Shut Up, Snow Leopard

The surge of source energy clearly marked the direction.

Yun Huang didn’t spare a single glance at those behind her.

She crouched low, her toes lightly brushing the withered leaves without making a single sound.

Her figure transformed into a blur skimming the ground, moving with minimal disturbance as she pursued the trail.

A deathly silence lingered in her wake.

The others stood frozen, exchanging bewildered looks.

Li Ran, a burly young man, heaved with ragged breaths.

Yun Huang’s indifferent glance had struck him harder than any physical blow.

With a sudden lurch, he leapt to his feet, his labored panting piercing the stillness.

“Damn it!” he growled, as if expelling the frustration coiled in his chest. “I’m going too! What’s so special about this?”

With someone taking the lead, a girl tugged at her companion’s sleeve and whispered, “Should… should we follow?”

“What else? Stay here?” Her companion rolled her eyes and quickened her pace after Li Ran.

The rest, now emboldened, began to move as well.

Liu Feiyu was the last to act.

He adjusted his glasses with deliberate calm, the lenses reflecting the dappled forest light, obscuring his expression.

He stood motionless, his face flickering with conflict before it all dissolved into a nearly inaudible sigh.

Then he, too, stepped forward, trailing leisurely at the group’s rear.

He wanted to see.

To witness firsthand the insurmountable gap that lay between them.

…

Under the cover of dense foliage, the group soon reached the edge of the battlefield.

They found a slightly elevated mound, crouched low, and parted the ferns before them to take in the scene below.

It was a relatively open clearing in the woods.

The military squad known as “Thunderhawk” was already locked in combat with a snow-white, agile magical beast—a Frostshadow Panther.

The panther wasn’t particularly large, but every movement left behind a series of blurred afterimages, its speed defying reason.

Its claws sliced through the air with such force that they produced sharp sonic booms.

An eighth-tier beginner, the Frostshadow Panther.

Yet what happened next stole their breath entirely.

Faced with the panther’s lightning-fast assault, not a single member of Thunderhawk showed a trace of panic.

Their formation appeared loose but concealed intricate coordination.

But the gap between the eighth and seventh tiers was vast.

The battle had barely begun.

And already, one of the squad members had left an opening.

A sweeping claw strike.

Aimed straight for a fatal weak point.

A burly squad member stepped forward, crossing his arms in front of his chest as a thick energy shield materialized instantly.

The Frostshadow Panther’s claws slammed into the barrier.

CLANG!

A deafening impact shook the shield, leaving a hairline crack—but it held.

The shield-bearer, however, staggered back three steps, his face flushing red.

Now!

In the split second before the panther could retract its claws, two other squad members struck simultaneously.

One thrust his spear like a dragon’s fang, piercing toward the beast’s flank.

The other formed hand seals, conjuring dozens of ice spikes that sealed off every escape route.

The entire sequence flowed seamlessly, without the slightest hesitation.

As if rehearsed a thousand times.

But what sent chills down Liu Feiyu’s spine came next.

The shield-bearer, after being forced back, had every chance to recover—or even sidestep the panther’s counterattack.

Yet he didn’t.

Instead, he steadied himself with brutal efficiency and lunged forward again, planting himself directly in the Frostshadow Panther’s path.

His role was singular—defense.

Even when golden opportunities to strike presented themselves, he never once entertained the thought of attacking.

He defended, and only defended.

The spearman, too, adhered to the same principle.

When the panther’s tail whipped toward his face, he didn’t so much as blink, pouring every ounce of focus into maximizing the power of his spear thrust.

Because he knew—his “shield” would intercept the blow.

And so it did.

Another thunderous crash.

The energy shield shattered, and the shield-bearer was sent flying once more, now visibly injured.

But he had bought his spearman a tenth of a second—an eternity in battle.

THUNK!

The spear found its mark, plunging deep into the Frostshadow Panther’s flesh.

ROAR!!!

The beast howled in agony, its fury shaking the trees.

The squad’s coordination was nothing short of a precision-engineered killing machine.

Each member was a cog, a component.

Some drew aggression, others dealt damage, some restricted movement, and one—from start to finish—chanted a single, devastating spell.

They abandoned individual heroics, discarded on-the-fly judgment, even overrode their survival instincts.

They executed their roles with mechanical ruthlessness.

Placing absolute trust in their comrades.

Individually, their strength had limits.

But through this cold, calculated synergy, they moved a force far beyond their own.

Li Ran, crouched on the mound, dug his fingers into the dirt until his knuckles turned white.

His body trembled faintly.

What was he seeing?

A shield-bearer who ignored openings to strike.

A spearman who didn’t even flinch at death’s approach.

These… these weren’t people.

They were emotionless instruments of war.

His pride in close-quarters combat withered before such ironclad discipline—a pitiful joke in comparison.

Liu Feiyu’s face was ashen.

He had always preached teamwork, emphasized unity.

But his idea of coordination? Just positioning everyone together and shouting,

“So-and-so, use such-and-such!”

If this were a Pokémon battle, he’d be a champion trainer.

But real combat didn’t leave room for verbal commands.

Sound took time to travel. Comprehension took time to process.

Against a Frostshadow Panther?

That delay would’ve killed them twice over.

This squad showed him what true coordination meant.

The absolute sacrifice. The absolute trust.

The resolve to stake their lives on another’s actions.

He couldn’t do it.

Neither could the so-called teammates around him.

The battle lasted less than five minutes.

Then the mage at the rear—who had been chanting nonstop—finally unleashed his long-prepared finisher.

Four minutes of incantation, condensed into a single moment.

A beam of indescribable brilliance erupted from his hands.

At first no thicker than an arm, it expanded mid-flight into a three-meter-wide torrent of devastation.

The air warped under its heat, the ground torn open in its wake.

The [Blizzard Saber Leopard], tightly restrained, let out a desperate roar. It struggled fiercely but couldn’t break free from the layers of bindings imposed by the other team members.

Reluctantly, it endured what was called "a skill nearly impossible to land in actual combat."

The next second, the beam cannon struck it head-on.

A full four-minute charge time—such a skill, even if unleashed by someone only at the early seventh tier, was deadly to an eighth-tier creature.

The conditions were too demanding.

The deafening explosion made the entire forest tremble. The students lying on the dirt slope felt their eardrums sting, their minds blank.

The massive body of the [Blizzard Saber Leopard] was pushed backward by the beam, plowing through over a dozen thick trees before crashing violently into a towering cliff.

Boom!

The cliff shattered, sending debris flying in all directions.

Dust filled the air, obscuring everything.

After a long while, the dust settled, revealing a massive crater in the cliff face.

The [Blizzard Saber Leopard] was embedded at the center of the crater, drenched in blood, its fur charred black. Its front legs were twisted at unnatural angles—clearly broken.

Yet even then, it struggled to rise from the rubble.

Its crimson eyes locked onto the squad, filled with madness.

Its speed advantage had been completely nullified.

It knew that if it didn’t fight with everything it had, it would die here today.

"Rooooar—!"

A shrill howl pierced the sky as an icy gale erupted from its body, spreading outward in all directions.

The temperature plummeted. Frost formed visibly on the ground, and fine snowflakes began to drift through the air.

Domain Expansion.

"Shut up, snow leopard!"

The mage who had just unleashed his ultimate, his face pale, suddenly shouted. A mental shockwave blasted straight into the [Blizzard Saber Leopard]’s head.

The beast’s domain expansion faltered abruptly. The blizzard that had been on the verge of forming weakened by a third.

Though the interruption wasn’t complete, it wasn’t a total failure either.

An eighth-tier creature, already grievously wounded and unable to fully deploy its strongest domain, had lost all chance of turning the tide.

What followed, in Liu Feiyu’s eyes, could no longer be called a battle.

It was… a one-sided execution.

The Thunderhawk Squad maintained their earlier formation and pressed forward again.

Despite being far stronger than any individual on the field, the [Blizzard Saber Leopard] felt an infuriating sense of helplessness.

It lunged furiously at the gun-wielding squad member, only to be blocked by one energy shield after another, unable to advance an inch.

It tried to freeze its opponents with ice, but the mage’s counterspells always arrived a step ahead.

It felt as though it wasn’t fighting a team.

But a single entity.

A flawless seventh-tier war machine assembled from ten parts.

This "entity" possessed defense capabilities at the pinnacle of the early seventh tier.

A reckless, all-offense-no-defense combat style.

Long-range attacks and relentless crowd control.

And one ultimate skill—inescapable in a prolonged fight—capable of crippling even an eighth-tier foe.

Every one of its skill activations would be interrupted without fail.

Each component performed its role to perfection—no more, no less.

On the slope, Li Ran’s fists clenched until his knuckles turned white.

What he had called bravery was nothing but brute recklessness.

The other team, however, operated on absolute trust—placing their backs and their lives entirely in their comrades’ hands.

Liu Feiyu’s body trembled uncontrollably.

All his theories about teamwork and tactical formations were shattered by the textbook-perfect display before him.

He finally understood how wrong he had been.

True coordination wasn’t about barking orders or adjusting formations on the fly.

It was about calculating every possibility before the fight even began, with each member becoming a precision component in a well-oiled machine.

No thinking required—only execution.

The battle ended.

The [Blizzard Saber Leopard]’s massive body collapsed to the ground, lifeless.

The Thunderhawk Squad showed no hint of celebration. Not a single word had been exchanged throughout the entire engagement.

For instance, had that "final spell" been cast by Yun Huang’s squad…

The outcome would’ve been obvious.

"Move aside! I’m dropping my ultimate!"

But they didn’t need that. That "final spell" had swept up even their own teammates in its blast.

After all, an attack capable of crippling an eighth-tier source creature could easily kill an early seventh-tier with just a glancing hit.

Yet the caster had been certain his teammates would evade in time.

The squad leader merely gave a calm wave of his hand, showing no joy over their "cross-tier kill."

"Mission complete. Secure the area and report resource expenditure."

Several members stepped forward, efficiently dismantling the [Blizzard Saber Leopard]’s corpse and collecting valuable materials.

The entire process was silent, efficient, and chillingly ruthless.

Yun Huang watched it all quietly.

Unlike the others, she wasn’t disheartened.

Instead, a thoughtful expression crossed her face.

What she saw wasn’t just the gap between them.

But a method.

A way to maximize limited strength through flawless coordination.

She glanced back at her so-called teammates behind her—their heads hung low, their spirits all but broken.

Suddenly, she understood why Su Qi had left without hesitation.

What these people lacked wasn’t strength or tactics.

It was courage.

The courage to challenge the strong.

The courage to entrust their backs to others.

And perhaps, just a shred of the resolve to be worthy of that trust.

These weren’t things that could be gained from a single battle or a few lectures.

By the time the Thunderhawk Squad had finished looting and vanished silently into the sea of trees, Yun Huang’s team seemed to collapse where they stood, drained of all energy.

Not a word was spoken.

Yun Huang withdrew her gaze, turned, and silently walked away from the slope.

She didn’t return to where they’d come from. Instead, she headed in a different direction.

This kind of synergy wasn’t something that could be forged in a few days.

Rather than waste time forcing teamwork, it was better to fight separately.

At least that way, their initial scores would look decent.

As for whether they needed to practice coordination…

They had a month after the initial rankings to think about it.

Li Ran and Liu Feiyu remained seated on the slope for a long, long time.