NOVEL WEB Chapter 28: Voting
Zi Cheng pulled her hand back. “Yifu, look me in the eye and tell me you really didn’t take the crocodile’s egg.”
“I.. I didn’t take it. I really didn’t take it.” Yifu eagerly said.
Zi Cheng shook her head in disappointment. “Yifu, you took it. You still won’t admit it?”
“I.. .” Yifu couldn’t say anything.
“Take the egg out Yifu, otherwise we can’t save you.” Ai Lin looked at Yifu with a complete deadpan expression. Her time was precious and she didn’t want to waste it on this kind of thing.
“Roar!” The crocodile screamed again, clearly at the end of its patience.
“I’ll take it out! I’ll take it out!” The roar of the crocodile scared Yifu. She understood no one in the group would help her. She might be willful but she wasn’t a fool. She knew if she didn’t take it out this time the group really would leave her behind. She pulled out a red egg after rummaging in her space bag. The egg was such a great find! How was she to know the mother crocodile would come out of nowhere and start chasing?! She had run back she thought with so many people it would be easy to defeat the crocodile. How was she to know they’d all be so useless! Running and hiding. How pathetic.
Although Yifu felt bad about giving up the egg, her mood improved after trash talking everyone in her mind: if I’d known how useless you all were I wouldn’t have bothered joining the team.
The fire crocodile finally got its egg back. After Feng Wu talked to it for a bit it agreed to leave Yifu alone. The crocodile gave her farewell to Feng Wu and ambled away with her egg.
Once everything was settled, everyone looked around for places to sit and rest so they could deal with the wounded. The only ones uninjured were Feng Wu, Ai Lin and Zi Cheng. Everyone else had wounds of varying degrees. The most seriously wounded was Pei. He took his role of captain very seriously so when he saw Melis in danger he immediately pushed the other boy out of the way. As a result he bore the full brunt of the flames.
Fortunately Ai Lin’s magic was a wood elemental with strong healing powers. She could heal them but not completely. In order to fully recover they would have to spend some time to rest and heal.
“Captain, I suggest we kick Yifu out. She’s a selfish troublemaker and we can’t rely on her. I’m afraid she’ll only bring us more trouble in the future and we won’t be able to continue with the assessment.” Xi saw that Yifu was also injured along with everyone else and so had held back from saying anything earlier, waiting until Ai Lin finished healing everyone before speaking. But now she couldn’t hold back anymore and gave voice to her frustration.
“Xi! Why are you targeting me?! What did I do wrong?! Aren’t we all here because we’re looking for opportunities? That crocodile’s egg, if you’d seen it you would have snatched it too!” Yifu yelled and sneered at Xi.
Originally Yifu didn’t dare speak because of everything that happened with the crocodile, but when Xi attacked her she couldn’t hold her tongue back.
What would she do if she got kicked out? How would she face people? Thinking of the ridicule she could get made her heart itch like a cat got at it. It was unbearable!
“What did you do wrong?! You have the nerve to ask?! Just look around at all the people injured because of you. And then to top it off you try to make yourself look innocent? How shameless can you be?!” Watching as Yifu made herself out to be a victim rubbed Xi the wrong way. She itched to slap the girl.
“It’s not like I’m the one that hurt you! Why do you have to blame it all on me?!” She was wronged too you know! Such a good mutated crocodile egg… Gone! I’m so pitiful! Yifu thought to herself. She was heartbroken she lost the egg.
“I’m not gonna bother arguing with you. Captain why don’t we put it to a vote? Those who agree to kicking her out can raise their hands. If more than half vote yes, then we kick her out. If not then she can stay and I won’t say anything more.” You’re such a weirdo, why would I bother arguing with you. Voting is faster and clearer.
“Xi wait! Don’t joke about something like this. Give Yifu another chance. I’ll keep an eye on her OK?” Zi Cheng didn’t mean to make things difficult for Xi, but Yifu wasn’t a bad person. Even though she hadn’t known Yifu long, Yifu was still the first friend she made. She couldn’t let Xi drive Yifu out.
“Xiao Cheng!” Yifu was quite moved that Zi Cheng stood up for her. Sure enough Zi Cheng was the only good person here!
“You don’t have to say that Zi Cheng. This time it’s because of Yifu that we suffered such losses. She should be held responsible. I agree with Xi. Captain? Your decision?” Ai Lin didn’t want to bother with Yifu any longer than necessary. She didn’t recall the original assessment being this dangerous. Regardless of why the difficulty level increased Yifu was like a time bomb waiting to go off. She was too dangerous to have on the team.
Pei had been raised and educated to be a chivalrous knight so the current situation was a real dilemma for him. Kicking a girl out of a group was a clear conflict of his values, but at the same time Yifu really was bad for the team. Pei muttered to himself pondering the situation. Everyone there had a strong opinion about her. What would they do if she stayed and something like this happened again?
Thinking up to here he finally made up his mind. “Alright we’re going to vote. Everyone here who wants Yifu to stay raise your hand.”
After Pei finished speaking the only person with a hand up was Zi Cheng. Everyone else was either too busy tending to the wounded or pretending not to hear. Their meaning was obvious. No one wanted Yifu to stay.
Yifu’s eyes reddened when she saw everyone’s reaction. A strong sense of resentment rose up in her heart. Just wait! She would take her revenge against every single one of them!
“The results are pretty clear. No one wants you here. Leave already.” Xi couldn’t help but rejoice in Yifu’s misfortune.
“You… you. I’ll remember this!” Yifu indignantly sputtered out at Xi.
“Yifu stop that. I’ll go with you OK?” Zi Cheng had originally joined the group with Yifu, so everyone knew that she and Yifu were together. If Yifu was going to leave then it wouldn’t be good for her to stay on.