Dust Release "Biological Mother Stripping Technique" This punch carries twenty years of skill...

Because she had rejected so many times before, Xia Tongxin instinctively assumed this latest pop-up notification was just another rejection. Without a second thought, she swiped it away and continued sending invitations to Ye Cheng.

But with that little swipe, she accidentally kicked Ye Cheng out right after he had accepted the invite.

"User has been removed from the room!"

Xia Tongxin’s big, dewy eyes blinked in confusion as she tapped the glowing screen in front of her, murmuring to herself in a daze.

"Huh? Why are the words different this time?" Her large eyes brimmed with even larger confusion. Thinking tears might be blurring her vision, she rubbed her eyes with her tiny fists, wiping them dry.

Nope, still the same. The message really was different!

A spark of excitement lit up Xia Tongxin’s face, her earlier frustration vanishing instantly—though she was still puzzled. If the message changed, why hadn’t she seen him join?

Wait… had something flashed in the room earlier?

Xia Tongxin blinked her watery eyes, her head starting to ache from the effort of thinking. Ugh… too hard. Better not dwell on it.

For Xia Tongxin, even the simplest thoughts required channeling all her energy into her brain. Otherwise, her mind would stay foggy, and her gaze would take on that unmistakable "clueless" look.

With an air of someone blissfully unburdened by intelligence, Xia Tongxin lived by one philosophy: If you give up on a problem, the problem disappears!

Currently, her daily struggles revolved around: What to eat for breakfast? Lunch? Dinner? And which episode of last night’s anime did I fall asleep on?

As for deciphering why the pop-up message had changed—well, that was far too "complex" for Xia Tongxin’s mental CPU. Pushing it might cause a full system crash, so she opted for the classic strategy: Lie down and do nothing.

"User has been… removed from the room… What does that mean?"

Xia Tongxin blinked her big, "enlightened" eyes, pondering this "profound" riddle on her phone screen.

Then—Eureka! A spark of wisdom flashed in her clear, innocent gaze.

She had just kicked Ye Cheng out!

After inviting him so many times, he finally accepted… only for her to immediately boot him.

Xia Tongxin: "……"

"Waaah—!" The "air raid siren" wailed again in her room as she bawled, her little tongue wobbling adorably like a rattle drum. Sniffling, she wiped her tears and resumed her mission—furiously tapping the invite button for Ye Cheng.

---

Meanwhile, in the boys' dorm of Great Sea City Noble Academy.

"Oh ho? This little rascal dares to come back?" Ye Cheng raised an eyebrow, sitting up from his bed. He exited the split-screen tab where he’d been watching mind-numbingly dumb videos—the same ones he hadn’t finished during his earlier "python-like suffocation session" with Tang Yuyao.

While waiting for his next match, Ye Cheng killed time with these clips. Maybe because his last game was such a clown fiesta, the system took ages to pair him with teammates capable of carrying his deadweight.

At this point, the algorithm probably classified Ye Cheng as non-human.

Little did it know—this was where the fun began. The less "human" the system deemed him, the more unhinged his teammates became.

Last round, his four teammates had fought like rabid wolves. Ye Cheng, never one to back down, held his own—shouting down all four in chat. The result? A 24-hour voice and text ban, plus a 4-point stamina penalty.

Stamina was whatever—a couple of games would restore it. The system, that "righteous judge," would surely correct this injustice!

But the 24-hour mute? That was annoying. No voice chat meant no more 1v4 verbal smackdowns. A damn shame. Now, he could only troll in the lobby with "Cpdd" spam, fishing for free skins from gullible players.

Ye Cheng was the epitome of a freeloader—zero dollars spent, maximum emotional damage.

Despite never swiping his card, his skin collection dwarfed even whales who dropped hundreds. His secret? Mastery in the art of the grind.

Freeloading was an art form, and Ye Cheng was its obsessive connoisseur. Through events, team rewards, and skin fragments handed out by whales in voice channels, he’d amassed over a hundred skins—fast fingers, no mercy. Even a dog passing by would leave behind two turds.

After an eternity of matchmaking—no teammates, but an invite from Xia Tongxin’s room popped up.

"Huh?" Ye Cheng squinted at the familiar name: "NoobCarry/." Wasn’t this that little noob from before?

Now, the million-dollar question: Why’s she inviting me to a private room?

A) To "thank" him for their last pleasant gaming experience—likely via a verbal assault spanning generations, with "mother" as the epicenter and the family tree as the blast radius.

B) To gift him skins.

Tough call. What could it be?

Though bored, Ye Cheng wasn’t keen on losing lobby chat privileges too. Without hesitation, he declined.

No way. If the lobby gets muted, how am I supposed to scam skin fragments?

The instant he refused, another invite from Xia Tongxin appeared.

Decline. Pop-up. Decline. Pop-up. Decline—

Back and forth they went. Ye Cheng sucked in a breath. In this era of decay, such a stubborn prodigy exists?!

Fine. Today, the ancestral graves would not be spared.

Come. I acknowledge you. Bring your full might to entertain me. Witness the terror of my prime form!

Dust Release: "Mother-Erasure Technique"!!!

Ye Cheng snapped into battle mode, fingers poised like a ninja weaving hand signs. He accepted the invite and slammed the mic on.

"Yo—"

"You have been removed from the room!"

Ye Cheng: "……"

His insult died unborn. Staring at the system message, he felt outplayed for the first time. He’d assumed she was on level one—turns out she was playing 4D chess in the stratosphere.

She’d initiated combat, kicked him mid-sentence—no counterplay.

A master.

Ye Cheng wasn’t a sore loser. This time, he’d been outmaneuvered. Skill issue. Deserved.

In this world, the strong must trample the weak.

Silently, Ye Cheng dragged out his punching bag for a few "executions." Back in his sweatshop days under that exploitative boss, this was how he coped.

Whenever Ye Cheng felt the urge to charge forward in rage to teach the other party a lesson—showing them the might of a working-class hero—he’d find himself thwarted by their impenetrable defense, and what’s more, it was the protection of the Heavenly Dao itself!

The overwhelming pressure of the Great Dao left Ye Cheng gasping for breath, so crushing that he couldn’t even meet their gaze. Forced to retreat, he settled for buying a punching bag instead, so he could "vent his frustrations on a substitute."

"This punch carries twenty years of skill—do you think you can withstand it?"

Just as Ye Cheng got up, ready to properly "vent his frustrations on a substitute," another message from Xia Tongxin popped up on his phone screen.

Ye Cheng raised an eyebrow.

"Well, well, look who’s back for more?"