Han Zhiqi changed back into his coarse linen clothes. Every morning, he got up at five sharp and resumed the training regimen from before the final selection.
One evening, White Dragon Mountain welcomed a new face.
The White Dragon Waterfall crashed into the pool with a thunderous roar. Down the rugged mountain path skipped a girl wearing a pink haori.
The girl had a sweet smile and a curvaceous figure. As she bounced along, her ample breasts jiggled wildly beneath her clothes.
As soon as she reached the bottom of the path, the girl spotted the neatly folded coarse linen clothes on the shore. A pitch-black crow was lying sprawled atop them, resting.
The girl's face lit up. She cautiously approached the shore and reached out to tease one of the crow's little toes.
Annoyed, the crow kicked a few times, tilted its head, and slowly opened its tiny bead-like eyes. Once it recognized her, it sprang upright from the clothes and shouted joyfully in its raspy voice, "Big-boobed little sister, it's you! Big-boobed little sister, did you come all this way to see me? Did you miss me?"
The newcomer was Kanroji Noe.
Hearing the crow call her big-boobed little sister, Noe flushed crimson with embarrassment. She grabbed both of its wings and lifted it off the clothes, saying indignantly, "Didn't I tell you not to call me that? And you're still saying it?"
"That's right."
Noe's crow chimed in from her shoulder. It flew before Han Zhiqi's crow, flapped its wings, and gave it a hard smack.
"Your mouth needs a beating. Let me snap that beak of yours."
"Ow!" Han Zhiqi's crow let out a miserable cry, then turned toward the pool behind it and yelled for help.
"Han Zhiqi, someone's playing with your bird—no... no, someone's