Dragon Raja; Chapter 72: A Dragon’s Shadow (10)

Dragon Raja

“Then of course I worry about dying. It’s a normal reaction, right?”

“Then why doesn’t anyone want to drop out?” Lu Mingfei sighed, “I think they are all very sad.”

“What do you Chinese say? The death of a rabbit makes the fox mourn? It’s true that the people of Cassell Academy are very supportive of slaying the dragon. Does slaying a dragon add experience points? Obviously not. The salary of the executive department is not bad, but it can’t make up for the danger of dying, right? But you also saw that there must be problems with the mission in China, but no one wants to leave crying.” Finger asked firmly, “What kind of spirit is this?”

“You guys really have ideals and ambitions,” Lu Mingfei said firmly, “but I don’t seem to have any of these things.”

“Bah, ideals and ambitions are what you eat?” Finger curled his lips in disdain and looked out the window. Many windows of the dormitory building in District 2 in the distance were still lit. It seemed that this was a night when many people could not sleep. “In fact, everyone has their own reasons, each of them is different, but in the final analysis, many people in this academy hate their dragon bloodline.”

“Loathe their Dragon heritage? Why? You all seem pretty cool!”

“Do you know why Manstein and Guderian are such close friends? Because they graduated from the same mental hospital,” Finger raised his eyebrows.

“Wait!” Lu Mingfei was stunned. “What… mental hospital?”

“Hybrids’ thoughts are different from those of ordinary people, so it’s hard for them to fit into regular society. When Guderian and Manstein were kids, their extraordinary behavior got them labeled as mentally ill, and they were confined to a hospital until they were fifteen. That’s why Cassell College calls itself an ‘alternative choice.’ By choosing Cassell College, you have to say goodbye to ordinary life, and the only thing you can do here is slay dragons. Dragons hate hybrids the most—we have their abilities, but human hearts. We are people who live in the cracks, accepted by neither side.”

“Right,” Lu Mingfei murmured. “You aren’t fully human, nor are you fully dragons.”

“You’re the one who’s not human—your whole family isn’t human…”

“True… If both my parents were part of the College, I guess they should’ve had dragon tails too…” Lu Mingfei agreed.

Finger had long grown accustomed to his junior’s thick skin—it was as thick as a city wall, though his own was no thinner. “Take Chu Zihang, for example. Everyone in the college says he’s extremely repressed. He’s always holding himself back, hiding how different he is from ordinary people. He’s been searching the entire internet for information about dragons since high school. He’s one of the few who proactively contacted Cassell College, and at first, they didn’t believe that there could be a hybrid with such a high purity of dragon blood. So, I’m sure this guy had a really oppressive childhood. Now that he’s found an organization, of course, he’s going to fight dragons with all his might!” Among the people who went to China this time, there was also a Japanese girl named Aki. Speaking of which, she was my classmate at the time. I always thought she liked me very much. She was also sent to the United States by her family from Japan because she was different from ordinary people since she was a child. According to Japanese tradition, she was ominous, so her family didn’t come to see her. Her childhood was so miserable that it could be written into a tragic novel.”

“And what about Caesar? He’s not repressed at all—he’s overt.”

“Caesar is an exception. His full name is Caesar Gattuso. The Gattuso family is a famous noble family in Italy, with seven or eight dukes in its history, though none of them ever successfully ascended to the Italian throne. The Gattuso family has always believed that they should produce an emperor. Later, they discovered that young Caesar had an extraordinary natural charisma, along with a talent for mathematics and combat. His way of thinking was vastly different from that of normal kids, which made the elders of the Gattuso family very proud.” Finger said, “Caesar is so overt because his family elders love him too much.”

“What a stroke of luck. Didn’t anyone think that being so arrogant was a sign of mental illness?” Lu Mingfei said, not hiding his dislike for Caesar.

“He’s supposed to be an emperor—the one his family hopes will become an emperor. Of course, an emperor is different from ordinary people. It’d be strange if he weren’t.”

“An emperor? In this day and age?”

“The Gattuso family is really unfortunate. After waiting hundreds of years, they finally have someone who could be an emperor of Italy, but then—bam—democracy happened, and there’s no more emperor. So they had to lower their goal to Prime Minister of Italy. Caesar graduated from Eton, and he chose Cassell College over Cambridge. He didn’t come here for comfort; he chose this place because it seemed more challenging, more suited to someone as abnormally strong as he is. His first words upon enrollment were, ‘You can challenge me, but I’m ready to laugh at you!’”

Lu Mingfei covered his face. “What were my first words when I enrolled?”

“If we count from the moment you boarded the train, I remember you said… ‘Whoa, so fancy!’”

“I didn’t expect you to have such a good memory in that fluffy head of yours!” Lu Mingfei thought for a moment. “What about Senior Sister?”

“Senior Sister? You’re calling her that so intimately! Unfortunately, my Yellow Pages doesn’t include any stories about the person you covet—Caesar’s girlfriend. She seems to have a very wealthy father, but she always tells others she has no family. She has a younger brother, also of dragon descent, who never grew up. His name is GATES, nicknamed ‘Key,’ which is quite the opposite of his actual name. The little guy’s blood can open every door in the world.” Finger looked expectant. “I often think that if I ever go broke enough to rob a bank, I’ll bring him along.” Her mentor is Professor Mans Rundstedt of the Executive Department, but her guardian before she was 18 was Professor Guderian, so she has been working part-time on campus with Professor Guderian.”

“I’ve seen her driving a Ferrari!”

“I’ve seen her in a Lamborghini. But it’s strange—she still works campus jobs with Professor Guderian. You’d think she wouldn’t need to earn money at all. Anyway, be careful if you try to get close to her.”

“Why?” Lu Mingfei was puzzled.

“Do you know her nickname? ‘Redhead Nono’ or ‘The Red-haired Witch.’” Finger gave a mysterious smile. “She’s sometimes very quiet, but sometimes she goes totally crazy! If you try using your ‘three-month immunity to rejection’ privilege with her, she just might agree!”

“Caesar would probably beat me to a pulp.”

“Back in the day, Prince Paris of Troy risked being attacked by both Agamemnon and Achilles to bring Helen back to his palace—what are you afraid of?” Finger said boldly. “Besides, Caesar is a true hero—bros before ladies!”

“Ugh!” Lu Mingfei suddenly remembered something. “Oh, right, Chu Zihang talked to me today!”

“I know, the whole school knows,” Finger moved his laptop, connected it to Cassell College’s homepage, where the headline news was “S vs. A! A Loving Gaze!” The accompanying picture showed two people, smiling as they looked at each other in the afternoon sunlight, the light reflected in their eyes—one was the newcomer king, Lu Mingfei, and the other was the president of the Lionheart Society, Chu Zihang.

Lu Mingfei covered his face again. “This college even has paparazzi? Are they going to question my orientation?”

“Definitely not! Your orientation has been clarified in the second news story.”

Lu Mingfei opened the second news story. The photo was of him being pulled along by Nono, running towards the library, his eyes gazing at her back in such a way that he himself wanted to slap the guy in the photo. The headline read, “A Gaze as Deep as the Ocean—Guys with Girlfriends Need Not Worry, the New S Rank Has a Target!”

“A gaze as deep as the ocean!” Lu Mingfei almost jumped up. “Which paparazzo wrote this? Are they trying to ruin me?”

“Actually, I think it was one of my juniors,” Finger mused.

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