Free Web NovelChapter 120: Practical exam
Ayla’s life in the last week at the Ascendant Academy was completely uneventful.
Her focus and attention were fully directed toward the invention step of her Emotion Weaver trait, so she completely ignored most of the standard happenings inside her daily classroom.
Her entire schedule was locked into a fixed pattern, moving between her morning theoretical classes and her evening personal practice sessions inside her heavily reinforced private training suite.
While the other high-tier students in her class formed diplomatic alliances, created political groups, or started friendly connections to secure future benefits, only she remained entirely uninterested in all of these social activities.
Though many individuals from different infinite races had indeed tried to step into her personal space to get acquainted with her because of her direct recruitment status, she simply ignored them all without uttering a single response.
After all, every single person who managed to successfully enter the gates of the Ascendant Academy was considered the absolute best genius among their own respective races.
They were highly proud beings who were used to being worshipped by their people back home. Because of this high pride, Ayla’s repeated lack of interest and blatant disregard deeply offended them.
They quickly grew tired of her silent attitude and started to indirectly boycott her, collectively deciding to single her out from all class interactions.
But to a solitude fan like Ayla, being a complete social outcast was actually much less annoying and perfectly suited to her personal taste.
She didn’t want any aliens bothering her schedule. In fact, her general impression of the surrounding students improved a bit because they finally stopped talking to her, though it was to their absolute massive luck that she was currently so immersed in her complex invention process.
If she were not so busy working on her skills, she would have already started hunting them down to clear their heads for breakfast.
Ayla had firmly decided to fully master her current line of traits and develop a unified combat technique of her own design before she went out collecting any new traits from the academy sectors.
And after seven full days of non-stop internal simulations, she was finally so close to reaching this breakthrough point.
Today started exactly the same as the last week, but the ambient atmosphere inside the wide amphitheater was obviously extremely hostile the moment she entered the room.
The students glared at her with cold eyes as she moved down the aisle.
Just like always, she paid zero attention to the collective pressure, ignored all the students completely, and easily found her usual seat in the back row.
She waddled up onto the table, bubbling up lazily like a simple ball of harmless blue liquid.
She used her fluid control to mimic a pair of small blue arms with her slime body, leaning her chin into one of them as she looked toward the main stage, waiting for the lecture to begin.
Instructor Argenta stepped into the lecture hall right on time, her long dark green hair swaying straight against her black military coat. She walked to the center of the platform, her pupil-less silver eyes instantly doing a sweeping check of the desks.
’What a strange situation,’ Argenta thought inwardly, her marble face remaining perfectly cold as she noticed the wide empty gap surrounding the blue slime in the back row.
Over the past week, the professors had been observing the new batch of recruits very closely.
To Argenta’s surprise, out of the one thousand geniuses assigned to her sub-division, only that little blue slime had remained truly attentive during every single one of her difficult theoretical classes.
While the other students often looked bored or distracted by their own racial pride, Ayla seemed to completely grasp the deep inner meaning of the three major steps required to master a trait.
However, Argenta was also a bit worried about the casual, dismissive attitude of the little thing.
The slime had managed to thoroughly offend almost every single student in the division within seven days.
This widespread isolation was going to be a major tactical problem because the next week on the schedule was officially designated for the practical examinations.
"Listen up, beginners," Argenta spoke out loudly, her icy voice cutting through the ambient muttering of the hall. "Your initial theoretical orientation is now officially over. Starting next Monday, all of you will participate in your first practical examination."
The entire classroom went completely silent, the students leaning forward to listen.
"The practical exam is a week-long survival trial inside an isolated artificial realm managed by the system grid," Argenta explained, her silver eyes glowing slightly. "Inside this specific trial realm, your physical deaths are not permanent. If your core is shattered or your body is destroyed by an opponent, the system parameters will instantly eject you back to your residential rooms. However, your collected points will be completely reset to zero upon deletion."
A young alien with scaly blue skin raised his hand from the middle row. "Instructor, what kind of threats will we face inside the survival realm?"
"The realm is populated by wild simulation monsters ranging from the Bronze rank all the way up to the Gold rank," Argenta answered flatly, causing a wave of nervous whispers to erupt across the desks.
Most of the students currently sitting inside this Class One hall were only at the Bronze rank, with only two or three exceptionally powerful geniuses having managed to reach the Silver rank before arrival.
Forcing them to survive in a territory containing Gold ranked monsters was an incredibly high level of difficulty.
"The top ranked students who collect the most survival points by hunting beasts and eliminating rivals will receive massive resource rewards directly from the academy bank," Argenta continued, ignoring their nervous expressions.
The students were still a bit perplexed and hesitant about the extreme difficulty of the trial, even if they wouldn’t actualy die inside.
Sensing their weak hesitation, Argenta let out a cold, mocking smile.
"I suggest you don’t look so pathetic," the elven teacher sneered. "The absolute first place winner of this specific division trial will receive a very special bonus reward directly from the inner vault."
She paused for a second, letting her silver gaze lock onto the back row. "The reward is a rare, unassigned Bone Fragment."
The moment the words left her mouth, every single student in the amphitheater stunned into absolute, dead silence. freeweɓnovel.cѳm
A bone fragment was a world-class item that could permanently alter a person’s biological framework or grant them a god-tier trait line.
Even Ayla’s deadpan golden eyes suddenly shone with a bright, predatory light beneath her translucent blue surface.
She knew exactly how valuable those fragments were because she already possessed the Twin Lens of the Weaver inside her layout, and the thought of harvesting another piece made her entire core throb with extreme hunger.
Ayla looked around the classroom at the one thousand students. They were no longer just annoying classmates to her. They were now just obstacles standing directly between her and her next meal.
Every single student in the lecture hall suddenly felt a sharp, terrifying chill run down their spines. For a split second, they felt like they were being targeted by a ferocious, bloodthirsty beast that wanted to rip them apart.
But when they nervously followed that suffocating gaze back to its source, all they met was a cute, harmless ball of blue slime lazily wobbling on a desk.
Instructor Argenta subtly curled her lips, feeling the intense, sudden enthusiasm radiating from the little thing.
’This week gonna be so fun...’ Argenta thought to herself.
