With a graceful wave of her hand, Jennie instantly turned three Straw Worms into ice sculptures. The threads binding them to the trees snapped, and the ice crashed to the ground, breaking into a scatter of icy fragments.
Xie Yang took a quick look at the back of his hand. The number on his arm had changed to 9. Clearly, the Straw Worms were all mature, at the seventh layer of the first rank, with each worth three points.
He glanced at the leaderboard again. In just a brief span, it had filled with a multitude of names. Lian Xia was in the lead with 21 points, followed by Han Xuemei with 18, and Jin Haocan with 15. The top three contenders, all mentioned by Di Feng, had third-rank pets. Xie Yang found himself in 234th place, among at least a hundred others with the same score.
"Their pace is impressive; everyone seems quite eager," Xie Yang noted with a smile, his composure unshaken as he pressed on.
Along the way, a succession of ferocious beasts emerged. They ambushed or charged head-on: Man-eating Flowers, Wilted Beasts, Wind Slice Mantises, Striped Spiders, Thunder Worms, Fermi Soldier Ants... As Xie Yang had surmised, the beasts were predominantly of the plant and insect variety. And as he ventured deeper, the strength of the beasts he encountered steadily climbed.
Yet, for Xie Yang, this posed no issue. Whether facing first or second-rank beasts, Jennie handled them with ease. They were no match for her.
Focused on their journey rather than hunting beasts, they forged ahead. Over an hour later, Xie Yang paused and narrowed his eyes toward the horizon. Just beyond the outermost line of trees, a vast, open plain stretched out before him. Dominating the center was a colossal stone pillar, impossible to miss.
"That must be the stone tablet worth 500 points," Xie Yang mused, then shrugged and turned his attention away. With Jennie at his side, he retraced his steps back down the path they had come.
"I've found the exit. Now it's time for the hunt to really begin."
Outside the Land of Nothingness, in the plaza of Nightbay Academy.
Jiang Hao and his fellow teachers were fixated on the massive screen floating before them.
Displayed on the screen was the leaderboard for the exam.
It showed the point totals for the top thousand students, clear as day.
Nearly every second, the rankings of over a hundred students would shift.
Those closer to the bottom experienced the most dramatic changes.
"Not bad. The overall strength of this year's candidates has significantly improved from previous years," one teacher remarked with a nod of approval.
"Indeed. In under two hours, the top hundred students have all scored over 300 points."
"In past years, the student in hundredth place barely had 200 points at this time."
"And the top four students have been particularly impressive, their scores leaving the rest trailing far behind," several teachers agreed, nodding and smiling.
Lian Xia, Jin Haocan, Han Xuemei, and Yun Ye each had over 700 points, with a narrow margin between them.
Their positions would switch every so often.
But no matter how their rankings shifted, they solidly held the top four spots, with the fourth place's score a significant leap ahead of the fifth.
Barring any surprises, this year's seat of honour would likely go to one of these four.
Suddenly, a teacher voiced their confusion: "Come to think of it, weren't there five students with third-rank pets this year? We've only seen four; where's the fifth one?"
ВЫ ЧИТАЕТЕ
Reborn to Be A Beast Master
ФэнтезиIn an alternate modern world, where people could summon their own beastly companions, His journey was anything but ordinary. As the college entrance exams loomed, He found himself the subject of ridicule for his choice of a companion - a small, seem...
