Eavesdropping on the Battlefield, Starting from Zero

(Desert Energy Core Capture—in the desert, a group of mysterious creatures guards the energy core. Participating academies may either search for and seize it, or engage other academies in combat. This match does not use decapitation as a victory condition; a fully eliminated team is considered out early. Final ranking points are still calculated by headcount. If an academy obtains the energy core and holds it until the match ends, they are declared victorious regardless of headcount. Academies are permitted to fight over the core.

[Special Note: The energy core is located in a pyramid-shaped structure. Exploration is limited to 10 or fewer people, and the danger level is high.])

The full rules materialized before every participating cadet. Guan Chuanjun breathed a sigh of relief when he saw that decapitation was not a victory condition.

Jinfang Taibai, meanwhile, was already making his move.

He hotwired the central control system of a command vehicle on the spot, using the operation keys as his keyboard to begin directly hacking into Moye's communication channel. It was his specialty.

Against Moye, Jinfang Taibai outdid himself—he cracked it in under five minutes. He'd figured Xu Lingqu would anticipate him hacking the comms, but she certainly hadn't expected him to do it this early.

Right now, everyone had just spawned in the desert. The desert wasn't exactly a place with easy landmarks, so Xu Lingqu would either command—and let Jinfang Taibai track her every move—or stay silent, and plunge Moye into leaderless chaos again.

Moreover, in desert combat, everyone wore heavy desert gear and stayed mostly in armored vehicles. Shouting or passing notes instead of using the channel simply wasn't practical.

Jinfang Taibai thought to himself: even if Xu Lingqu had predicted this, there was no way she could avoid his eavesdropping now.

The moment he breached the channel, he caught Xu Lingqu speaking with Moye's students.

"Before the match, I ran extensive simulations on the Sky Network's maps," she said. "Among the published desert maps, there are two hundred distinct desert terrains, and I've committed every single one to memory. So tell me—why should we lose today?"

Last year's Moye—an inept commander, a team like headless flies, rife with infighting, panic, and bickering—had been easily split apart and crushed by other academies under the boundless yellow sands. Losing had been deserved.

But this year's Moye was a different beast.

Xu Lingqu's tone remained calm. That calm carried a quiet strength, like drawing a cup of water from a mountain stream, separating the fear stirring in some Moye students' hearts from the rest.

She understood exactly what they were thinking. From the very first moment, she fed reassurance straight into every Moye student's mouth.

Everyone in Moye knew Xu Lingqu wasn't bluffing. In the days before the league, her exhaustion had been plain to see—that was when she'd been memorizing map data and running through war games in her head.

Two hundred desert maps. Anyone else would have been written off as a lunatic spouting nonsense. But for Xu Lingqu, the ones worried now were Shaji and Du'e, who'd secretly allied against her.

"She's too ruthless with herself..." Jinfang Taibai rubbed his temples. Two hundred desert maps—as an S-level analyst, he'd wanted to spit blood by the time he hit a hundred. These piles of sand all looked alike; only the main roads were easy to remember.

Li Muyi, sitting beside him, was stunned into silence too. Someone who could go this far defied easy labels—genius or sheer grit. Whether it was talent or effort, no one here could match Xu Lingqu.

He felt a twinge of unease. This time, allying with Shaji—did she really have no guard up? Had she already devised a countermeasure for them?

Over Moye's channel, Xu Lingqu methodically ordered her students to hold position, consolidate their formation, dispatch scout squads to establish direction, and begin tracking down the other academies.

Li Muyi glanced out at the rolling sand beyond the vehicle. The wind had picked up, whipping yellow grit across the sky, and Du'e's students had all taken shelter in their armored carriers.

"We need to move out of this area," he told Jinfang Taibai. "Let's contact Guan Chuanjun first—he knows desert terrain better. Have him come find us instead."

Just as he finished speaking, a communication request popped up on the vehicle's system screen.

It was Xu Lingqu.

Li Muyi hesitated. It was obvious she was reaching out to talk cooperation—there weren't just the three Empire academies in this map; the Federation's three were here as well.

When Du'e and Shaji had discussed their private alliance, he and Guan Chuanjun had agreed they wouldn't go after Moye at the start. The priority was the Federation academies.

Still... Li Muyi worried that two exchanges with Xu Lingqu would end with her talking him in circles and securing absolute say over the Empire trio's combined effort.

Hesitation aside, he still had to hear her out. He steeled himself—as long as he held firm to his convictions, he wouldn't be led around by the nose.

Li Muyi accepted the request. He looked up and found himself staring, wide-eyed, at Guan Chuanjun on the left side of the screen.

Xu Lingqu had created a three-way channel outright, pinging both Li Muyi and Guan Chuanjun simultaneously.

And Guan Chuanjun had accepted even faster than Li Muyi!

Xu Lingqu watched the subtle currents shift across both their faces and smiled from her armored vehicle. "You've already hashed out your plans against me in private," she said directly. "No need to be awkward seeing each other now."

Of course. She'd never treated Jinfang Taibai's words that day as a joke.

Xu Lingqu knew about Shaji and Du'e's covert alliance, and still she'd calmly pulled both commanders into the open to talk about it.

Before Li Muyi or Guan Chuanjun could respond, she spoke again.

"Jinfang Taibai—does Moye's communication channel sound good?"

Jinfang Taibai, seated beside Li Muyi, jolted like a student caught playing with his phone in class, snapping upright.

"You... you knew."

Outside the arena, Kai Ang and the others—along with Moye's supporters in the stands—collectively exhaled in relief.

Jinfang Taibai had breached Moye's command channel from the very start, which would have crippled their operations and laid everything bare to Du'e.

Unless Xu Lingqu abandoned channel-based command altogether—but on a desert map, that was suicide.

Though the problem wasn't fully resolved yet, the fact that Xu Lingqu could call it out so openly meant she had a plan.

They just had to trust her.