"Oh... I suppose I might have caught a few stray whispers about that on my journey back to the school." Bai Xifeng replied, her voice trailing off vaguely.

"I honestly have no idea which miserable bastard started the rumour, telling everyone within earshot that you had perished in the field. But yes, the entire campus was absolutely shocked to see a ’dead’ person casually strolling into the Quest Building to file a report." Xie Lanying explained, a playful smirk dancing across her lips.

"I see... Well, I made sure to leave the cave shortly after I successfully completed my primary quest objectives. Whatever incident everyone is talking about must have occurred after I had already departed the area." Bai Xifeng stated.

She was careful to keep her expression neutral, meticulously maintaining her cover.

"If that’s the case, then why did it take you so long to arrive? Every other student went to that area returned ages ago." Xie Lanying pressed, her curiosity piqued.

Bai Xifeng cleared her throat and coughed into her hand, looking slightly sheepish as she avoided direct eye contact. "Well, you see, that is simply because I found a particularly quiet, secluded spot, fell into an unexpectedly deep sleep, and failed to wake up on time."

Upon hearing this remarkably mundane explanation, the bustling hall fell into a stunned silence for several heartbeats. Then, the tension snapped, and the crowd burst into a deafening roar of laughter.

Bai Xifeng felt a prickly heat crawl up her neck and into her cheeks. She was mortified as everyone laughed at her expense, despite the fact that she was telling the literal, unvarnished truth.

"Xifeng, you are truly one of a kind." Xie Lanying wheezed, reaching up to wipe a genuine tear of mirth from the corner of her eye.

Bai Xifeng rolled her eyes toward the ceiling, attempting to salvage whatever remained of her dignity. "If you are quite finished, I am going to report my quest results now."

Pushing through the lingering chuckles, she walked over to the heavy wooden counter and presented her quest tag to the collection staff member. The woman behind the desk stared at the tag and then back at Xifeng, blinking as if she were convinced she was staring at a vivid hallucination.

"Do you actually have the required materials with you?" The staff member inquired, her voice trembling slightly with uncertainty.

"Yes." Bai Xifeng gave a firm, singular nod.

"In that case, please follow me to the designated inspection area." The staff member directed.

She stood up and led Bai Xifeng toward a private chamber in the rear of the building, far away from the prying eyes and wagging tongues of the other students.

Once they were inside the sterile room, the staff member turned to her. "You may take the items out of your storage device now, and I will begin the formal inspection process."

"Understood." Bai Xifeng nodded once more.

She focused her mind, channelling her Qi into the intricate storage rune etched upon her person. With a sudden shimmer of light, she released four massive, incredibly heavy corpses of Stone-Clad Wolves. The collection staff member let out a sharp yelp and jumped back in genuine fright, nearly tripping over a nearby wooden stool as the monstrous, Stone-Clad Wolves thudded heavily onto the stone floor.

"What on earth is this? Did your quest description not explicitly state that you were required to bring back two bags of processed Xien Stone?" The staff member demanded, her heart racing rapidly against her ribs.

"Huh? This is Xien Stone. You should look more closely at the bodies." Bai Xifeng remarked, pointing calmly toward the thick, crystalline plates that grew naturally over the wolves’ bodies.

The staff member approached the carcasses with extreme caution, leaning in to perform a professional inspection. After a few moments of scrutiny, she confirmed the impossible. The mineral was indeed high-purity Xien Stone. However, it was naturally fused into the living armour of the beasts.

The staff member stared at the bloody haul, completely stumped. She had been trained to weigh ore, not to figure out how to process a quest where the minerals were still attached to a thousand pounds of apex predator muscle.

"I... I will have to call for a supervisor." The staff member stammered before scurrying out of the room.

Bai Xifeng stood there, stunned for a moment by the woman’s abrupt exit. Eventually, she shrugged, found a sturdy chair, and sat down to wait. It did not take long for her to find a comfortable position, and within minutes, she drifted off into another nap.

Bai Xifeng had no idea how long she had been slumbering when she felt a hand patting her shoulder gently. Opening her eyes, she saw the frantic staff member accompanied by two stern, middle-aged men observing her.

Instead of feeling the slightest bit of embarrassment at being caught napping in an official inspection room, Bai Xifeng simply stood up, rubbed the sleep from her eyes, and stretched her limbs lazily. Only after she was fully awake did she bother to acknowledge the newcomers.

The men watching her were momentarily speechless. In all their years at the academy, they had never encountered a young woman who cared so little for social decorum or her behaviour in front of other people.

"Well, now that you are here, can we process this as soon as possible?" Bai Xifeng asked.

"Student Bai, why exactly did you bring back these beasts instead of the ore?" One of the middle-aged men stepped forward.

This was Yi Shanyuan, a prominent teacher in the Armament Master Division and the very man who had posted the quest for Xien Stone in the first place.

***This novel is a contracted work with w e b n o v e l. c o m. If you do not read this novel on w e b n o v e l. c o m, that means it has been stolen. Thank you, from your shameless author, ZerahNeko*