Taking a Little Brother

"Hello, Qin Chen!"

Zhou Lei came up to Qin Chen and greeted him politely.

"And you are?" Qin Chen looked at him and asked, puzzled.

He hadn't spoken to a single student since entering the training camp, so he was a little surprised when the other boy suddenly called out to him.

"You might not remember, but when we were climbing the mountain, I asked which school you were from," Zhou Lei said with a smile.

Qin Chen thought for a moment, then nodded. He picked up a piece of meat and put it in his mouth. "Did you need something?"

"Uh..." Zhou Lei was at a loss. He had come over simply to get to know Qin Chen, and now he didn't know what to say.

After a moment of silence, he took a deep breath and looked at Qin Chen, who was eating. "I want to be your little brother."

After saying that, he lowered his head, not daring to look at Qin Chen.

Qin Chen looked up and smiled faintly. "You want to be my little brother? Other people see me as someone who got in through connections. If you become my little brother, aren't you afraid they'll gossip?"

Everyone at the training camp looked down on him now. If word got out that someone had approached him at a time like this and willingly become his little brother, everyone would surely despise that person.

Zhou Lei had thought Qin Chen would ignore him, but Qin Chen had responded. He quickly raised his head and said, "Other people don't know, but I certainly do. You relied entirely on your own strength. Besides, I'm not afraid of what other people think of me."

"Just like you. Other people think you got in through connections, but you never explain yourself, and you don't even deign to."

Zhou Lei greatly admired that about Qin Chen. Anyone else would surely have been unable to hold back from explaining themselves, but Qin Chen hadn't. It was as if he didn't take those people seriously at all, and whatever they said was just a joke.

"Good mindset." Qin Chen put down his chopsticks and smiled. "Taking a little brother isn't out of the question, but what do I get out of it?"

Zhou Lei was stunned. He thought that having someone as a little brother was a benefit in itself.

But Qin Chen didn't seem to care, leaving him at a loss for what to do.

"Whatever information you need in the future, I can ask around for you."

After thinking it over, he felt that was all he could do.

"Not bad. Then I'll give you a task right now. Find out what elemental cultivation rooms there are in this training camp, what other special cultivation rooms there are, and who's in charge of this training camp," Qin Chen said immediately.

These were things he was quite concerned about. The elemental cultivation rooms were tied to his breakthrough to martial artist.

The special cultivation rooms, meanwhile, were tied to increasing his strength. As for the person in charge of the training camp, he was simply curious.

"Well... I know that," Zhou Lei suddenly said.

"Hm?" Qin Chen looked at him in surprise.

"Well, I looked into it last night." Zhou Lei sounded a little embarrassed. "A distant relative of mine is in charge of miscellaneous tasks at this training camp. I asked him last night, and he told me everything he knew."

At that point, he lowered his voice and said quietly, "There are five elemental cultivation rooms in this training camp, one for each of the five elements."

"Actually, that's the standard setup. Elements outside the five elements are generally called special elements, and cultivation rooms for them are usually only available over in Yang City."

Qin Chen nodded at that. Yang City was a technology city, and Jiang Province's elemental cultivation rooms were all developed there. Special-element cultivation rooms were scarce to begin with, and not only were they slow to develop, but they were also slow to update.

The training camp required entirely new ones, so it was understandable that there were no special-element cultivation rooms this time.

"As for the other cultivation rooms, besides the gravity room and infrared room from previous camps, a combat room has been added this time. But its exact purpose isn't clear."

Zhou Lei spoke earnestly.

The gravity room and infrared room were easy enough to understand. The gravity room was simply a cultivation room with increased gravity, used to increase the pressure one could withstand.

The infrared room, or infrared cultivation room, was used to train movement techniques and physical agility.

The combat room had been set up for the first time. Judging by its name, it was a cultivation room for fighting opponents, but it was hard to say exactly what it involved.

"As for the person in charge you asked about, her name is Yang Xue. She's really something!"

Zhou Lei was clearly even more interested when he brought up Yang Xue. As if sharing a juicy piece of gossip, he said excitedly, "She also came out of the Genius Training Camp, and she ranked first in her class. After graduating from university, she joined the Western Theater Command. She's only in her thirties now, but she's already a senior colonel."

There was clear admiration in Zhou Lei's eyes. Reaching the rank of senior colonel wasn't just a matter of talent; one also had to perform great deeds on the front lines.

"Good, good!"

Qin Chen nodded in satisfaction. It would have taken him some time to learn all this himself, but now he had saved that time.

"Everyone, report to the training camp square within ten minutes. Anyone who's late will be eliminated!"

A voice suddenly rang out over the cafeteria's broadcast system. Everyone immediately put down their chopsticks and raced nonstop toward the square.

Qin Chen stood up as well, and Zhou Lei followed behind him.

A few minutes later, everyone had assembled in the square. Before long, a man and a woman in military uniforms walked over from a distance and stood before the crowd.

"My name is Luo Bin!" As soon as he arrived, Luo Bin spoke loudly. "This is the commander-in-chief of this training camp and your chief instructor, Senior Colonel Yang Xue!"

"She'll say a few words now."

Without any unnecessary chatter, everyone fell silent at once.

Yang Xue swept her gaze over the crowd. "First, congratulations to all of you on entering the training camp. Next, I'll explain the rules of your training."

"First, you'll earn points during training. Points have many uses, one of which is access to the various cultivation rooms."

"As for the other uses, you can discover them for yourselves!"

"The ways to earn points are also very simple. There are only two."

"First, either Lieutenant Colonel Luo Bin or I will evaluate your usual performance."

"Second, you can challenge someone who has points. If you win, their points are yours; if you lose, your points go to them. In every challenge, you wager all the points you have. Once your points reach zero, you'll be eliminated from the training camp!"

Everyone's expression changed at that. The first method was rather vague. With no standard in place, no one knew whether their performance would catch the eye of either evaluator.

As for the second method, a single loss meant certain elimination. That was unusually brutal.

"Instructor Yang, what restrictions are there on challenges?" someone suddenly asked.

Everyone's expression turned serious.

If there were no restrictions on such challenges, someone at Peak Body Tempering could challenge someone at Early Body Tempering. If the challenge couldn't be refused, the weaker cultivators among them would probably be eliminated very quickly.

"Good question!" Yang Xue smiled.

"For the sake of fairness, anyone challenging someone at a lower cultivation level must first challenge two opponents at the same level in succession. Only after winning both can they issue the challenge!"

"Those at a lower cultivation level may challenge those at a higher level as they please. The same goes for those at the same cultivation level!"

Everyone finally breathed a sigh of relief, especially those with lower cultivation levels.

This way, those with higher cultivation levels couldn't challenge them at will. After all, no one would dare casually attempt to defeat two opponents at the same level.

For example, Yu Yang and Xu Fei were the only ones at Peak Body Tempering. Neither had a chance to challenge anyone else, since they couldn't find two opponents.