Taking the Second Step Against Hegemony

No matter how viciously the students cursed in their hearts, none of them dared show it. They could only pull long faces as they put on the Iron Clothes and prepared to run laps.

"Everyone, can you give me one minute to say something?"

At that moment, Qian Chaoguang stepped forward.

For no other reason—if only for the sake of disgusting Zhou Yi, he could not let a single person be eliminated.

Look past life and death; if you don't like it, fight.

"I believe none of you want to be eliminated, right?"

Hearing Qian Chaoguang's words, the students who were about to start running subconsciously looked toward him.

The eight people he had "saved" that morning had a faint trace of expectation in their eyes as they looked at him.

"Teacher Zhou said the last-place student will be eliminated. Then here's the question: if all of us run the same number of laps and there's no last place, what happens? Then no one will be expelled, right?"

Most of their eyes lit up.

Especially some of the students whose cultivation and bodies were comparatively weak; their eyes practically shone.

Wang Dong said irritably, "Aren't you taking that way too much for granted? How can you guarantee everyone runs the same number of laps at the same speed? If one person runs one extra lap, won't all of us be finished?"

Nice. Divine assist!

Qian Chaoguang took advantage of the opening and pulled an enormous stone more than half a person tall from his Storage Ring. After tossing it high into the air, he punched out casually. The stone shattered into fragments that rained down all over the ground, and also onto quite a few people.

It hurt. It was real stone, and the quality was shockingly good.

"On what grounds? On the grounds of this fist the size of a sandbag. I'd like to think there aren't any classmates in our class who are that selfish and self-serving, with such dark minds. If there are, then once I throw a punch, the one eliminated today will definitely be you."

As he spoke, his gaze swept toward a few "lawbreakers" in the crowd who had been thinking of making small moves. These people had a little confidence in their own strength and had dismissed Qian Chaoguang's words with contempt.

After that punch, they all behaved.

No one doubted the truth in his words.

Everyone still remembered clearly the terrifying strength he had shown that morning, lapping himself twenty or thirty times in those ten minutes.

After considering whether their heads or the giant stone was harder, they decisively gave up certain little ideas.

Qian Chaoguang shaped the words with his mouth, but in reality, he used Divine Sense to transmit his voice to the group. "There's no need to doubt my motives. The classmates from this morning all know that I simply find our Class Advisor unpleasant."

"With this kind of simple physical training, I can instantly crush everyone here, including my Younger Sister Huo Yutong and Wang Dong. I'm also the one least likely to be eliminated. So I hope everyone will cooperate with this thankless work of mine. You don't want to live every day in fear of a lunatic, do you?"

As soon as those words came out, New Student Class One, including Wang Dong, immediately united as one.

Damn it, you should've said that earlier!

We've disliked Zhou Yi for ages too!

They were all Heaven's Chosen. Each and every one of them had been born with a silver spoon in their mouth and pampered by their families. Even if they had excellent upbringing, that did not change much. Who didn't have a temper?

"Brother Guang, just tell us what to do and we'll go for it!"

"Right, right, we'll all listen to you!"

"Chaoguang Gege, you're being too modest! How can this be thankless? We'll all remember your kindness!"

"Exactly!"

"."

Listening to everyone's righteous indignation, the corner of Qian Chaoguang's mouth curved up in a tiny arc.

"Then I'll assign things now. Based on my observations this morning, Peng Qingwei is a Support System student and also the physically weakest classmate in our class. We'll use her speed as the standard for running. Wang Dong, apart from me, you have the strongest physical constitution. When the time comes, we'll..."

New Student Class One began running.

They arranged themselves into a specially adjusted formation and, listening to Qian Chaoguang's calls of "One-two-one, inhale—exhale—inhale—," ran forward with orderly steps.

At first, their footsteps were somewhat chaotic, and some even subconsciously wanted to speed up.

But Qian Chaoguang roamed along the edge of the formation, using his Divine Sense to monitor every person in the ranks.

No matter who fell out of sync, he would promptly remind them, maintaining the formation's order and their specific speed.

At the same time, as he ran, he still had enough energy left to take out a large vat. No one knew what was inside. It seemed to be some kind of liquid, transparent, colorless, and odorless.

Under the central idea of "infuriate Zhou Yi, the whole class passes," these eleven- or twelve-year-old boys and girls burst out with extremely high enthusiasm. They began to unify at an astonishing speed, helping and cooperating with one another.

In the distance, Zhou Yi watched the scene with a frown but said nothing.

Qian Chaoguang seemed to have organized and united New Student Class One and had some kind of plan, but...

It seemed a little different from the result she had expected?

When Class One collectively reached the fourteenth lap, the group with the weakest cultivation and physical constitutions had already begun to show signs of decline.

The longer time dragged on, the more obvious the effect of the Iron Clothes became. Even sweat appeared on Wang Dong's and Huo Yutong's faces.

Drops of sweat began to dampen the ground of the square.

When almost two hours had passed, Qian Chaoguang sensed the condition of the entire formation. The weakest group was already on the verge of their limit.

No matter how much they conserved it, their Soul Power had already been completely exhausted.

For them to bear thirty jin of weight with their own bodies was truly asking a little too much.

So he decisively gave the order.

"Everyone, halt! Switch positions! Rehydrate!"

Under Zhou Yi's puzzled gaze, all of New Student Class One came to a stop and changed their positions within the formation with unbelievable discipline.

At the same time, they all used their own cups to scoop water from the large vats Qian Chaoguang had set down and drank it. (Thank the Storage Soul Tools.)

It was salt water.

Zhou Yi had only said they had to keep running. She had never said they couldn't drink water while they ran, right?

If they really forced themselves to run for four hours without replenishing anything, the damage to their bodies would be far too great. Even if a Soul Saint treated them afterward, it would be impossible to completely erase every lingering consequence.

He had only ever heard of treating injuries and illnesses. He had never heard that after treatment, a patient no longer needed to eat, or that it could even replenish depleted energy and salt.

Even marathon runners on Blue Star had to replenish enough energy during a forty-two-kilometer long-distance run.

Bananas, for example, were an excellent natural energy bar. Unfortunately, there were none here.

Qian Chaoguang controlled how much water each person drank and silently thought, Too bad there's no way to heat it. Warm water would be even better.

In the distance, the sharp-eyed Zhou Yi noticed that the students who had drunk water seemed to be arranged according to some kind of pattern.

Students with poor physiques always had physically strong students around them.

Qian Chaoguang stood in the front row. To his left and right were several of the weakest students, the ones who were practically about to collapse onto the ground.

If he had not needed to control the pace, standing in the center would actually have worked better.