“Young Master, happy birthday, Young Master,”
by M1zushiTaking advantage of the 7:00 AM morning sunlight, Bai Ling deftly applied the tape. Next, they had to spend 10 hours waiting for the adhesive to emulsify, fusing seamlessly with the broken glass aperture.
“Alright, mission accomplished.”
Wiping the adhesive from his hands, Bai Ling pondered back and forth, feeling that this broken hole looked far too obvious from the outside and that it was best to find something to cover it up.
He simply fetched a roll of ultra-wide electrical tape from Yu Chen’s toolroom—the bright yellow kind—then stepped onto a stool to stick crisscrossing yellow strips across the inner side of the broad conservatory glass.
Sava studied it for a long time, yet failed to figure out what pattern he was taping.
Lifting his chin, Bai Ling noted with total confidence: “This is a maxim capable of deterring the enemy. I just learned it today.”
Sava handed over the terminal left on the table: “It was ringing continuously just now. Someone was looking for you.”
Holding the stool in one hand, Bai Ling checked the terminal with the other: “It’s the Captain. I need to call him back and inform him that we have a ship.”
“Your Captain is going to follow us too?” Sava noted in surprise.
“Of course. He’s a native; with him around, handling matters later will be vastly easier.”
Sava was habitually competitive, immediately asking: “What’s his race?”
“Black-winged Kite,” as Bai Ling spoke, he dialed the comms, which connected in a fraction of a second.
Sava exposed a knowing smile: “Black-winged Kite—that species of falconidae that dumped every single skill point into beauty stats?”
“Don’t put it like that. He’s also a skilled mouser—mn, catching frogs and praying mantises is also quite neat,” Bai Ling attempted to save some face for the Captain.
“He can’t even beat a small bird like a shrike.”
“…Did you two forget I am on the comms channel?” the Captain noted coldly.
Sava stated with righteous severity: “We were praising you. Speaking of which, smelly bird, we can send him to execute honey-trap missions—such as enticing enemy high officials who have a fetish for white hair and red eyes.”
Over the loudspeaker, the Captain replied unceremoniously: “Hmph, thanks, but no. As for honey-trapping high officials, this gentleman better do it himself—you sound vastly more experienced.”
Seeing the two on the verge of escalating into a verbal clash, Bai Ling hurriedly stopped them. He executed a shushing gesture toward Sava and began instructing the Captain on boarding procedures:
“The boarding location is set near the coastline; I’ll send you the coordinates later. To ensure safety, our maximum hovering duration is merely three minutes. You’d best arrive piloting your own mechas; when the time comes, I will open the lower hatch to let you inside.”
The Captain asked: “Which port is your ship currently docked at? I need to head over to confirm beforehand so I can lead my team aboard.”
As the leader of an association, he was naturally responsible for his subordinates; though holding profound trust in Bai Ling, he needed clear confirmation before issuing orders downward.
Bai Ling: “It’s currently parked on the top floor of the Royal Palace tower. Just pilot your mecha to catch a distant glance.”
Half an hour later, the Captain piloted his mecha to the secure sector near the Royal Palace tower. Activating the optical telescope, he zoomed the focal length toward the top floor infinitely. Taking in the yellow tape applied over the glass, he dazed on the spot for a moment.
Spelling it out word by word, it was three words:
The Captain was dealt an immense psychological shock, his lips twitching uncontrollably as he placed the call: “You guys are far too arrogant.”
Bai Ling took the advice with smooth grace: “Join us, and you can be this wild too.”
8:00 AM.
North rubbed his sore, swollen eyes, sensing that someone had returned to the room. He called out, “Sava?”, but the response came in a completely different, ice-cold voice:
“You’re awake. Do you want to leave with us?”
North forced his eyes wide open, catching clear sight of a face with crisp, cold bone structure. Letting out a waaah, he pounced forward to embrace Bai Ling: “Fledgling, you’re back, wuuuuuu! I watched the news yesterday and assumed something terrible had happened to you.”
Bai Ling patted his back to soothe him slightly, then inquired with meticulous care once more: “We are leaving the Royal Palace tonight. Do you want to—”
“Yes, yes, yes! Let’s go, go, go!” North’s eyes lit up in an instant, looking as though he had been awaiting this exact day for ages. “I’ll pack my luggage immediately.”
Bracing his arms, Sava leaned loosely beside the ladder, arching an eyebrow to tease: “Usually seeing you so intensely devoted to studying omega virtue, I never expected you to be this impatient.”
With matters having reached this point, North held nothing left to conceal. He spoke directly: “My friends from the seafolk race and I have long planned our escape.”
Bai Ling understood that North was the social master of the concubine area—flitting between every single dormitory all day long, keeping a crystal-clear tally on everyone’s true background. He was by no means someone to be underestimated.
North pleaded: “Um, I know this is a presumptuous request, but could we take my friends along too? For instance, Mantis Shrimp. Her father was persecuted to death, and remaining in the Royal Palace will only subject her to endless humiliation and a dead end.”
Sava struggled to recall: “Mantis Shrimp… which one in the group chat?”
“The one named [One Big Shrimp for 999],” North lowered his voice. “I heard her father was framed, by Hei—”
Before finishing his sentence, he suddenly reacted, casting a lightning-fast glance at Sava as he snapped his mouth shut. So close—he had almost forgotten that Heinz and Sava were old acquaintances.
“Heinz again,” Sava ground his teeth, his face darkening in a fraction of a second.
That jellyfish acted as though he had swallowed far too much heavy-metal polluted water, his temperament growing increasingly twisted. In the past, he had merely played petty tricks on him; lately, he seemed less and less inclined to act like a decent human being.
The Heinz of the past was indisputably not like this.
Sava’s gaze uncontrollably drifted toward the ceramic cup resting on the desk. That handmade little owl cup was a 15th birthday gift made by Heinz.
Back then, he had just entered high school and struggled to adapt to the closed-off military academy life. Coupled with the unpalatable food from the mess hall, he consistently failed to finish his meals, and his entire frame had thinned considerably within a month.
That beta was a year younger than him. Upon receiving the news, he stayed up through the night to prepare six dishes Sava loved, sneaking out from the Duke’s estate in secret.
Following his grandfather’s passing, his eagle-owl parents cared for nothing beyond luxurious indulgence. The moment the young master reached adulthood, they stood prepared to marry him off to a noble of the exact same social tier to trade for mutual interests.
No one cared whether the mommy hen was genuinely fed and satiated; only that humble beta youngster treated the young master as the absolute heaven and earth of his life—wishing he could chop himself into pieces, cook himself into meals, and deliver himself straight into the young master’s stomach to fill his belly.
The 15-year-old mommy hen, standing before the academy’s thorn-covered fence wall, met the 14-year-old little slave who had braved the cold rain, stepping through muddy water to arrive.
Little slave—the mommy hen consistently addressed him aloud in this exact manner.
Yet Heinz found total sweetness within it. Lifting his arm to wipe the rainwater from his face, looking battered yet overjoyed, he passed the still-scalding food box across the fence.
The thorn vines gouged Heinz’s wrist and a trace of blood-red washed away in an instant beneath the rain’s flush.
The mommy hen silently took the food box from his ice-cold hands.
Heinz shoved an individually wrapped plastic bag over as well, pleadingly pressing it into the mommy hen’s arms: “Please accept this, Young Master.”
The mommy hen felt the bag; inside was something hard—a cup.
“Young Master, happy birthday, Young Master,” he bowed with an unpracticed awkwardness.
At that age, Heinz harbored zero slick smoothness across his frame. He was raw, genuine, and his bowing wasn’t executed for flattering sycophancy, but purely to express an overflowing, devoted love.
The mommy hen departed without uttering a single word. In his mind, it was only natural for his servant to come out and bring him food.
Yet when he returned to his dormitory and opened the layered, overflowing food box, a wave of fresh moisture laced with the fragrance of rice washed over his face. The mommy hen unhelpfully spilled his tears straight into the rice.
That was the very first time, as well as the absolute last time.
Without even realizing it, the little slave had brought his arrogant, domineering young master to tears.
Afterward, rumors gradually began circulating within the military academy, claiming that the cheap beta who arrived twice a week—come rain or shine—to deliver meals was the young master’s paramour.
The phrasing was thoroughly foul, yet the young master had never once denied it.
Until one day, Heinz—arriving to deliver food—was unfortunately caught by the patrol team’s searchlight, and the whole school was informed that the young master was having a secret rendezvous with a beta in the middle of the night.
Consequently, Heinz suffered severe punishment from the Eagle-Owl Duke’s household.
Forbidden from eating, he was hung and beaten. His entire body was swollen and throbbing, yet he was forced to kneel on the floor using a filthy rag to wipe the tiles. If a passing housekeeper discovered a single improper fingerprint, Heinz would be ordered to wipe it ten more times.
The little slave finally fell ill, curling up like a puddle of transparent, rotten mud beside the kitchen’s boiler to fall asleep.
On that night, he welcomed the eternal moment of his life.
His little young master climbed the high walls of the military academy, running back to see him with total disregard for consequences, even stealing a kiss from him under the belief that no one would ever know.
For the rest of Heinz’s life, he would endlessly savor that exact split second. Because the cherishing, shy, and reluctant nature embedded within were all the manifestations of his young master’s soul—a treasure that he, a cheap beta, could barely reach yet felt tears of gratitude for.
At this exact moment, Heinz lay on Sava’s bed inside the Duke’s estate, staring unblinkingly at the completely blank ceiling.
Suddenly, he let out a twisted, faint smile.
He lives solely to obtain the young master, and he will stop at nothing and pay any price.
Outside the dust-laden French windows, trails of smoke sliced through the sky one after another. Fine white lines traced crisscrossing patterns beneath the canopy of heaven—the lingering smoke left by the warships arriving to offer birthday congratulations to the tyrant Kaide.
Heinz slowly sat up from the bed, adjusting the hem of his suit, and stood before the window. The reflection showed a perfect smile.
They had arrived.
The kings were assembled, each taking their positions. The corner squares of the chessboard were fully populated, and a magnificent show was on the absolute verge of commencing.
This time, whoever could claim the crown would have to rely on their own respective capabilities.
Inside the ward, sunlight saturated the milk-white bedding.
A row of virtual screens was set up before the bed, the density of the overlapping displays vastly more exaggerated than a stock market trader examining the boards. Bombarded by such a high-intensity stream of information, an ordinary person would have been flustered long ago, unsure of where to direct their eyes. Yet the man leaning against the soft pillows held a structured and stable gaze, looking exceptionally composed.
Yu Chen simultaneously directed his subordinates to arrange matters while using a small knife to carve an object in his hand.
A beam of bright light pierced through the window grates, settling precisely upon his fingertips.
It was a mahogany chess piece.
A Queen piece, already taking shaped within his palm.
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