Fang Mo stared blankly at the falling figure and fell silent. In his mind, only Lu Baoyou's resolve and pride remained from the instant he broke free of Fang Mo's arm.
He stood there in silence for a moment, took a deep breath, and continued climbing slowly toward the mountaintop.
Lu Baoyou plummeted down the sheer cliff.
Just as he was about to crash into the valley floor and be smashed to pieces, Lin Qiye, standing atop the cliff, opened his mouth and softly murmured something. A gust of wind swept out of nowhere, catching Lu Baoyou and gently lowering him to the ground.
Every bit of Lu Baoyou's strength had been exhausted. He lay helplessly in the snow, gazing up at the sheer cliff whose summit he could not see, then closed his eyes.
"...I won't make the same mistake a second time," he muttered to himself.
The wind and snow howled. The surrounding recruits stepped forward, wanting to lend Lu Baoyou a hand, but he simply lay quietly in the snow without moving, as if dead.
High above on the cliff, Lin Qiye, who was resting with his eyes closed, curled his lips into a faint smile.
At the foot of the cliff, Su Yuan and Ding Chongfeng, who were about to begin climbing, passed by Lu Baoyou. Ding Chongfeng looked at the figure gradually being buried by snow and was about to pull him up when Su Yuan stopped him.
"Leave him alone. He's focused on recovering his strength."
Ding Chongfeng was silent for a moment, then sighed. He walked past Lu Baoyou and began climbing the cliff.
Time passed. By now, nearly half the recruits had arrived beneath the cliff and begun climbing upward one after another.
Su Zhe bent over with both hands braced on