It took Arthur quite a while to clean himself; he spent even more time in the bathroom than Layla did! It's not that he wanted to stay that long, but he needed to carefully experiment with everything in the bathroom to understand how they work without breaking them. Finding the right substance to clean himself was another problem; there were a lot of bottles in the bathroom, and Arthur didn't know which one to use.

*Knock, knock.* Arthur knocked at Layla’s bedroom.

“Get in! What is taking you so long?” She told him, protesting.

“Sorry,” Arthur opened the door but did not come inside, hesitating whether to get into the same room as his tormentor.

Layla was laying on her stomach while hugging Karina on her bed, a sight that might make any man drool, but Arthur was not moved; it's hard for him to see her that way when the Sergeant in his mind was scary and had some screws loose in her head.

“Don’t make me repeat myself, we need to talk,” she growled.

Arthur slowly entered the room but did not close the door behind him, ready to bolt away any time.

“Close the door, Karina won’t bite you if you don’t try anything funny,” The beauty said.

“I’m not afraid of it, I’m afraid of you!” Arthur grumbled in his heart but followed her order, afraid that the sergeant would snap if he didn’t.

“What do you need me for, ma'am?” Arthur asked politely.

“Tell me, Arthur, who do you think the spy is?” Layla got to the business right away.

“Uhhh... I’m not sure yet. I don’t like how Stevan acts, but I might be a bit biased there. Kale is suspicious as well; he was quite timid, but he's completely different in a fight. Tamara said she could not control her strength when she kicked Stevan, but I think she did it on purpose, but that does not really mean she is a spy. Simon is... a good person, I think, but you said he got caught snooping at night twice, so there is a possibility. Aroon is strong and from a big family, which made him really suspicious. Athena is always so silent, which might be her way to not let her true thoughts show,” Arthur gave her his impressions about the other recruits. “But nothing conclusive so far. I will need more time; I don’t want to jump to conclusions yet,” he said, trying to sound less accusing toward the sergeant.

“That's good; you should not jump to conclusions and gather information about them. Try to befriend them and see if they act suspiciously. It's better to act carefully than to catch the wrong person and let the spy get away,” she sagely said.

“How can you say such a thing! Where was your wisdom when you accused me openly? Don’t you have any shame at all?!” Arthur screamed inside but agreed with her verbally instead.

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“Now, Arthur, do you think you are stronger than any of them? Can you beat any of them in a fight?” Layla asked seriously.

“No ma'am. If we fight, I don’t think I will last five minutes against them,” Arthur honestly said. He was not delusional enough to think he can beat his squadmates; he didn’t even need to account for their bonds. If he accounted for their bonds, then he probably would lose even faster!

“That's good; you did not deceive yourself. You are weak, Arthur. I did not notice because I was biased, and I was suppressing my cultivation, but now it's clear that you are weaker than the other recruits in the 4th squad,” Layla seriously said.

“They are among the strongest recruits we have this year, meanwhile, you are not even average compared to the other recruits,” She added, driving the point harder into him.

“You need to get stronger, Arthur, at least so you can survive a life-and-death battle against any one of them. If you ever find out who the spy is or catch them in action, they will not spare you; the first thing they will do is to silence you before escaping,” the sergeant cautioned him.

“You need to be able to catch them or at least stall for time so backup can arrive,” she told him.

“I understand, ma’am, but I don’t know how,” Arthur honestly said.

“You have to train harder than anyone else. You might have a lower starting point, but that does not mean you can’t catch up,” Layla suddenly stood up and took a scissor from her night table.

“What are you doing?” Arthur got worried, thinking that she would attack him, saying it would help him get stronger.

“You need a haircut; it's getting in the way. It will impair your vision, and it is too long anyway,” She said as she pushed him down on a chair.

She started cutting his hair while talking, “You should eat more, Arthur; you need more muscle. I’m surprised you can take so much damage with your body like this.”

Arthur was still skinny and had not grown muscle from his long starvation, but now, with him joining the military, he didn't need to worry about his meals anymore.

Arthur was stiff when Layla cut his hair; he did not dare to move while she got a sharp object near him. He did not even notice the hair Layla cut from his head burned by a blue flame and simply vanished, leaving no trace.

Layla taught Arthur some general knowledge while cutting his hair and gave him some advice to find the spy.

“It’s done, what do you think?” she took out a mirror to show him his new hair.

Arthur found an unfamiliar young man looking back at him in the mirror. The young man was skinny but did not look bad, quite handsome if he had to say. He had black eyes like obsidian and stylish black hair, which looked nice in his opinion.

“Is that me?” Arthur wondered. He looked way different than the boy living under the bridge, fighting with hunger every day.

“It looks nice,” Arthur said with a smile.

“Really? That's good; I wanted to be a hairstylist before the apocalypse, but life had different ideas," Layla said, reminiscing about the past.

“If you are done, get out. You are sleeping on the couch,” She suddenly changed her tone back to the stern officer, seeming to realize her blunder.

“Huh? Don't you have another room? Why am I sleeping on the couch?” Arthur protested.

“I knocked the partition, so my room can be bigger; Karina took up a lot of space. Now don't protest and get out before I kick you out!” She pushed him out as he looked around and found that the bedroom was indeed bigger, and there were two doors in the bedroom.

“And here I thought I could finally sleep on a bed,” He thought but then thought better of it, “Well, a couch is still an upgrade from cardboard.”