Ze Tian Ji (Way of Choices)-Chapter 5: The Blue Shirt Youngster Called Thirty Six

The students who entered the entrance exam followed the teacher’s command and picked up the stone one by one. As they held the stone tightly for a few seconds, the black stone would emit light in the hands of the people. Sometimes the light was bright, sometimes dim, and sometimes the stone didn’t change at all.

The pitch black stone has a very unusual name called the Sensory Stone. There was a chapter named Ten Thousand Uniques in the Scriptures of The Way which described special or weird items all over the world. Chen Chang Sheng saw the picture of this stone in the chapter and knew its special effect. The dark stone naturally contained a trace of spiritual power. When it came in contact with a human body, a small trace of this power would sink into people’s body and activate the person’s True Essence. Just like fishing, the stone will absorb the True Essence and start to emit light. The stronger the True Essence of the holder, the brighter the stone will shine. After years of testing, humans already concluded its usage. They can use the brightness of the stone to determine the strength of the holder.

Because there are too many people taking the entrance exam every year, this extra step was added. People continuously reached for the stone and held it. Some brightened but some dimmed. Some people continued toward the building while some people were stopped by the teacher. The entire line’s mood was depressed.

One boy held the dark stone but the dark stone didn’t give off any reaction. When he was asked to leave by the teacher, he fell into hopelessness and cried for another chance. He held the dark stone tightly in his hand and refused to let go. However, his struggle didn’t bring anything but mockery from the crowd.

The exam continued. People who could make the dark stone shine had a happy look on their face while the people who couldn’t were disappointed beyond their beliefs.

Faintly you could hear the mocking from the senior students on the other side of the river. The face of the teacher who was responsible for the dark stone stage turned darker as more and more students held the stone. Since the morning until now, several hundreds of people had held the Sensory Stone. Although many of them could make the stone glow, which meant that they are already in the Purification Stage, the results couldn’t compare to the past. The performance of this year’s students were too ordinary. There was only one person at stage three of Purification. No one had reached the peak of the Purification stage. Geniuses who are able to reach the Meditation Realm at a young age were nowhere to be found. Because of this, the teacher’s mood wasn’t exactly positive.

The human race’s way of cultivation is very different from the Yao race and Demon race. At the beginning, humans needed to open their minds through education, train insight through meditation, and use the wisdom and spirit of nature to purify their body. This process starts from skin then continues down to veins and muscle. It goes all the way until it reaches the bones and marrows. When they reach the peak, humans are strong enough to lift stones and resist regular illness. This is called the Purification Stage.

However, the Demon race are born with rock solid bodies. If humans didn’t go through the Purification Stage, they aren’t even able to fight against them on the battlefield. Therefore to join the military and fight, people need to atleast be in the Purification Stage. Besides this, Purification has one other important usage and that is strengthening the bones and veins of the human body. It also helps to open the minds of people. After Purification, a human’s memory ability and thought processes grow to a new height. Using a summary from the Scriptures of The Way, it described it as “Seeing a whole new world”!

There was a saying, “There are three thousand Ways in the world.” There was an ocean of literature and countless words in the world. If a person didn’t Purify his/her body, how dare he challenge himself to seek the knowledge in the sea? Even he if was bold, he would be lost in a second and killed by the endless waves of uncertainty. This extra step that Heavenly Academy added recently was very logical. If you weren’t even in the Purification Stage, how are you even qualified to cultivate deep and mystical techniques?

Yesterday at the Divine General’s Estate, Chen Chang Sheng mentioned twice that he didn’t cultivate. Naturally he didn’t Purify his body either. This means that later, when he holds the dark stone in his hand, the dark stone won’t emit any light and he will be expelled from the line for entering the exam. But the weird thing was that his expression remained extremely calm. He didn’t seem to be worried.

Right now, he’s very close to that table. There were only three people in front of him. The frontmost person was a youngster who wore a blue shirt. The youngster walked towards the table and didn’t wait for the teacher to speak and picked up the dark Sensory stone with his hand. Unknowingly, everyone felt nervous at this moment. Perhaps it’s because the youngster was too calm.

During that early spring, the Capital was always cloudy. The sun was blocked by the white clouds in the sky and the grassfield was dark. Suddenly, the grassfield on the two sides of the brook turned brighter, as if the newly grown grass leaves became jade. The leftover dew became pearls. The thin fishes in the clear brook looked at the sky and was stunned by the light.

The crowd instinctively covered their eyes. They thought it was the light shining on the earth by the cloud-broken sun. However, they realized in the next moment that even the brightest spring sunlight couldn’t be this intense. If it wasn’t sunlight……then where did this bright light came from?

As the light dimmed away, their eyes adapted to the brightness. People put down their hands and saw the teacher from Heavenly Academy drop his jaw. His face was full of unthinkable surprise. Simultaneously, people realized where the light originated from – it came from the palm of that youngster wearing a blue shirt. The once pitch black Sensory Stone was now like the hottest rock in the opening of a live volcano. Countless light rays were emitted from the separation of his fingers. It seemed like it was burning!

“Meditation……it really is…..Meditation Realm?”

The teacher from Heavenly Academy said with a shaking voice. Right now he’s looking at the blue shirt youngster as if he was a precious gem. He hurried to stand up and walked towards him. The teacher lowered his head and greedily looked at his palm and the light emitted from the stone. No one thought that the teacher misbehaved. You have to know that the blue shirt youngster looked very young. He was definitely not over sixteen years of age, but was already in the Meditation Realm!

What did this mean? What is a genius? This is a genius! The senior students on the river side had already stopped their teasing a long time ago. Instead they looked down the bamboo shed as if they saw a ghost. The senior student who teased the most was so surprised, that he slided off of the stone chair and fell on the ground. He was so surprised that he didn’t even feel the pain from his back bone at all. All shaken up, he said “How is this possible? Even Guan Bai senior only the Meditation Realm at sixteen….this kid…is this kid just young looking? Otherwise how is it possible!”

At this moment, an old and cold sound came behind them.

“If he is Tang Thirty Six, then there is nothing impossible!”

“Tang Thirty Six? So he is Tang Thirty Six?” After the crowd heard the name, they felt even more shocked. Someone said, “He was already at the 36th place on the Proclamation of Azure Clouds….Why did he leave Wen Shui and come to the Capital? For next year’s Grand Examination? But his ability is more than enough to enter the Mausoleum of Books.”

Someone explained, “Tang Thirty Six is very arrogant. He thinks no one is better than him. Not to mention the Seven Laws. He even remains unconvinced that he is weaker than the wolf kid in the North. Since he was going to enter the Grand Examination next year, he would definitely change his name. By doing so…he obviously wants to arrive at the Capital early. Since he is coming to the Capital, he obviously wants to join our Heavenly Academy.”

After they mentioned the name Tang Thirty Six, the students thought of the rumors about the Wen Shui young genius. They involuntarily applauded. Someone then said, “He thinks he is superior to almost everyone among the Seven Laws, but how does he dare to feel he is stronger than Qiu Shan Jun?”

“That’s unknown, but based on the brightness of the black rock, he probably didn’t use full power. Even if he hasn’t reach the completion of the Meditation Realm, he is probably not far away from it.”

The crowd continued this discussion for a long while. Suddenly they recalled the old voice they heard. They turned around and realized that the incoming person was the scariest Vice-principal Zhuang of Heavenly Academy. They involuntarily got scared and made a bow to show courtesy right away before rushing to give way.

………………..

Both elites and geniuses deserved to receive others’ sights. The youngsters who were taking the entrance exam didn’t recognize the blue shirt youngster but they felt both surprise and admiration from looking at his back. Chen Chang Sheng looked at that blue shirt youngster. He also felt admiration, but he didn’t have such talent so he was somewhat envious.

The blue shirt youngster coldly walked forward. Shortly after, he entered the building deep into Heavenly Academy but everyone else’s exams had to continue. In a short while, it was finally Chen Chang Sheng’s turn. He walked to the table. He took a look at that black rock which had a rough surface and faintly infinite small holes. He hesitated for a while but finally grabbed the black rock and lifted it in front of his eyes. He began to look at it closely.

He could clearly feel that a cool and comfortable air came out of one of the black rock’s small holes. It flowed along the center of his palm and entered his body. It then circulated along his vessels at a high speed, attempting to go into the deeper places to seek his True Essence. The cold air apparently had no consciousness and obviously no malevolence. He didn’t do any reaction, allowing it to seek around. Of course, even if he wanted to react against it, he didn’t have any ability. He understood very clearly that his vessels had some problems. Before he started the curing process, that air could not find out anything. Since there was no True Essence flowing back. No mentality sensed. The black rock obviously wouldn’t light up.

Nothing surprising occurred. The black rock was a still black rock, quietly lying on his palm.

He put the black rock back to the table, looking toward the Heavenly Academy teacher and said “It didn’t light up.”

In others’ eyes, he had simply grabbed the stone then put it down. Such an obvious fact, but he confirmed it seriously, which might have appeared somewhat funny. Strangely, no one laughed. As they looked at his indifferent facial expression, people felt somewhat strange. The previous youngsters who did not make the stone light up all felt somewhat shameful and also sad due to failure. They would even cry like the previous boy. He….looked too calm.

Did he not understand what this meant? It seemed like that’s not the case

The teacher slightly frowned. He should have just waved his hand and suggest Chen Chang Sheng leave, but because of the strange silence, he asked, “You can’t cultivate?”

“I have not cultivated.”

Chen Chang Sheng said a sentence that he had repeated twice yesterday at the Divine General’s Estate.

The teacher looked at him expressionlessly, implying why don’t you leave now?

Chen Chang Sheng made a bow to show courtesy, then left.

The direction he was heading for was not the gate of Heavenly Academy, but towards the building.

The teacher felt shocked before he realized what he was trying to do and shouted angrily, “Stop!”