Jiangcheng Third High School

"Aunt! I..."

"Why are you crying?"

When Jiang Fan saw Su Qingwan in tears, panic flickered in his eyes, and he hurriedly got to his feet.

Su Qingwan quickly wiped away her tears.

"It's nothing. I just got some sand in my eye!"

"Are you still hungry? I'll make you some more!"

Jiang Fan looked at the table and said guiltily,

"Aunt, you haven't eaten yet!"

Su Qingwan smiled.

"I can't eat."

"How about I stew another pot of meat?"

Seeing how much Jiang Fan had eaten, she was startled as well.

But she quickly attributed it to his injuries having only just healed and his needing more nutrition.

Jiang Fan hesitated.

"Another pot of rice will be enough!"

Even after eating so much, he was probably only half full.

But Aunt's family couldn't afford for him to eat that much meat again!

Beast meat was expensive!

After much persuasion, Su Qingwan finally gave up on stewing more meat.

As Su Qingwan busied herself in the kitchen cooking rice,

Jiang Fan sat at the dining table and couldn't help speaking up.

"Aunt, Uncle went to Phoenix Mountain!"

Su Qingwan's figure paused. She turned around and pretended to be calm.

"You're just a child. Don't go poking your nose into things!"

"Your uncle went out on patrol!"

Jiang Fan gritted his teeth.

"I just went to the beast trading market too. I saw on the registration records there that Uncle went to Phoenix Mountain!"

Su Qingwan frowned.

"You went to the beast trading market just now?"

"That place is too chaotic, and all kinds of people go there. Don't go to places like that in the future!"

Knowing that Jiang Fan already knew about Ma Jiang's situation, Su Qingwan stopped hiding it and instead tried to reassure him in another way.

"It's fine!"

"Your uncle has a friend who's going out to hunt beasts and asked him for help!"

"He'll be back in a couple of days!"

Silence!

Although Jiang Fan knew Su Qingwan was lying, he couldn't say anything more at a time like this.

Ma Jiang had already set out. There was nothing they could do to change that.

"He'll definitely be fine!"

Jiang Fan seemed to be comforting Su Qingwan, but in truth, he was also giving himself confidence.

Jiang Fan ate another pot of rice, barely reaching the point of being eight-tenths full, before finally stopping.

"You're done eating, right? If you are, go to school this afternoon!"

"You didn't go to school this morning. You probably didn't ask for leave either, did you?"

"Now that you're feeling better, hurry up and greet your teacher!"

The moment Jiang Fan put down his chopsticks, Su Qingwan urged him on.

Jiang Fan had originally planned to continue cultivating at Thunder Martial Hall that afternoon, but seeing how urgently Su Qingwan was pressing him—and since he really did need to make an appearance at school—he could only agree.

Before she knew it, Jiang Fan had already vanished in a flash.

Su Qingwan shook her head helplessly.

"This child..."

Her gaze fell on the table, and fresh worry welled up in her heart!

Jiang Fan and Ma Ning were both in adolescence, the perfect age for building up their qi and blood.

If the family had good conditions, buying them some beast meat every day might nourish their qi and blood and even help them awaken successfully.

But now, the family relied on Ma Jiang alone to work on the patrol team. The money he earned was barely enough to support Ma Ning by herself.

Now that Jiang Fan had clearly fallen out with his family, if he stayed here too, they wouldn't just be unable to eat beast meat every day—even ordinary meals might become a problem!

What were they going to do?

At the thought of Ma Jiang, the worry clouding Su Qingwan's face deepened.

Before dawn today, Ma Jiang had already left to hunt beasts!

Now Jiang Fan's body had recovered, but Ma Jiang had already entered the mountains!

He was just an ordinary man. Although he worked on the patrol team and looked very sturdy, his seemingly formidable physique had been built entirely through body-tempering. In truth, his qi and blood had not even reached 1.

Going to Phoenix Mountain was extremely dangerous!

He was the only man in the family who earned money. If... something happened to him too, what would they do?

After leaving home, Jiang Fan slowed his pace and leisurely made his way toward the Inner City.

His school was Jiangcheng Third Martial Arts High School, located at the very edge of the Inner City.

Usually, only students with relatively poor middle-school entrance-exam results came here after having no hope of getting into First High School or Second High School.

The Jiang Family's poor treatment of Jiang Fan was not limited to his daily life; it extended to his studies as well!

With his scores back then, he had been more than qualified to enter First High School.

But Jiang Zhihe and his wife had secretly discussed it and sent him here instead.

At the time, he had not understood why.

It was only much later that he learned the two of them had accepted benefits from Jiangcheng Third High School, taking a reward the school had given to examinees.

"Animals are more humane than them!"

Jiang Fan cursed under his breath.

Granted, academic achievement still depended mainly on oneself.

But a school with better teachers naturally had teachers with richer teaching experience.

At First High School, even an ordinary Martial Arts class teacher might have the strength of a Level-Two Martial Artist.

If it was a head teacher or someone of that sort, they might even reach the level of a Level-Three Martial Artist.

They were highly experienced in cultivating martial arts and could better teach students to temper their qi and blood, increasing their chances of awakening.

But what could Third High School teach?

As far as he knew, its teachers, from top to bottom, were basically all below Level One.

They might not even understand what being a Martial Artist was themselves. How could they teach students?

At most, they could only parrot from the textbook!

Jiang Fan even suspected that his failure to awaken was because he had been held back here!

He crossed the school's main road.

The sounds of "Heh! Ha!" rang out endlessly from the squares on both sides!

Quite a few classes were probably taking Martial Arts lessons.

In this world, all high schools were named martial arts high schools.

Schools divided their curriculum into Martial Arts and cultural studies!

Martial Arts class, as its name suggested, taught the basic body-tempering techniques from True Explanation of Martial Arts and taught everyone to temper their qi and blood, with awakening and becoming a Martial Artist as the goal.

Cultural classes, meanwhile, taught knowledge related to martial arts, such as martial arts history, Beast Compendium, gene serums, and other subjects.

Although the two subjects each accounted for 50 percent of the college entrance examination, when it came to actual admissions, the major universities placed greater emphasis on Martial Arts results.

After all, in the current world, everyone below the level of a Martial Artist was nothing but an ant!

"The college entrance examination is almost here. Everyone, pull yourselves together!"

"This may be the only chance in your lives to change your fate! If you don't fight now, when will you?"

"Hardship lasts only for a while. Once you make it through this period, you'll have plenty of time to relax in the future!"

"Think about your parents. Do you really want to end up like them, ordinary people living at the bottom of society for your entire lives?"

"Becoming a Martial Artist... is your way out!"

"..."

"All right. Now let's review the origins of martial arts once more!"

"Lei Ming! You tell us!"

In a classroom at Third Martial Arts High School, a bespectacled, short, middle-aged man finished his rambling speech and called on someone.

In the back row, a burly boy built like an iron tower stood up nervously.

"Eight... eight hundred years ago, a gigantic meteor fell onto Blue Star... After that, Blue Star began to undergo mutations!"

"Phantoms appeared in the sky, cracks opened in the ground, and when the phantoms descended upon the earth and the cracks spread to the surface, beasts began to emerge..."

"Humanity's hot weapons were largely ineffective against the beasts. Countless towns fell, and the territory where people could live was compressed to less than one-tenth of the globe!"

"Six hundred years ago, Dr. Z invented the gene serum and joined forces with several hundred martial artists from around the world. Combining ancient jujutsu with ancient martial body-forging techniques, they compiled True Explanation of Martial Arts. Humanity entered the Martial Arts Age on a massive scale, and only then did the situation gradually turn around!"

"Three hundred years ago, humanity produced its first Level-Nine powerhouse. After that, he led the other powerhouses in sweeping through the towns, driving the beasts into the wastelands. Only then did humanity gain a place where it could live in peace!"

"Afterward, towns were established and technology was restored..."

Through the crack in the back door, Jiang Fan saw Lei Ming stammering through his answer. Finding a suitable moment, he quietly pushed the door open, bent down, and slipped inside.

He tiptoed to his seat. He had barely sat down and had not even had time to catch his breath when an angry shout rang out.

"Jiang Fan!"

"Stand up!"