Nobody said that teachers at elite academies have to be heartthrobs.

Only three people remained in the snowy forest, their breathing suddenly becoming heavy—two of them due to pain and blood loss, and the other purely due to shock.

It took Yu Fuli a full three seconds to process the amount of information in that sentence.

Organization? Rebellion? Suppression? A fugitive? Find the Academy?

Every word was completely at odds with his perception of the Saint Laurent Royal Academy, a place filled with aristocratic etiquette, academic rankings, and subtle bullying.

It felt like watching a teen movie when the scene suddenly cut to a gunfight, car chase, and secret agent scene without the director even giving a warning.

"...What organization?" Yu Fuli's voice was hoarse. As he asked, his hands continued to bandage Yun Bai's wounds, even speeding up the process, striving to complete the emergency treatment as quickly as possible.

No matter how you switch channels, the fact remains that the student in front of you is bleeding.

Yunbai's lips moved, as if he hesitated for a moment, but the sharp pain from the wound in his waist and the potential threat in the distance made him set aside his concerns and say succinctly: "Mo."

He gave a name, but his eyes warily scanned the hilltop they had come from and the deeper forest. "They are skilled at tracking and assassination. The gunshots just now were aimed at me. The noise you made when you fell off your horses was too loud; you've probably given away your position."

墨？

Yu Fuli's mind was racing.

The name was completely unfamiliar to him, and it didn't seem to be explicitly mentioned in the original novel. The novel's description of Yun Bai's background was extremely vague, only briefly mentioning that he came from an ancient and mysterious underground organization and was its young master.

Then, recalling that time in the bar, the silent and powerful subordinate beside Yun Bai, known as Mo Yi…

A hypothesis flashed through my mind like lightning.

Could it be... that this so-called "Ink" is actually Yunbai's organization?

If "墨" is a code name, then "墨" represents what one belongs to.

Xiao Chi leaned against a tree root, his face growing paler from blood loss and the low temperature, but his deep black eyes were sharp as knives, instantly grasping the key point: "You mean, that gunshot from the startled horse just now wasn't a stray bullet or an accidental hunt, but was fired by the people chasing you? They're very likely searching for us in this area right now?"

"Yes," Yun Bai affirmed, her grip on Yu Fuli's arm tightening, her fingertips icy cold. "Teacher, we must move immediately and find a more secluded place. Staying here is tantamount to waiting to die."

Yu Fuli finally finished bandaging Yun Bai's wounds. He straightened up, quickly wiped the snow off his face, and glanced at the two wounded men—one with a possible leg fracture, almost unable to walk; the other with a gunshot wound to the waist and abdomen, suffering severe blood loss and greatly reduced mobility.

Although he only had some scratches, carrying these two burdens, he had to evade potentially armed professional hunters in the dense, ankle-deep snow-covered forest with no clear direction...

This difficulty level is absolutely hellish.

"Do you have any communication devices on you? Can you contact the academy or the outside world?" Yu Fuli asked Yunbai, this was the most direct hope.

Yunbai shook his head, the movement aggravating his wound, causing him to groan softly: "It's lost. Even if it were, this forest area has special interference, and ordinary signals can't get through."

Yu Fuli's heart sank.

He then looked at Xiao Chi.

Xiao Chi shook his head.

The last hope was also dashed.

"Listen," Yu Fuli took a deep breath of the icy air, forcing herself to calm down and make a quick decision, "Our current location is indeed unsafe. But moving blindly, leaving bloodstains and marks, is equally dangerous. Xiao Chi's leg needs to be immobilized to move even with difficulty. Yun Bai, how much strength do you have left? Can you walk a bit on your own?"

Yun Bai gritted her teeth: "Yes."

"Okay." Yu Fuli no longer hesitated. He quickly broke off a few relatively straight pine branches from the surrounding area, and used strips of cloth cut from Xiao Chi's shirt and some flexible vines he picked up to make a simple but sturdy temporary splint for Xiao Chi's swollen left leg as quickly as possible.

"Bear with it," he said to Xiao Chi, his movements swift and decisive, ignoring the other's instantly tense body and the bulging veins on his forehead.

After securing Xiao Chi's leg, Yu Fuli draped the mud-covered, snow-covered but still windproof coat back over Xiao Chi's shoulders. Then she looked at Yun Bai and said, "You support him on the other side, minimizing the weight on his injured leg. I'll lead the way, finding a relatively easy and concealed route. Remember to step on rocks or thick snow as much as possible to reduce footprints, and avoid low-hanging, easily broken branches."

His instructions at this moment were clear and decisive, shedding his usual gentle teacher persona. Xiao Chi and Yun Bai were both taken aback, but neither of them raised any objections.

Yu Fuli stood up, picked up Yunbai's dagger from the snow, wiped away the blood, and held it in her hand.

The cold metallic touch calmed him down.

He quickly scanned his surroundings, roughly determining his location based on the density of the tree canopy and the direction of moss growth. He chose a side opposite to the top of the slope and the direction from which gunshots might be heard, where the trees seemed to be denser.

"Walk."

He gave the order in a low voice, and stepped into the knee-deep snow first. He carefully used his dagger to push aside the low branches blocking his way, and tried to find a place with thick snow and rocks or fallen leaves underneath to put his feet.

Yunbai gritted her teeth and propped herself up, placing Xiao Chi's arm on her uninjured shoulder.

Xiao Chi also cooperated by using his other hand to lean on a thick tree branch as a crutch, and the three of them began to move into the depths of the dense forest at an extremely difficult and slow pace.

The cold snowflakes kept falling, trying to cover up the traces they left behind. But Yu Fuli knew that in the eyes of true trackers, these traces might be as clear as black and white writing.

How long can they hide?

How many pursuers are there? What kind of equipment do they have?

What exactly is the Mo organization that Yunbai mentioned? Why has it affected the academy?

Countless questions swirled in Yu Fuli's mind, but he had no energy to think about them at the moment. All his senses were heightened to the extreme, his ears listening to everything around him and his eyes watching everything around him, not missing any unusual sounds or movements in the forest.

"Didn't you already take care of everything during the summer vacation?" Xiao Chi asked in a low voice, enduring the sharp pain in his leg, "How did you end up causing trouble at the academy?"

As one of the very few people who knew about Yun Bai's murky background, Xiao Chi was aware of the bloody purge that took place during the summer vacation.

Logically, all unstable factors should have been completely eliminated by then, and Yunbai's position and the internal order of the Mo organization should have been restored to stability.

Yun Bai supported Xiao Chi, each step difficult, the bandage around his waist bleeding again. His gaze was fixed on Yu Fuli ahead, looking unwilling to say more, "The old man is up to something."

Yu Fuli led the way, listening to every word of their conversation. Although the details were unclear, she could deduce what had happened.

Various fragmented clues began to collide and piece together in Yu Fuli's mind—summer vacation, bars, Yunbai who seemed unlikely to go to bars, her own hasty escape, the subsequent period of calm, until Yunbai finally appeared at the academy after the start of the semester...

Therefore, the chance encounter at the bar that night was most likely a break Yunbai had while dealing with cleanup matters, or perhaps part of a mission.

He was simply unlucky to have run into the line of fire, and for some reason (perhaps it was his face or his state at the time?), the young master inexplicably mistook him for someone else.

He was so frightened that he scrambled to his feet, and for days afterward he was paranoid, fearing that Yunbai would come knocking on his door.

It turned out to be a false alarm; Yunbai didn't reappear until long after the start of the school year.

Now it seems that it wasn't that they didn't come knocking; it was that they were busy dealing with a life-or-death internal rebellion and didn't have time to pay attention to him. That period of peace for him was probably during Yun Bai's bloody suppression and cleanup!

Having figured out the cause and effect, Yu Fuli felt as if a mouthful of blood was stuck in her throat.

But—!

What does this have to do with him at all?!

He was just an ordinary teacher who wanted a peaceful campus life, at least on the surface!

Why was I inexplicably thrown into a spy thriller set by a mysterious organization?! And with a bonus of a deluxe survival package: a frozen wasteland with two seriously injured survivors?!

When God switches channels, does He even look at the subscriber list?! This isn't how you force a sale!

Yu Fuli roared inwardly, but his feet did not stop. Instead, he chose his path more cautiously, his eyes scanning the snowdrifts and tree shadows ahead like a hawk, looking for any possible dangers.

Criticism is one thing, cursing is another.

You only have one life.

No matter how outrageous or unjust this mess is, the only option he has now is to live with these two troublemakers.

He gripped the dagger tightly, its blade slicing through the withered vines hanging down in front of him, laden with icicles.