"Fuck you!" It was nothing more than an ordinary curse.
But at that moment, it was like a bomb thrown into a crowd.
Everyone was stunned by the blast.
Whether it was the two Piltovan aunties, the passing teachers and students, or the students lined up behind her, everyone stared blankly at Lina:
How did she dare?
How could a student dare?
"Y-you, what did you just say?" The two aunties finally came to their senses.
They were shocked at first, then outraged, and finally snarled in humiliation and fury. "Say that again?"
"I..." Lina's blazing anger was forcefully choked back.
Damn it. She had acted on impulse.
Even if these two aunties were merely ordinary school staff, the lowest tier of Piltovan citizens, they were still not people she could afford to offend.
Sigh. Why couldn't she learn her lesson? Her impulsiveness was what had gotten her on Caitlyn's bad side before.
"Well? Why aren't you saying it now?"
"Let everyone see what kind of manners you people have!"
The scene fell silent.
Not only Lina, but the surrounding students also looked awful.
Some of them stared at the two aunties with restrained anger boiling in their hearts.
Others looked at Lina with a hint of resentment, as though blaming her for cursing and tarnishing their reputation in Piltover.
"Hmph!" The aunties glared viciously at the silent Lina. "Apologize to us!"
"Apologize loudly, right here, or this won't be over!"
Lina's body trembled as her anger threatened to break free again.
"So you dare to do it but not own up to it?"
"Fine. Let's see how capable you really are."
The aunties plopped back into their seats and pulled back the stack of stationery.
"Let me make this clear—"
"If you don't apologize, we won't hand out these notebooks and pens!"
"You?!" Lina's eyes widened with fury.
The students behind her could no longer restrain their indignation either.
This was going too far.
They were already students of Piltover University, the favored children of heaven in outsiders' eyes.
Yet two utterly ordinary Piltovan aunties could easily control them with nothing more than a notebook and a pen, making them stand there and endure a scolding.
"This stationery was given to us by the school..." Lina finally couldn't hold herself back again. "What right do you have to withhold it whenever you want? Even if I did something wrong, you have no right to deny everyone else their stationery!"
"Heh?" One of the aunties merely sneered. "What, you think cursing gives you the moral high ground? I said we're not handing it out, so we're not handing it out. If you've got the guts, go complain to the professors!"
"A bunch of filthy beggars. Who's afraid of whom?"
The crowd stirred again.
Without realizing it, the two aunties had provoked the anger of every student.
They were furious and humiliated.
They all wanted to curse out everything in their hearts as freely as Lina had.
"Everyone!" Lina could feel the anger of her fellow countrymen. That emotion fed back into her, encouraging her to do something no student had ever dared to do before. "Everyone, let's go file a complaint!"
"Y-you, what did you say?!" The aunties' expressions turned ugly.
Because they knew perfectly well that if so many students truly went to complain, they would likely be in serious trouble.
Their earlier arrogance came only from bullying these people because they did not dare cause trouble.
Lina seemed to sense her enemies' weakness as well, seeing through the paper tiger beneath their bluster. Excitedly, she jumped onto the library steps and raised her arms toward her fellow countrymen.
"Students, is this the only time they've humiliated us and made things difficult for us?"
"We are students of Piltover University, future scientists and future engineers! Why should we endure their humiliation? Why? Just because they're Piltovans?"
"She told us to complain, so let's complain! I refuse to believe that the professors who teach us to pursue truth would stand on their side too!"
Lina's words were like a violent wind, fanning a wildfire that spread across the plains.
Almost every student was angry.
They remembered the humiliation of being watched like animals while standing in line; they remembered the contempt in the aunties' eyes as they handed out stationery; they remembered countless similar incidents.
Their anger reached its peak, and then—
Then they did nothing.
No one said a word.
Lina, who had leaped onto the steps and shouted in a burst of passion, instead became a clown in an awkward silence.
"Why?" Lina was lost.
The two aunties were clearly already afraid, so why was no one willing to step forward?
Weren't they all so good at fighting among themselves?
Back in their hometown, they could even kill over a piece of bread.
So why had they all become like this after coming to Piltover?
"Alright, alright, Lina..." Not only did no one support her, acquaintances even tried to persuade her. "Calm down. Don't take things too far!"
"Yeah. Stop making trouble. If we get expelled, we're finished."
"Student Lina, you should just apologize. Don't waste everyone's time." A few people even complained to her. "There are so many teachers watching nearby. If something like this gets out, how bad would that look?"
"..." Lina was completely speechless.
She walked down the steps in a daze and tried to meet her fellow countrymen's eyes, but their gazes avoided hers.
The two utterly ordinary Piltovan aunties had won.
They looked smugly at Lina, signaling with disgusted eyes that she should lower her head and admit her mistake.
"I..." Tears welled up in Lina's eyes. "S-sorry."
"Louder! We can't hear you!"
"Sorry..."
"Pathetic. Again!"
"I..." Lina nearly crushed her silver teeth.
The students present all clenched their fists and lowered their heads, not daring to look at the humiliating scene before them.
But still, no one did anything.
Only Lina continued apologizing. "Sorry, I..."
"You did nothing wrong!" Suddenly, a voice rang out beside her.
Someone had actually done something.
Someone could not stand by and stepped forward.
"Who?!" The aunties turned toward the voice with hostile glares, as though intending to drag out this troublemaker as well.
But the person who emerged from the crowd was not a student.
He was a middle-aged man carrying a briefcase and leaning on a cane. He looked like a teacher.
"Professor?" Lina's eyes lit up.
The newcomer was none other than Professor Viktor, the man she had been longing to see!
"Y-you... why are you here?"
"I came specifically to find you, Lina," Viktor replied calmly.
"How did you know I was here?"
"Of course I knew." Viktor looked toward the long line waiting to receive "relief."
More than ten years ago, when he had still been a student, he had also been part of that long line.
The people sitting behind the table back then were not these two aunties.
But there had been no real difference.
Viktor had endured it for years. Once he got through it, he stopped thinking about it and treated it as though he had forgotten. But now that he saw it again, he realized he had never forgotten at all. He remembered everything.
"You should apologize to Student Lina."
Viktor looked coldly at the two aunties.
Then he turned to every student present.
"Apologize to every student here."
Some of the students knew Viktor, but most did not and had no idea how formidable he was.
So almost no one dared echo him, or even show any hope.
It was as though they feared Viktor would call out their identities, call them out loudly enough for all Piltovans to hear.
Sigh. Viktor let out a quiet sigh in his heart.
He saw his past self. He saw countless silent people.
Viktor could not help tightening his grip on the briefcase in his hand—the very briefcase containing Li Wei's article.
It seemed he had been right.
This article should not be seen by him alone.
These people needed to see it too. Even the suffering people of all Runeterra needed to see it!
Viktor quietly steeled his resolve, and his gaze grew colder.
That made the two aunties panic a little. "Y-you, who are you?"
"What gives you the right? What gives you the right to make us apologize to these people?"
In the past, Viktor would only have remained silent and kept a low profile, so low-key that he would not even speak his own rightful titles aloud.
But now, he was different.
"Who am I?"
Viktor slowly stepped onto the same stairs Lina had just stood on and looked at every student present.
"I am Viktor, Professor Jayce's colleague, Headmaster Heimerdinger's student, the second inventor of the core Hextech technology, a lifetime honorary professor of Piltover University, and the deputy leader of the Hextech Applied Research Project Group..."
That string of heavyweight titles was nearly enough to scare people to death.
The two aunties' faces instantly turned pale.
But neither they nor anyone else had expected Viktor's final, crowning title to be:
"I am also a—"
"Zaunite!"
Before you continue