NOVEL NEXT 12
### Chapter 12
As it turns out, idealism doesn’t always work.
Just because you’re mentally pumped and full of momentum doesn’t mean you can suddenly create miracles with a heroic surge.
A Zerg under pressure can do anything, except solve math problems.
Alongside math problems, there’s also gaming.
If you can’t win, you just can’t win; the more anxious you get, the less you win.
Lu Xi controlled his character to hide behind cover, a sniper rifle on a distant high ground reflecting a cold glint.
This was a 1v1 room Xia Baiyuan set up for them to practice sniping. Lu Xi had died countless times.
Whenever he dared to stick his head out, a cold shot would immediately take him down.
For some reason, despite using the same gun, Lu Xi felt that Xia Baiyuan’s shots were absurdly fast.
This was a chargeable sniper rifle, where the longer you charge, the higher the damage, with headshots dealing double damage.
At full charge, the headshot damage was 300, while a fragile character had only 200 health.
This meant that charging to 70% would be enough to one-shot someone.
In sniping duels, it was all about who was faster and more accurate.
Lu Xi felt his reactions were as slow as a tortoise.
With the level of freedom in games of this era, Lu Xi took off his hat, used the barrel to push it out from behind cover—
With a “bang,” the hat was shot to pieces. Lu Xi was dumbfounded and muttered, “Damn.”
Xia Baiyuan poked his head out from behind his screen, “I can hear you.”
In that instant, Lu Xi suddenly rose from behind cover, opened his scope, and aimed at Xia Baiyuan’s head.
Both shots rang out simultaneously.
Lu Xi’s character let out an “ah” and fell down again.
Xia Baiyuan reloaded his gun from the high ground, while Lu Xi’s bullet had merely grazed his head, missing the mark.
So close.
Lu Xi sighed, “Just a bit more.”
Xia Baiyuan’s suppressed laughter came from the other side, “You tried to ambush me.”
Lu Xi paused for a moment.
Then he quietly said, “But I didn’t succeed, right?”
During this exchange, Lu Xi’s fingers slipped, and his character stood up, only to be shot down again with a “bang,” the screen slowly fading to black.
Lu Xi angrily poked his head out and shouted at Xia Baiyuan, “Hey! I wasn’t ready yet!”
Xia Baiyuan leisurely reloaded, “Really? I thought you wanted to stretch your leg muscles.”
“Stretch my muscles, my foot!” Lu Xi thought furiously.
Xia Baiyuan was like a game-changing weapon in a war. When he was your teammate, you felt incredibly secure. But when he was your opponent, all you felt was helpless rage.
The death replay played on the screen. Lu Xi watched Xia Baiyuan’s perspective and couldn’t help but marvel, “Wow—so accurate—”
“You panic too much, which makes your hands unsteady,” Xia Baiyuan said, navigating through the game lobby settings to bring up the match replay. The screen split, showing his perspective on the left and Lu Xi’s on the right. The contrast was stark.
“You fired before you even aimed properly,” Xia Baiyuan pointed out. “The more you panic, the less accurate you become.”
Lu Xi felt numb.
He sighed and muttered, “But I didn’t even have time to aim, let alone practice. Wasn’t this whole morning wasted?”
“No, it was very productive.”
“Hm?” Lu Xi’s eyes widened with surprise. “What did I gain?”
Xia Baiyuan smoothly replied, “You improved your stress tolerance.”
Lu Xi was speechless.
That didn’t sound like a compliment.
Sensing Lu Xi’s despondency, Xia Baiyuan attempted to console him. “Maybe you did improve? You almost hit me with one shot earlier…”
Lu Xi dryly responded, “That’s a huge improvement, indeed.”
Xia Baiyuan awkwardly cleared his throat. “Well, you’re a beginner. More practice will help.”
You just said you had high hopes for me! Lu Xi fumed silently, feeling deceived. He grumbled, “Let’s go again!”
“No.” Xia Baiyuan shut down the game and stood up. “Don’t you have classes this afternoon?”
Oh—right—there were classes—
Lu Xi hurriedly left but quickly returned. “You haven’t told me where my dorm is. I’ll go there directly after class.”
Xia Baiyuan, munching on a compressed biscuit, mumbled, “All the other dorms are full. Since you’re an extra student this year, you’ll have to stay with me for now.”
Lu Xi stared blankly at Xia Baiyuan.
Xia Baiyuan turned to look at him. “What’s wrong?”
Lu Xi quickly shook his head. “N-nothing—I’m off to class now!”
Xia Baiyuan watched the door slam shut. Three seconds later, he shrugged and swallowed the biscuit in his mouth. Sometimes, he couldn’t figure out what Lu Xi was thinking, always looking absent-minded. Such a personality could be very dangerous on the battlefield…
—
But Lu Xi didn’t go to class. Although his schedule matched that of the other students in Class Sixteen, it was just a cover. His real destination was a very remote corner of the school, where an abandoned lab stood.
Lu Xi had agreed to the principal’s request to supply a certain number of weapons to the school each month. In return, he required a quiet place to work, without any onlookers for confidentiality reasons. The principal quickly agreed and had the old lab cleaned up for Lu Xi’s exclusive use.
Otherwise, Lu Xi really couldn’t explain to the principal how he could modify bullets just by holding them.
He scheduled his work during less important classes, making him seem like a regular student who loved to skip class. But he was smart enough never to miss the crucial ones, leaving the teachers helpless.
Lu Xi stood before the rusted gate, which was part of a perimeter wall. The original smart lock was broken, replaced by a chain and padlock. He unlocked it with a key, pushed open the gate, and walked down a cobblestone path towards the solitary building, surrounded by grass.
The area was very quiet, and the creaking gate sounded particularly harsh. The cobblestones were slippery with moss, despite previous cleaning, so Lu Xi walked carefully. The lush vegetation made the air cool and filled with the scent of plants. In summer, there would probably be many beautiful flowers, but now there were only fallen leaves.
The lab building was only three stories high, but Lu Xi only needed one room. Inside, it looked like any other lab, simply decorated, with pictures of sages and some tattered slogans on the walls. In a corner of the hall were stacks of boxes, filled with shiny silver bullets.
Each box contained thousands of bullets. Lu Xi sat on the clean floor, took out a bullet, and began to think.
In the future, male zergs would also use this method to train their mental power. Wrapping mental power around a bullet wasn’t difficult, but controlling the force was. Experienced soldiers had a sensitivity to the feel of firing bullets that was extremely precise. If they felt different feedback with each shot, they would quickly become confused. Thus, each bullet needed to be controlled to the same standard.
The principal had shown Lu Xi a few bullets from a bag, and as expected, the mental power on them varied greatly. Such bullets couldn’t be considered qualified.
Lu Xi decided to control the bullets to the maximum level that contemporary guns could handle, even though it would greatly reduce the guns’ lifespan. In an emergency, this could effectively repel enemies. Strengthening the guns themselves with mental power wasn’t his plan for now. Just modifying bullets was already astonishing; going further might attract unwanted attention.
At first, Lu Xi produced few qualified bullets. His control over his mental power was poor since he had never received similar training. It was as challenging as carving an article on a grain of rice.
Among the first ten bullets, three had mental power solidified too strongly, one failed to solidify, and four twisted into strange shapes in his hands. Only two were successful.
Lu Xi carefully examined the two successful bullets and still noticed some slight differences. He threw the rejected ones into a box and placed the two successful bullets into two different boxes. He then immediately grabbed another handful of bullets, ignoring the sweat beading on his forehead, and continued the process of mental power infusion. This time, he only succeeded with one bullet.
He carefully placed this bullet into the box labeled “Substandard,” which now contained a meager number of bullets compared to the overflowing “Rejected” box.
As time went on, the number of bullets in each of the three boxes steadily increased. The “Rejected” box gradually filled up and formed a small mound. The “Substandard” box slowly accumulated enough bullets to fill about one-third of its capacity. The “High-Quality” box finally had a layer of bullets covering its bottom.
Lu Xi wiped the sweat off his face and looked at the ten bullets on the floor. There were three high-quality bullets, two substandard bullets, and five rejected ones. This was better than he had expected. With continued practice, his skill level improved, and he no longer produced deformed bullets. Rejections were now only due to inconsistent mental power solidification.
Estimating his remaining energy, he cautiously picked up another bullet. He had an idea, a sudden inspiration. Instead of infusing mental power layer by layer from the outside to the inside, this time he would start from a single point, drilling inward, then expanding outward until the entire bullet was filled.
The actual operation was much more complex, but that was the basic concept. Concentrate. Drill. Fill. Solidify. Shape. A faint blush appeared on Lu Xi’s cheeks from holding his breath and concentrating for so long. After over a minute, just as his face was about to turn blue, he finally opened his eyes, gasping for breath, his collar soaked with sweat.
“Ha… ha…”
He looked down at the bullet in his palm. It had a beautiful dark golden color, but otherwise, Lu Xi couldn’t see any difference from the other bullets. Nevertheless, it hadn’t failed—in fact, it was quite successful. After a moment’s hesitation, he placed it in the “High-Quality” box.
If the principal asked, he’d just say it was a VIP exclusive version.
—
Although Lu Xi had skipped class, no one noticed his absence today.
The entire class was in a frenzy. A slender figure with golden hair stood on the podium, his amber eyes calmly scanning the room.
“Male zerg!”
“Male zerg!”
“Male zerg!”
The male zerg withdrew his gaze and pointed to a specific spot, asking the teacher, “Excuse me, may I sit there?”
The teacher was stunned. Male zergs typically sat alone, as their pheromones could soothe the female zergs around them. It was rare for a male zerg to want to sit among the female zergs.
“Is that okay?” the male zerg asked again.
The teacher snapped out of his daze and quickly nodded, “Of course! Yes, you can!”
“Thank you, teacher.”
Carrying his backpack, the male zerg walked through the aisle and sat at a window seat in the back row. The female zergs around him blushed with excitement, eager to talk to this precious male zerg but too nervous to start a conversation.
Surprisingly, the male zerg spoke first. He glanced at the name on his desk mate’s book and asked, “Is your name Gu Qing?”
Gu Qing stared at him, his face flushed. Oh my god, how could there be such a polite male zerg in the world! No male zerg would want to get close to them, these strong, rough female zergs — they would even wrinkle their noses in disgust just being in the same room!
Yet, this male zerg was actually asking for his name instead of calling him “hey!”
Gu Qing nodded vigorously, “Yes—yes! My name is Gu Qing!”
At that moment, he felt the entire class’s gaze fixated on him, as if it could pierce his back. But he didn’t care.
“Oh…” The male zerg nodded and softly asked, “Who used to sit here?”
He was pointing to the seat closer to the window.
This question left Gu Qing stumped. The new student had introduced himself again after sitting down and had even tried to strike up a conversation with him a few times. Gu Qing vaguely remembered the new student’s smile—a surprisingly kind smile on such a handsome face.
But Gu Qing had been busy practicing assembling a gun and didn’t remember the new student’s name or respond to his attempts at conversation. The new student had tried talking to others too, but no one paid him any attention. Everyone wondered why such a weak-looking female zerg was allowed into the school.
Probably another one shoved in by some influential family!
People were always indifferent to such female zergs. Gu Qing scratched his head, unable to recall, “Um… um…”
The student in front couldn’t hold back and turned around, loudly saying, “Lord Luo Zhao, his name is Lu Xi!”
The male zerg’s amber eyes lit up, and he nodded to the student, “Thank you.”
The student in front was overjoyed, almost ecstatic, “No problem! It’s an honor to help Lord Luo Zhao!”
Gu Qing shot a fierce glare at him but quickly became happy again. Such a good male zerg actually chose to sit next to him!
There couldn’t possibly be a better, kinder male zerg in the world!