Don't Ask. Train First.

Shrek Academy was unusually quiet all morning.

After returning from the Old Waterway last night, several of them had fallen asleep the moment their heads touched their pillows. Ma Hongjun had wanted to ask what they had encountered, but one look at Dai Mubai's ashen face sent his head straight back inside his room.

The fatty wasn't stupid.

Anything that left Boss Dai too drained even to curse was probably not fit to hear before breakfast.

Bai Jin, on the other hand, was in fine spirits.

He sat in Flender's office, several black wooden chests recovered from the waterway at his feet. The secret order bearing the words "Blue Silver Emperor's blood" lay open on the desk. Sunlight slanted through the window, making the writing on the page painfully stark.

Flender stood by the window, his gaze grave behind his glasses.

"This involves Tang San?"

"By the wording, yes."

"You're not telling him?"

Bai Jin crumpled a candy wrapper and flicked it into the wastebasket.

"Tell him what? That a pack of madmen are after his blood? Or that he might be in deeper trouble than he thinks?"

Flender fell silent.

It wasn't pleasant to hear, but Bai Jin had a point.

Tang San was only twelve. His Soul Power, temperament, and combat instincts far surpassed those of his peers, but however steady he seemed, he was still a child. Dumping a heap of malice from unknown quarters into his hands might not protect him. It might crush him instead.

Bai Jin picked up the secret order. A speck of pale-blue light flashed at his fingertip, and the page silently crumbled into powder across the desk.

"Let him train first."

"Until when?"

"Until someone tries to make a play for his life, and he can break their hand first."

Flender glanced at him.

Bai Jin sounded casual, but there was no hint of a joke in his voice.

Tang San woke after noon.

When he opened the dormitory door, Bai Jin was the only one in the yard. Sunlight fell across the training ground. The dampness from last night's rain had yet to fade, leaving the earth dark and wet. Sparrows hopped along the wooden posts, chirping up a racket.

Bai Jin crouched on a rock, his eyes covered by a black blindfold. He held a stick and was poking at ants on the ground, unhurried, as though passing the time.

Tang San walked over.

"Senior."

"Awake?"

"Mm."

"Sleep well?"

Tang San thought for a moment. "Well enough."

"Liar."

Tang San fell silent for a beat.

Bai Jin raised his head. "Dream about that thing from last night?"

Tang San did not deny it.

His hand had been steady when the blade fell. But having a steady hand did not mean he could forget. The ghost-faced creature's clouded eyes, the muffled wail caught in its throat, and the resistance he felt when the short blade entered its heart kept surfacing in his mind.

He did not regret it.

It just hurt.

Bai Jin stood and tossed the stick aside.

"Good. It should hurt."

Tang San looked up at him.

"If you ever kill someone, then eat three bowls of rice and sleep like a pig, I'll have to consider packing you off to your teacher so he can teach you how to be human again."

Tang San had no idea how to respond.

Bai Jin was already walking to the center of the training ground.

"Come on."

"Training?"

"What else? Did you think I invited you out to sunbathe?"

Tang San walked over.

Bai Jin pointed at the ground. "No Soul Skills. Grow your Blue Silver Grass from here to the base of that wooden post, then bring it back."

Tang San paused.

That was not difficult.

He barely had to think. A faint blue light glowed in his palm, and several strands of Blue Silver Grass sprouted from the earth and crept along the ground toward the post.

The next instant, Bai Jin brought his foot down.

The Blue Silver Grass snapped.

"Again."

Tang San frowned and released it once more.

This time, Bai Jin did not step on it. Just as the Blue Silver Grass was about to circle the post, he flicked a pebble. Small as it was, it struck the weakest point where the strands joined.

It snapped again.

"Again."

Tang San said nothing.

A third time. A fourth. A fifth.

Each time, the Blue Silver Grass reached the post, only for Bai Jin to break it lightly on the return trip. He used no Soul Power. With just his foot, a pebble, a stick, even a fallen leaf, he found a flaw in Tang San's control.

Sweat gradually beaded on Tang San's forehead.

At last, he understood. This was not about sending the Blue Silver Grass around a post.

It was about maintaining control despite interference.

Crouching nearby, Bai Jin said leisurely, "You're good at keeping tricks up your sleeve."

Tang San's movements faltered.

"Relax. I'm not saying that's wrong." Bai Jin smiled. "Staying alive means having a trump card or two. The problem is when your trump cards become crutches."

Tang San looked at him.

Bai Jin pointed at the broken Blue Silver Grass.

"Hidden Weapons are what you're most comfortable with, but the Martial Soul everyone knows you have is Blue Silver Grass. When someone attacks, they won't wait while you lay out everything you've got. If your Blue Silver Grass can't hold up against the first blow, it won't matter how much you've hidden."

Tang San nodded slightly.

The words were blunt, but they struck the heart of the matter.

He had always valued Hidden Weapons and the Mysterious Heaven Skill. But when it came to cultivating his Martial Soul, he had mostly treated Blue Silver Grass as a tool for restraining opponents. Bai Jin had spent the whole morning without preaching a single grand principle. He had simply broken the thing Tang San relied on most, again and again.

Until Tang San had to admit it.

His control was not steady enough yet.

Bai Jin did not keep prodding the sore spot.

He merely tossed pebbles in different directions and had Tang San control his Blue Silver Grass to touch them all at once, then withdraw it immediately. Speed did not matter. Not a single blade of grass was allowed to tremble more than necessary.

The exercise looked dull, but it took more concentration than a head-on fight.

By the end, Tang San had even quieted his breathing.

He suddenly realized that a true control-type Soul Master did not only control enemies.

He controlled himself, too.

The others woke one by one that afternoon.

As soon as Xiao Wu came out, she saw Tang San standing on the training ground. Blue Silver Grass glided silently over the earth, like little green snakes weaving through the soil.

She rubbed her eyes. "Little San, why are you training again?"

Before Tang San could answer, Bai Jin tossed her a carrot.

"You're joining in."

Xiao Wu caught it and asked warily, "Doing what?"

"Jumping."

"Over what?"

Bai Jin pointed to a row of wooden posts.

"You can't touch the ground."

Xiao Wu glanced at the posts and grinned.

Easy points.

Half an hour later, she crouched atop a post, so furious her rabbit ears looked ready to pop out.

Bai Jin had decreed that Tang San's Blue Silver Grass could attack her from the ground at any time, Zhu Zhuqing would dart in from the shadows, Ning Rongrong would alternate boosts between both sides, and Oscar and Ma Hongjun would create distractions nearby.

Shrek Academy's training ground instantly came alive.

Curses, laughter, and the thuds of falling bodies mingled like a pot bubbling furiously over the fire.

Bai Jin returned to his rock and slowly unwrapped a candy.

Watching the children get run ragged until the whole place was in an uproar, Flender suddenly felt that the academy was starting to look like a real academy.

"Bai Jin."

"Mm?"

"You really know how to teach."

Bai Jin considered this, then said earnestly, "Mostly, they can take a beating."

Flender: "..."

He had a point.

It still didn't sound like a compliment.

Tang San was still practicing with his Blue Silver Grass when the sun went down.

This time, Bai Jin did not interrupt him.

He simply watched from afar as those fragile blades of grass moved quietly across the earth. Suddenly, he felt that the boy's path would be tougher than many imagined.

Training on the grounds only gradually ended after night had fully fallen.

When Xiao Wu jumped down, her legs were so weak she could barely stand. She leaned on Tang San's shoulder to catch her breath, but still could not help grumbling under her breath, "That Bai Jin... was he picking on us on purpose?"

Tang San said nothing. He just steadied her.

Ning Rongrong leaned against a wooden post, her forehead drenched in sweat, but for once she did not immediately complain. She only stared at her hands, her expression conflicted. Last night's underground stone chamber, the ghost-faced creature, Tang San's strike... The images still circled in her mind. She suddenly realized that being a support-type Soul Master meant more than standing in the back and shouting encouragement.

Dai Mubai and Zhu Zhuqing rested together. Dai Mubai still looked unwell, but he did not curse. Zhu Zhuqing was as silent as ever, though she occasionally glanced toward Tang San.

Ma Hongjun and Oscar simply sat on the ground. Oscar still held a few unfinished sausages, his face a mixture of exhaustion and satisfaction.

"Today... was exhausting," Ma Hongjun murmured.

"But it was... kind of interesting," Oscar added quietly.

Sitting on his rock, Bai Jin looked at the children sprawled in every direction, too tired to stand straight, and the corners of his mouth lifted slightly.

He knew today's training had been more important than last night's battle.

Last night, they had only seen the darkness.

Today, they had begun learning to stand firm within it.

Flender came over and handed Bai Jin a cup of tea.

"You really don't intend to tell them about that secret order?"

Bai Jin took the tea and blew across its steaming surface.

"Telling them now would only give them one more burden to carry."

"But that thing..."

"Once they can stand on their own, it won't be too late to tell them." Bai Jin sipped his tea. "At least for now, they can still laugh."

Flender looked at the children on the training ground and suddenly smiled.

"I suppose so."

The night wind swept across the training ground, carrying away the day's exhaustion.

Tang San stood beneath a wooden post and glanced up at the stars.

He suddenly felt that, exhausting as today had been, it had left him more at peace than the strike he had made last night.

Because he knew he was growing stronger.

Not so he could kill anyone.

But so he could protect the people he did not want to lose.

Standing a short distance away, Bai Jin watched Tang San's back and nodded softly.

The boy was moving forward after all.

It was just that the road ahead was longer than Bai Jin had imagined.