Both the Federation's attention and the Empire's raids demonstrated how special and important awakened individuals were.
Something without value would never attract plunderers.
As an important human resource, if the situation became critical and the enemy could no longer be stopped, would the Federation prefer to let awakened individuals be taken by the Empire and become future enemies, or simply let them die in the Ancient Wilderness now? There was no need even to consider it.
Wen Jing was not part of the Federation's ruling class, like the children of plutocrats. If Tainuo intended to trick everyone into dying in the Ancient Wilderness, she might as well go with the flow and let the Empire take her, switch to another human faction, and not have to repay her life loan.
Wait... put that way, it was a little tempting.
During their brief standoff, some of the quicker-witted freshmen also looked thoughtful.
At last, the initial pressure in Tainuo's gaze disappeared, replaced by a faint regret-it was a shame she only had F-rank potential.
Then he withdrew his gaze and looked at the crowd before him.
"If you're conscripted in the future, you may encounter the Empire's awakened on galactic battlefields. I can tell you clearly right now: if the Empire takes you now, you won't die. They will indeed recruit and train you."
"But don't think that's a good thing. All the Empire's awakened are puppets of alien nobles! If the awakened there don't regularly seek out a noble for mental guidance, they go mad and rapidly die of genetic collapse."
Tainuo's words drew a wave of gasps. Along with her surprise, Wen Jing could not help silently snarking, There's even a Guide-Sentinel System involved?
"Instructors from Ochre Soil Academy are already on their way to reinforce us. The Ancient Wilderness is dangerous at night, but you're not going in to explore. Once you're inside, your objective is to find somewhere safe and immediately use the algorithm to anchor your spatial coordinates and return."
"Your compatibility is only 1%. Even returning from where you stand will take at least five minutes, which is enough time for us to deal with the enemy and receive you."
"Also, the algorithm I'm teaching you under my temporary authorization is considerably more precise than the free algorithm the academy teaches. It's essentially an intermediate algorithm for free..."
"Consider for yourselves which path to take. Anyone unwilling to enter the Ancient Wilderness should leave the protective barrier now."
Naturally, no one left.
Judging by the attitudes of the plutocrats' children present, Tainuo probably had not concealed anything about the Empire.
"Good. Everyone, look into my eyes!"
The moment Tainuo finished speaking, the defensive barrier around them abruptly shrank. The faces of the personal guards beside him flushed red as they strained to maintain it.
An uncanny blue light suddenly burst from his eyes, becoming marks that landed in the eyes of every student looking at him.
Everyone cooperated meticulously.
Algorithms were as indispensable to the awakened as foundational cultivation techniques were to cultivators.
Because of the difference in energy levels between the material universe and the Ancient Wilderness, awakened individuals could enter the Ancient Wilderness with a single thought, but returning to the material universe was different.
The Ancient Wilderness was a constantly changing, multilayered space. A position corresponding to the material universe one moment would differ enormously the next. Without an algorithm to calculate their spatial destination, even if they immediately "returned the way they came" after entering, they would end up millions of miles away.
Choosing a random destination to return to was even more terrifying. Whether they emerged in space hundreds of millions of light-years away or fell into a star and instantly vaporized, either was highly likely.
After all, environments where humans could safely survive were the real miracles in the vast universe.
The instant she came into contact with the mark from Tainuo's gaze, Wen Jing's mind buzzed, and a body of knowledge she had never encountered appeared out of nowhere-
Military Algorithm Type II... Lite Edition.
"Enter the Ancient Wilderness!" Tainuo barked.
As the defensive barrier contracted completely, the thousand-plus freshmen present vanished in swaths.
There was no discomfort, nor any special transit effects.
The next instant, Wen Jing was already in another world.
Chapter 7
For all awakened individuals, their first entry into the Ancient Wilderness was also when they learned what their wilderness body looked like in full.
The phantom imprinted using Ancient Wilderness materials when they awakened only allowed them to roughly distinguish their wilderness body's type.
Only once their compatibility reached over 60% could the awakened transform their human bodies into wilderness bodies in the universe.
Conversely, they could not transform into human bodies to move around in the Ancient Wilderness, because its energy level was too high. Fragile human bodies simply did not meet the standards for material composition here.
So only now did Wen Jing discover that her insect body... did not even have eyes!
As an Ancient Wilderness life-form, she could use the energy evenly distributed throughout her body to construct an image of her insect form in her mind-
It was spindle-shaped overall, with six legs and a covering of scales like a silverfish's. These scales were essentially her exoskeleton.
There were no eyes on her head, only a pair of pits. She had no antennae, but there were short bristles on either side of her mouthparts.
Its size was difficult to judge, but with all her attributes at 0.01, her body probably could not be very large.
Strangely, despite having lost her five human senses, Wen Jing felt no bewilderment or helplessness. She instinctively knew how to observe the world through her insect body.
The pair of pits on her head were heat-sensitive pits that could faintly distinguish light, darkness, and radiation.
The bristles beside her mouthparts could gather certain chemicals and pheromones from the air.
Her six legs could sense sound and vibrations.
This information reached her brain and combined with her human consciousness, ultimately presenting a strange perspective that was blurry yet filled with biological instinct.
But before she could gain any further insights, warnings of "danger, extreme danger, doubly extreme danger" began popping up one after another.
It was like a radar centered on her, covered entirely in red dots of varying sizes representing danger.
She instinctively knew that encountering any one of them would kill her!
Even more terrifyingly, an "extreme danger" was rapidly approaching her position.
Wen Jing's "slender feet" instinctively moved to the side. The hooked claws at the ends of her six legs were specifically designed for climbing, allowing her to clear the obstacles scattered around her, each about the same size as her, in a single movement.
If these obstacles were pebbles... just how small was her wilderness body?
Both the exponentially increasing vibrations she sensed and her brief assessment of her size made her recognize with absolute clarity that her current movement speed stood no chance against the source of danger.
How could she escape?
"Add points! Put 100 points straight into speed!" Wen Jing shouted urgently in her mind. This was no time to plan her point allocation carefully.
The next moment, the panel returned a message:
[Please provide an evolutionary direction]
"...Fuck!"
Wen Jing had never encountered anything like this in the past eighteen years.
The danger was upon her. Through the vibrations her body sensed, she pictured a towering pillar more than a dozen times her size about to descend from above.
At that critical moment, she felt every hormone in her body being secreted wildly, while all her energy instinctively gathered toward the rear of her abdomen...
Suddenly, her segmented abdomen curled up. An organ hidden inside one of the middle segments activated, unleashing a springing force far beyond her normal crawling speed!
Whoosh-
A pitch-black wolf-like creature charged past, its paws wreathed in black mist pushing off the ground and sending gravel and dust flying in its wake.
A strangely shaped bird with mottled plumage stood in a clearing.
Illuminated by blue fire farther away whose exact nature was unknown, it surveyed its surroundings warily with golden eyes. An uncanny power surged through its body, which appeared to be gradually turning transparent.
Suddenly, as though sensing something, annoyance flashed through its eyes. The uncanny power around it had to stop, and it flapped its wings instead, generating a whirlwind beneath it as it took flight.
But it was still a moment too late.
The next instant, the wolf-like creature, seemingly darker than the night itself, attacked. Its red-glowing eyes held no emotion as it charged straight into the whirlwind.
The distant blue fire suddenly flickered, growing brighter.
The black wolf's body abruptly collapsed like liquid, dropping into a true "wolf's shadow" on the ground.
Riiip...
The wolf's shadow, transformed from three dimensions into two, bared its fangs and viciously bit into the bird's... shadow.
Though it was clearly the shadow being bitten, the colorful bird already airborne let out a shrill scream at the same instant and fell helplessly to the ground.
The wolf's shadow rose from the ground, becoming a black wolf, and devoured the bird's body completely once more.
Dodged it!
Wen Jing shouted inwardly. At the crucial moment, her insect body's innate lifesaving leap had saved her from being crushed directly beneath the giant pillar.
But immediately afterward, the fierce wind raised by the other creature's high-speed movement swept her into the air.
Clang, clang, clang...
Falling, bouncing, falling... She felt like a stone skipping across water. Under the powerful impacts of the reactive force, she bounced back and forth four times before finally coming to rest.
She had only avoided being smashed to death because she had remained curled up, letting the exoskeleton on her back take the greatest impact.
That was close. I survived...
The tiny silver-gray insect slowly unfolded her body in a gap between the pebbles.
If Wen Jing had been merely an insect, all she could have known was that she had just successfully escaped an "extremely dangerous" creature.
But she also possessed a human's perspective and experience, allowing her to fill in more information that an insect's perspective could not comprehend-
An unknown creature had run past her. It might have been a creature of the Ancient Wilderness, or it might have been one of the thousand-plus freshmen who had entered at the same time as her.
Whether the former or the latter, any creature even slightly larger than her was dangerous to her.