Era of Mist

"Hah!"

"Hiyah!"

"Kill!"

Shouts and roars echoed endlessly from one secret realm after another. The sounds of fierce combat filled the air, and for a moment, the multicolored flashes of light were quite a spectacle.

Shi Tiexin stared blankly for a long time before a sudden realization dawned on him. He understood in an instant: these luminous figures were acting as the "exam papers" for this test in the Fengming First Middle School timeline!

The exam was meant to test the Six Basic Heart Techniques, so naturally, the questions should have been based on them. But this exam didn’t require answering any questions at all. Perhaps to eliminate biases from subjective factors like regional differences, question design philosophies, or assessment preferences, this timeline didn’t use written exams. Instead, it adopted a much more astonishing method of evaluation.

They set a specific difficulty level for the Six Basic Heart Techniques and then created humanoid figures within the Wenxin Secret Realm for a direct martial arts competition. An examinee’s Heart Skill level directly influenced their offensive and defensive capabilities in this assessment, making it the primary factor in determining the outcome of the fight.

Shi Tiexin saw one examinee whose body technique was nimble. With flashy footwork, sharp fists, and agile legs, he appeared to be quite accomplished in his fighting skills. However, the layer of light coalesced on his body seemed a little insufficient.

He landed a flurry of blows, each one finding its mark, but the luminous figure opposite him didn’t seem to take much damage. The luminous figure counterattacked three times, with only one blow grazing his arm. But a large chunk of the light layer on his arm immediately cracked and peeled away, a miserable sight that made his chances of victory look slim.

Meanwhile, another examinee looked a bit stiff. His techniques and body movement were unremarkable, and his foundational vitality training was probably nothing special either. But the luminous figure’s punches seemed to barely faze him. When he retaliated, a single blow was enough to shatter one of the figure’s limbs, making him look incredibly fierce.

Shi Tiexin came to a realization.

’This method of examination is actually quite clever.’

The qualification test before the exam was likely meant to establish the minimum threshold for participation, a hard requirement for one’s Heart Skill. But whether one could actually pass after meeting that minimum threshold was a dual test of both Heart and Power Techniques.

Heart Techniques were the main focus of this exam, but that didn’t mean Power Techniques were useless. If that student’s Power Techniques had been more refined, his body technique more agile, and his moves sharper, it wasn’t impossible for him to turn the tables and defeat the luminous figure.

But as Shi Tiexin watched, he saw the guy take a kick to the chest from the luminous figure, and his entire layer of light instantly disintegrated. He spat a mouthful of blood three feet into the air. The examinee collapsed to the ground, unable to get back up. It looked like he had at least eight broken ribs, not to mention internal bleeding.

Eliminated!

CRACK! Like shattering glass, the student’s personal secret realm instantly shattered, ejecting him from the Wenxin Secret Realm.

’This guy’s Heart Skill cultivation must have been terrible, just barely scraping past the qualification line. And his Power Techniques weren’t strong enough to defy the heavens, so he ended up with fatal injuries from the luminous figure.’

However, these so-called secret realms weren’t just set up by the Saint of Space-Time to look pretty. When the Saint of Space-Time created secret realms, it wasn’t just to save space; they also possessed a tremendous, miraculous effect that was indispensable to Martial Artists.

THUD. The student collapsed to the ground the moment he exited the secret realm, and a medical team immediately rushed forward.

But the student, who should have been on the brink of death from that kick, had all his fatal injuries reversed the instant he left the secret realm. He was still spitting blood, but not launching it three feet into the air. His sternum was still fractured, but it wasn’t shattered to pieces, let alone piercing his heart.

He went from certain death to severely injured but salvageable.

This was one of the secret realms’ most important functions: the ability to partially reverse injuries sustained during combat within them. At the very least, it could save your life. If the injuries sustained inside the secret realm weren’t very severe to begin with, it was even possible to make a complete recovery.

’It’s just like that guy I replaced. He was beaten until he was broken into three pieces during a duel in a secret realm—absolutely dead. But after leaving the secret realm and being sent to the hospital, as long as someone was willing to foot the bill for his treatment, he’d be up and running around, full of life, in no time.’

It was precisely because of this property of the secret realms that Martial Artists could fight duels without holding back, and injuries of any severity sustained in such duels were not subject to criminal charges. If it weren’t for this, no one—aside from natural-born killers and sociopaths—would ever be able to fight a battle without any reservations.

The medical team quickly loaded him onto a stretcher and, with a WHOOSH, sprinted away. It looked like the Central Hospital was open for business again. Shi Tiexin’s eyes followed the student being carried away, and when he looked back at the circular platform, he found that the battles there were mostly over.

The student who was just carried off had been able to fight and flee thanks to his agile body technique, so he had managed to drag out the fight for a relatively long time. But the others were different. Most of them had settled things within just a few moves. It was either victory or defeat, clean and simple.

Of the more than two thousand examinees, about one thousand four hundred had defeated the luminous figures—not a low ratio. But no matter how high the ratio, several hundred people still failed.

These were the ones who had failed.

Most of the failures were carried away on stretchers. A small portion could still stand, but they remained on the platform, crestfallen and unwilling to leave just yet.

"Losers, exit the stage!"

The Dragon Map Scholar barked coldly, and several members of the security-slash-model team were dispatched to lead the failures who were lingering on the stage away. Shi Tiexin was the most proactive, zipping up to be the first one on stage to guide them. He blended into the crowd, observing his surroundings, and noticed that the one thousand four hundred or so secret realms hadn’t dissipated. Instead, they seemed to be gathering power, preparing for something else.

"I’m not leaving! I’m not leaving!" the failure Shi Tiexin was holding onto struggled, and he was surprisingly strong.

Shi Tiexin thought, ’Nice one!’ He immediately pretended to be struggling with the person, but not so much that he couldn’t handle it or needed backup. While unhurriedly pulling the person away, he took the opportunity to look around and carefully examine the surrounding secret realms.

The one thousand four hundred secret realms were densely packed across the entire circular platform, but magically, Shi Tiexin could move through it completely unimpeded. The secret realms around him seemed within arm’s reach, yet they were fundamentally untouchable.

’Theoretically, it wouldn’t affect the continuation of the exam whether these failed losers lingered on the platform or not.’

Shi Tiexin was so focused on observing the secret realms that he didn’t look up. Meanwhile, the Dragon Map Scholar above, apparently unwilling to waste any time, barked out another cold order: "Second round, begin!"

WHOOSH! One thousand four hundred luminous figures once again leaped out of the void, charging menacingly toward the examinees.

This time, Shi Tiexin was closer and could see more clearly.

The six-colored radiance of this new batch of luminous figures was brighter than the last. Logically, basic-level Heart Skills shouldn’t be able to manifest externally, and most of them didn’t even have any combat power. But somehow, the Student Union had managed to make it so that within the Wenxin Secret Realm, these luminous figures and the layers of light on the examinees all wielded genuine, tangible power.