Chapter 1156: Explosive Across the Internet

Mm…

After handing her territory over to Beard Feng's squad and catching up on sleep at home, Xia Qing had barely slept two hours before being woken by noisy chirping birds.

For an Evolver with enhanced hearing, this kind of high-pitched, sharp birdsong was especially stimulating to the eardrums and triggered irritation. From the sounds alone, Xia Qing knew without going out to look that some birds had discovered the swallows had left her home and come to fight for territory, and the fight was quite fierce.

Which group of blind birds dared come to her territory? Had they not heard in the bird world about her stealing egret eggs, or seen the wolves carrying birds over for visits, or seen her Wolf Lao Er's agile form when catching birds?

Xia Qing got up, put on her clothes, ignored the big red squirrel wagging its tail at her on the windowsill, and went clomp-clomp-clomp down the stairs to swipe open the surgical-style entry door.

The moment the door opened, the fierce birdsong immediately stopped, the flapping of wings quickly ceased, and twenty or thirty feathers of various sizes drifted down from the air.

Seeing Xia Qing stop and stand still, the little Feimao in the luxurious wooden nest immediately ran over and burrowed into her pocket. Xia Qing reached down to pat her Employee No. 001, stepped outside into the yard and looked up, seeing more than thirty little grayish-brown heads poking out of the swallow's nest under the eaves, all staring at her with their tiny eyes in unison.

The eight big magpies on the roof and the surrounding trees were also staring at her in unison.

Very good! Less than 24 hours after the swallows migrated, a group of sparrows had seized the swallow's nest and gotten into a fight with a group of magpies. The smaller sparrows seized the swallow's nest — what were the magpies after?

Xia Qing took out her phone, snapped a few photos with click-click sounds and sent them to her friend, then turned and went back inside.

"Chirp chirp! Chirp chirp!!!"

"Tweet tweet, tweet tweet!!!"

After Xia Qing's door closed, outside the fight quickly became intense again.

Xin Yu soon video-called Xia Qing, asking, "The swallows at your place migrated with the flock?"

"Mm, they left yesterday evening." Xia Qing opened the waist-high wolf's double-door refrigerator and took out a bottle of chilled water, taking a few sips.

Although it was September, near noon the temperature still exceeded 30 degrees and was still quite hot. Because the refrigerator contained Yishi that could shield against Qiang elements, Xia Qing was accustomed to keeping food, water, and medicines inside for storage.

"Sparrows have poor nest-building skills; they can only build loose nests from grass stems and feathers inside existing holes, and they snatch swallow nests, lining them with feathers to claim as their own. Magpies are larger; they aren't very interested in already-built swallow nests, and actually prefer to snatch the building materials during the swallows' nest-building period, using them for the shock-absorbing layer of their own nests. So the behavior of this group of magpies is somewhat unusual."

After explaining the habits of the two bird species to Xia Qing, Xin Yu showed great interest in the fight under her eaves. "What are you planning to do?"

Xia Qing's attitude was clear. "Both groups are omnivorous insect-eating birds. I won't interfere — whichever wins, the nest belongs to them."

Xin Yu reminded her, "If the big magpies win, the swallow's nest might not be preserved."

Xia Qing felt this wasn't a big deal. "It's fine. If the swallows come back to live here next year, they can build a new nest. They build pretty fast."

Her friend's attitude toward every kind of wild animal was remarkably consistent — free-range. Xin Yu laughed. "Alright, if the swallows come back to build a nest next year, I'll come watch. By the way, you haven't had time to get online yet, have you? The internet is full of news about you."

After Xia Qing sniped a raptor at 2,080 meters altitude on Hui Mountain No. 3 last night, then defeated Hui Five's top sniper Phantom on Mountain No. 29 and wiped out the entire Phantom Squad, the news and videos went viral across the entire internet.

"Haven't had time to look yet, but I expected it." Xia Qing was used to staying low-key; suddenly becoming the focus of everyone's attention made her feel very insecure.

However, Xia Qing did not regret it.

The reason her top-tier sniping ability was exposed was that she had accepted the Tang family's mission invitation, gone to Lan Five Base to rescue the kidnapped Little Eleven. On that mission, she went as Territory Three Lord Xia Qing, not as Azure Dragon Night Heron.

If she hadn't rescued Little Eleven, her important partner and idol Zhang San wouldn't have been able to obtain more recovery factors to reduce the damage to his body from Qiang element allergy.

Compared to exposing her abilities, of course the idol was more important.

Xin Yu knew Xia Qing didn't like being famous, and understood what she was worried about. "Black Panther Squad lost the Phantom Squad, so they definitely can't hold onto their ranking as Hui Five's number one squad. But you don't need to worry — the Base Commander will definitely send additional troops or squads to protect you, so Black Panther's people won't get a chance to get close to you for revenge. Though I estimate Black Panther won't dare come, because you're not just a top sniper — you're also Third Brother's assistant and the Azure Dragon Captain's girlfriend. Anyone with a brain wouldn't dare provoke you lightly. Do you still have enough grenades?"

The grenades Xia Qing used were all specially made by Xin Yu.

"If you have time, make me 50 more. After the migratory bird season passes, I still have an important mission to go on." After ordering fifty grenades, Xia Qing contacted Beard Feng, confirmed she didn't need to help protect Territory Three, and simply drove to Center Nine to inspect, picking up her idol along the way.

Zhang San was giving a lecture to students at Center Nine School this morning from nine to eleven, and would be finishing soon.

When Xia Qing entered Center Nine, all the employees looked at her with burning eyes. Security Department Head Guo Chongjun stood at attention and gave Xia Qing a standard military salute with red-rimmed eyes.

Equally excited Yue Haiying explained, "Three people in Guo Chongjun's former service unit were killed by the Phantom Squad. Because there was no evidence, they couldn't be arrested."

Order was chaotic during the Catastrophe years; even Xia Qing had several identities, and experts like Phantom had even more fake ones. Xia Qing nodded at Guo Chongjun and continued following Yue Haiying inside. After a round of inspection confirming that Center Nine's air defense deployment, wall construction, new dormitory expansion, and other tasks were all progressing smoothly, Xia Qing went to the office to handle some documents, then timed her arrival at Center Nine School's gate to wait for her idol to come out.

Seeing that even the sign at the school's main gate had been wiped spotlessly clean, Xia Qing secretly nodded. Principal Yang Runian really expressed his warm welcome to the big shot in his own low-key yet sincere way.

The big shot was very punctual. At eleven o'clock, shortly after Xia Qing heard thunderous applause and the children's cheers from inside the school, the big shot — wearing ordinary protective gear, with a head of curls and glasses — walked out of the classroom, escorted by Zheng Chen and Zhang Jingwu carrying boxes, and got into the car.

The car had barely left the school gate when it stopped. The door opened, Xia Qing climbed in and sat beside her idol, smiling as she asked, "What did Third Brother demonstrate for the kids? Got them so worked up they were howling."

Wolves? Still howling. Zhang San gave Xia Qing a lazy sideways glance. "Just did a few simple chemistry experiments and fooled them. There's a kid named Wang Shunkang in the beginner class — look into which territory he's from."