Look What I Found!

Perhaps due to the stacking effect of his transmigrator soul, even among fellow sixth-rank Martial Apprentices, Ji Ruo's reaction speed was slightly faster than the others.

Moreover, having lived two lives, Ji Ruo's life experience alone surpassed that of these ordinary high school students. So even if his actions sometimes seemed childish in pursuit of triggering achievements, he never let his guard down.

The moment those green shadows burst from the grass, Ji Ruo was the first to spot them and the first to counterattack.

Due to their positioning, the green shadows' primary target was Liu Neng—and Liu Neng had his back to them.

"Watch out!"

Ji Ruo shouted in a low voice, shoving Liu Neng aside. Then he activated the Basic Movement Technique, twisting and dodging as his palms flushed red and struck out in rapid succession!

Iron Sand Palm!

The green shadows were fast, but Ji Ruo was faster!

In the span of a breath, five palms lashed out, each one precisely hitting a green shadow's head. The Iron Sand Palm, at the proficient level, shattered all five skulls on contact, killing them instantly.

Iron Sand Palm was no joke!

The five green shadows died almost simultaneously. Ji Ruo reached out and snatched them up—hunted Monster Beasts counted toward Martial Exam scores, after all!

"Emerald Snake?"

Ji Ruo raised an eyebrow, recognizing the creatures at a glance.

His original self had studied diligently, and after taking over, Ji Ruo was no slouch either. He had the high school-level Monster Beast illustrated guide memorized front to back.

Liu Neng was initially annoyed at being shoved aside without warning—he'd nearly stumbled and fallen. But after seeing Ji Ruo kill the Emerald Snakes, gratitude replaced his irritation.

If Ji Ruo hadn't reacted so quickly, he might have taken a few bites.

But Ji Ruo didn't hesitate. He growled, "Forget the thanks—run!"

The so-called Emerald Snake wasn't really a proper Monster Beast; it was more of a low-tier nuisance.

It carried paralytic neurotoxin, moved at decent speed, and excelled at Camouflage.

A lone snake or even a few of them were nothing to a sixth-rank Martial Apprentice with a proficient-level Iron Sand Palm like Ji Ruo.

But these things lived in groups. Five snakes didn't count as a group.

And right here, you could see the difference in everyone's grasp of basic knowledge.

The moment Ji Ruo recognized the Emerald Snakes, he bolted. Liang Shixian hesitated for a second, then followed suit.

Liu Neng and Zhang Quan stood frozen, confused about why their newly met classmates from Cloud City were running.

Then they saw the horrifying sight.

The entire patch of grass began trembling violently. Hundreds of Emerald Snakes rose from the turf, their cold serpentine eyes fixed on the group, tongues flicking. The terrifying hissing sound made everyone's scalp crawl.

"Run toward the lighter grass!" Ji Ruo shouted.

In that instant, the surrounding vegetation started shaking wildly. Countless Emerald Snakes poured out from the darker side of the grass, and from the tree canopies as well.

These creatures were actually using the environment to mislead humans!

As he fled, Ji Ruo took a moment to scan the terrain.

So much for distinguishing direction by grass color—this was all the same damn shade! Where was the difference?

Liu Neng and Zhang Quan were a step slower. The tide of Emerald Snakes was closing in behind them.

"Follow me!"

Ji Ruo spun around and struck out with his palms, pushing the Iron Sand Palm to its limit. Both hands glowed an even deeper red. Even the snakes instinctively recoiled just from getting close.

Under the proficient-level Iron Sand Palm, the temperature of his bare palms was so high that even these cold-blooded creatures felt an instinctive aversion.

Ji Ruo didn't bother trying to kill many—he couldn't finish them all anyway.

Seeing the Emerald Snakes' numbers swell, Ji Ruo didn't linger. He turned and ran.

All of them were high school seniors preparing for the college entrance exam, with an average rank of sixth-grade Martial Apprentice. At full sprint, these low-tier Emerald Snakes couldn't keep up. They could only watch helplessly as the four ran farther and farther away.

An hour later.

The four finally burst out of the woods.

In the heat of the crisis, they hadn't had time to check their direction, and now they were lost.

But no one cared about that at the moment. As they gasped for breath, all of them felt a wave of relief at having survived.

"Ji, Ji Ruo... thanks for earlier."

Liu Neng and Zhang Quan panted heavily, speaking with gratitude.

They were strangers thrown together by chance—fellow exam-takers, but not from the same school. Neither of them had expected Ji Ruo to turn back and save them in that situation.

"Hah... we're teammates now. Teammates look out for each other," Ji Ruo said.

He'd actually been hoping to trigger an achievement. He'd even thought of the name: "Saving Two Lives Beats Building a Fourteen-Story Pagoda."

The result didn't trigger. A bit of a pity.

"Class monitor, which way should we go next?" Ji Ruo asked.

Liang Shixian looked around, sighed, and said, "I don't know either. The direction-finding methods the school taught us are useless for now."

Behind them in the forest, the Emerald Snakes had already gone back into hiding. The green of the vegetation had once again become one side dark, one side light.

But after what had just happened, everyone knew that the darker side was actually where the Emerald Snakes were lurking.

Zhang Quan timidly raised his hand and said, "How about we just wait here? I was a bit scared just now, so I already activated the rescue device."

Ji Ruo: "?"

You ran all the way out here, and now you say you activated the rescue device?

Liu Neng also said somewhat awkwardly, "Mine too."

Ji Ruo and Liang Shixian looked at their wristwatches, which displayed a message: 'Distress signal sending. Please ensure your personal safety as much as possible.'

Ji Ruo: "."

Activated it was, but the Ten Thousand Beast Mountain Secret Realm was too vast. Even though the martial artists serving as proctors and rescue personnel had all opened their Qi Vessels and surpassed normal human limits, they couldn't reach every distress signal location instantly.

Generally speaking, if the situation was truly critical, activating this device was actually not very useful.

From what Ji Ruo knew, in past years' Martial Exams, the rescue personnel's most common task was collecting the students' corpses.

Even after the exam grounds had been cleared once by powerful martial artists, countless dangers still remained.

So the Martial Exam death rate stayed high.

But there was no helping it.

Martial artists had to undergo the baptism of blood before they could stand on their own.

Facing countless alien races, demons, and Monster Beasts, humanity could barely take care of itself. A safe, injury-free college entrance exam was impossible in the short term.

Zhang Quan said apologetically, "Sorry, we were too scared at the time and activated it on instinct. But don't worry, only ours went off. You two still have your exam qualifications. When the proctor comes, they'll only take us away. It won't affect you."

Liu Neng also said, "Yeah, do you want to wait with us? We've already lost our exam qualifications, and since we're all lost now, when the proctor arrives, we can ask them for directions for you."

Ji Ruo and Liang Shixian looked at each other.

"Alright, we'll wait with you."

But no one noticed that the information on Liu Neng's and Zhang Quan's wristwatches had always been 'Distress signal sending,' with no change and no indication of who was coming to rescue them.

This was everyone's first time taking the Martial Exam, and they weren't familiar with the rescue device. The school teachers only said to find a safe place and wait patiently after activating it.

Suddenly, Ji Ruo's eyes lit up.

"Look what I found!"

The others were startled and all looked in the direction Ji Ruo was staring.

Ji Ruo was already walking that way with sparkling eyes.

Then they saw Ji Ruo bend down and pick up a wooden stick, looking very happy.

Liang Shixian asked curiously, "Ji Ruo, what are you picking that up for?"

"Class monitor, look how straight this stick is!"

Ji Ruo struck a pose with a proud look and said, "It's like a sword. Look at me, handsome or what?"

The others: "???"

You're already carrying a real sword on your back!

Liang Shixian said helplessly, "Ji Ruo, you... can't you read the room? Can you stop being so childish?"

But Ji Ruo softly hummed a tune: "I don't want to, I don't want to~ grow up~ The world after growing up~ has no fairy tales~"

The others: "."