In the Star Lord class at Xiūshé City Second High School, there were thirty-four students. Twenty-seven remained after reaching the passing mark of thirty minutes.
But then another wave of failures swept through the students who remained. In less than ten minutes, ten more students had to end their tests one after another.
Their vassals had passed the minimum mark but failed to last forty minutes, placing them below average. Most of them came from ordinary households and had refined the Spotted Snake Demon Core provided by the school. Their vassals were all ordinary Spotted Serpentfolk.
Still, their homeroom teacher, Teacher Du, carefully analyzed each student's performance in the test, pointing out their strengths and weaknesses and offering plenty of encouragement.
Their foundations were average, but they had plenty of room to improve. If they focused on making up ground over the next two months, they still had a chance to do better in the college entrance exams.
After all, every step forward in the exams might mean surpassing thousands, even tens of thousands, of people. That would be a tremendous advantage when they went on to cultivate at an academy.
Forty minutes in, seventeen students were still taking the test.
All seventeen had achieved at least an above-average score.
Unsurprisingly, fifteen of them had chosen not to use the Spotted Snake Demon Core provided by the school. Instead, they had used special Demon Cores bought by their families to cultivate special vassals.
The school and teachers had repeatedly stressed in their daily lessons that ordinary Spotted Serpentfolk vassals also had excellent prospects for growth. Even in this mock exam, Teacher Du, who was overseeing the test, had chosen Spotted Serpentfolk as his own vassals, demonstrating their potential to the students.
But there was no denying that, at the starting line, the special vassals chosen by the dozen or so students from wealthy and influential families were simply stronger than ordinary Spotted Serpentfolk.
What was more, anyone who could choose special vassals had no shortage of money to spend on cultivation. They had made ample preparations for their vassals, so it was hardly surprising that they achieved far better results in the test than ordinary students with ordinary Spotted Serpentfolk vassals.
If they lost to ordinary Spotted Serpentfolk vassals belonging to ordinary students, that would be the real surprise. Otherwise, all the Spirit Stones and resources their families had poured into them would have been wasted.
Though every Star Lord had the potential to become a Sage, some people simply started higher and advanced faster, while others started lower and moved more slowly, having to take a few more steps than their peers.
But whether they could make it to the end and ascend to Sainthood did not necessarily depend on how high they started or how quickly they advanced.
Some gained the lead with a single step and stayed ahead at every turn, charging ahead like a tempest all the way to the First-Rank Celestial realm. But far more people advanced steadily, taking one step at a time until they slowly reached the Celestial realm.
The choices, gains, and losses all came down to one's personal cultivation.
Teacher Du swept his gaze across the seventeen remaining test projections, then pointed at one and enlarged it, displaying it before the dozen or so students in the classroom who had already finished.
The image showed the vassals of Xu Hong, one of their classmates, still taking part in the test. They, too, were ordinary Spotted Serpentfolk, but had lasted until now.
Of the seventeen students, fifteen had special vassals. The other two were Liang Ji, with his mutated Half-Dragonfolk, and Xu Hong, with his Spotted Serpentfolk.
At that moment, Xu Hong's Spotted Serpentfolk had dwindled to fewer than two hundred in the test arena, while Teacher Du's Spotted Serpentfolk, the group they were being tested against, still numbered over ninety.
It was clear that Xu Hong's Spotted Serpentfolk had inflicted very few casualties on the teacher's vassals during the test.
Still, Teacher Du had singled out Xu Hong's test and praised him loudly. "Xu Hong's vassals have performed very well in this test."
"His vassals are Spotted Serpentfolk, too, and they're equipped with the simplest Rune Artifact shields and Rune Artifact sabers, just like many of yours."
"Why have they lasted this long?"
"Look closely at how his vassals fight: their tactical arrangements, use of the terrain, and coordination. Then compare their performance with that of your own vassals and see where the difference lies."
"From the very start, I made it clear that your score in this mock exam would be based on how long your vassals lasted, not how many enemies they killed."
"But some of you fought without any tactics at all. Your vassals were a complete mess, and you insisted on clashing head-on with the teacher's vassals. What, did you think you could beat mine in a straight fight?"
"If you could beat them like that, wouldn't all my years of cultivation have gone to the dogs?"
"How could I still have the face to be your teacher?"
Pointing at the image of Xu Hong's vassals taking the test, Teacher Du used the fighting on display to teach the class.
As he did, Xu Hong's vassals in the test arena finally reached their limit. They had barely lasted past forty-five minutes when their test ended.
At nearly the same time, four other students failed and had to end their tests.
Then, between the forty-five- and fifty-minute marks, four more students failed in succession.
That left nine students with scores between forty and fifty minutes, which counted as above average.
Teacher Du analyzed each of their performances in turn, pointing out their strengths and weaknesses.
These students had achieved above-average scores on solid foundations. As long as they made up for their shortcomings, most of them would do well in the college entrance exams, and some might even make it into Penglai Star Palace to study and cultivate.
At that moment, the vassals of eight students were still taking the test in the arena.
Eight screens appeared in midair, showing Peng Yue, Fang Xiaohan, Wang Zhihe, Bai Lingling, and the others. Most of the class knew they came from Star Lord families or from the city's wealthy and powerful households. Their daily cultivation had already shown them to be far ahead of their peers, so no one was surprised to see them still competing.
The one who truly astonished everyone and drew the most attention was Liang Ji, whose vassals' test was shown in a starry projection.
Of the eight students, Liang Ji was the only one from an ordinary household. When he had refined his Demon Core, he had used an ordinary First-Order Spotted Snake Demon Core provided by the school.
Moreover, in class and during their daily cultivation, Liang Ji had never stood out. He was a quiet, almost invisible presence. Some of his classmates might not even have known his name.
His only noteworthy performance had probably been during the earlier trial. But the trial had not been made public, nor had it been impressive enough for the school or teachers to promote.
So perhaps he had earned a little recognition among the top Star Lord students from Xiūshé City who had taken part in the trial with him, and perhaps he had even been able to attract the Yun Family's attention and an offer to join them.
But among the more than forty students in the Star Lord class at Xiūshé City Second High School, few had likely paid him any attention.
And even those few had probably only noticed him because of Peng Yue and Fang Xiaohan.
After all, the three of them were quite close in class.
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