cage. No one has ever walked out of the Whale Sea alive. Lin Xiaohe will be buried at the bottom of the sea, never to be free again!”
The deathly pale hand tapped lightly on a letter stamped with the Imperial Medal.
Home. A home you could never return to.
This wandering son far from home would water the Empire’s flower with the blood and flesh of the Federation’s genius.
……
Lin Xiaohe fell from the sky, creating a huge splash in the blue sea.
Tiantian instantly transformed into a large bubble, wrapping around Lin Xiaohe and floating her to the surface using the buoyancy of the seawater.
Lin Xiaohe shook her slightly dizzy head. Once she saw where she was, she said with feeling, “Babu is really a good person. I misjudged him.”
Preconceived notions in people’s hearts are like a mountain.
Babu looked strange, but he turned out to be so thoughtful, assigning her to the blue sea.
Happy!
A ten-meter-tall crayfish, brandishing two massive, sharp pincers, suddenly charged at Lin Xiaohe.
“Doudou!”
Doudou went poof-poof-poof and transformed into a rocket launcher.
Lin Xiaohe hoisted it onto her shoulder and aimed at the crayfish, firing away.
The crayfish was torn to shreds, blood and flesh splattering everywhere. But the moment the pieces hit the sea surface, they began to wildly wriggle and grow.
In just ten seconds, the tiny scraps of flesh had grown back into a ten-meter-tall crayfish.
Lin Xiaohe was stunned!
What kind of terrifying regenerative ability was this? Even better than an earthworm’s.
Giant crayfish started swarming in from all directions. Lin Xiaohe tossed out Fanfan.
Big eater, go!
Fanfan was so excited it was screaming with joy. Its roots grabbed hold of a crayfish’s body.
The next second, the crayfish turned into an empty shell.
But Fanfan was confused and lost. Why did it feel like it had just eaten a mouthful of air? Like it ate nothing at all?
Oh well, it would just eat another one and see what it tasted like.
Fanfan ate ten in a row, but didn’t feel the slightest bit full.
Were these things inflatable crayfish or something?
“Come back, Fanfan!” Lin Xiaohe’s expression turned serious.
Just now, the crayfish that Fanfan had drained dry… stood back up again!
Lin Xiaohe’s brow was deeply furrowed. This was the Secret Prison, all right. Even the crayfish were extraordinary.
Lin Xiaohe was breathing heavily. She wasn’t sure if it was from running so much, but she felt incredibly hot. Sweat poured down her like rain, soaking her dress.
The shells of the crayfish slowly turned red. At the same time, they became faster and more aggressive.
Lin Xiaohe turned and ran. The crayfish chased closely behind her.
If she got hit by one of those big crayfish pincers, Tiantian’s shield would be destroyed every single time.
Lin Xiaohe didn’t dare let up. Her wallet couldn’t handle that many attacks.
……
Back in the Secret Prison administration office, the blood-red eyeball was staring at a water mirror. In the mirror, Lin Xiaohe was fleeing in a panic, about to be cut in half by the giant crayfish.
The deathly pale hand was happily doing a finger dance, while the gaping mouth sang a song.
“Wash, wash, wash, wash a basin of crayfish first. Add a little salt, add a little her, the meat is tender and plump, top-notch. The Empire’s flower definitely wants to eat her!”
“Ahhh!”
Far beyond the star rings, Bayard was tied up, letting out miserable wails.
His spine was crackling and popping, as if something was trying to burrow out of his body.
“Warning! Warning! The experimental subject’s body is about to collapse. Do you wish to pause the experiment?”
Inside the observation room, red warning lights flashed incessantly.
A silver-haired man in an Imperial military uniform stood up abruptly.
His eyes were filled with unwillingness and determination.
He stared intently at Bayard’s contorted face and pressed the communication button. “Bayard, this is your only chance to turn things around. You were doomed to be abandoned from the moment you were an embryo. You’re just the experimental control for your brother, Bashid!”
“Your mother gave birth to you, but she didn’t want you. Your father raised you, but he never valued you. Your brother is the sun, high and mighty, while you can only shrink in the shadows, crawling in the darkness. Don’t you want revenge against them?”
Bayard had no strength left to scream. He just wanted it to end.
Death, to him, was a beautiful finish line.
The silver-haired man clenched his fist and slammed it heavily on the table.
Damn it! What was wrong with Bayard? After suffering so much injustice, did he have no desire for revenge at all?
The silver-haired man refused to give up.
The four great Golden Families protected their bloodlines very well. Even though Bayard had been exiled to the frontier, he still had a team of guards with him.
The Empire had paid a heavy price to get Bayard here.
And to be fair, Bayard hadn’t disappointed them. Out of all the test subjects, he had come the furthest!
The silver-haired man’s teeth ground together audibly, his eyes filled with stubbornness. “Bayard, that commoner from the Sixth Star Ring in the Federation, Lin Xiaohe, has successfully entered the Central Military Academy and been elected student council president.”
What?!
Lin Xiaohe had become student council president?
Bayard’s eyes snapped open. His entire eyeballs were black, with faint red flashes occasionally crossing them.
His pronunciation was strange, with a kind of tremor to it. “Lin… Xiao… he…”
The silver-haired man was overjoyed at his reaction and continued to stir him up. “That’s right. Marshal Chu thinks very highly of her. He accompanied her through registration and the tests. Tsk, tsk. She even signed up for the school competition.”
“I truly feel sorry for you. You’re suffering inhuman torment here, while the one responsible for your ruin is at the Central Military Academy, doing just fine and dandy.”
“With Marshal Chu’s favoritism toward her, she’ll surely make it to the finals, don’t you think? She might even trample over your brother Bashid to become the youngest student council president in the Central Military Academy’s history.”
“Oh my. A little worm crawling out of the mud has climbed to a position of power. And your family? Your family is just a stepping stone for her to climb higher. Every time the Federation praises her, you and your family will be dragged out as the villains to be shamed.”
“Doesn’t that bother you? Don’t you want to descend from the sky at the height of her glory, shatter her beautiful dream, and turn her into a pile of mud?!”
“Hold on, Bayard. Ultimate power. The means for revenge. It’s all right in front of you. You just have to reach out and take it!”
An ominous red color slowly began to invade Bayard’s eyes.
A single obsession was keeping him going through the pain.
Revenge! Kill Lin Xiaohe!
