NOVEL NEXT Chapter 95 - The Competition 3
Due to her legendary comeback experience and the scene on the first day of school where numerous instructors fought over her, Mai Dongzi became the most dazzling presence among the first-year students.
For the Arts Department, it was fine; the top student of the first year in the Arts Department willingly gave up their position.
However, Wang Yiyi, the top student of the first year in the Command Department, felt quite awkward.
Mai Dongzi was only a dual major in the Command Department, so she could not possibly hold the position of the top student in the Command Department for the first year.
Not only did Wang Yiyi feel this way, but her classmates also sensed that her position as the top student in the Command Department seemed somewhat unjustified.
As a result, Wang Yiyi had been harboring frustration. She had watched live-streamed videos of Mai Dongzi participating in survival games and thought her abilities were mediocre, not as impressive as rumored. It was hard to say who was truly stronger.
However, Mai Dongzi had been a dual major and had been out of sight for so long that Wang Yiyi had no chance to compare their abilities.
Wang Yiyi had been secretly preparing to compete in both the individual and team events, intending to test her skills against Mai Dongzi.
But when the instructors required them to form their teams and follow Mai Dongzi’s leadership, Wang Yiyi naturally developed a sense of discontent.
Wang Yiyi’s arrogance was based on her belief that Mai Dongzi was not much stronger than she was.
However, after experiencing Mai Dongzi’s overwhelming display of power, she realized that Mai Dongzi was not just slightly stronger but far beyond her capabilities. This made Wang Yiyi’s sense of discontent vanish immediately.
Given Mai Dongzi’s strength, finding teammates in the Command Department would be easy for her. Even if Wang Yiyi returned to her original team, she knew she would not win the first-year team competition, let alone the overall university team competition.
However, if she followed Mai Dongzi, with Mai Dongzi’s capabilities as a leader and their combined strengths, they could even dare to aim for the championship in the university-wide team competition.
Wang Yiyi, who was usually pragmatic, quickly decided to submit.
Seeing that Mai Dongzi was stronger than they had anticipated, and with Wang Yiyi, the top student in the Command Department, yielding, the others did not want to lose face either.
Thus, another girl followed Wang Yiyi and said, “Reporting, Captain, I’m Yu Lan.”
As soon as Yu Lan spoke, she felt the pressure on her disappear. Recognizing the new captain’s superior strength, Yu Lan was pleased.
Similarly, seeing their top student submit, the three boys, although feeling somewhat embarrassed by being subdued by Mai Dongzi’s display of power, knew that resisting now would only make things worse when the situation worsened.
“Reporting, Captain, I’m Jin Zhongxing.”
“Reporting, Captain, I’m Tony Li.”
“Reporting, Captain, I’m Zhuang Huiya.”
The three boys also expressed their submission one by one.
When Mai Dongzi heard the last boy introduce himself as Zhuang Huiya, her eyelid twitched and she looked at him closely.
In the novel she had read, the female protagonist had a cousin of the same age named Zhuang Huiya. She remembered this character because Zhuang Huiya and his family were notorious for being leeches, constantly draining the protagonist’s family.
However, in the novel, Zhuang Huiya is an incompetent wastrel.
In reality, Zhuang Huiya looked somewhat gloomy but was likely ranked among the top five in his year. Even if he wasn’t a genius, he was at least a top student, which was entirely different from his portrayal in the novel.
Moreover, in the novel, Lucy’s parents lived well before the apocalypse, whereas in reality, Lucy’s mother, Mrs. Zhuang, mysteriously disappeared after Atom’s death.
The changes in Lucy’s parents have always been inconsistent with the novel’s plot.
Mai Dongzi, synthesizing all the information, concluded that reincarnation and crossing over are not isolated events. Someone likely reincarnated over a decade ago, altering Lucy’s and her parents’ fates.
Mai Dongzi suspected that the most probable candidate for this reincarnator was Zhao Fanni.
When Vice Admiral Chen publicly assigned bodyguard Su to Mai Dongzi’s side, he informed her that bodyguard Su, though funded by the state, would be her personal bodyguard, dedicated to protecting her and handling some private matters. Unless Mai Dongzi showed signs of treason, bodyguard Su wouldn’t report her actions to the state.
Mai Dongzi, of course, didn’t naively trust Vice Admiral Chen’s words. However, after taking General Su Wenli as her mentor, bodyguard Su’s role changed from a mere bodyguard to something more personal.
Thus, Mai Dongzi could employ bodyguard Su for certain tasks. This time, since she was staying at school and didn’t need bodyguard Su’s close protection, she asked bodyguard Su to hire a private detective to investigate the death of Lucy’s father and the disappearance of her mother. Mai Dongzi would not acknowledge the Zhuang family until she received the investigation results and understood the changes in the Zhuang family over the past decade.
Moreover, Mai Dongzi felt that Zhuang Huiya’s look towards her suggested he was unaware of the fact that she was his cousin.
These doubts only briefly passed through Mai Dongzi’s mind; her expression remained unchanged. Not only did the other four not notice anything wrong, but Zhuang Huiya himself also didn’t feel any discomfort in how the captain was assessing him.
“I’m Mai Dongzi, majoring in both the Arts and Command departments. I will compete in the individual competition as an Arts student and in the team competition as a Command student. I am confident and capable of leading you to win the team competition in the school-wide competition. However, for this to happen, you must follow my command. If you can’t do that, I won’t keep you in the team. Can you manage that?”
Mai Dongzi’s tone was calm but carried an indescribable force.
Though the five hesitated for a moment, they ultimately resolved to follow the captain’s orders.
“Sit down. I’ll play a piece for you,” Mai Dongzi said.
Suppressing five level-four practitioners with her level-six mental abilities wasn’t as easy as she made it look.
This ease was due to her having taken a mental energy potion before coming in, which quickly replenished her depleted mental energy. Otherwise, she wouldn’t have been able to both maintain her suppression of the five and speak at the same time.
Additionally, the five hadn’t truly resisted her. They all understood that this was merely a show of strength and not an actual threat to them.
If the situation were different, such as on a battlefield or in a competition arena, where the five could coordinate their efforts to counterattack, she wouldn’t be able to suppress them at all.
To effectively show her authority and suppress them, Mai Dongzi had to use a bit of force, which caused some harm to their mental energy.
Although the injuries weren’t severe—just needing a couple of days’ rest and a healing potion to recover—Mai Dongzi had better treatment methods and wanted to demonstrate them properly.
After all, she had already struck them with a show of force and needed to properly soothe and comfort them.