She eased her eyes open, and the first thing she saw was a blonde, cat‑eared girl sprawled on the floor like a fallen dandelion—Nina.

“Ow, ow, ow, ow…” Her voice trembled like a plucked string as she rubbed her drooping cat ears, then pushed herself up like a baby deer on ice.

Annoyance first, then curiosity rippled through Ling’s chest. You hit your head, she thought, so why are you rubbing your ears?

She swallowed the question, the kind that would send the internet’s sages into endless debate, and vowed to study this unsolved mystery of humankind on her own.

While Ling drifted on cat‑ear theories, Nina had already risen. She had barely stood when she clamped both hands around Ling’s, urgency flickering across her face like a storm lantern.

“Ling… Lady Ling! Nina wants to ask for your help!”

A soft‑framed girl clutching her hand made Ling’s body jolt like a sparrow startled from a branch. The word help lit a tinderbox. Her mind bloomed with vine‑sweet fantasies: the rescued girl falling madly for her, the two of them living a happy little life, sun on paper windows and tea steaming between laughs. One “big bro” from that little voice and she’d probably even conjure back her lost Blackflame Dragon—upgraded, of course.

“Eh‑heh‑heh… what is it, sweet Nina~?”

She slipped and let out an uncle’s chuckle, but the frantic Nina didn’t care.

“Nina… Nina wants to train with Sister Rafi!”

Crack—

The dream shattered like frost‑thin glass.

Ling’s smile vanished in a frame cut. Silence pooled like still water.

With no reply, Nina grew more anxious. Tears brimmed like rain at the rim of a leaf, ready to spill.

“N‑no… sob… i‑is that… not okay?”

The wobble in her voice pricked Ling’s ears like cold rain. Panic surged first; sense came after.

“Ah—no, no, no, no! I agree, I agree! How could I refuse sweet Nina’s request!”

At the yes, Nina’s tight brow unknotted like a loosened bow, and her smile came back, bright as an angel’s lantern warming the world—though it couldn’t thaw Ling’s little heart bruised by a broken dream.

“Then… Lady Ling, Nina will go first.”

She released Ling’s hand and turned away under Ling’s unwilling gaze. Halfway off, she wheeled back on light feet, rose on tiptoe, slipped her arms around Ling’s neck like a warm scarf, and pressed a petal‑soft kiss to Ling’s cheek. A second of warmth. Then gone.

“This is a reward for Lady Ling~”

She left that line behind and used Ling’s stunned daze like a doorway, darting away.

After a long breath, Ling returned from her out‑of‑body drift. Her small hand brushed the kissed cheek, searching for the echo of heat. Only her own skin’s warmth lingered.

“Honestly~ that’s so unfair~”

She looked toward the distance. The curve at her lips was a crescent moon, telling on her joy.

She had been sulking that Nina would train for Rafi’s sake, like a thorn in the heel. One kiss, and the thorn turned to dust.

Somewhere no one saw, Alicia and Rafi were both unknowingly crowned with the green hat of betrayal. The wind laughed and told no one.

After Nina’s cheat‑level cuteness, Ling officially added her to the training crew. Except training felt more like penance, like kneeling on rice under temple bells.

“I can’t do it!!”

Rafi roared and slammed a five‑meter strip of white paper to the floor, a scroll crashing like a waterfall. Her face burned like a furnace.

Ling ignored the blaze. She picked the scroll up and said, deadpan as winter stone, “We’ll begin with item one. Five million meters, short sprint, now—”

“I said I can’t do it!”

Rafi snatched the paper and glared at Ling like a hawk pinning a mouse.

“Stop treating your body like ours. No one but you could finish this! Forget your five‑million‑meter ‘sprint’! What even is this eight‑hundred‑meter high jump? The lateral hop hell? The dodge training under six hundred machine guns? What is this?!”

Her voice boomed like drums. Ling covered her ears and let her eyes go dead‑fish flat, staring as Rafi poured out thunder.

A long while passed. Maybe it was the way Ling never changed that blank tide‑pool gaze, even when Rafi unleashed the worst swear she had ever used—“You idiot!”—but defeat seeped into Rafi like evening cold.

“Done?” Ling’s tone was a still pond.

Rafi nodded, all steam gone like a kettle taken off the fire. She stopped thinking to spare herself the headache.

“Then take this. I grabbed the wrong one. That was my pet’s training plan.”

Ling produced an A4 sheet, neat and bright as a fresh snow tile, listed with normal drills. Rafi stared, doubt flickering like a moth.

“Are you messing with me?”

Ling turned her head so Rafi couldn’t read her face. “No…”

“…”

“Training or not? If it’s too hard, we can go back to the last sheet.”

“Don’t! I’ll train! I’m training now!”

She fled like a spooked cat and started working with Nina.

Once Rafi finally left, Ling wiped sweat that had appeared at some unknown hour, dew on a leaf. Then she tossed the earlier sheet away.

Yes, she had messed with Rafi. It was pure pettiness, a little thorn of annoyance she had to press. And it was absolutely not because Rafi had a cute little girl by her side. Absolutely not!

Obviously, that first list wasn’t her pet’s regimen. Of course not. How could she give her own pet something that easy? She’d stack the weights on top and then some!

Wanted Notice

Seeking one cute small animal, the smarter the better. I’ll feed you on time every day, walk you under the sky every day, bathe you till you sparkle, and train you into a genius animal~

Posted by: Yufan Ling