After distancing themselves from the group of Predators, Dangdang’s mother began wiping the food scraps from Dangdang’s face. Dangdang stopped her, reaching into her schoolbag to pull out a blue-and-red sea urchin shell. It was filled with tiny, densely packed medicinal globules. She pinched one open and pressed it against the wound on her mother’s forehead. Fan Li immediately picked up a nearby cotton swab to help spread the medicine evenly.
“You two girls, do you understand what I meant?” Dangdang’s mother sighed.
“I understand.” Fan Li actually didn’t; she just felt the laws governing this world were too absurd for her to adapt to.
“Are we really going to have to live alongside those bastards from now on? It’s so unfair!” Dangdang complained.
Dangdang’s mother looked up at the shimmering, cerulean world above and said sorrowfully, “Fairness? This world has no good or evil, no fairness—only the strong and the weak.”
“If something doesn’t exist, you can create it,” Fan Li remarked.
Hearing this, Dangdang’s mother froze, looking at her in shock. “What nonsense are you talking? What did I tell you before…”
“Actually, Mom, I think Fan Li is right!” Dangdang gave Fan Li a playful wink. “Fan Li, remember when we first met? You told me that all the cannabinoids in sea urchin painkillers were being diverted for useless things. You said those guys wasting energy on mating products should just go open a sea urchin sashimi restaurant instead. Even then, I thought you were a girl with ideas.”
“Haha, you really remember everything so clearly.” Fan Li realized she had no idea what the girl was talking about.
“Of course! I also remember you telling me that once the ban on going to the surface is lifted, you want to go to the shore to find THC. You wanted to synthesize it with sea urchin cannabinoids to create a potent painkiller. The production cost would be so low that even the lowest Marine Tribes could afford it as a household medicine. I felt… ah, sorry, Mom, does it hurt?” She glanced at her frowning mother and whispered to Fan Li, “I felt that maybe one day, another legendary potion master might be born among the lower Marine Tribes.”
The more Dangdang spoke, the more Fan Li felt like her head was spinning. She had always been a good student and a quick learner, but this was an entirely new world. She had zero foundational knowledge. Before she could find a way back, she would likely need to do some serious cramming.
After treating the wound, Dangdang and her mother said a hurried goodbye, and Dangdang pulled Fan Li along as they dashed toward the school.
As they moved, under the watchful eyes of numerous students, a boy swam over. He had his schoolbag slung over one shoulder and held an extracurricular book in a hand adorned with a seaweed bracelet. He looked like he belonged to a more dangerous race, but he had black hair, green eyes, and a clean, bright smile. “Brave move, junior. You did great at the school gate just now.”
Before Fan Li or the others could respond, he waved and left without looking back.
Watching his retreating figure, Dangdang’s mouth hung open for a long time before she finally spoke. “If a boyfriend could look like that, I’d accept him even if he’d never had a wife or children…”
“The way you phrased that ‘even if’ makes me feel very uneasy.”
Fan Li made a face like the ‘confused old man looking at his phone’ meme, which made Dangdang burst into laughter.
“Hahaha! You’ve made more expressions today than in all the time I’ve known you combined! I always thought you only had a ‘coffin face’! This is great; I like you much better this way.”
The school grounds featured neatly manicured seagrass lawns and sprawling architecture. Ordinary buildings were three to seven stories high, their exterior walls built of golden bricks and hung with silver lamps that glowed by some unknown means. There were also decorative gables and algae hanging outside the windows.
The most magnificent building resembled an ancient castle, with bronze statues of famous figures standing nearby. A dark gold chapel featured stained-glass windows, and directly above it, a beam of light—as if from heaven itself—rotated and fell, illuminating the ripples in the sea. It made the civilization look brilliant and profound, instantly lending the architecture an air of noble antiquity.
As they hurried along, many students dressed in bizarre fashions passed them. Members of various clubs were handing out flyers and shouting:
“Hey, you two beauties! Want to join the Terrestrial Studies Club? Come study the mysterious and cruel world of humans with us…”
“Luoya University Student Union here! We have the strongest business partners and sponsor the annual Arcane Athletics competition!”
There were also the “Seamount Geology Department,” the “Racing Club,” the “Wrestling Club,” the “Venom Club,” and more. Introduction cards and badges made of shells were laid out on tables for interested students to take.
Finally, they reached the freshman registration point. The queue stretched from inside the teaching building all the way down the outdoor steps, longer than a taxi line at an airport during peak tourist season.
A girl from a Marine Tribe had been following them for a while. Finally, she plucked up the courage to emerge, pointing toward a certain spot and whispering, “You two… were amazing just now.” She was small in stature with long, pale yellow hair. Her anal fins were long and large, fluttering like silk, resembling a swallow’s wings from the side.
“Amazing for being bullied by a pack of Predators?” Dangdang, still annoyed, wiped her greasy cheek again.
From her conversation with Dangdang along the way, Fan Li had gathered a general understanding. In the savage eras of the past, Predators could hunt Marine Tribes; it was something branded into their genes and instincts. Even though the law now strictly forbade it, they still bullied the Marine Tribes and used racial slurs like “Bait.” Because the disparity in strength and status was so vast, 98.7% of the slaves available on the market were from Marine Tribes.
“It wasn’t just any group of Predators…” The Swallow-wing girl cautiously used a soundproofing spell to encircle the three of them, though her voice remained as quiet as a mosquito’s hum. “Those three girls and I are all from the Luoya University Affiliated High School. They were our school’s ‘Black Coral Goddess Gang’…”
Dangdang interrupted her. “Wait, you said you’re from Luoya Affiliated?”
“Um, yes…”
“Rich kid.” Dangdang gave her a thumbs-up. “Go on.”
“The one who scratched your mother, ‘Fierce Princess’ Lina—her mother is the general agent for the Red Moon Sea Hammerhead Navigation Systems. Every private vessel we use has parts with her family’s trademark on them. So, she is super, super, super wealthy, and one of the biggest donors to Luoya Affiliated.”
As she spoke, the Swallow-wing girl pointed toward the Orca girl in the distance.
At that moment, the Fierce Princess had grabbed a slender boy by the collar, pulling him toward her for a rough, aggressive French kiss.
Fan Li’s face twitched at the sight. The Swallow-wing girl gave a dry laugh. “That’s her boyfriend. They just met today.”
Fan Li was stunned. “Met today, became boyfriend and girlfriend, and… kissed already?”
By then, they had reached the front of the registration line. Dangdang pulled out her ID, admission notice, and completed registration forms. Hearing Fan Li’s comment, she looked up from her paperwork in surprise. “Fan Li, do you have some kind of misunderstanding about Orcas? They are the most decadent tribe in the entire ocean because they’ll sleep with any creature! Any. Creature! If my mom hadn't been there today, I really would have fought them to the death!”
The Swallow-wing girl nodded. “It’s true. Even though the Fierce Princess has a boyfriend, she won’t let a single one of those Predator guys she was with just now off the hook. And sometimes, she won’t let them off the hook all at once.”
“Won’t let them off? All at once?” Fan Li’s mind raced, and her face darkened. “That doesn’t mean what I think it means, does it?”
“Anyway, whenever our old school held a party, the Fierce Princess would disappear for a while. Once, at a party on land, we found her in a small room. She was drunk, leaning against the wall, and the entire floor was covered in white mucus.”
“…” A wave of nausea rose from Fan Li’s stomach, and she clutched her chest.
“Female Orcas can keep all the male seeds in their internal storage chambers. When they’re in a good mood, they pick the one they like best to conceive—do you get what I mean?”
So that was it. Female Orcas could decide when to get pregnant and whose child to have. Naturally, collecting as many high-quality genetic varieties as possible was advantageous for them. No wonder they looked down on girls who wanted to get married. This was perhaps the most extreme form of biological feminism.
While their behavior made sense from a biological perspective, learning the details still shattered Fan Li’s worldview. At the same time, Xinghai’s face flashed through her mind. She hesitated for a moment before asking, “Did all those boys just now have that kind of relationship with her?”
“Yes,” the Swallow-wing girl said decisively.
Fan Li thought for a moment, then glanced at Dangdang. “Then… what about Xinghai? Is he like the other boys?”
“I feel like he doesn’t have that murderous aura the other Predators have,” Dangdang said. “But Xinghai doesn’t seem to be a purebred Shark? His pupils are always round, and his irises are blue—” At this point, Dangdang tilted her head uncertainly. “Shark irises are only ever gold, right?”
Fan Li froze. If she answered “yes” or “I don’t know” and got it wrong, what then? Finally, she patted the back of Dangdang’s hand. “You’re asking me that? Read more books.”
“Wow, I’m not a top student like you. That’s asking too much!”
“Shark irises aren’t only gold,” the Swallow-wing girl interjected. “They lack blue-green and red-purple pigments, so any color in the yellow-brown spectrum is possible. That boy Xinghai is likely a hybrid. It’s just that his Marine Tribe features aren't very prominent.”
“A… a hybrid?!” Dangdang covered her face with both hands. “How can you use that word?!”
“What’s wrong with that word…”
“No, I mean, isn’t ‘hybrid’ a slur?”
“Please, many hybrids call us ‘Bait’ too. I can’t help it; I have even less of a favorable impression of hybrids than purebreds. They always identify as Predators and look down on Marine Tribes. But among the Predators, they’re nothing but sycophants. For someone like Xinghai, he probably needs a female Orca even more to improve his offspring’s genes. It’s all about clinging to the coattails of purebred parents.”
“Oh…” Fan Li felt a bit disappointed by this answer.
Dangdang tilted her head. “But why did those purebreds seem a little afraid of him just now?”
“That, I don’t know. It’s the first time I’ve seen that. But I don’t think Lina would be afraid of him—oh, right, Lina is that red-haired Orca, the queen of the ‘Black Coral Goddess Gang.’”
She didn’t realize that as she spoke, the soundproofing spell had worn off. A girl standing in front of them in line turned around, the bubbles she exhaled trembling. “Seriously, don’t mess with Lina. Don’t challenge her authority, or you’ll be waking up screaming from nightmares for your entire university career. I’m from the Luoya Arts High School, but even there, Lina’s name is legendary.”
The students behind them chimed in as well:
“In the Starry Sea, Lina’s family power is second only to one, and above ten thousand. She and her mother have dined with the Autocrat multiple times in groups of fewer than ten people.”
“I’m from Luoya Affiliated. I’ve bought knock-offs of every single outfit she’s ever worn.”
“Lina owns a 2.15% stake in the largest cosmetics company in the Bodhi Sea.”
“If I could marry into Lina’s family, I’d be willing to spend my life as a gentle, virtuous male concubine.”
…
“Because of Lina, I didn’t sit down to eat once in seventeen years at Luoya Affiliated…” This last part was said by the Swallow-wing girl. As she finished, she re-established the soundproofing around the three of them. “Just because I talked to her ex-boyfriend for two hours.”
“Her ex-boyfriend?”
“Yeah, they were together for less than six months before breaking up. He was already an ex at the time. She didn’t love him, but in her philosophy, even if it’s something she doesn’t want, no one else is allowed to take it.” The Swallow-wing girl blinked. “By the way, it’s the boy who just spoke to you.”
Dangdang pointed to her wrist. “The senior with the seaweed bracelet?”
“That’s him.”
Fan Li felt that this environment was a massive test of one’s survival instincts. It was so stressful it made her feel a sudden, urgent need to use the bathroom. She looked around and whispered to Dangdang, “I need to go to the toilet.”
“The toilet? Do you need to do a number two?”
“No, number one.”
Seeing Dangdang’s strange expression, Fan Li asked cautiously, “…What’s wrong?”
“Nothing. You just suddenly displayed such a noble habit that I couldn't adapt for a second.”
“Huh? Don’t you usually go to the bathroom?”
“In principle, you don’t actually need a toilet for number one.”
“…You mean you just go anywhere?”
“Yeah. We aren’t high-level Marine Tribes, after all.”
Though she had already guessed the truth, Fan Li refused to accept it. “If you don’t go to a restroom, do you just… absorb all the waste back into your body?”
“Fan Li, don’t be like that. This is the deep sea; it’s very clean.” Dangdang pressed down on the starfish in her hair and wiggled her hips, flashing a bright smile. “Just be casual about it.”
Within seconds, the water around Fan Li grew warm. She clamped her gills shut and let out a scream. “Oh my god! What are you doing?!” Then, she bolted a hundred meters away in a daze.
She was going to suffocate! she couldn't breathe in this water anymore! She couldn't get used to ocean life; she wanted to go back to land!!
The students in the queue all stared at her:
“What’s that girl doing? Did she run into a pervert?”
“Wow, that’s the first time I’ve seen a Marine Tribe with speed comparable to a Predator. Hey, classmate! Want to join our Swimming Club?”
…
*Her 430 Million Years* by Junzi Yize, To be continued...
***
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