"There really was one."
He had only tried on the off chance.
And he had actually found one.
It was just that the amount...
seemed a little stingy.
A faint glimmer flashed.
A pristine white crystal, no bigger than a fingernail, appeared in Chen Ming's hand.
"This is the rare resource?"
Sun Yang immediately leaned over, curious, and examined it closely.
"Why does it... not feel like anything special?"
The rare resources he'd imagined were the sort of glowing treasures that looked like "heavenly materials and earthly treasures."
What Chen Ming held felt like an ordinary little crystal.
Was this really a rare resource?
"How could the really good stuff be easy to recognize?"
Chen Ming couldn't see what was special about this [Mind Crystal], either.
After collecting his rewards, Chen Ming entered the Guild building.
He went to a counter.
"Hello. Are you selling beast cores?"
The young woman behind the counter glanced at him, her tone indifferent.
"Yeah."
Chen Ming took out a bulging bag.
He'd just received the ten gold coins from the Grand Exam rewards, but there was no such thing as having too much money.
There'd be plenty of things to spend it on in the future.
Clatter—
Beast cores of various sizes rolled out.
Seventeen in total.
"1,700. Have a nice day."
The woman glanced at the number and spoke without looking up.
At the same time, she reached out to collect the beast cores.
"Hold on."
Chen Ming said unhurriedly, "Take another careful look."
The woman furrowed her brows and gave Chen Ming an impatient glance.
"What's there to look at? They're just seventeen Level 1..."
"Huh?"
Her expression changed as she realized something was off.
These beast cores didn't look like Level 1 cores?
She hurriedly picked them up one by one to inspect them, sweeping them with her mental power.
"Level 2 Spike Roller Beast, Level 2 Flying Leaf Rat core... Level 3 Red Tusk Boar, Level 3 Triangle Lizard, Level 3 Earth Rat core..."
The more she looked, the more astonished she became.
"And a Level 4 Two-Headed Rattlesnake!"
Aside from one Level 1 Spike Roller Beast core, the whole pile was made up of Level 2 and Level 3 cores!
And there was even a Level 4 core.
Wasn't today only the first day of the Grand Exam?
What was going on?
During the Grand Exam, Class Changers taking part in the trial couldn't team up with people who weren't taking it to level up.
In other words, this person standing before her had hunted all these beasts himself.
Hunting a Level 4 Exotic Beast on the first day?
What a monster.
"Sorry. Let me recalculate the price for you."
The woman immediately changed her tune.
"That comes to 4,500."
Chen Ming nodded, then asked, "How much for four Strength Rune Stones?"
"Attribute Rune Stones are 1,000 each, so that'll be 4,000. Would you like to buy them?" the young woman replied patiently.
What a rip-off.
He remembered that the Guild only paid 600 for an Attribute Rune Stone. Reselling them nearly doubled the price.
"Here are your four Strength Rune Stones and 500. Have a nice day."
Seven-thirty in the evening.
Chen Ming finally returned home.
A home all to himself.
In his memories... his family in this life had died in a beast tide ten years ago.
"Beep."
Chen Ming opened the door, changed his shoes out of habit, and took a shower.
After a whole day fighting Exotic Beasts, a strange, bloody smell clung to him.
After dinner, Chen Ming lay on his bed to rest.
His stamina hadn't dropped below 10% all day.
In fact, he had almost completely recovered by now.
So he felt almost no physical fatigue.
But mentally, he was exhausted.
Although Chen Ming had no active skills that required mental power, he had spent nearly the whole day fighting.
He'd used up quite a lot all the same.
Taking advantage of the brief rest, he pulled out his phone and checked the latest news about today's Grand Exam.
The Grand Exam was the most talked-about event during this month of the year, and related trending topics had practically taken over the entire internet.
Chen Ming opened the Cloud Sea City section.
The first trending topic that caught his eye—
[Shocking! At 18:00, Cloud Sea City released the first-day level rankings, and the results were unexpected!]
[C-Rank Shield Guard Class Changer Chen Ming gained two levels on the first day of the Grand Exam, ranking second in the first-day level rankings!]
The second—
[Shocking! Qin Zhixue, an SS-Rank Holy Radiance Angel Class Changer, has confirmed she's teaming up with Chen Ming, trending across the entire United States!]
The third—
[Examining the connection between the first- and second-place finishers on day one! The two may have already confirmed their relationship...]
"What even is all this?"
Chen Ming stared at the screen, speechless.
The top three trending topics across the entire city were all about him?
Did these people have nothing better to do?
Couldn't they pay attention to something that actually mattered?
All they did was dig up gossip...
Chen Ming glanced at the notifications from the group chat on his phone. A bunch of people were hounding him about his relationship with Qin Zhixue.
Others wanted to join the Morning Light Squad.
Ignoring them, Chen Ming opened the trending topics for the entire Alliance.
[SS-Rank Prophet, Master Azure Sky, makes a prophecy: Blue Star has entered a special turning point in history, and the future will be an age of heroes...]
To his surprise, the number one trending topic across the whole internet wasn't about the Grand Exam at all, but a prophecy.
Curious, Chen Ming tapped it to read more.
Master Azure Sky was a heavyweight figure in the Huaxia Alliance. Rumor had it that he made a "Great Prophecy" once every ten years.
Each one caused a huge stir.
They even drew the attention of every Alliance on Blue Star.
Who would dare dismiss the importance of an SS-Rank Prophet's Great Prophecy, made only once every ten years?
A short while later, Chen Ming finished reading the trending post about the future age.
What surprised him was that it wasn't just clickbait.
This time, the "Great Prophecy" had two main points.
One was that Class Changers would awaken more and more high-level classes in the future, and that more geniuses would emerge, ushering in an age where the finest gathered together.
Well, that was a classic line...
Whenever it involved major Alliance events, everything was always on the rise.
Besides, Chen Ming had no idea how many people across the Alliance had changed classes this year.
"Blue Star might make contact with an interstellar civilization in the future?"
That was the second point, and the most explosive part of Master Azure Sky's prophecy this time.
"That sounds like a bit of a stretch."
Chen Ming wasn't entirely convinced.
When it came to exploring the stars, Blue Star was even less advanced than the world he'd lived in during his previous life.
This world was overrun by Exotic Beasts and full of dangers. Even the sky contained things like dungeons and mysterious regions.
The Exotic Beast Airspace and Exotic Beast Ocean were even more terrifying than the Exotic Beast Forest.
The people of Blue Star had no chance to explore the stars.
They still had plenty of work to do developing their own civilization. Why talk about a civilization among the stars?
But when Chen Ming glanced at the other trending topics, he fell silent.
[After thirty years, the Huaxia Alliance has produced another SSS-Rank Class Changer! An unparalleled pair of prodigies, one man and one woman!]
[A massive "Star Dungeon" may have been discovered in Kunshan City, Xishu Province! The Alliance has now intervened in full force...]
[Two SS-Rank Class Changers have awakened in Jiangnan Province and Shuanghe Province, drawing the Alliance's attention...]
[The Lighthouse Alliance claims it has made contact with an extraterrestrial civilization and may lead the future of all Blue Star...]
"How are these trending topics so similar to the two points in the prophecy?"
Was this some new way to capitalize on a hot topic?
Chen Ming shook his head and didn't dwell on it.
These things were still a long way off for him...
Even if he cared, it wasn't his place to get involved.
Before you continue