"Maybe because it was too weak."
Zhao Bai answered with certainty.
The moment he finished speaking, Kiana kicked Zhao Bai in the ass. Taking the hint, he sprinted forward, his icy-blue blade light severing the vines. After only a few steps, a thunderous boom erupted behind him. A vine whip lashed down, leaving a black-green afterimage through the air and carving a deep gash into the ground.
"Kiana?"
"I'm fine!"
Kiana shouted back. The whipping vines kicked up dust, obscuring his vision. Zhao Bai heard gunfire and saw pulses of light flashing without pause.
In an instant, the entire school came alive.
The net-like vines parted, and countless tendrils danced before him. Zhao Bai dodged awkwardly, glancing toward Kiana from the corner of his eye, but the smoke and dust blocked his sight. He could not make out her figure. Kiana was probably in the same situation.
Kiana wouldn't notice the anomaly here.
Zhao Bai came to an abrupt halt. Faced with the vines trying to devour him, he did not dodge. Instead, he muttered something under his breath.
"Vines... plants... green vegetables... you're ingredients too!"
Zhao Bai's expression suddenly changed. He swiftly released his grip on his blade and pulled a kitchen utensil from his subspace.
The blade was long and slender, its tangled red and black colors making it resemble a bloodstained evil weapon. Its name was the Anti-Field Katana, and its ability was to gather enemies together and slice them apart. In Zhao Bai's hands, though, it was a natural juicer.
With Zhao Bai, an entire arsenal of weapons could only serve as kitchen utensils, but this time was different.
What he could chop depended on what Zhao Bai considered an ingredient. After all, chef was a broad profession, and slaughtering was part of it.
After a full two years of training, Zhao Bai could already regard certain nonhuman things as ingredients. Vines like these could be imagined as some kind of moving fruit or vegetable. However, this mode of thinking required powerful self-hypnosis, and Zhao Bai had yet to master it proficiently.
"Kitchen Knife Style Twelve: Wash and Chop."
He shouted the embarrassingly named technique and swung with all his might. A dark crimson black hole appeared at the tip of his blade, and the vines were helplessly drawn together.
Amid the chaos, he sheathed his blade and took a breath, quietly picking up the Particle Cutter from the ground while pretending nothing had happened.
"What just happened?"
The vines were torn and sliced apart by the black hole, squeezed into pale green juice. When it was all over, Kiana rushed over with her twin pistols raised, looking around repeatedly as though she were deeply worried about Zhao Bai's safety.
"Nothing. Just a blade technique I figured out while chopping vegetables."
Zhao Bai answered calmly, carefully watching Kiana's reaction. According to Theresa's instructions, as long as he handled things carefully, Kiana would believe anything no matter how absurd it was. But this excuse was simply too ridiculous. Even he wanted to laugh when he heard it.
Yet strangely enough, Kiana looked at the mess on the ground, the blue-green juice flowing across it, and after thinking carefully for a moment, she actually revealed an expression of sudden realization.
"So that's how it is?" She calmly holstered her guns at her waist. "I think I get it now."
No, you don't get shit.
Kiana really was... adorably dumb. She was clearly still completely confused, yet she arrogantly pretended she understood. For the foreseeable future, she would bury that confusion deep in her heart. No wonder Theresa was so at ease about Kiana. The headmistress truly understood her.
"A blade technique you figured out while chopping vegetables... can you explain it?"
After a while, Kiana suddenly turned around and asked. Her cheeks were faintly red, clearly because her confusion had defeated her pride, though her young lady's heart still found it embarrassing to ask.
Before you continue