High School of Demon Hunting

Chapter 2192: Chapter 413: Xiangqi Hunting Team

Mike Gold Cypress Plano sat grandly on the remains of a fallen oak tree, silently contemplating, with a shattered ogre skull under his foot and a thick dragon skin cloak draped messily by his side, completely ignoring the snowflakes that had fallen on the lining.

Whoosh!

A gust of wind and snow brushed past as a tall witch strode quickly to Augustus’s side. She noticed a black crow about a foot high perched on the trunk next to the warlock, and frowned slightly.

The crow seemed frozen stiff, not moving even as the witch approached, its dark eyes coated with a layer of white film, as if snowflakes had glued them shut.

The witch ignored this anomaly and looked at the warlock sitting on the oak remains.

”The school-designated hunting area is cleared, and Lord Falcon wonders if we should detour to hunt a wild dragon. He got a lead on a wild dragon’s nest from the Wandering Bar, not far from our hunting area.”

Though the snow and wind howled, the witch spoke neither too fast nor too slow, much like a report presented in an office: ”...He says it’s a Romanian Fire Dragon, and this weather works to our advantage.”

Sepulano still kept his head down, maintaining silence.

The crow remained motionless.

The witch lowered her eyelids without a hint of urgency. As the current deputy captain of the Xiangqi Hunting Team, she was also the vice president of the Xiang Qi Club and was long accustomed to Sepulano’s occasional ’sluggishness.’

After a while, the warlock seemed to suddenly snap out of it.

”Gloria,” he rubbed his stiff face, his voice somewhat muffled, ”Without Friedman, how likely am I to earn the loyalty of the entire Alpha?”

The witch raised an eyebrow.

”Without Friedman, there’s O’Brien. Without O’Brien, there’s Black.” She curled her lips slightly into a mocking smile. ”Every corner of the Alpha Fortress reeks of the chaotic name of freedom. Only in this kind of issue does it carry the ancient stench of... Without breaking the old order, the new leader can never gain everyone’s loyalty.”

Sepulano let out a heavy sigh, an unusual hesitance for him.

”But that traditional order based on bloodline talent has already infiltrated every corner of this ancient fortress.” Augustus from Alpha Academy’s tone was somewhat unpredictable. ”The cycle between old and new is like two intertwining Yin Yang Fish; it’s hard to imagine what would happen if they were completely separated.”

”This is unlike your usual attitude.” The witch frowned slightly—this sense of weakness and hesitation was not the Sepulano she remembered. She glanced instinctively at the crow.

The crow stubbornly remained still.

The fat wizard chuckled softly, grabbing the wide cloak beneath him and shaking off the accumulated snow, with his voice falling gently like the snowflakes: ”Because ignorance knows no fear. The more you know, the more constraints and frameworks bind you, revealing a bit of cowardice... You haven’t been dominated by the known fear, so I wanted a piece of advice from you... If there was an opportunity to elevate our bloodline, but this opportunity might cause deaths, many deaths... would you seize it?”

”Elevate the bloodline?”

The witch’s eyes narrowed dangerously. ”Deaths have never been your concern. The Xiang Qi Club was born to break Alpha’s bloodline rules... Alpha prizes talent above blood.”

”So?” Sepulano appeared very patient.

”So, what’s causing your hesitation isn’t fear but ambition.” The witch drew out the Law book, aiming it at the suspicious crow, and coldly pinpointed the core issue: ”Now, you crave a complete Alpha Fortress more than a clean one.”

”So,” the warlock calmly repeated the word.

Gloria hesitated for a second about casting a Crushing Curse right away to blow that crow to bits but paused, suppressing her inner agitation, emphasizing: ”So, bloodline has never been our goal. Nor has talent. Breaking the stale shackles of Alpha and retrieving the true Alpha is our aim.”

Sepulano burst into laughter.

The witch was somewhat annoyed by his laughter.

”You saw it?”

The captain of the Xiangqi Hunting Team turned to look at the big crow, his tone somewhat regretful: ”Even though your proposal is tempting, it’s really not to our taste.”

For a moment, Gloria thought that the big crow’s eyelid would ’click’ shut or that it would open its large mouth to let out a hoarse cry.

But all along, it maintained that stiff pose, unmoving.

Then, the captain of the Xiangqi Hunting Team swept out his hand, and the big crow tipped over, gently hitting the oak remains and silently turned into a pile of black dust.

”What is this?” Gloria raised an eyebrow.

The robust fat wizard spread his hands with an innocent look: ”As you’ve seen, an unsuccessful emissary. It seemed to want some commotion at the Winter Hunting... Maybe its master thought we were crazy enough, so it sneakily approached... Just before you arrived, I had frozen it into an ice block.”

His wording was somewhat vague, with no further details on the crow.

The witch showed a slight hesitance: ”Then we...”

”Go deal with the wild dragon Lord Falcon found.” Sepulano had no hesitation.

”Shouldn’t we report back? Or at least alert the other hunting teams at the perimeter?”

”The school doesn’t need our report.”

Sepulano tugged at the corner of his mouth, attempting a laborious sneer: ”I don’t think there’s much on this island that can escape those legends... As for the other hunting teams... if the school doesn’t alert them, why should we overstep our bounds?”

”Besides, aside from a crow that has turned to dust, we know nothing. Risking ridicule and attacks from the Friedmans to create trouble isn’t my custom... They initially agreed to let me be the new Augustus, but then gave the Alpha Hunting Team’s captain position to Friedman... Augustus’s authority was challenged, and every move I make is scrutinized by them... This feeling, it’s awful.”

”That was your choice back then.” The witch tried to maintain a bit of objectivity and fairness.

”Choice? That word only exists in dreams... In reality, there’s no opportunity to choose. If there really were choices, I would prefer those crows to tear the Alpha Hunting Team apart in this Winter Hunting.”

The fat wizard slowly stood up, his towering figure seemingly quieting the snow and wind for a moment. He tread heavily, step by step, into the depths of the snowstorm. The ogre’s skull he had been stepping on was soon buried by the whistling wind and snow.