Chapter 484 - 220: Invincible Force Field, The Grand Examination Begins
Chapter 484: Chapter 220: Invincible Force Field, The Grand Examination Begins
...
「Three days later.」
「Dongjiang City. Myrrh Forge.」
The day after giving Lin Ye some pointers, Lan Yunxi set off again, returning to the Star Domain Battlefield.
In her words, her vacation was over. It was time to go back and earn contribution points, or her bones would get rusty.
Lin Ye felt a bit helpless when it came to his master, who was as decisive and efficient as she was wild and unpredictable.
He hadn’t been idle during these three days, either. He had consumed all one hundred pieces of Asking Dust that Lan Yunxi had given him.
Now, the rank of his Martial Arts Spirituality on his status panel had reached Resonance 39.6%.
This improvement in his spirituality gave him an increasingly intuitive control over gravity.
He could now silently plant a Gravity Beacon on someone just by brushing past them, and they would be none the wiser.
Lin Ye walked through the familiar, verdant bamboo forest and arrived at an old, traditional courtyard tucked away in its depths.
He pushed the gate open and went inside.
In the courtyard, a bare-chested young man was swinging a heavy smithing hammer, striking forcefully at a red-hot iron billet.
Sweat soaked his short hair and trickled down the lines of his young, toned muscles.
Lin Ye thought he looked a little familiar.
’He looks like one of Ouyang Ye’s young apprentices.’
The young man noticed his arrival and stopped his work. He wiped the sweat from his brow with a towel hanging around his neck and looked at Lin Ye, confused.
"Excuse me, is Mr. Ouyang in?" Lin Ye asked.
"Master hasn’t been feeling well lately. He’s resting at the hospital," the young man answered, his voice somewhat dejected.
’Sick?’
A flicker of disappointment passed through Lin Ye.
He unwrapped a long, cloth-wrapped bundle from his back, revealing a broken spear.
It was the Star-Piercing Spear, the very one that had accompanied him in slaying countless xenos, but its head had been completely melted away.
Lin Ye laid the cloth-wrapped spear on the ground.
"Please thank your master for me."
"Tell him the weapon he forged with his own hands served me well. It’s tasted the blood of at least ten thousand xenos."
"Also..."
Lin Ye took an irregular, fist-sized material that gleamed with a metallic luster from his pocket and held it out.
"Please give this to him as well. It’s just a small token of my appreciation."
The young man stared blankly at the broken spear, then at the object Lin Ye was offering, and instinctively reached out to take it.
The moment his hand closed around the seemingly small piece of metal, the young man’s expression changed drastically.
’It’s so heavy!’
He had to use nearly all his strength, veins bulging on his arms, just to cradle the material against his chest and keep it from falling.
By the time he looked up again, the courtyard entrance was empty. Lin Ye was gone.
"Junior Brother, who was that just now?"
A voice came from behind him. A young man in a blacksmith’s attire, but with a calmer and more mature presence, walked over.
Seeing the newcomer, the young man quickly called out.
"Senior Brother!"
"A visitor came looking for Master just now. Since he wasn’t here, the man left these."
The young man’s name was Ouyang Lian.
He was Ouyang Ye’s grandson and the most skilled of all his apprentices.
The prime candidate to one day inherit the forge.
Ouyang Lian’s gaze fell on the piece of metal, though he didn’t think much of it at first.
But as he drew closer and got a clear look at the material’s texture and the faint light shimmering across its surface, the casual expression on his face instantly froze.
"This is..."
"Flow Pattern Meteorite Iron! Wait, the purity isn’t perfect, but the energy it contains..."
"Someone must have already forged a weapon with the main piece. This is just a leftover scrap!"
The younger apprentice pouted. "Just a scrap? And he called it a token of his appreciation..."
Ouyang Lian shot him a glare and scolded, "You’re still wet behind the ears! Watch your mouth!"
"Do you have any idea how much a piece this size is worth? Even as unrefined ore, we’re talking tens of millions, at least!"
"More importantly, you can’t get this stuff around here. I doubt even my grandfather has ever worked with it!"
Ouyang Lian’s voice trembled. He carefully reached out, gently touching the material’s surface as if caressing a priceless treasure.
Ouyang Lian snapped his head up to look at his junior brother.
"What did that man look like?!"
"He was young, looked about our age..."
As Ouyang Lian listened to the description, a face flashed through his mind and his pupils contracted.
’It’s him!’
’The mysterious young man who came to have Grandfather forge a custom weapon for him over a month ago!’
...
「Dongjiang First Middle School. The athletic field.」
A rally for the entire senior class was underway.
On the stage, Principal Wang Zhengguo looked down at the sea of young, vibrant faces, his voice resonant and firm.
"Students, tomorrow is the decisive battle that will determine your future: the National Martial Arts College Entrance Exam!"
"I won’t waste your time with a long speech. I only hope you remember to give it your all and leave no regrets!"
"Give a perfect answer to your three years of high school—and your decade-plus of hard training!"
The speech ended to thunderous applause.
In the formation for Senior Class 7, Lin Ye stood at the head of the line, his expression serene.
Behind him, Li Jun’s face was flushed with an excitement he couldn’t quite contain.
To Lin Ye’s surprise, the kid seemed to have been spurred on by his example. He had gone through a complete transformation, training like his life depended on it.
Although there was still a gap between him and the true top students in Class 1, he had already broken into the top one hundred of their entire grade.
Not far away, in the ranks of Senior Class 1.
A pair of beautiful eyes watched Lin Ye’s back with a complicated expression.
Zhang Yuqing was filled with mixed emotions.
It had all started with indignation, a secret rivalry.