The makeup of Shen Yi's class was quite interesting.
Half were wealthy kids, and the other half were top students with excellent character and academics.
In the past, classes were divided based on family backgrounds.
But now, it was an even mix of the rich and the ordinary, with no apparent pattern.
However, they did share one thing in common—
Everyone was exceptionally good-looking.
Walking in felt like stumbling onto the set of an idol drama. Even the most inconspicuous boy in the corner could easily be cast as a supporting character in a TV show.
The system had told her that the entire protagonist group was in this class.
There were three of them in total, and they happened to be the classmates she argued with the most.
When Shen Yi first heard this news, she fell silent for a long time.
What a sin.
Truly a sin.
Among the protagonist group was a girl named Xu Meng. She came from a middle-class family; her father ran a Taekwondo studio, and having grown up around it, she was a very capable fighter.
With his obnoxious personality, Li Mingyue constantly provoked Lu Mingyuan, which frequently resulted in Xu Meng beating him black and blue with just a couple of punches.
Chen Jiaojiao skillfully brought out the iodine to treat his wounds. "Stop messing with Xu Meng. Her family practices Taekwondo; beating you up is as easy as disciplining a child for her."
"I'm going to find someone to beat that Xu Meng up," Li Mingyue was still wailing.
"That seems a bit too classless," Zhao Shumin advised mildly. Out of the four of them, she looked the most harmless.
But the reality was an entirely different story.
After spending these past few years together, Shen Yi had figured out exactly what kind of people they were.
At most, Chen Jiaojiao and Li Mingyue would charge up to the protagonist group to hurl provocations and sarcastic remarks.
They were openly, brainlessly malicious.
Zhao Shumin was different. She was genuinely wicked, sabotaging exams, slinging mud at them, and stirring up trouble behind their backs.
And after doing all that, she would put on a pitiful expression and say, "Huh? I didn't do anything. Why are you falsely accusing me?"
This time, Shen Yi gained a new understanding of her own friends.
It turned out that they were the typical villain group in face-slapping novels, the ones who loved to provoke and cause trouble.
In the beginning, Shen Yi had planned to just keep her head down like a quail.
She never intended to provoke the protagonist group.
Shen Yi's attitude towards life had always been submissive and going with the flow.
Later, she discovered that the protagonist group were actually former friends of Song Yi.
They harbored a natural hostility towards her, the chief culprit who caused Song Yi to be sent abroad.
Fine then.
Since Shen Yi couldn't beat them, she joined in.
Wearing the complete face of a vicious villain, she and her friends would mock the protagonist group whenever they had nothing better to do.
She didn't know what kind of bad karma brought this on.
They had been going to school together since they were seven, and now, in their third year of middle school at fifteen years old, the two sides were still endlessly entangled.
The two sides were evenly matched, often engaging in meaningless verbal spars. Their daily school life was surprisingly cozy.
Over the course of eight years, everyone had their own things to busy themselves with. Song Sijun was busy dealing with the messy affairs of her family; whenever she missed Shen Yi, she would run to school, pretend to attend classes for a few days, and then continue skipping school to handle the Song family's business.
Shen Yi was also busy taking orders at the Archive, as well as practicing her marksmanship and close-quarters combat.
As a result, she also frequently skipped classes at school.
"Have you guys noticed? I feel like our class assignments over the years have been cursed. Why is everyone in our class so good-looking?" In the classroom, Chen Jiaojiao rested her chin on her hand, looking around at the surrounding students, finding it bizarre. "Could we have been set up by some capitalist?"
But what capitalist would be so bored as to gather a bunch of highly attractive students together?
That would just be sick in the head.
Li Mingyue wasn't interested in their class situation. His mind was entirely occupied with: "Why isn't Shen Yi at school again? What exactly does she do for her part-time job? To be so busy that she doesn't even come to school?!"
Without the strong and capable Shen Yi by his side, every time he went to provoke Lu Mingyuan these past few days, he got beaten up!
...
Meanwhile.
Shen Yi wasn't skipping school on purpose.
She was genuinely busy, busy being criticized and lectured by her group leader.
The girl kept her head down. Her long chestnut hair had been cut short for convenience, hanging down to her collarbones. The ends curled slightly, fluffing out around her face, making her already small face look even more delicate, like a talking doll displayed in the most prominent position of a storefront window.
Unfortunately, the group leader wasn't buying it.
"You are all the youngest and most promising batch of assassins in the Archive."
The group leader sat behind her desk. She was a woman in her forties with short hair and silver-rimmed glasses, wearing an expression as solemn as if she were attending a memorial service.
Spread out in front of her was a stack of reports, the glaring red numbers shocking to the eye.
"Where does our Team Nine fall short compared to the other teams? Everyone who makes it into the Archive has roughly the same level of skill. So why can the other teams do it, but you guys can't?"
Standing next to Shen Yi was another teenage girl.
Codename Iris.
Her speaking voice was soft and gentle. Paired with her pure and innocent little white flower appearance, anyone who saw her would think she ought to be protected, rather than sent out to commit murder and arson.
This was probably Iris's biggest disadvantage.
Shen Yi muttered quietly, "If you're going to ask that, then I'd like to say, why aren't you the boss?"
Was it that they didn't want to have a good performance record?
Simply based on their age and looks, they were at a disadvantage.
The group leader took a deep breath, flipping the reports with a loud rustle.
"Shut up. You two are the only ones in the team who always have something to say. Wisteria is your partner too, so how come she gets orders?"
Iris pursed her lips in defiance.
"That's obviously because Wisteria looks exactly like someone clients would trust," she argued plausibly. "The two of us are still students, so it's excusable since we're young, right?"
Shen Yi nodded frantically in her mind.
Wisteria was three years older than them. At eighteen, she had the face of a cold beauty. Just standing there without saying a word was intimidating enough.
It perfectly matched the image of the ruthless, quiet assassin that rich people imagined.
Whenever the two of them went on a mission, they would only be questioned by the employers: "School isn't on break, is it? Why would the Archive send children over to cause trouble?"
It was really messed up.
"Being young isn't an excuse for constantly being at the bottom," the group leader tapped the desk, her tone turning stern. "A neighboring organization once had a female assassin codenamed Harbinger Bird. At fifteen, she single-handedly wiped out an entire organization."
Shen Yi and Iris raised their heads at the same time, their eyes lighting up.
Harbinger Bird.
Wen Ya truly became famous from a single battle in her youth. At fifteen, single-handedly, she completely eradicated a stronghold of a rival organization.
Even now, legends of this senior circulated among all the major organizations, told as an inspiring story to every newcomer.
"Seniors like that are just legends," Iris genuinely admired the other party, but she also recognized reality and waved her hand. "If we could reach the top of the industry like her, would we still need to be standing here listening to your lecture?"
Shen Yi chimed in, "I skipped class again today... I didn't get a perfect score on the last exam either. My mom wanted to whip me with a belt before because I didn't do well on a test."
In her family, doing poorly on an exam was scarier than having bad job performance.
The group leader took a heavy, deep breath. "Are you two even normal human beings? You slack off at work, your grades at school are terrible. When you have free time, why don't you reflect on whether you've actually worked hard?"
"..."
Boohoo.
