"Gao Jinyun"s proposal is very accurate. The 12-man mecha fight is indeed the most advantageous for us. In comparison, the 50-man clan fight is the most disadvantageous because although we have already established our mecha clan, we have never experienced a large-scale mecha fight. I believe that in Mecha World, the most you all would have encountered would have been a 24-man cooperative battle, and many of you would probably only have experienced a 6-12 person mini battle clan mission, right?"

Ling Lan"s question received nods from all corners of the room. Indeed, these team leaders" strength was not sufficient for them to partic.i.p.ate in large-scale team missions. In this regard, they truly had no experience.

"If Qiao Ting simply needs a victory to wipe away the disgrace Leiting suffered when they lost to us, he should choose the safer option of the 50-man large-scale clan fight. However, as far as I know, Qiao Ting is a very aloof and confident person, perhaps even somewhat arbitrary and wilful. Using this sort of safe method to defeat us, for him, may be a disgrace in and of itself."

At this point, Ling Lan paused, then continued to say, "The reason he has decided to challenge us now is — one, he is indeed afraid we"ll use this time to fully develop our clan, and two, their fifth-year division a.s.sessment is about to start. Qiao Ting is probably thinking of using this challenge fight before the a.s.sessment to carve his name gloriously upon the military academy"s historical list of honour ... in order to achieve this objective, Qiao Ting is unlikely to choose even the 24-man battle; he will only choose the 12-man battle which can best showcase individual ability."

After saying all this, Ling Lan did not seem to feel any pressure at all. She nonchalantly tugged at the cuff of her right sleeve, her expression unperturbed as she continued to say, "As for special-cla.s.s operators, he will not send them. The members who will fight alongside him should all be advanced mecha warriors. This challenge fight is his personal exhibition, and those members are just there as a backdrop to his strength."

Stating this, the corners of Ling Lan"s lips curled slightly into a mocking smirk. An enemy who thought highly of himself was in fact the easiest to handle — she had always thought that Qiao Ting might be her greatest enemy and obstacle to dominating the military academy, but now, from the looks of it, he might be the easiest one to handle. Hopefully, after this battle, Qiao Ting would not give up on himself from the shock! It was not easy for Ling Lan to find a rival on par with her — she still wanted to play some more.

"Ah, is he looking down on our Lingtian Mecha Clan?!" Ling Lan"s words stirred up everyone present; their faces were flushed with indignant rage, and quite a few actually broke out swearing. If things really turned out as Ling Lan had said, Qiao Ting"s decision absolutely meant that they were nothing in Qiao Ting"s eyes.

Observing the frothing indignation of the people before her, Ling Lan"s eyes closed once more and she showed no intent of saying anything more. Xie Yi, standing to one side, knew that his boss was not interested in explaining things any further, so he quickly stepped in to add on behalf of his boss, "Everyone, have you all paid attention to that bit of gossip recently?"

Xie Yi was unsure why, over the course of this past year, his boss had become more and more reticent. Boss would only communicate with them with his gaze and his actions, but the effect was quite good — the team members could almost always understand what their boss was trying to convey. However, even as team rapport improved, the pressure the team members felt increased accordingly. They just could not tell when they would fall out of favour with the boss ... oh, how uneasy it made them feel.

Xie Yi"s words gathered the entire group"s attention once more. Right now, Xie Yi was no longer simply a member of Ling Lan"s team but also its external relations officer. What Xie Yi said was very often the intent of Ling Lan"s battle clan as a whole, so they could not take him lightly.

Just as everyone was confused, uncertain which bit of gossip Xie Yi was referring to, Xie Yi elaborated, "I hear that Qiao Ting has been trying hard to chase the soul singer Li Yinfei recently, but Li Yinfei has made a high-profile announcement that her future partner shall be an indomitable king. Only if one can fulfil that criteria would that person be qualified to pursue her. In order to become a king in Li Yinfei"s eyes and be qualified enough to pursue her, Qiao Ting must use exceptional results as proof. He wants to become the king of the academy, and the one stain on his kingly image is precisely our newly established Lingtian Mecha Clan. In order to prove publicly that he is truly the king of the academy, he can only use an overwhelming victory to clear away the shame from his faction"s previous defeat. As such, he can only challenge us in the way Boss Lan has explained. Ah, how beauty leads one astray ..." said Xie Yi gleefully with a dramatic sigh, causing many of the seated members to chuckle despite themselves.

Right then, at the bend of the staircase leading up to the second floor, a dark figure was standing within the shadowed recesses of the corner. When he heard what Xie Yi said, his body actually shuddered, but he very quickly stood straight and steady again, as if that brief lapse was all just an illusion.

"Just obsessed with that face? It looks like my speculations are correct. Qiao Ting really is that despicable king ..." A trace of disgust flashed across the black figure"s eyes, killing intent right on its tail, but the disgust and killing intent soon dissipated to be replaced by sheer bitterness. What means could he, who was still a special-cla.s.s operator, have to deal with the other? He was still too weak.

Very soon, the black figure recovered from the mental shock and his gaze became determined once more. He believed that as long as he followed the rabbit"s arrangements and continued working hard, he would become strong one day, strong enough to match Qiao Ting"s strength. At that time, he would personally end this evil fated bond.

Xie Yi waited for everyone"s laughter to subside before continuing to say, "Of course, Qiao Ting has a wonderful plan. Personally put an end to the grudge between us, take the prized throne of the king of the academy and, with this air of majestic authority, sweep right into some army division to gain loads of accolades. And then, riding this momentum, he will rise higher and higher to finally become the veritable king of Mecha World and win the heart of the great beauty Li Yinfei. It cannot be denied that Qiao Ting has an ideal plan in place, and he views our Lingtian Mecha Clan as a solid stepping stone ... However, our Lingtian Mecha Clan is no sandbag which he can push around as he likes 1 ..." At this point, Xie Yi"s smile disappeared completely and a trace of iciness could be seen on his face; it actually resembled the cold air of Boss Lan somewhat.

So after following Boss Lan for so long, one would also inherit this special ability of Boss Lan"s. Even the ever-smiling Xie Yi could make others feel so cold the moment his expression turned stony ... the group snuck a glance at the frozen face of the person sitting in the main chair, the expressionless Ling Lan, and once again confirmed that Boss Lan was truly unmatched in dominance. Her influential power was just too great.

These words of Xie Yi"s finally let everyone understand why Boss Lan would conclude that Qiao Ting would choose the 12-man battle mode when challenging them. Everyone could not help but be filled with admiration. Wu Jiong was the one who felt this most profoundly. His gaze was filled with admiration and respect when he looked at Ling Lan, but it also carried a trace of frustrated disappointment.

The more he spent time with Ling Lan, the more he felt that Ling Lan was unfathomable. After establishing the Lingtian Mecha Clan, Wu Jiong knew very well that though Ling Lan was the first chair in their mecha clan, she actually did not handle anything — the true manager of the Lingtian Mecha Clan was him, Wu Jiong. But when the Leiting Mecha Clan had issued their letter of challenge, filling him with panic, Ling Lan had calmly collected data and intel on Leiting and Qiao Ting. He had completely overlooked some of these news and gossip which had seemed disjointed and unrelated, but Ling Lan had been able to find some clues from all of it, swiftly grasping the key points to determine the possible behaviour of the opponent. Obviously, in terms of gauging the big picture, he was still no match for Ling Lan.

At this thought, Wu Jiong could not help but glance at Gao Jinyun, who had by now resumed his usual humble manner. This person had always been extremely low-key and un.o.btrusive, so low-key that they had all overlooked him. Yet, despite not actively managing the clan, Boss Lan had been able to see his strengths with just one glance, only choosing him among all the others to speak. This astute vision was equally worthy of Wu Jiong"s admiration and envy — in terms of mining talent, he was also no match for Boss Ling Lan.

Wu Jiong could see very clearly that the interaction between Ling Lan and Gao Jinyun had not been a pre-planned thing. The pleasant surprise and excitement on Gao Jinyun"s face could not have been faked. Unless Gao Jinyun was a natural actor whose acting skills had already achieved flawless perfection, there was no way his reaction could be that real.

His father had spoken truly — following an exceptional person would indeed let him learn many things he never knew before, and come to recognise weaknesses he had not noticed in himself previously ... but, father, when someone was so strong that one could only look up at them, how could he find the courage to oppose the other? Wu Jiong could not help but smile wryly ...

The Lingtian Mecha Clan came to a consensus; they could only wait to see what Qiao Ting would do now. As expected, Qiao Ting did not give the Lingtian Mecha Clan too much time to prepare. The very next day, the Lingtian Mecha Clan had already received a notification from the academy mainframe. It was truly as Ling Lan had predicted. The Leiting Mecha Clan had chosen the 12-man mecha challenge fight, and the leader of the representative team was Qiao Ting.

At the bottom of the notification from the mainframe was a reminder for the Lingtian Mecha Clan and the Leiting Mecha Clan to make sure and submit the official name list of their partic.i.p.ating members to the mainframe three days later.

In reality, when Ling Lan had judged that Qiao Ting would choose the 12-man challenge fight, she had already had a name list in mind. However, she had not announced the list because, for one, she wanted to wait and see if she had missed anything. And secondly, she also did not want Leiting to somehow find out about this list and make some adjustment specifically countering it.

Since Qiao Ting was planning to use the Lingtian Mecha Clan as his stepping stone to crowning himself king, then he should not blame her for planning to use the Leiting Mecha Clan as her mecha clan"s "chicken" in a lesson to strike fear into the "monkeys" of the military academy 2 .

********

In the headquarters of the Leiting Mecha Clan, Qiao Ting seemed to be waiting for something. Finally, someone rushed in from outside. Seeing this person appear, Qiao Ting"s initially tense expression eased slightly.

"Did you manage to get the partic.i.p.ating name list of the Lingtian Mecha Clan?" asked one of the people standing beside Qiao Ting hurriedly. As a confidant of Qiao Ting"s, he knew very well what Qiao Ting wanted to know most right now.

"No, the name list is being held by their regiment commander. Even the team leaders below are not sure who will be fighting in the end. But what we can confirm is that all of the regiment commanders will be partic.i.p.ating, and the remaining few slots should be selected from among the various team leaders." The newcomer wiped the cold sweat from his forehead. He had not been able to obtain the true name list even after using about three days" time. This made him feel rather timid, worried whether his regiment commander would blame him for this.