“Wait, you guys—I’m not from Team 3—”
Relying on instinct, Yuan Li quickly spoke up, trying to explain.
But those people had no patience.
The person closest to her suddenly erupted, lunging straight at Yuan Li.
Yuan Li only had time to shut her eyes. The attacker’s killing intent surged, making her heart nearly stop. Even the small of her back, pressed against the wall, tensed and arched instinctively.
But only for a moment.
Because before that fist could land on her, it was intercepted by another lean, powerful hand.
“Tut, tut, tut… so it’s you lot, bullying our Team 3’s little tagalong?”
“Who gave you the guts?”
The voice sounded warm and bright.
But the blade between his fingers showed no mercy, stabbing straight through the man’s palm.
Yuan Li opened her eyes and blankly stared at the baby-faced man standing in front of her.
The baby-faced man grinned at her, raising his brows as he showed off, “What? Are you so moved you can’t even speak?”
Still clutching her food tightly, Yuan Li said, “…You splashed his blood into my meal.”
The baby-faced man froze.
He looked at her in disbelief. “That’s all you want to say? Nothing else?”
Yuan Li, who had accidentally blurted it out, fell silent. “……”
Before she could think of a way to explain, the man whose palm had been pierced snapped, unable to endure it any longer. “You two are flirting right in front of me? What do you take me for?”
The baby-faced man put on a smile again. “A dead man.”
The brighter he smiled, the harsher he struck.
He dodged the man’s punch and appeared at his side like a ghost.
The pitch-black dagger in his hand moved like a fluttering black butterfly, effortlessly slicing across the man’s face.
The man’s cheek split open, exposing his gums and teeth beneath.
Hong Yuan alone could take on more than a dozen of them.
And when the rest of Team 3 arrived, working together, it was only natural that the others ended up sprawled all over the ground.
At that moment, another group entered from outside. Seeing the chaotic state of the cafeteria, the red-haired man leading them darkened his expression.
“Who allowed you to cause trouble in the cafeteria? Who reported this?”
Team 3 wore fierce expressions, while a group of people lay groaning on the ground.
The red-haired man grew impatient and directly called back through his Communication Device.
The next second, the device rang from a corner.
In an instant, Yuan Li became the center of everyone’s attention.
“……”
No, wait—
She had clearly asked for help, not filed a report!
Seeing the strange looks Hong Yuan and the others were giving her, Yuan Li immediately jumped out.
“Report! I sent the distress signal—I’m reporting that someone tried to kill me!!”
The red-haired man looked at Team 3 coldly. “Captain Lin, your Cleaning Team does take on many missions, but that doesn’t mean you can disregard human life. This is still within the Cleaning Department. If you dare to act like this here, then outside—”
“Wait!!”
Seeing Hong Yuan’s expression darken, and even the usually smiling baby-faced man turn cold, Yuan Li hurriedly interrupted.
“The one I reported is him!! Hong Yuan-sis and the others from Team 3 were saving me!!!”
Yuan Li pointed directly at the man who had provoked her first.
After a pause, she added, “And him!”
That was the second man who had tried to attack her.
“And him, him, him…”
Yuan Li pointed at everyone except Team 3.
The red-haired man’s face turned pitch black. He stared at Yuan Li, radiating cold hostility, and warned in a low voice, “Watch your words. You say they tried to kill you—do you have evidence?”
“We—we didn’t try to kill her! We just wanted to spar, just a little sparring!” One of the men on the ground, bruised and battered, sweating profusely, still tried to explain.
The red-haired man’s expression had just softened when Yuan Li suddenly said excitedly, “See! He admitted it!”
The red-haired man: “?”
Yuan Li looked especially agitated. “He even said sparring! His fist is almost the size of my head! If that punch landed, you’d be kneeling and begging me not to die!!!”
The red-haired man: “……”
He glanced at Yuan Li, puzzled. “When did you join the Cleaning Department? You don’t even know its rules?”
Yuan Li replied confidently, “I didn’t join! I’m just staying at the Cleaning Department temporarily!”
The baby-faced man let out a mocking laugh, his tone dripping with sarcasm. “Oh right, someone personally allowed by the Deputy Minister to stay here for a few days almost got beaten to death just for eating in the cafeteria. What excellent~ rules~ the Cleaning Department has!”
The sarcasm was unmistakable.
“So that’s why you beat them into this state?” the red-haired man sneered.
Something didn’t seem right.
Yuan Li raised her hand hesitantly. “Um… weren’t you here because of me?”
The red-haired man choked.
He clearly didn’t want to deal with her anymore. Narrowing his eyes, he unleashed his killing intent and pressure directly at Yuan Li.
Yuan Li had already been hiding alone in a corner, and that corner happened to be close to him.
His intention had been to intimidate her into silence.
But he had overestimated her endurance—and underestimated her fragility.
The moment his pressure pressed down, Yuan Li’s already pale face turned even whiter. Her long lashes trembled slightly, her eyes rolled back—
—and she fainted on the spot, collapsing toward the ground.
The baby-faced man, the fastest among them, caught her by the back. A hint of surprise flashed through his mind, though his expression remained unchanged. He simply pushed her into the arms of the approaching Hong Yuan, his smile gone.
“Xu Hualiang, you’d better explain to the Deputy Minister how you threatened an innocent civilian and scared her into unconsciousness.”
The words hit like a slap across the face.
Xu Hualiang had arrived aggressively with his men, but now he could only watch as Team 3 carried the girl and hurried away.
He had somehow become the one in the wrong.
Cursing under his breath, Xu Hualiang looked at the groaning men on the ground with growing irritation. He sneered, “Arrest them all! Group fighting—record every single one!”
On the other side, Team 3 rushed out, but instead of heading straight to the medical room, they stopped after putting some distance between themselves and the cafeteria.
Holding Yuan Li, Hong Yuan said calmly, “We’re far enough. You don’t need to keep pretending.”
Yuan Li stiffened. She cautiously opened one eye, and seeing no one around, she struggled to get down.
But Hong Yuan stopped her. “If you’re acting, act it through.”
Yuan Li stopped resisting. She glanced at the members of Team 3, then lowered her head like a wilted plant.
“Sorry… I dragged you all into this.”
“What nonsense are you talking about? You did amazing just now!” the baby-faced man laughed gleefully. “It’s the first time I’ve seen Xu Big Red get shut down in front of us. That was so satisfying!”
Yuan Li looked confused. “Huh?”
Captain Lin shot a glance at his unreliable teammates, signaling Hong Yuan to keep walking toward the medical room. Then he said to Yuan Li, “This isn’t your fault. It was an accident. If anything, we dragged you into it.”
Yuan Li looked even more confused. “Huh??”
Captain Lin said lightly, “About 300 kilometers from Zhou City, there’s an SSS-rank Mutant. Late last night, it went berserk.”