Playing dirty while standing at attention? Your footing is way too weak!

The next day, at eight in the morning.

Jinghai University's south sports field.

The sun had only just risen, but the ground temperature was already closing in on thirty-five degrees Celsius.

The freshmen from the School of Economics and Management wore baggy camouflage uniforms and stood in several loose, sloppy formations.

Complaints and sighs rose one after another. The entire field was as chaotic as a market.

Fatty Wang stood in formation, sticking his tongue out from the heat and fanning himself furiously with his hand.

"Bro Bei, making us do military training in this weather is practically murder. These layers of pork belly on Lord Fatty are going to meet their end right here today."

Lin Bei stood beside him without so much as a drop of sweat.

After cleansing his meridians and marrow the day before yesterday, his body was now like a perfect internal circulation system.

The heat outside couldn't penetrate the surface of his body at all. Instead, faint threads of coolness flowed over his skin, leaving him wonderfully comfortable.

"Talk less. Save your spit." Lin Bei gave a lazy yawn.

Just then, a furious shout suddenly exploded from the front of the formation.

"All of you, shut up!"

A man in a combat training uniform strode over.

He was less than 1.8 meters tall, but he walked with the force of the wind.

He stopped directly in front of the formation, sweeping his piercing gaze across every face.

The noisy ranks instantly fell so quiet that a pin dropping could have been heard.

"My name is Zhao Tianlong. I'm your instructor." Zhao Tianlong's voice carried powerfully. "Don't think you came to university to enjoy yourselves. In my company, there is only obedience. No exceptions!"

"For the next fourteen days, I'll hold you to military standards. If anyone dares drop the ball, I guarantee I'll make him regret getting into Jinghai University!"

Zhao Tianlong pointed at the track beneath his feet and bellowed at the top of his lungs, "Now, all personnel! Attention!"

Swish-

The freshmen shuddered in fright and scrambled to straighten up.

"Zhang Liang! Step forward!" Zhao Tianlong called.

The sturdily built Zhang Liang immediately jogged out of formation and answered loudly, "Here!"

"Your counselor appointed you sports representative. You'll organize the ranks now. Arrange them by height, boys in front, girls behind. Move!"

"Yes, sir!"

Holding the class roster, Zhang Liang began directing everyone to change places.

He walked up to Lin Bei and grinned, but there was a vicious edge to his eyes.

Young Master Zhou had promised him that pair of Travis Scott Air Jordans last night.

As long as he made this brat embarrass himself today, the shoes were his.

"You. Third row." Zhang Liang pointed at Lin Bei, then at an unremarkable spot in the middle of the formation.

Lin Bei said nothing and slowly walked over to take his place.

Zhang Liang's eyes shifted, and he placed himself behind Lin Bei to his right.

It was the perfect position, right in Lin Bei's blind spot, and convenient for either sticking out a leg to trip him or ramming him with a shoulder.

Once the formation was arranged, Zhang Liang turned his head and exchanged a look with Zhou Zihao in the neighboring Second Company's formation.

Zhou Zihao was standing at the edge of his formation. Though the sun had left him dizzy and seeing spots, he instantly perked up when he saw Zhang Liang in position.

"Lin Bei, you're fucking dead today." Zhou Zihao stared fixedly at Lin Bei's back.

Today, he would collect the humiliation of being dubbed the "Great Emperor of Holy Water" yesterday, with interest.

Lin Bei stood where he was without even lifting his eyelids.

With his senses at qi refining first layer perfection, Zhang Liang's little movements and Zhou Zihao's venomous gaze couldn't have been more obvious.

Want to play dirty?

Sure. Let's see who plays whom to death.

"Standing at attention is a soldier's first lesson!" Zhao Tianlong paced back and forth before the formation. "Head up! Chest out! Stomach in! Legs together! Middle fingers pressed against your trouser seams!"

"Without my command, nobody moves! Even if a bug lands on your nose, you will endure it!"

Time passed, second by second.

The sun climbed higher and higher, its vicious rays beating down on the freshmen without a shred of shade.

In less than twenty minutes, unrest began to stir through the ranks.

Fatty Wang was fat to begin with, and now sweat poured off him like rain.

It ran down his forehead into his eyes, stinging painfully, but he gritted his teeth and didn't dare raise a hand to wipe it away.

His two thick legs had already begun trembling uncontrollably.

Over in the girls' formation, Ruan Qingwu had a decent constitution, but the heat was still getting to her.

Using the girl ahead of her as cover, she stole a glance toward the boys.

She had been worrying that a lazybones like Lin Bei wouldn't hold out and would faint.

But when she looked over, she discovered that Lin Bei stood straighter than a javelin, his head even tilted slightly upward as though he was thoroughly enjoying the sunshine.

Ruan Qingwu rolled her eyes speechlessly. All that worrying had been for nothing.

Zhou Zihao in the neighboring company wasn't doing much better.

He had been pampered since childhood. When had he ever suffered like this?

By now, his camouflage uniform was soaked through and clinging to his back, unbearably hot and stuffy.

Worst of all, he kept feeling that something wasn't quite right with his stomach.

The shadow of yesterday's diarrhea still lingered, and his sphincter kept contracting involuntarily, leaving him on edge.

But to witness Lin Bei's humiliation himself, Zhou Zihao swallowed his suffering like shattered teeth and stubbornly held himself upright.

Hands clasped behind his back, Zhao Tianlong slowly inspected the ranks.

When he reached the first row, he stopped and kicked the back of a boy's knee.

"Keep your legs straight! Haven't you eaten?" Zhao Tianlong roared.

Now!

Behind Lin Bei to his right, Zhang Liang's eyes suddenly lit up.

The instructor had his back to them, his attention entirely on the first row.

The students around them were all dizzy and seeing spots from the sun. Nobody would notice what happened behind them.

Zhang Liang took a deep breath and discreetly scraped the sole of his right rubber-soled shoe against the synthetic track.

He was a student admitted for his athletic talent, with a basketball background and excellent control over his center of gravity.

Pretending his strength had given out, he suddenly slid his right foot forward.

Using that sliding momentum, he twisted hard at the waist, drove all of his more than eighty kilograms into his left shoulder, and slammed it viciously toward the center of Lin Bei's back.

He had practiced this move many times, using it on the basketball court specifically to injure people through dirty play.

If it landed solidly, the person ahead would definitely lose his balance and fall flat on his face.

With bad luck, he would even knock out a couple of front teeth.

Zhang Liang could practically see Lin Bei face-planting already, and he laughed wildly inside.

It was as though Lin Bei had eyes in his back.

The instant Zhang Liang's shoe scraped against the track, he had picked up his movement.

Dodge? No need at all.

Lin Bei didn't even mobilize the spiritual energy in his dantian.

He merely planted his feet a little more firmly, the muscles in his calves and back tightening in an instant.

After cleansing his meridians and marrow last night, his muscle fibers had already been tempered into steel sinews and iron bones, and his bone density far exceeded an ordinary person's.

Forget a university student's body check-even a charging wild boar would smash its head bloody against him.

Thud!

A dull collision sounded through the quiet formation.

Before the vicious grin on Zhang Liang's face could fully spread, it froze.

He felt as though he hadn't struck mortal flesh at all, but a load-bearing wall cast from reinforced concrete!

A terrifying recoil surged back through his left shoulder bone with the force of toppling mountains and overturning seas.

Click.

The teeth-grating sound of a joint slipping out of place rang out.

"Aah-fuck!"

Zhang Liang let out a scream like a pig being slaughtered.

The tremendous rebound threw him completely off balance. He staggered three or four steps backward and landed with a smack on the scorching synthetic track.

Meanwhile, Lin Bei stood exactly where he had been, without so much as a sway.

His middle fingers remained pressed firmly against his trouser seams, steady as Mount Tai.

The sudden scream startled everyone in Third Company.

Zhao Tianlong whipped around.

At one glance, he spotted Zhang Liang lying on the ground, clutching his shoulder and howling. His face instantly turned as black as the bottom of a pot.

He strode over to Zhang Liang in a few quick steps, pointed at his nose, and unleashed a torrent of abuse.

"What are you yelling for? Did I tell you to move?"

Cold sweat poured off Zhang Liang from the pain as he stammered in his defense, "I-instructor... my foot slipped..."

"Your foot slipped?" Zhao Tianlong was so angry he laughed. "You got admitted for athletics, and you can fall on flat ground just standing at attention? With footing that weak, what were you doing last night? Out stealing?"

"With physical fitness like yours, you're supposed to be the sports representative? You're not even as good as an ordinary student!"

Zhao Tianlong pointed at Lin Bei, who stood ramrod straight ahead.

"Look at him! Not moving a muscle! You hit him in the back, and he didn't even sway, yet you bounced yourself away? Useless!"

The heat had already left the surrounding students irritated and restless. Hearing the instructor's scathing tirade, they all struggled so hard to hold in their laughter that their shoulders shook.

Fatty Wang grinned without the slightest restraint and muttered very quietly, "Serves you right! You look brawny, but you're as flimsy as paper."

Zhang Liang lay on the ground, his face turning the color of pig liver.

His shoulder hurt to the core, and the instructor's scolding struck his face like slaps. He wished he could find a crack in the ground to crawl into.

In the neighboring Second Company's formation.

Zhou Zihao stared so hard that his eyes nearly bulged out.

He had been eagerly waiting to see Lin Bei fall flat on his face, yet Lin Bei hadn't lost so much as a hair.

Instead, the number-one henchman he had paid a hefty price to buy off had actually knocked himself flying!

And the instructor had called him useless in front of all the university's freshmen!

Idiot! Good-for-nothing!

Zhou Zihao's chest heaved violently with anger, and he nearly spat out a mouthful of blood.