Forty Millenniums of Cultivation, page 162
"This Yuan Yeshi is a student of Deep Sea University Exos Department. He wasn't getting aroused by the university's curriculum and specifically came to our training camp over summer vacations."
A bald instructor told Mao Feng, laughing, "He has a solid foundation and can be trained in accordance with the highest standards. In my opinion, he could very likely become the best among the hundred trainees."
Mao Feng nodded absently. Suddenly, he jerked his chin towards a direction and asked doubtfully, "Who is piloting that staggering Seven-Step Rock Snake? It's already set in beginner mode yet he can't even walk safely! Even though coming to our training camp with such aptitude isn't burning much money, it is still wasting our time!"
The bald instructor glanced at the hologram and quickly replied, "He is Grand Desolate War Institution's Li Yao."
Mao Feng's countenance became extremely weird as he said, frowning, "What happened to him?
"Although this little guy is not very powerful, he has a splendid record and is quite intelligent as well. At the beginning, I was quite looking forward to his performance, but how can he perform so badly!?"
The bald instructor pursed his lips into a smile as he said, "It's quite simple. Some people are inherently unsuitable for piloting crystal suits. No matter how much they train, it's all futile.
"Some Foundation Building Stage experts and even Golden Core Stage powerhouses can control other magical equipment like an arm directing its fingers, but once they enter the crystal suit, they seemed to have been shackled and under a restrictive spell; all of a sudden, they would become stupid and clumsy.
"What I mean to say is, their talent with crystal suit was not fated.
"Although such people are not many, there are still one or two in one hundred. Maybe Li Yao is one of them. He can only blame his bad luck!"
Mao Feng pursed his lips, "Forget it, let him be. After watching him drive the crystal suit like that, I really want to wash my eyes!"
"Ah!"
At this time, the bald instructor suddenly exclaimed. He said, dumbfounded, "93 points!? Someone among the second batch of trainees has actually scored 93 points!? Genius! He is a true genius!"
Chapter 232: Pushed It Too Hard |
The surprisingly high score grabbed every student's attention.
All of them turned their eyes to the corner of the testing field, where a white suit in crescent shape stood proudly.
This crystal suit, named "Moon Fox", was best known for its high speed as well as its swiftness. Although the test in which it performed a splendid dance had long ended, everybody seemed to still be dwelling on its bleak, moonlight-like traces.
The wearer's name quickly spread around everyone in the testing field.
"Long Qianyue, age 25, 12th level of the Refinement Stage, second daughter of the Master of Crescent Moon City."
"Crescent Moon City is not a wealthy sect, but it values combat skills more than anything else. Every member from top to bottom is crazy about fighting."
"Long Qianyue is no exception. In the battle of the Iron Eagle Mountain last month, she killed three demon generals by herself and thus gained her fame."
"I'd never have imagined that she's so gifted in crystal suits too. The Crescent Moon City is sure to rise!"
"There are not only battlesuit major students like Yuan Yeshi, but also geniuses like Long Qianyue in our class. These two have reserved two places in the winners' list. The competition will only get fiercer!"
Grinding their teeth, many students were complaining jealously.
While the 99 students and the instructors were talking in a mess, Li Yao did not know a thing that was happening around him, for he had fully immersed himself in the world of crystal suits.
He moved his body and walked the first step, as if he were a rusted machine.
"I MADE IT!"
"I can walk now!"
Although he felt that his body had been slapped by a thorny rope dozens of times, there was still satisfaction on his face.
It was not easy. After falling over 17 times, he finally managed to grasp the delicacy of balance to control the jet direction of the 28 power rune arrays, so that he could make his first step!
"Relax. The key is to relax. Don't try to subdue the crystal suit. Consider the power rune arrays as a new organ. Chill out and let nature take its course. One step, two steps, three steps…"
He was still unsteady and sometimes his arms would be flapping like the wings of a hen. But this time, he didn't fall over and successfully walked more than 10 steps.
Li Yao grinned in satisfaction.
The few students around eyed him with obvious contempt.
"It's just walking, the simplest of all. It took him such a long time to learn, and he's smiling now…"
"Does he not have any shame?"
Li Yao wasn't bother by what other people thought of him. He was like a boy who'd just got a new toy and was eager to find new ways to play with it. His entire body and soul were wrapped up in the world of crystal suits, thirsting to overcome all the difficulties and discover new usages.
"Next, I'm going to learn how to jump."
Compared with walking, jumping was ten times more difficult. Even a hop would require almost a hundred rune arrays to work together.
Li Yao had failed dozens of times, but Li Yao was not the least bit tired of it, nor did he care how other people were looking at him.
After every failure, his understanding grew deeper.
After every attempt, he was better at it than the previous one.
The feeling of getting close to success was really sweet.
Finally!
After falling on his face for the 32nd time, he made a jump of precisely 5 meters.
No more, no less. Exactly onto the place that had been assigned by the crystal processor.
"I've got a new skill now!"
"Next, should I learn running, or consecutive jumping?"
Li Yao found himself addicted to the crystal suit.
Right at this moment, Mao Feng's rough voice boomed in his ear:
"The last group of students, prepare to take the test!"
"Sha Yangwen, Lane No. 1."
"Zhou Qun, Lane No. 2."
"Li Yao, Lane No. 3."
"What?!"
For a moment, Li Yao was confused. Then he realized that he was playing with the crystal suit so devotedly that a full hour already had passed without him knowing.
The other groups of students had already finished their test. Their preliminary test results were almost ready now.
'This is happening too fast.
'The crystal suit is so much fun. The last hour felt like half a minute while I was playing with the suit. I haven't enjoyed enough yet!
'Why are these people so adept at it? We're all beginners, but there is quite an enormous gap between me and them. No wonder Mao Feng said that I'm the weakest of us all. He wasn't lying.
'My contenders are all geniuses, experts, and professionals!
'But it doesn't matter. In three months' time, I will be more of a genius, expert, and professional than any of you!'
While setting up his big plan, Li Yao hobbled to Lane No. 3 cautiously.
Since he'd just learned how to walk, his hips were wiggling and his posture was extremely ugly, it was like he was trying to hold an egg between his legs.
Everybody almost laughed out aloud when they saw his jitteriness.
They had been anxious after seeing too many geniuses. Many of them were depressed. Now that they noticed someone far worse than themselves, they all felt cheerful.
"Who is this guy? Walking like that under 30% sensitivity rate?"
"Let me check the name sheet. Huh. Isn't he the Li Yao that chief instructor just introduced?"
"Well well well. According to what chief instructor said, he's the 'vulture', a cruel man, a total badass in his college. I thought he would be better than this."
Yuan Yeshi was completely lost. After a long while, he mumbled to himself, "Seriously?
"You dared to join the Thunder Training Camp despite such poor talent?
"I shouldn't have looked for trouble with you. It embarrasses me to set you as a target."
Long Qianyue, ranking No. 1, stood quietly at a corner. She glanced at the folly, too.
Faint laughter came from behind her helmet.
Under everyone's doubtful gazes and mockery, Li Yao moved himself to Lane No. 3, one step after another.
The rest of the test-takers had long gotten into position and viewing him as if he were a 3-year-old child.
Mao Feng roared,
"The test begins now!"
The other 19 students sprinted forward like an arrow!
Li Yao took the first step, but had to open his arms to maintain the balance in a hurry because the strong ejection almost made him fall off.
The fumbling caused another round of laughter.
Seeing his stupid actions, Mao Feng frowned his eyebrows so hard that they almost merged together. He scanned the other instructors and asked, "Who is interested in this fellow and would like to teach him?"
The instructors exchanged a look, took a step back unanimously, and seemed to start enjoying the beautiful sceneries of the desert.
Inside the crystal suit, Li Yao was talking to himself without any stop, "You can make it. Come on!
"Mystic Skeleton Battlesuit is waiting for you in the foreseeable future!
"Pass this test. You must pass this test. You can't allow the prototype of the Mystic Skeleton Battlesuit to fall into somebody else's hands!
"It is destined to be yours."
After a deep breath, Li Yao raised his head. The flame of confidence in his eyes seemed to be burning a hole on the crystal suit.
He took a giant leap.
Despite the same ugly posture and the shaking now and then, Li Yao was moving forward faster and faster, changing from jogging to running, as if there were an invisible string attached to his waist.
"Shua! Shua! Shua! Shua!"
20 silver-shining balls charged towards him.
The crystal suit test consisted of five parts: dodging, attacking, agility, charging and critical striking, each of which had a maximum score of 20.
In the dodging part, 1 score would be reduced every time the test-taker was hit by the silver-shining ball.
Grinding his teeth, Li Yao tried his best to avoid 4 balls with every muscle on his body, only to be hit by the rest 16 balls in the end.
He only got 4 points in this part.
Apart from him, even the worst student had managed to dodge 11 balls.
The second part was attacking.
The test-taker needed to hit 20 moving balls within five seconds.
After five seconds, all the silver-shining balls would be gone.
"Biu! Biu! Biu! Biu!"
Li Yao stood on his toes and waved his hands crazily, as if he was being drowned, while he was aiming at the balls.
But in the end, he got 6 points, less than half of those of others.
Part 3 was agility.
In front of the test-takers were 20 red transparent threads that were tangled together.
The test-taker would need to walk through the apertures among the threads in their crystal suits.
1 score would be reduced every time they touch a red thread.
Li Yao got 7 points on this part.
Li Yao's performance was absolutely terrible in the first 3 parts.
Many people had lost their interest in mocking Li Yao and shifted their attention to contenders that were more competitive.
Nobody even noticed that Li Yao's points, although tiny, were improving steadily after each part.
Although the improvement seemed to be insignificant, it did show that Li Yao was getting the hang of it rapidly in the span of dozens of seconds.
Li Yao felt that he had touched upon something real.
The wild horse beneath him was still galloping desperately, trying to get rid of the rider. But he was getting familiar with its temper, and could felt its passion and pride behind its madness.
The last two parts were charging and critical striking.
The test-taker needed to run 500 meters in the shortest time they could and punch the target with the biggest strength they could afford.
"Let's do this…"
Hundreds of dancing wild bees in Li Yao's brain now combined into a cloud of glaring stars and then boomed.
"Now is the time!"
Deep squat, jump, speed up, and charge!
There seemed to be a volcano eruption behind his crystal suit, leaving hundreds of magnificent rays of light!
In a blink of eyes, Li Yao had passed hundreds of meters and outrun many students who were in front of him.
"So fast!"
Many people's contempt now turned into cold sweat.
Li Yao hadn't learnt much about punching yet, so he simply lowered his shoulder and threw himself directly at the target!
"Boom now!"
After a roar, he accelerated again. A white smoke in the shape of an umbrella was formed before him because of his supersonic speed!
However…
The crash that he expected did not happen.
Li Yao was still not good enough at direction controlling, so he missed the target and continued running at an amazing sped!
200 meters ahead, at the end of the lanes, Mao Feng was studying the test results of the last few groups of students.
They were the weakest and least experienced in crystal suits among all. There was nothing particularly interesting about them in their test results.
Mao Feng glanced at their results and decided not to waste his time. Instead, he began considering how to train the few geniuses he had.
Right at this moment, a strong feeling of apprehension grasped him. He felt he was about to be killed, as if a bold demon king was coming at him!
"What a strong scent of killing. What's happening?"
Mao Feng raised his head. His pupils shrank as he saw Li Yao's dashing towards him unstoppably with a distorted face. He bellowed, "What the f*ck is going on?!"
Chapter 233: Astonished Training Planner |
Two hundred meters were literally nothing when one's going at a supersonic speed.
"BOOM!"
Many people felt that their eyes were blurred. Then they heard an earthshaking noise, as if a meteorite had just landed on the field. The collision was so powerful that there was a small sandstorm spreading a kilometer away.
No one could see anything or hear anything except the aftershock of the impact. It took a long time before they came back to themselves.
When the smoke finally settled down, a dramatic scene unfolded itself before them, and there was indistinguishable murmuring of fear in their mouth.
Not far ahead, a shallow pit appeared, with white gas popping up.
The Seven-step Rock Snake collapsed in the pit. Its right shoulder had been completely shattered. Colorful sparks were dancing everywhere with cracking sounds.
Right beside it… was chief instructor Mao Feng, who was in a coma now!
The testing field was caught in an awkward silence. But it was immediately broken. Dozens of twisted screams reverberated in the sky,
"Not good. Chief instructor passed out!"
"Someone has— knocked chief instructor out!"
…
An hour later.
In a fully-equipped crystal suit warehouse, two refiners were repairing the Seven-step Rock Snake.
The refiner on the left, who had a big mole on his forehead, frowned.
"That was a huge impact. The right shoulder was almost broken into pieces. Why was it so bad?"
The refiner on the right had crooked lips. He said,
"Rushing for hundreds of meters in a supersonic state before reaching the chief instructor… How could it not be bad? The chief instructor was knocked out before he could even defend himself with his Building Foundation Stage abilities. It was nuts…"
He stopped when he noticed that his partner looked terrible. Knowing something was wrong, he turned back rigidly.
Mao Feng was standing right behind them with a grim face.
For a moment, the temperature in the warehouse seemed to have dropped 10 degrees!
"Hello, Instructor Mao!"
The two refiners greeted him hurriedly.
Even an idiot would know that the chief instructor of the Outer Camp had been under super-high pressure and was not in his best mood. It was best not to offend him, in case the volcano suddenly burst out.
But Mao Feng had a weird countenance. Behind the gloomy face was some indistinct confusion.
There was something that nobody else in the training camp knew.
When Li Yao was about to hit him in the Seven-step Rock Snake, he already braced himself for the collision.
He didn't dodge. Instead, he brought himself up to the preliminary level of Building Foundation Stage and condensed a strong spiritual energy shield in front of him.
By his calculation, since Li Yao was merely a Cultivator in the 6th level of the Refinement Stage, the shield would be more than enough to hold him back, even if the crystal suit had empowered him with the supersonic speed and maybe doubled his combat abilities.
But as it turned out, he was blown away in shame!
It was simply impossible!
If Li Yao had not been hiding his true capability, the only explanation will be—
The endowment that this crystal suit offered him was not just doubling the combat abilities, but tripling them, or even more!
Showing no emotion, Mao Feng said coldly, "Leave the damage on the shoulder alone for now. See if there's anything wrong with the drive mode."
The two refiners nodded. They lifted a component below the Seven-step Rock Snake's neck, connected a crystal wire to the processor of the suit, and started checking immediately.
No sooner had they begun than they detected something abnormal. Their faces turned darker and darker and their eyebrows scrunched together.
"What's wrong?"
Mao Feng asked gravely, his eyebrow bouncing.
They looked at each other. The first refiner finally made up his mind and said, "Chief instructor, it is universally known that the crystal suits for new students are all antiques from a hundred years ago. They've endured a lot of battles before and therefore bear a lot of wounds. To fix them, we had to replace some of their components with miscellaneous substitutes, some of which were actually refined by ourselves…"
