Chapter 15 (continued)
When Li Yang heard the announcement, she perked right up.
What?!
They were taking down the isolation walls?!
Countless little shrubs, scruffy little flowers, and shabby little weeds flashed through Li Yang's mind. She had thought the harvest was over, but she hadn't expected more little bits of life to come waving at her.
As for the points ranking, Li Yang only needed to make the top twenty. She had no desire to take first place.
What good was first place?
It would only stir up jealousy and resentment for no reason.
She was just an ordinary citizen and had no wish to provoke the young masters and misses of those Star Wielder families.
Fang Chuyun and Yu Hongyuan were already rich and distinguished as far as she was concerned, yet students from backgrounds like theirs were everywhere in the provincial capital.
The hierarchy of classes in this world was far crueler than in her previous life.
Ideally, Li Yang wanted to scrape into the top twenty and quietly earn the right to choose her own school. That would be enough...
But now... oh well, things had come to this, and there was no use dwelling on it.
Besides, even if she could do it all over again, Li Yang would still harvest the Gradeless mutated plants.
She wouldn't give up the little bits of life within her grasp.
Once her life was gone, what did any of that matter? Even if the Heavenly King himself came, she would still have to take a gamble.
Li Yang glanced at the rankings again and decided to let the broken jar shatter. She wasn't afraid of getting a few more points. There were four hours left, and she was going to keep sweeping up Gradeless mutated plants!
Li Yang took out her hand-drawn map and studied it carefully.
She had covered all of Group 8's area over the previous two days, so naturally she knew where the isolation walls were.
There was one in each of the four directions, though she wasn't sure which group each one led to.
Still, every group's area ought to have plenty of Gradeless plants, so it didn't matter where she went!
After working out her route, Li Yang rushed toward the isolation wall on her left.
In the main control room.
The main screen still displayed the situation in each group. The sound from the rescue devices had been switched back on, and a noisy clamor once again filled the room.
"Damn! You get points for killing Gradeless mutated plants too!"
"That Li Yang is such a dog! How did she even think of killing Gradeless mutated plants?!"
"Most Gradeless mutated plants are in the safe zones. She must've had such an easy time farming those points!"
Hearing the candidates' muttering, the chief examiner sneered and said, "Naive."
The other examiners weren't necessarily as perceptive as the chief examiner, and they still had their doubts.
Had the chief examiner really set the points too high...?
If Gradeless ones were worth two points...
It felt like a lot of people's scores were about to shoot up...
Would Donghua Province make a laughingstock of itself with this assessment...?
Clearly, after learning how Li Yang had scored 200 points, the candidates were itching to try their hands at killing Gradeless mutated plants.
First Grade mutated creatures were highly aggressive, and killing one alone carried considerable risk.
Yet killing a Low Stage one only earned five points. To have a real shot at the top twenty, they would have to kill at least four or five.
One wrong move could get them eliminated on the spot.
But Gradeless mutated creatures carried no such risk. For one thing, they all lurked in the safe zones. For another, they were Gradeless... so they had to be weak. One stroke of the blade meant two points, so why not?
With that thought in mind, the candidates began sharpening their knives for the Gradeless creatures.
On the main screen, candidates in every area were searching the safe zones for Gradeless mutated creatures. But... in less than half an hour, they were drenched in sweat.
One candidate had wandered around a safe zone for half an hour, staring until his eyes were about to pop out, yet he still hadn't found a single Gradeless mutated creature. He muttered, "Where is it? Where is it? Where the hell is it, damn it?!"
Another candidate, driven to fury, started hacking wildly at the bushes. As it turned out, he really did disturb a Gradeless shrub.
This shrub was the mutated plant Li Yang had named the ugly shrub. It suddenly sprang up, its leaves turning into blades that shot at the candidate with a swish, swish, swish. Fortunately, the candidate had 84 points in physique and reacted quickly enough to duck, saving his eyes from injury.
The ugly shrub wasn't about to let him off. It charged forward and sank its teeth into his calf. The candidate shrieked in pain and swung his long saber wildly, only to disturb a sleeping Gradeless frog.
The frog leaped up and sprayed poisonous mist at him...
This time, the candidate couldn't dodge. His head spun, and even his face turned green!
Scenes like this played out everywhere on the big screen in the main control room. The candidates were either cursing because they couldn't find any Gradeless mutated creatures, or hacking about and provoking mutated creatures that left them at a loss.
Of course, some candidates with outstanding combat abilities successfully dealt with Gradeless mutated plants, only to sigh, "These things aren't easy to kill either."
The 100 plants Li Yang had killed by hand had given them a huge misconception. In reality, Gradeless mutated creatures were nowhere near as easy to kill as they had imagined.
Even those capable of killing Gradeless creatures felt that two points weren't worth the effort.
In the time it took to kill two, they could kill a First Grade Low Stage creature, which was worth five points.
The only advantage was that it was relatively safer.
But the problem was that time waited for no one!
With bad luck, they might not find a single Gradeless creature in half an hour. With less than four hours left in total, candidates hoping to farm points from Gradeless creatures could forget about making the top twenty.
An hour later, all the candidates who had questioned Li Yang were filled with respect.
How on earth had she found 100 Gradeless mutated plants?! That alone was enough to stump ninety percent of the candidates!
In the main control room, the examiners who witnessed all this were utterly convinced by the chief examiner. She truly deserved to be the chief examiner; the points she had assigned were the most reasonable!
Li Yang knew nothing of any of this. After reaching the new area, she used the perception granted by her 90 spirit points to quickly locate the Gradeless mutated plants hidden in the safe zones.
Crack! Down came her axe!
Li Yang skillfully harvested one and happily gained a month of life.
The only regret was that the safe spots were far apart, and each safe zone contained a limited number of hidden Gradeless mutated plants. She spent most of her time traveling.
Along the way, Li Yang also encountered other candidates gathered in groups. It wasn't that they hadn't thoroughly read the Entry Instructions; they had deliberately gathered together to lure out mutated creatures and gain points quickly.
Li Yang learned from them which group's area this was.
"Group 7..." Li Yang made a mental note. "Then the other side is Group 6..."
Li Yang set herself a modest goal: "I'll try to finish sweeping through Group 6."
Averaging two hours per group, she would skip the safe zones tucked away in remote corners and take the most efficient route to clear out as many Gradeless plants as possible!
As luck would have it, her muttering was picked up on the main control room's screen.
The examiners: "..." You're really getting into this!
But no one would question her score anymore. This kid's spirit stat was definitely very high; otherwise, she couldn't possibly detect Gradeless mutated plants so precisely, like a radar scanning the area.
A physique stat of 90, and if her spirit stat was also above 80...
Then she truly was a once-in-a-decade monstrous talent!
On the screen, another person drawing a great deal of attention was Zhong Qian of Group 3. He was a member of the Zhong Family, a powerful family entrenched in Donghua Province that had produced many important figures over the years.
Zhong Qian was also the most outstanding child of his generation and had made something of a name for himself even in the Central Capital.
At that moment, he stared at the rankings, his already stern face now utterly expressionless.
He was in second place.
A full 80 points behind first.
Zhong Qian stared for a full three minutes before closing the projected screen expressionlessly and racing toward the isolation wall on his right.
All the First Grade mutated creatures in Group 3's area had been wiped out. He wasn't going to kill any Gradeless mutated plants; he was going after the one and only Second Grade mutated creature.
As long as he killed the Second Grade mutated creature, he would earn a full 100 points.
First place was his!
Lin Zhaoqin of Group 5 was also looking at the rankings. At first, she swore in displeasure when she saw she was third. Then, on seeing that Zhong Qian was second, she beamed and swore again. "You dog, your day has finally come."
Finally, she saw the lofty score of the person in first place...
Lin Zhaoqin: "Holy fucking shit!"
Who was this?
Li Yang?
She was a whole hundred points ahead of her?!
After seeing Zhong Qian's score, Lin Zhaoqin had originally wanted to fight for a better ranking, but she instantly gave up. There was no need for her to go to the trouble; someone had already hammered Zhong Qian flat.
Most of the candidates in the top ten knew which groups the others were in, but no one knew which group Li Yang was in, much less what she looked like.
Fang Chuyun and Yu Hongyuan were also dumbfounded by what they saw.
They had guessed that Li Yang was first, but they had never imagined she would score as high as 220 points!
Yu Hongyuan crawled out of a "dog hole" and stared at the rankings, his face covered in dirt. "Holy crap. Believe in this lady and gain eternal life."
He had originally been reluctant to become her lackey, but now he wished he could wear a headband proclaiming "Li Yang's lackey."
With the rankings no longer hidden, some candidates who had no chance of making the top twenty couldn't be bothered to keep trying and began watching the action.
"It moved, it moved! Li Yang's score moved again, and again, and again!"
"+2, +2, +2... She really loves those Gradeless mutated plants."
"Even if Zhong Qian kills the Second Grade mutated plant, it'll be hard for him to take first..."
"He'll definitely clear out some Grade One High Stage ones along the way. As long as he can kill the Second Grade mutated plant, he still has a tiny sliver of hope!"
"A tiny sliver..." The candidates couldn't help feeling a little secret satisfaction.
A celebrity of Donghua Province's younger generation was actually being trounced this badly. How could they not feel a little secret satisfaction?
Meanwhile, candidates were steadily gathering around Zhong Qian. His purpose was clear. "Follow me. I'm going to lure out the Second Grade mutated creature. When the time comes, you won't need to fight."
He was a celebrity in Donghua Province, after all. Once he spoke, most of the candidates followed him.
Partly to help him lure out the Second Grade creature, and partly to watch the show. With the proctors keeping an eye on things anyway, it would be a waste not to watch!