Although Hotaka Gya struck Fang Zheng as a frail and introverted girl, she still mustered her courage the next day and arrived at Fang Zheng and Julie's training ground early in the morning.
She had brought a tagalong with her.
"What are you doing here?"
Fang Zheng looked at Tachibana Tomoe, whose face flushed slightly.
"I-I was just worried you might do something bad to Ya! I have to keep an eye on you!"
"Oh, suit yourself. I don't care."
Fang Zheng shrugged, looking entirely unconcerned. Tachibana Tomoe, on the other hand, glared at him with considerable displeasure. She had been holding in plenty of resentment. Before this, Hotaka Gya had always worked hard to train herself, and Tachibana Tomoe had always told her that hard work would bring improvement. In fact, Hotaka Gya's efforts had indeed paid off. At first, she could not even finish a marathon, but now she could barely complete one within two hours. Her progress had been tremendous, and Tachibana Tomoe had been very happy about it.
As her partner, of course she hoped Hotaka Gya could pull herself together and fight alongside her.
But the courage and confidence Hotaka Gya had painstakingly gathered had been utterly shattered by Fang Zheng during the previous New Blade Battle. Although she had later undergone the Rite of Ascension and successfully raised her Star Crest rank, quite a few students in the class still questioned whether she truly deserved it. Some even claimed she had only earned the qualification by clinging to Tachibana Tomoe.
Naturally, that placed a great deal of pressure on Hotaka Gya. Perhaps because of that, after watching Fang Zheng's duel stream earlier, she had suddenly acted completely out of character and taken the initiative to ask him to train her.
Although Tachibana Tomoe had