Chapter 55

Inside Xuanwu City, the bonfire burned bright, its orange‑red flames dispelling the chill around and lighting up the flushed faces of excitement.

In the air, the greasy aroma of grilled luncheon meat mingled with a faint hint of gunpowder, whetting everyone's appetite.

Come on, Old Zhang! Let's drink to our victory in today's first battle!

Hahaha! Satisfying! Damn satisfying! You didn't see it—I sprayed a burst of bullets and knocked down a whole swath of those beasts!

If you ask me, Captain Han Ya did a great job commanding! Our twenty people held off the charge of hundreds of rats without a single injury!

The members of the Xuanwu Defense Corps sat around the bonfire, loudly boasting about their daytime exploits.

This was their first genuine collective action since joining Xuanwu City, and the first time they felt they were no longer burdens but true warriors.

A Qiang was even more excited, waving his arms and legs, one hand holding a half‑eaten, fragrant grilled meat patty, the other gesturing as he sprayed saliva while describing his own "brave" feats.

"Let me tell you, that beast—its tusks were like knives—it lunged at me! At that moment, if I had been even a step slower…"

Everyone in Xuanwu City was savoring this hard‑won victory.

Except for one person.

Lin Yue.

He simply leaned quietly against a parapet, holding a cup of purified water, his gaze blandly sweeping over the excited "new recruits" before him, his face showing neither joy nor sorrow.

He slowly rose to his feet and walked over to the bonfire.

As he approached, everyone instinctively stopped what they were doing.

"City Lord!"

"City Lord, won't you have something to eat?"

A Qiang was the most enthusiastic, thrusting the largest piece of grilled meat toward him.

Lin Yue didn't take it; he merely glanced around and then spoke in a flat, emotionless tone.

"Today, your performance leaves me dissatisfied."

As his words fell, the entire crowd fell silent.

The air seemed to freeze at that moment.

The crackling of the bonfire sounded especially harsh right then.

The smiles on the corps members' faces froze; they stared at one another, eyes full of bewilderment and incomprehension.

Dissatisfied?

Why?

They had suffered zero casualties while holding off a rat swarm hundreds of times their number, buying time for Black Tortoise to act and seizing a huge amount of food.

Consider that this was their first time on the battlefield and they achieved such results—what more could the City Lord possibly be dissatisfied with?

They felt that the merit they had earned through bloody struggle was nullified by Lin Yue's offhand remark.

Just as everyone's thoughts diverged, Lin Yue moved.

He slowly walked up to the young man who had just been bragging about his god‑like marksmanship,

"What's your name?"

"Reporting to the City Lord! I'm Li Hu!"

The young man instinctively straightened his back.

"Li Hu,"

Lin Yue's tone showed no ripple,

"You fired five magazines today, a total of 150 rounds. Do you know how many rats you actually hit?"

"I… I think I killed about a dozen or so…"

Li Hu answered somewhat guiltily.

"It was thirteen."

Lin Yue coldly spat out a number.

"Of those, six were actually killed by your teammates' grenades, and you just finished them off. Your 150 rounds gave you a hit rate under ten percent; the rest slammed into the hard walls of the granary or flew off into the sky."

Li Hu's face turned ashen in an instant.

Lin Yue didn't look at him again,

"Today, if it weren't for the Night Blade and Black Feather squads suppressing those iron‑toothed giant rats on the flanks with firepower, a single charge from the rat horde would have wiped you all out!"

"Your circular defense looked solid but was riddled with holes! Fire allocation was chaotic, shooting sectors overlapped badly, and several times bullets whizzed past your own comrades' scalps! Did anyone notice?"

"Is this what you call a victory?! You were just lucky, with Black Tortoise covering your backs!"

Lin Yue's words made everyone's faces flush with shame.

"And yet someone here is still boasting, claiming to be a sharpshooter who can mow down a swath of iron‑toothed rats with a single burst!"

"To be honest, I truly feel ashamed for you all!"

Silence.

A deathly silence.

Everyone bowed their heads, Lin Yue's words leaving them nowhere to hide.

Yeah… they were just lucky.

"City Lord…"

Just then, a clear, cold voice shattered the suffocating silence.

It was Han Ya.

She pushed through the crowd, walked up to Lin Yue, and offered no defense for herself or her subordinates.

She simply bowed deeply, deeply, her head nearly touching her chest.

"You're right. It's my failure as commander—I was too careless and didn't foresee the hidden danger."

She lifted her head; in her bright eyes there was not a trace of resentment, only an almost obsessive yearning.

"I implore you, City Lord! Please…… subject us to more systematic, more rigorous training! I don't want to entrust my life and that of my teammates to the illusory thing called 'luck' any longer!"

A Qiang and all the guard team members stared at her in shock.

Lin Yue looked at the girl before him, and finally a hint of approving smile appeared on his face.

"Recognizing this is good."

He turned around, faced everyone again, and his voice returned to calm.

"However, I cannot grant your request for the time being."

"City Lord..."

Han Ya's face turned pale, her heart sank instantly.

"Could it be that the City Lord thinks they're hopeless and wants to abandon them?"

"Because I don't know how to fight either. Letting an amateur teach you would only lead you astray. I can't give you the systematic training you want, but someone can."

He no longer paid attention to the astonished gazes, walked to the side, took out the black satellite phone, and dialed a number under everyone's complex stares.

By the campfire, for a moment only the crackling of the burning firewood and the "beep-beep" of the phone before connection remained.

Soon, the phone was connected.

"Mr. Lin?"

A voice slightly surprised yet steady came from the other end—Zhang Zhen Guo's.

"It's so late; what urgent matter do you have?"

"Commander Zhang, sorry to disturb you."

Lin Yue got straight to the point,

"I've organized a guard unit here, but they're all raw recruits lacking systematic training. In today's first real combat, their performance was… mediocre. So I'd like to ask for your help."

"Oh? Mr. Lin, please go ahead—I'll do what I can."

Zhang Zhen Guo immediately became interested.

"I'd like to ask that your subordinates, the captains Gui Ying and Wu Ya, come to my Xuanwu City for a month to serve as temporary instructors."

Lin Yue said in a calm tone.

On the other end, the line fell into sudden silence.

"Gui Ying? Wu Ya?"

"That's no ordinary soldier!"

"They are the captains of the two top special forces squads in their refuge, true Soldier Kings—having them train a bunch of raw recruits?"

"That's like using a cannon to swat a mosquito—vast overkill!"

"But he couldn't outright refuse, since they're still in a cooperative relationship; angering Lin Yue over this would be too costly."

After a moment, Zhang Zhen Guo spoke in a measured tone:

"Mr. Lin, you know that the strong have their pride; having them train the recruits… I'll try to persuade those two, though I can't guarantee it will work. In that case, I'll give you a definite reply by tomorrow morning at the latest—how does that sound?"

"That's already the biggest concession Zhang Zhen Guo can make."

"Fine, then I'll wait for Commander Zhang's word."

Lin Yue promptly hung up the phone.

"PS: New book—please urge updates and collect!"