A Feast Begins

Wenren Sheng quickly recovered. This was the first time he had received such an unexpected delight. It seemed that taking an unconventional path truly aligned with the essence of the Seed of Mystery.

It was just that many places had no path to begin with, and if too many people walked them, it became easy to fall to one's death... He still had to be somewhat careful.

Once he had composed himself, he asked, "You two, is the Martial Exam over now?"

"Yes, I'll bring you the Written Exam questions right away. Please remain in the room and do not move around," Liao Zheng immediately replied, then began packing up.

"I only took these two tests. Don't you need to test the rest?" Wenren Sheng recalled that, according to the materials he had read, the Martial Exam did not seem this simple.

"These two are enough," Cheng Ning confirmed.

"All right. Thank you for your hard work, you two." Wenren Sheng leaned back on the sofa and closed his eyes.

"You're too polite, Mr. Wenren." After Liao Zheng finished packing, he left with Cheng Ning, gently closing the door behind them.

The moment the two stepped out, they began talking in the corridor.

"He has such great talent. What a shame—he chose the wrong path. No matter how gifted he is, it'll all go to waste." Liao Zheng carried his heavy suitcase as he walked slowly, shaking his head again and again.

Cheng Ning walked beside him. "At least he has the chance to waste his talent. We don't even have that. All we can do is these peripheral jobs and muddle through our days."

"That's precisely why no one likes the emergence of geniuses more than we do. Only then can accessories like us find powerful patrons to cling to, and enjoy the splendor of the mysterious world in peace." Liao Zheng turned to look out the window, then added, "Of course, they have to be geniuses with proper values."

Cheng Ning nodded. "Yes, this one's character is truly beyond reproach. He possesses an enthusiasm and affection for this city, this country, even our history, that ordinary people would find difficult to understand. Compared to his talent, I think this pure-hearted nature of his is even more precious. If someone like him became one of the strongest, I would feel sincerely happy and at ease."

"Yes, which is why I want nothing more than to drag those childish, ridiculous ideas of his back onto the right path, like leading an ox by the nose." Liao Zheng sighed.

"Forget it. You can force an ox to lower its head, but you can't force it to drink. Grandmaster Level figures can never be produced through coercion. Fortunately, people like us live long lives and have more time for trial and error than Ordinary People. If he comes to his senses within ten years and changes the direction of his research, he can still become a powerful patron." Cheng Ning comforted him.

"Mm. Let's go prepare the Written Exam. I believe the questions we've set this time will leave plenty of experts dumbfounded." Liao Zheng slightly quickened his pace.

Cheng Ning smiled and followed him.

At that moment, Wenren Sheng, who was inside the room, suddenly opened his eyes and looked toward the door, which had not been fully closed.

The two had echoed each other in the corridor, and every word had reached his ears. With an Extraordinary Physique nearly at Master Level, as long as the faintest sound reached him, he could hear it clearly.

Their words had indeed come from the heart, and they also aligned with the current mainstream direction of development in the mysterious world.

What everyone needed was stable, sustainable power—not a genius appearing in one decade and becoming invincible, only to die in the next decade and leave everyone as weaklings.

There was nothing wrong with that. It was simply that Wenren Sheng had his own path to follow.

As for their assessment of his character, only he himself knew why. Having experienced another, far more real and cruel worldline, he understood just how precious this current worldline was.

Yet such an understanding was something the natives of this world found difficult to possess. The overwhelming majority merely took everything they currently had for granted and could not comprehend the cruelty of Another World.

He had to possess power himself—power capable of holding the line—so that the cruelty of Another World would not happen around him.

Then he closed his eyes again.

After an unknown amount of time had passed, Wenren Sheng heard many orderly footsteps approaching through the corridor. When he opened his eyes, he saw the door open once more.

A group of Black Shirts filed in and stood neatly throughout the room. Like athletes, each had a white number tag affixed to both chest and back, numbered one through fifteen.

This showed the advantage of an individual examination room. In a standard room of over seventy square meters, there was more than enough space for a dozen or so people.

Liao Zheng and Cheng Ning entered right afterward.

"Mr. Wenren, the following Written Exam will be a practical exercise. You will need to use the Otherworldly Host Cultivation Progress Appraisal Method and the Weapon Affinity Appraisal Method you have mastered to personally appraise these colleagues of ours. They are all Black Shirts who have performed outstandingly over the past few years. Like the two of us, they have been given another opportunity for Otherworldly Host implantation."

"Oh, I understand. After I provide my evaluation data for them, you'll compare it with the regular inspection data, then score me based on that, correct?" Wenren Sheng let out a breath and asked.

"That is correct. There is no strict time limit for the appraisal, but the standard, naturally, is accuracy and speed. After the appraisal, you will also need to sign a confidentiality agreement. If you have any other questions, feel free to ask at any time." Liao Zheng answered in a rigid, formal manner, just as he had when he first met Wenren Sheng.

Wenren Sheng nodded and stood up.

He took a deep breath, as though preparing himself.

One appraisal method after another that he had previously reviewed surfaced in his mind.

The Five Senses Method, Spirit Response Method, Bloodline Method, Lie Detection Method, hypnosis... they appeared one after another in an orderly array.

These were the standard methods ordinary experts used to appraise Otherworldly Host cultivation progress. But to him, their greater significance was that they provided channels for the Seed of Mystery to come into unobstructed contact with the other party.

The consequences of failing a progress assessment were severe. Aside from several fixed exemption circumstances, failures would have their Otherworldly Hosts stripped away. They had one chance to appeal, but successful appeals were rare.

Therefore, temporary hosts taking part in assessments would employ all sorts of methods to make their progress data look better.

Perhaps some people deliberately concealed their abilities, but the vast majority had to exert every effort just to barely pass.

Thus, for Wenren Sheng, this was undoubtedly a feast for raising the upper limit of his Mystery Points. Even without Brother De's involvement, he would have gone all out.

If there was an opportunity, he had to take it. If there was no opportunity, he had to create one.

Now, he patiently swept his gaze across the fifteen Black Shirts. He had seen these people many times before and worked with them many times, but never had he observed them as seriously as he did today.

That was because Wei Yiqing had once warned him, "Don't try to get close to them, and don't seek to understand them deeply. Just treat them as programs you can call upon—stable, reliable, efficient. Nothing more."

That was also why he had doubted her age—he could hardly imagine a girl in her twenties calmly saying something so Ruthless and detached.

If she had said it merely to look cool, she could never have fooled his eyes.

Liao Zheng and Cheng Ning sat quietly to one side, watching the scene with great interest.

Wenren Sheng examined them for a long time before finally stopping before Black Shirt Number 8, who stood in the middle of the fifteen.

He was a man with a long scar across his face, stretching from his left eye to the right side of his chin. His complexion was sallow, he was around forty, and his eyes carried a trace of mockery that was difficult to detect.

A thorn. A strong man. Fearless...

"May I ask, sir in Number 8, what is your name?" Wenren Sheng pushed aside the thoughts in his mind and began his questioning.

For the Seed of Mystery to provide data, he needed to know the other party's name. Even a false name would do, as long as the other party acknowledged it.

In his view, this established a mysterious connection.

The scarred man was slightly taken aback, then immediately answered expressionlessly, "LA7324."

Wenren Sheng neither confirmed nor denied it. His gaze shifted slightly, and a string of information emerged.

LA7324
Mystery Points: 19/47
Mystery Composition: Seed of Wrath, Extraordinary Power, Mystic Cognition, active-duty Black Shirt, ???

He continued, "Please extend your right hand. Do not resist in any way."

The scarred man did as instructed, extending a large, weathered hand covered in scars.

Wenren Sheng then extended the index finger of his own jade-like right hand, holding it above the other man's palm.

A stream of dark purple mist emerged from his fingertip and slowly flowed into the other man's palm.

The scarred man's palm instinctively curled inward, only for him to forcibly suppress the reaction.

This was the Spirit Response Method.

One used one's own Alien Power to sense the Otherworldly Host within the other party, thereby assessing their cultivation progress.

As long as the other party was weaker than oneself and did not understand advanced concealment methods, its accuracy was extremely high. It was one of the simplest and most basic appraisal methods.

Its limitations were also significant, since it required the other party's cooperation.

But to Wenren Sheng, whether the other party cooperated or not did not matter. As long as they were weaker than him, under conditions of direct contact like this, it was equivalent to being completely defenseless.

This method made it easier to obtain detailed data than when Zhao Han had casually activated her Otherworldly Host beside him without concealing it.

The dark purple mist continuously seeped into the scarred man's palm. As time passed, he seemed to begin trembling and slightly shook his hand.

Liao Zheng and Cheng Ning exchanged glances, giving each other meaningful smiles.

At that moment, Wenren Sheng had already finished examining him.

LA7324
Mystery Points: 0/47
Mystery Composition: Seed of Wrath, Extraordinary Power (Extraordinary Physique intermediate, combat skills intermediate, Mystery Resistance beginner), Mystic Cognition, active-duty Black Shirt, Mystic Sniper Weapon Modulation