Chapter 8: Reporting

What should a morning be like?

For others, maybe it’s birds chirping, the first rays of sunlight slanting in, leaves gently drifting, the slightly cold air waking you and your beloved beside you.

I don’t have any of that.

Just the cold.

I woke up because of the cold.

After confirming this fact, I immediately sat up.

Sure enough, Hai Shi had rolled all of my half of the blanket onto herself.

She now looked like a meat roll, with the little raccoon ears on her pajama hood poking out, like some decoration added to that meat roll.

I rubbed my hands together to warm them up.

Let Hai Shi sleep a little longer.

I quickly put on my clothes and left the room.

Walking down the hallway, I could already hear people moving around.

Even though it was only six o’clock, everyone was quite diligent.

Many were already preparing to start work.

I might as well go grab breakfast first.

I took the elevator down to the first floor and casually greeted a few people having breakfast there.

If I didn’t have my team members around me, they were still willing to exchange a few words with me.

After stepping out, I planned to go to the street I usually frequent for breakfast.

“Boss, a bowl of beef offal rice noodles.”

“Coming right up.”

I found a random seat and sat down, only to discover that Xi Si Te was sitting right across from me.

“Good morning, Captain. The weather is really nice today. Feels like a perfect day for an outing.”

“Yeah.”

I looked at the sky outside the shop.

Clear of clouds—a rare sunny day.

If it were possible, I’d really like to go somewhere and have fun.

“Speaking of which, I don’t think I mentioned it to you all yesterday. Today, our team is getting a new member.”

“A new member? That’s quite rare.”

Xi Si Te tilted her head in confusion, looking equally surprised.

After all, over the years, aside from the few of them, no one else had been able to withstand the Mad Contagion and survive.

The last person who could revive after being killed was Hai Shi, but that was already seven years ago.

“What kind of kid is she?”

“She seems to have been an ordinary female college student before. Nothing special on her resume.”

“Then suddenly suffering such a misfortune, she must be in a lot of pain.”

Xi Si Te nodded slightly, her hands clasped tightly together, as if praying for our new member.

Even though she had been through something similar, Xi Si Te didn’t sympathize out of that.

Instead, she felt pained—she didn’t want to see anyone else walk the same path they had.

That path was too dangerous, filled with suffering, and had no end in sight.

“Here’s your beef offal noodles, young man. And yours, miss.”

“Thank you.”

“Let’s lighten the mood a bit. Since it’s already happened, we can only live in the present.”

“Yeah, that’s true.”

Xi Si Te replied with a cheerful smile.

“Isn’t your bowl a bit too big?”

The soup noodles Xi Si Te ordered seemed to be the largest size, a whole circle wider than mine.

Were they always this good at eating?

I hadn’t really gone out for meals with the whole team before, so I never noticed.

“We consume a lot of energy, you know? So this portion is necessary.”

With that, Xi Si Te picked up the noodles with her chopsticks and brought them to her mouth.

Though she ate a lot, she did so slowly and methodically.

But surprisingly, she wasn’t slow at all.

She finished around the same time I did.

“Let’s head back. They should be awake by now.”

“Yeah.”

Xi Si Te and I walked side by side down the early morning street.

Many shops were rolling up their shutters, preparing for the day’s business.

The cold autumn wind blew against our faces.

Since I hadn’t expected the morning to be this cold, I’d only worn a padded jacket when I left.

Now, everything above my neck was being battered by the cold wind, my face showing signs of distress.

Xi Si Te, on the other hand, was well-prepared.

Not only was she wearing a thick padded jacket, but she also had thermal tights under her long skirt, and a scarf wrapped around her neck that, even after several loops, still reached down to her waist.

“Captain, are you cold? You’ve been exhaling steam and shivering from the cold.”

Xi Si Te hurriedly pulled out her scarf to offer it to me, but I quickly refused.

“No, no, you keep it. It’s just a little way left.”

“Then how about we share it?”

“No, no, that’s even worse. I told you yesterday—don’t let your guard down like that.”

“Then…”

Xi Si Te quickly stepped in front of me, matching my pace, and blocked the cold wind blowing toward us.

“This way, Captain, it should feel a bit better, right? Though I’m not tall enough to reach your head. It’d be even better if you lowered your head a little.”

“No need. The fact that you’re thinking of me like this has already warmed my heart. This wind doesn’t seem like much anymore.”

“That’s good to hear.”

Hearing my answer, Xi Si Te’s smile loosened a bit, more relaxed than the shy smile from before.

After returning to the Defense Department building, I checked my watch.

It was 6:30.

Everyone should be awake by now.

I pushed open the door to the team’s operations room.

Although it was called an operations room, it was essentially our private space.

When there was nothing to do, we’d kill time here, so there were surprisingly a lot of items inside.

“Oh, everyone’s awake.”

Ou Mi You was hugging a pillow, lying listlessly on the sofa.

Le Paxi was brewing tea.

Hai Shi was sitting on another sofa, reading a book.

Seeing me arrive, everyone’s attention gathered on me.

“Listen up. A new member is joining today. She should be here in a little while. Let’s welcome her.”

“A new member?”

All three looked confused.

After I explained the full situation, they didn’t say much more.

Even though another person was walking this path, they wouldn’t offer meaningless sympathy.

Since it had come to this, there were only two choices: die or survive.

“Since she’s not here yet, everyone can go back to what they were doing.”

I clapped my hands to end the topic, and everyone returned to their own business.

“Ugh, so boring. When is she coming already?”

Ou Mi You threw the pillow in her hand, hitting Hai Shi, who was sitting across from her reading a book.

“Ou Mi You…”

Hai Shi stood up with a displeased look, the pillow in her hand crumpled from being squeezed.

“Ah, no… Pwah!”

The pillow shot out like an arrow from Hai Shi’s hand, hitting Ou Mi You square in the face as she tried to hide.

“Fine, you want to play for real? Don’t blame me then…”

Ou Mi You’s expression turned fierce, her hands tightly gripping the pillow.

This was a pillow I’d specifically bought to be super durable—it wouldn’t tear even under several hundred pounds of force.

It could handle a real fight!

Hai Shi also stood on guard, her arms stretched out in front of her, trying to block Ou Mi You’s attack.

“Here I come!”

Ou Mi You threw the pillow.

Looked like a battle was unavoidable.

“Over here!”

“Got it!”

“What?!”

These two could actually have such an intense tug-of-war in this space of less than two hundred square meters.

You really had to admire it.

Ou Mi You had the pillow in her grip, apparently waiting for the moment Hai Shi poked her head out to throw it.

But Hai Shi wouldn’t be foolish enough to expose herself.

She was hiding behind the sofa, waiting for Ou Mi You to make a mistake.

As the situation stalled, Ou Mi You suddenly charged to the right, but the pillow was thrown directly toward the other side of the sofa.

Caught off guard by the unexpected attack, Hai Shi rolled forward in a panic, narrowly dodging it.

At that moment, the door to the operations room opened.

“I’m sorry I’m late. I’m Leng Qiongling, reporting in today… Pwah…”

The pillow, which had originally missed its mark, hit—well—Leng Qiongling square in the face.

But even so, Ou Mi You didn’t stop.

She sprinted to Leng Qiongling’s feet and picked up the pillow.

“Aha! A pillow blessed by the new member’s face. This one’s an instant kill. Take this!”

Ou Mi You predicted Hai Shi’s trajectory and threw the pillow directly in front of her, hitting Le Paxi instead.

Le Paxi, who had just been about to pick up her teacup, got hit in the face.

She silently set the cup down, but I thought I heard something crack—the sound of ceramic breaking.

“Heh heh, Miss Ou Mi You?”

“Ahh, no, no, no! Le Paxi, let me explain! Eeek!”

Seeing that her words had no effect, Ou Mi You scrambled to get as far away as possible, but Le Paxi didn’t give her the chance.

With a pitcher-perfect throwing form, she launched the pillow, hitting Ou Mi You on the back of the head and sending her sprawling to the floor.

Having dealt with Ou Mi You, Le Paxi sat back down, poured the tea from the cup whose handle she’d snapped into another cup, and pretended nothing had happened.

Then she noticed our new member had arrived and looked at her with her usual faint, elusive smile.

“Please excuse the spectacle. Don’t mind it.”

Hai Shi silently returned to her seat and stared at the new member without a word.

“Um, this is…”

Leng Qiongling looked at a loss.

Getting hit in the face with a pillow right as she walked in was certainly disorienting.

“You must be Miss Leng Qiongling, right?”

At that moment, Xi Si Te stepped forward with an approachable smile and walked over to Leng Qiongling.

“Ah, yes, that’s me.”

“Then please, come in. Find a seat. Captain!”

“Huh? What? Let me finish this round first.”

“No, Captain. You need to properly fulfill your responsibilities.”

“Ah! Fine, fine.”

The game was shut off by Xi Si Te.

I had no choice but to set it aside for now.

I walked up to Leng Qiongling.

Hmm, she looked about the same as the photo in the file, but the real person was prettier.

She had the youthful innocence of a female college student, but also a hint of maturity.

Seeing me scrutinize her so seriously, Leng Qiongling seemed very nervous.

She stiffened her body and saluted me.

“Good morning, Captain! I am Leng Qiongling, officially joining the Madman Squad from today onward. From now on, I will follow your orders!”