“Where is your teacher?” Li Hongxiang couldn’t help but feel annoyed, wondering where Aya Tone had vanished.
He had been keeping an eye on their group, stealing glances whenever he wasn’t engaged in battle.
Yet, throughout the entire process, he hadn’t caught a single glimpse of Aya Tone.
To leave students to face C-rank monsters alone—what kind of irresponsible teacher was this?
‘Perhaps some young lady with too much time on her hands had pulled strings to get in through the back door,’ he mused.
He scoffed, a sneer twisting his lips, completely forgetting his initial conjecture that Aya Tone was a B-rank fighter.
“Teacher?” Ye Liu shook her head gently, equally unsure of Aya Tone’s whereabouts.
“Over there.”
Following Fire Wushuang’s pointed finger, everyone squinted into the dim light.
There she was.
A petite figure was furtively rummaging through a pile of ore, her actions shrouded in mystery.
Her movements resembled nothing so much as a tiny mouse sneaking a forbidden snack.
Everyone fell silent.
****
At the teleportation entrance.
“My deepest apologies, I overstepped my bounds and offended you, Your Excellency…”
Li Hongxiang bowed his head, cold sweat trickling down his back.
‘He wished he could slap himself twice,’ he thought, his mind racing.
‘Why had he meddled in how someone else taught their students?’
****
A few minutes earlier.
Seeing Aya Tone abandon her students to go mining by herself,
Li Hongxiang had instantly seen red, erupting in fury on the spot.
‘Genius? Teacher? What nonsense!’
All such notions were utterly cast aside.
Before Fire Wushuang and the others could intervene, he stormed behind Aya Tone and snatched off her hat.
“How can you call yourself a teacher!? If anything happens to those children, you—”
Ever since entering, he had been puzzled why this so-called teacher constantly wore a hat.
It was as if she had something to hide.
The moment he saw the cascade of silver hair fall, he understood.
But it was already too late.
“Are you implying I’m unfit to be their teacher?” Aya Tone slowly turned, her voice an icy whisper.
Though her senses had registered Li Hongxiang approaching, she had never expected him to rip off her hat.
She felt utterly displeased.
Pinned by eyes that regarded him as nothing more than a corpse, Li Hongxiang’s body went rigid with cold dread, and an alarm blared in his mind.
Every cell in his body screamed in agony, urging him to flee immediately.
“No… I… I didn’t mean that.”
Under immense pressure, Li Hongxiang clenched his back molars, barely managing to force out the words.
“Hmph!”
Aya Tone scoffed coldly, having no desire to hear his explanation.
She shot him a sidelong glance, her small hand idly fiddling with something nearby again.
Then, she walked past Li Hongxiang, beckoning the others to leave.
She had disliked this team leader from the start, as he had bothered her earlier.
‘How could she ever let her own students get hurt!’
She had only stepped away after ensuring that the entire dungeon was devoid of any monster aura.
With the icy pressure lifted, Li Hongxiang collapsed to the ground, gasping for air.
‘He was going to die!’
He had genuinely believed his end was near.
Seeing their boss in such a state, his subordinates rushed over, encircling him.
Their clamoring expressions of concern, however, failed to penetrate Li Hongxiang’s ears.
His mind was entirely consumed by the memory of those eyes, filled with an overwhelming sense of death.
‘Aya Tone: ‘Deathly intent? No, those were just my angry dead-fish eyes.’
‘Don’t speak carelessly if you don’t understand; I’ll sue you for defamation.’
“Right! An apology!”
Regaining some composure, Li Hongxiang belatedly scrambled towards the dungeon entrance.
The sniper rifle in his hand unconsciously slipped to the ground, dissolving into specks of light before vanishing.
Having offended an S-rank individual, his career in this position was likely over.
“Hmm, and then?” Aya Tone asked blandly.
‘If apologies worked, what would we need the police for?’
“I…” Li Hongxiang was instantly speechless, unsure what to say.
Gritting his teeth, he steeled his resolve.
He respectfully handed over the storage pouch hanging from his waist.
“This storage pouch contains all the resources from a C-rank dungeon. Please accept it!”
His posture was exceedingly humble.
The resources within that pouch actually belonged to the guild’s treasury.
Such misappropriation was a direct violation of regulations, incurring legal consequences.
At this point, he could no longer afford to care about such details.
Having offended an S-rank, his future was effectively ruined; he might as well take a gamble.
The resource issue could be reported as an error requiring a new inventory check.
His priority was simply to overcome the immediate crisis.
Aya Tone remained silent.
Even so, Li Hongxiang’s heart remained uneasy.
‘What if she didn’t accept it…?’
‘The mere finances of a C-rank dungeon might not even catch her eye.’
Just as his heart began to pound with anxiety,
“Hey, what’s all this about? Uncle, weren’t you just concerned about them? It’s a small matter, why be so polite?”
Li Hongxiang felt his hand lighten, and simultaneously, the enormous burden in his heart shattered into pieces.
“I won’t disturb your mining anymore.”
With that, Aya Tone pulled the others along, leaving the dungeon without a backward glance.
After greeting the soldiers guarding the teleportation array, she found a relatively quiet spot and stopped.
“Teacher…”
“Stop! I know what to do.” Seeing Fire Wushuang about to speak, Aya Tone quickly cut her off.
She consciously pulled out her phone, opening the QR code on its homepage.
“Come on, add me as a friend, then send me your bank account numbers.”
Lin Ling and the other two blinked, momentarily failing to grasp their teacher’s intention.
It was Fire Wushuang who quietly reminded them, “To the victors go the spoils.”
Hearing this, a flicker of excitement danced in the trio’s eyes.
They hastily accepted the friend request and sent their bank account numbers.
They weren’t born into wealthy families; their extra expenses usually came from part-time jobs.
Such a windfall was undoubtedly a godsend for them.
“Keep it safe, and don’t blab about it,” Aya Tone said briskly, transferring 100,000 to each of the four.
She couldn’t bear to part with any more.
“So little,” Fire Wushuang remarked, raising an eyebrow as she looked at the deposit notification on her phone.
“There’s nothing left!” Aya Tone hugged the storage pouch tightly, glaring at her with a vigilant expression.
‘The rest is all hers!’
That fiercely protective expression made Ye Liu instinctively lick her lower lip.
‘So cute, she wanted to take her home and keep her as a pet.’
To avoid further entanglement, after tossing a Holy Light Heal at each of them,
Aya Tone’s magic wand traced a circle in the air, and a teleportation array quietly materialized.
This was a teleportation array connected to the spatial node at the entrance of Dragon Court Academy.
“Off you go!”
Before the four could react, she gave each of them a kick, sending them tumbling into the teleportation array.
Closing the magic array, she felt utterly content.
‘She had effortlessly earned hundreds of thousands today; how delightful!’
****
At the Vermilion Bird Branch.
No sooner had Aya Tone arrived than she encountered an unexpected person.
“Vice Principal? What brings you here?”
Ying Li, upon seeing the short figure at the entrance, was also taken aback.
However, she quickly recalled that Aya Tone was likely there to submit a mission report and didn’t dwell on it.
“The same as you, here to submit a student combat commission.”
‘Oh! So you’re one too!’
Aya Tone’s eyes immediately lit up. She hadn’t expected the Vice Principal to be a kindred spirit, just like her!
“How much did you earn on this trip, Vice Principal?”
Ying Li’s expression was one of utter bewilderment.
‘Was that some sort of secret code?’ she wondered.
After a moment’s thought, she replied, somewhat uncertainly, “A hundred?”
‘She had found a hundred-yuan bill today; that should count as earning something, right?’
“Amazing!” Aya Tone exclaimed, surprised that the Vice Principal was so secretly formidable.
‘To earn a million on one trip!’
‘If not for her extra bag of ore today, she wouldn’t have earned as much as the Vice Principal.’
“Vice Principal, would you be interested in a little favor?”
Ying Li was once again utterly baffled.