Chapter 25: Eat Something Good

“Let's run two laps to warm up first,” Qiao Sang continued.

After putting on the weighted rings, the Fire Fang Dog adapted quite quickly. Its walking gait already looked mostly normal, but simply walking with weights wouldn't yield any particularly significant training results.

"Ya."

The Fire Fang Dog nodded, having no objections to Qiao Sang's arrangement.

This time, Qiao Sang chose to run alongside the Fire Fang Dog.

Under Qiao Sang's encouragement, the Fire Fang Dog struggled through the two laps, eventually looking at her with a face full of existential despair.

*You call this a warm-up?*

Qiao Sang panted heavily; after running two laps, even her physique was struggling to keep up.

*It seems I really need to exercise more in the future...*

Once Qiao Sang's breathing recovered, she took out her phone to check the recorded running time.

During her morning jog, the Fire Fang Dog averaged about 18 minutes per lap.

Now, with the weighted rings, the first lap took 29 minutes and 03 seconds, and the second lap took 38 minutes and 42 seconds.

Qiao Sang noted this down in her phone's memo app, intending to compare the running times later.

"Warm-up is over. Next, perform ten Tackle attacks against this tree," Qiao Sang said, leading the Fire Fang Dog to the sycamore tree where she had been reading that morning.

"Ya~"

Hearing this, the Fire Fang Dog plopped onto the ground and let out a weak cry.

"Don't you want to get stronger?" Qiao Sang asked.

Having spent the last few days with the Fire Fang Dog, she knew it had a competitive personality and excellent willpower. Although it had only battled others four times, it had rushed to the front every single time without fear of injury.

*Get stronger?*

The Fire Fang Dog slowly stood up, its gaze turning resolute.

Wasn't the very reason it entered a contract to go out and get stronger by finding more opponents?

Qiao Sang was very satisfied with the change in the Fire Fang Dog's eyes. She recalled the scene of when she first met it.

Back then, the Fire Fang Dog had been repeatedly slamming its small body against a tree trunk, possessing that same resilient gaze.

Thinking about it now, it felt like a lifetime ago.

"Maybe with this training, you'll even master the skill you wanted to practice last time," Qiao Sang smiled.

"Ya?"

The Fire Fang Dog looked at its Beast Tamer with a face full of question marks.

"The skill you wanted to practice when I first saw you at the Pet Base," Qiao Sang explained.

"Ya?"

The Fire Fang Dog became even more confused.

Since when did it have a skill it wanted to practice?

"If you didn't have a skill you wanted to learn, why were you hitting the tree trunk? Were you practicing Tackle?" Qiao Sang was also bewildered.

That didn't make sense. A Tackle required a run-up of at least five meters to build momentum; she remembered the Fire Fang Dog hitting the tree from within one meter last time.

The Fire Fang Dog recalled its first meeting with its Beast Tamer.

What was it doing back then?

It was hitting the tree because it wanted the fruit on top to fall down.

"Ya ya ya ya ya."

"Ya ya."

The Fire Fang Dog gestured and explained to Qiao Sang.

Qiao Sang: "..."

After a long silence, Qiao Sang ended the topic: "Let's start training."

With the thought of getting stronger on its mind, the Fire Fang Dog worked exceptionally hard.

Tackle is a skill formed by gathering strength in the limbs to release an instantaneous burst of impact.

However, because the Fire Fang Dog was currently wearing weighted rings, its impact speed was significantly slower, and the resulting attack power was not enough to be called a Tackle.

After exerting itself through six consecutive hits, it finally performed its first true Tackle of the day on the seventh attempt.

"Ya!"

It looked at its Beast Tamer excitedly, only to find her staring blankly into space.

Qiao Sang was actually still reeling from the truth she had just realized.

She felt her Fire Fang Dog was a bit dim-witted; it had been hitting the tree for so long just for the sake of the fruit.

Was the food at the Pet Base not filling enough?

With its small body, how could it possibly knock them down by hitting like that?

It would have been better to just use Tackle on the tree...

And yet, not only did the fruit fail to fall after all that hitting, its head even hurt...

*Why can't I climb trees...*

"Ya!"

"Ya!"

The Fire Fang Dog's cries snapped Qiao Sang back to reality.

"I'm fine," Qiao Sang said.

"Ya."

The Fire Fang Dog nodded, forgetting its original intention for calling out to its Beast Tamer, and continued training.

17:53.

Training ended.

The Fire Fang Dog lay exhausted on the ground. Qiao Sang stepped forward and gently picked it up, sighing with emotion, "You are the best Fire Fang Dog I've ever seen."

Even though she hadn't seen many Fire Fang Dogs, it didn't stop her from praising it.

Even though it clearly had no strength left, it had gritted its teeth and relied on sheer willpower to complete the final tenth Tackle.

After an entire afternoon of hitting, it had certainly achieved a hundred impacts.

"Ya~"

Nesting in Qiao Sang's arms, the Fire Fang Dog felt a rare sense of bashfulness.

"I'll take you to eat something good," Qiao Sang smiled.

...

Nian Guo Pavilion.

The Fire Fang Dog stared dumbfounded at the food on the table.

Fruit platters, fruit salads, fruit noodles, fruit ice cream, fruit cakes, fruit jellies, fruit pies, fruit juice...

A table full of various foods made from fruit was laid out before it.

*Gurgle...*

As the Fire Fang Dog stared, its stomach let out a growl.

"Eat up," Qiao Sang said warmly.

The Fire Fang Dog no longer hesitated, immediately picking up a piece of fruit cake with its paw and devouring it voraciously.

Qiao Sang felt the scene was exceptionally warm and beautiful.

It's just that this beautiful scene came at a price...

The price being one-fifth of Qiao Sang's assets plus a lecture from her mother...

...

Three days later.

*Bang!*

A flame the size of an adult's fist, accompanied by scorching heat, caused a distant rock to explode, leaving a significant crater.

[Name: Fire Fang Dog] [Attribute: Fire] [Level: Junior (127/1000)+] [Skills: Bite (Entry 74/100)+, Tackle (Proficient 168/500)+, Fire Fang (Proficient 116/500)+, Ember (Proficient 135/500)+] [Points: 55]

In just four days, the Fire Fang Dog's Fire Fang and Ember had reached the Proficient level.

If others knew this, it would definitely cause a massive stir.

Setting Ember aside—after all, it wasn't impossible for pets with extremely high talent to move a low-tier skill from Entry to Proficient in a short time.

But Fire Fang was different; that was a genuine Mid-tier skill!

Normally, it took an average of six months for a Mid-tier skill to go from Entry to Proficient, yet the Fire Fang Dog had done it in just four days!

At this moment, the Fire Fang Dog was wearing the dark green triangular sunglasses that had arrived the day before, focusing intently on its skill release training.

With the red and green color combination, the Fire Fang Dog's "head-turn rate" was rising steadily. Many children playing in the park stopped to look, though they didn't dare approach because of the flames surrounding it.

With the training rhythm established over the past few days, the Fire Fang Dog knew what to do without Qiao Sang's guidance.

Under the sycamore tree.

Qiao Sang sat reading a book.

Ever since the Fire Fang Dog's Ember and Fire Fang reached Proficiency, she wasn't worried at all about the pet battles for the Shengshui Middle School special recruitment exam.

Everyone else was also just starting to contract pets; it was impossible for anyone's pet to be able to train a Mid-tier skill to Proficiency like the Fire Fang Dog.

Over the past few days, the Fire Fang Dog's speed had also been steadily increasing. Yesterday, it completed a lap with the weighted rings in only 22 minutes and 07 seconds, nearly 7 minutes faster than the first day.

The pet battle in five days was no longer a concern, but Qiao Sang still lacked absolute certainty regarding the high school entrance exam in twelve days.

(End of Chapter)