Chapter 42: The Battle for the City (Part 8)

"Sound and silence, color and colorlessness; technique and art, abandonment and preservation."

Amidst the chanting, the main screen, which occupied the most space, switched frequently before settling on a bustling commercial street two seconds later. On the street, a group of examinees happened to be locked in a fierce battle with monsters.

The three chief examiners searched carefully for a long while, but could not find Zhou Ke anywhere. They asked, "Where is that examinee?"

"Uh..." The cameraman hesitated for a moment, then zoomed in on a certain focal point, and then zoomed in again. "He is here."

"..."

Seeing the image that was practically pressed against their faces, the chief examiners finally realized where Zhou Ke was, and why they couldn't find him anywhere.

Because—this little brat was sitting in a second-floor cafe, leisurely crossing his legs! It would be a miracle if they could find him on the street!

The youth, with his laid-back demeanor, watched the battle below through the floor-to-ceiling windows. From time to time, he would put down his teacup to doodle in a manga volume he had found somewhere, or jump up to clap and cheer.

His appearance was even more relaxed and carefree than the chief examiners themselves.

"Hmph, look at his ranking. He's dropped from first place to who knows where," Zhu Xusheng snorted in annoyance. "Sly and lazy, lacking in diligence, he's squandered his initial advantage completely. What does a bit of petty cleverness matter? He's just another face in the crowd."

Liu Xishu, however, felt there was more to it. He probed, "Chief Examiner Jingmu, you seem especially concerned about this examinee named Zhou Ke?"

"Hmm..." Jingmu pondered for a moment and said frankly, "To tell you the truth, not long ago, the Magic Association captured an illegal immigrant monk from the [Ascetic Monastery] in Baiyue Province."

"Ascetic Monastery?" Zhu Xusheng was confused.

Having only recently come into contact with the world of magic, he was familiar with the domestic guilds, but knew little about overseas magical organizations.

Liu Xishu, appearing friendly, explained, "The Ascetic Monastery originated in the Indus and Ganges basins. They worship 'Tathagata Buddha,' Siddhartha Gautama. Their doctrine is 'Suffering is a stepping stone to achieving the True Fruit.' It means that suffering is merely one trial after another; there is no need to fear or hide. Only through suffering can the body and mind grow."

"You can simply summarize it as a bunch of masochists looking for trouble everywhere," Jingmu said coldly.

It seemed he didn't have a friendly attitude toward the Ascetic Monastery; to put it more bluntly, he harbored hostility toward any organization that increased his workload.

"The Ascetic Monastery isn't the point. There are a few of these little mice sneaking in every year, and they never amount to much," Jingmu added. "The key is that from that dead pervert's confession, we obtained some intelligence."

"Did he just curse?" Liu Xishu looked at Zhu Xusheng, questioning if he had misheard.

Zhu Xusheng was busy wiping sweat from his face and dared not respond.

"Just a week ago, a D-rank danger level [Gate of the Ghost-Gold Sheep] appeared in Baiyue Province."

"D-rank? That would require at least a Flame Ring-level mage to intervene," Liu Xishu mused. "Then..."

Liu Xishu wanted to ask if that monk was a Flame Ring-level mage. If so, the severity of the situation would be much greater. As the backbone of the magical world, if a Flame Ring-level mage were to infiltrate the country, they would be capable of causing quite a bit of chaos.

Jingmu clearly saw through the question and answered in advance: "No. Due to the secret arts of their asceticism, that person's level was only at the tenth stage of the Mars realm."

"How do you think a tenth-stage Mars mage managed to pass through a D-rank [Gate of the Ghost-Gold Sheep]?"

Without giving Liu Xishu and Zhu Xusheng time to be shocked, Jingmu continued:

"According to his testimony, we learned that the only reason he survived was thanks to one person—a young middle school student, a middle school student who had only just awakened his Truth."

The expressions of Liu Xishu and Zhu Xusheng grew even more solemn. Compared to this absurd testimony that defied common sense, they would rather believe that the Ascetic Monastery monk had hidden his true strength.

"Based on the description of the school uniform, we narrowed the target down to Guangcheng No. 1 Middle School."

Speaking plainly, Liu Xishu had a sudden realization: "You think it's Zhou Ke?"

"There are twenty or so students at Guangcheng No. 1 Middle School who have awakened their Truth. Isn't it a bit too hasty to judge based solely on a school uniform?" Zhu Xusheng remarked.

"I'm not sure." Jingmu shook his head, not insisting on his opinion.

In truth, there was one point he was highly suspicious of that he hadn't mentioned.

That was what the monk had said in his own words: "That student was just too cool! So cool that I wanted to date him, but his personality was so awful that it scared me a little."

If there was anyone whose personality had left the deepest impression on Jingmu, it was Zhou Ke, who had nearly choked him to death during their few minutes of contact. Looking around the world, it would be hard to find a beast to match him.

"Could it really be you?" Jingmu pressed his fingers together, resting them at the bridge between his nose and upper lip, his gaze fixed like a falcon on the slouching youth on the main screen.

"Oh my, didn't I tell you guys already? Tie up the citizens and recycle them! You just wouldn't listen. If you don't listen to my words, you're bound to end up in the gutter..."

Zhou Ke watched the spirited battle below, shouting and sighing by turns.

Witnessing one of the most promising "seed" examinees being tossed around by a pig-headed monster before being rescued by a proctor and disqualified, he snapped his ballpoint pen in frustration.

"I wanted to make you the protagonist of my next fairy tale. You took such an overbearing name like 'Dragon Overlord,' yet your performance was mediocre. Hmph, are you worthy of your name? Are you worthy of the parents who gave you that name? Are you worthy of all the Dragon Overlords in the vast sea of literature!"

Mr. Zhou was extremely disappointed in the examinee named Dragon Overlord; he was one step away from digging up the ancestors of the guy's eighteen generations to question them one by one.

It is no exaggeration to say that if Dragon Overlord had stood in front of him, he would have been scolded to tears within two seconds, and while crying, he would have had to ask, "Wuwuwu, who are you? I don't think I know you?"

Two more hours passed, and the second wave of the monster siege was nearing its end.

On the current leaderboard, there were about a hundred examinees with over 100 points, and Mr. Zhou's name had long since vanished.

"Everyone is working so hard," Zhou Ke muttered indifferently. His lazy attitude made the efforts of others seem cheap by comparison.

He took a sip of his coffee and let out another self-absorbed remark that would have certainly infuriated the other examinees: "But only a hundred or so people have broken three digits in points by now. Is this batch of examinees not very good?"

"Sigh, if they had listened to me back then, they would at least be in the top twenty by now." Zhou Ke felt regret for some of the examinees.

Back when the first wave of the siege ended and they returned to the safe zone, many had chased after him, asking for the secret to his rapid scoring. Some claimed to be children of the wealthy, others called themselves campus beauties, using every trick in the book—money and beauty—to get answers.

As for whether Mr. Zhou actually told them?

Of course he did.

How could someone as charitable as Mr. Zhou bear to refuse a sincere request from others?

So, he packaged the hidden scoring rules into a 50,000-word fairy tale, intending to share it with everyone in a witty and humorous way.

It was just a pity that not a single one of them had the patience to listen to the end.

Most of them gave up when they reached the part where "the farmer brought a frozen snake home, warmed it with his body, only to realize it was a pile of excrement," and they would hoot and boo with ugly expressions before leaving.