Chapter 37 - Weird Test Results

After placing his hand on the disk, it glowed for a moment and then showed his age and cultivation.

-Age: 13 years, 7 months, 13 days, 7 hours, 2 minutes-

-Cultivation: Blood Purifying Realm, 88% blood purified-

After the disciples saw this youth’s cultivation, a small commotion occurred. Not because his cultivation was incredibly outstanding or anything, but because it was rare for newly admitted disciples to reach so close to being able to enter the Bone Reconstruction Realm.

There were common consensuses involving the different cultivation realms among each years’ Freshmen Disciple Competition participants.

The newcomers, which was a name given to the newly admitted disciples, would usually be between the Qi Condensation Realm and the Blood Purifying realm when competing.

The first years, disciples who were usually around the age of fourteen and been in the Academy for a year, would be within the Bone Reconstruction Realm or maybe just entering the Meridian Opening Realm.

And finally, the second and third years, who were around fifteen or closing in on sixteen years old and had been in the Academy for almost three years. They would be in Meridian Opening Realm with varying degrees of cultivation bases in that realm, with the most prominent one being at the Third Phase of the Meridian Opening Realm.

Opening 1-9 meridians, one would be in Phase One of the Meridian Opening Realm. Opening 10-27 is Phase Two, 28-57 is the Third Phase, and finally, 58-90 is Phase Four.

As one moved through each of these Phases in the Meridian Realm they would find that it became harder and harder opening their meridians.

To be able to break through to the Sea Expansion Realm the required amount of meridians one should open is 9. However, someone who breaks through into the Sea Expansion Realm after only opening nine meridians would be among the weakest of Sea Expansion Realm cultivators.

Each meridian one opens in the Meridian Opening Realm, would signify greater strength and could even determine the cultivation speed when entering the Sea Expansion Realm. So most disciples would try to reach the highest possible number of meridians open before entering the Sea Expansion Realm.

However, the difficulty of opening one’s meridians could be seen from the fact that it takes almost double the time to reach Phase Four from Phase One, then it is to move from the 1st stage of the Qi Condensation Realm to the peak of the Bone Reconstruction Realm.

With a prideful smile, the youth strutted off the podium under the gazes of the Outer Disciples as well as the Inner Disciples. However, the youth could see several looks of contempt from the Inner Disciples.

The youth’s expression couldn't help but turn into a frown, as he leaped off the stage.

The senior Inner Disciples who had competed in the Freshmen Disciple Competition before were completely dismissive of the newcomers.

One thing that should be mentioned, is that ninety percent of the Inner Disciples competing was from one of the Seven Major Clans, with around three or four out of the thirty-three of them being from an aristocratic family.

This was simply because the Seven Major Clans were the only ones with enough wealth and resources to produce children with Sky-innate talent.

But even if they were among the same clan and some even in the same Division, it doesn't mean they didn't see each other as another opponent within the Academy.

There were different side branches within large clans’ and even if they seem amicable to each other on the surface, what goes on in the shows was a different story. Plotting and scheming, even attempted assassinations against the talented members from each other’s side branches was a lot more common than it was supposed to be.

So needless to say, even the senior Inner Disciples from the Fei Clan was looking at the youth with scorn and contempt.

Well, it wasn’t only the senior Inner Disciples that was dismissive of the newcomers, so were the Outer Disciples somewhat. Asides from a few rumors going around, it would be like all of the other competitions before this one, the newcomers will be the first to get knocked out and the highlight of the competition would be the senior disciples.

After the youth from the Fei Clan stepped off the podium, another newcomer came up to the stage. He was a youth from the Bai Clan and after placing his hand on the disk his cultivation was revealed to be at the Blood Purifying Realm, having purified 20% of his blood so far.

Like this, the nine youths who were selected at the Disciple Selection Ceremony four months prior went up and took the test.

The only three who remained were the two youths from the Ming Clan and the youth named Sun Donghai that Yang Su had heard about.

When people saw that it was their turn next a veil of excitement suddenly started covering the crowd.

After a few moments of neither of the three stepping forward, the youth named Sun Donghai looked at the other two youths before he snorted and leaped up onto the stage.

“Look! Sun Donghai's decided to go first, this is it, once he takes the test we’ll know if the rumors are true or not.”

Sun Donghai, who wore the Sword Pavilion’s white robes had a steady fast bearing as he calmly walked towards the disk.

Reaching the disk, Donghai casually placed his hand on its smooth surface, and immediately after his results were shown.

-Age: 13 years, 2 months, 1 day, 11 hours, 23 minutes-

-Cultivation: Meridian Opening Realm, 32 meridians opened-

“…..”

“…..?!!”

“What?! The rumors are true Sun Donghai has reached the Meridian Opening Realm!!”

“Look, he even opened four additional meridians than what the rumors were saying!!”

The Outer Disciples erupted into a clamor of noises.

Within a luxurious Pavilion, the Patriarch of the Sun Clan had a big grin on his face.

All the other Clan Leaders looked at him with varying expressions of surprise, suspicion, and envy. The latter being from the Bai and Zhong Clan Leaders.

Under their gazes, Sun Wu Fen was feeling smug, but he just so happen to glance at old man Ghuanyu and saw that he had on a placid expression. This made his heart shudder, as his prideful expression fell a little.

‘He isn’t even phased by, Hai’er’s cultivation base. Even when he was little we had to hide his talents from the public eye, and even before cultivating, we knew that his Sky-grade innate talent was special among its rank. Despite having Sky-grade innate talent, his cultivation speed is comparable or even surpasses his sister's own, who had a Heaven-grade Foundation and a pseudo-Heaven-grade soul.’

One reason why everyone was so taken aback by Donghai's cultivation base, was because it was right under the same level as the legendary crown prince and sword genius Ling Tian when they were competing in the Freshmen Disciple Competition for the first time.

Fu Wei at the age of thirteen and a few months old had opened 46 of his Meridians, while Ling Tian was a bit behind with 44 Meridians opened.

So seeing Sun Donghai's own 32 was shocking because he was showing talents that could compete with two of the Three Peaks, despite only having Sky-grade for all of his attributes.

Even Fu Wei had narrowed eyes as he stared down at Donghai walking off the stage.

Though, amid everyone’s shock and amazement at Donghai's accomplishment, two persons had different reactions. The first was Ghuanyu, and the second was Xi Shen.

Ghuanyu sported an indifferent reaction upon seeing Donghai's test results, while Xi Shen was slumped in his chair bored out of his mind.

Leaping off the stage, Donghai softly landed on the ground before he shot an arrogant smile at the two youths of the Ming Clan, who were wearing blood-red robes.

Without so much of a glance in his direction though, the two youths ignored him completely as one of them hopped onto the stage, and quickly hurried to the disk and placed his hands on it.

Some of the disciples were still reeling from the shock of seeing Donghai's cultivation level and weren’t paying attention, but they suddenly heard gasps of shock from their fellow disciples who had horror-stricken faces as they stared at the stage.

On the stage, the youth from the Ming Clan had his hand on the disk’s surface, with it displaying his test results.

-Age: 13 years, 7 months, 3 days, 1 hour, 50 minutes-

-Cultivation: Blood Purifying Realm, 40% blood purified-

-Cultivation: Meridian Opening Realm, 20 meridians opened-

As soon as those results appeared on the disk's surface, the youth retracted his hand hurried off the stage.

The whole venue was suddenly quiet with only this youth’s rapid footsteps echoing out as he walked to the edge of the stage before leaping down.

The other youth from the Ming Clan showed no indication of getting ready to take the test.

Finally, after a period of silence, someone in the crowd spoke up, “Wh-what did I just see? How can he have two different cultivation results, is the testing tool broken?”