Chapter 49: Small Ji, the Crystal Beast
Trantor: Strivon / Ash Editor: Geoffrey / Lancent
A facial recognition glyph array was drawn on the door of the cabin. A red light swept across Li Yao’s face, ringing twice with “Beep Beep” sounds. With a “*click”, the cabin door opened.
The room inside was very simple and in; there was only a bed and a tiny bathroom. There wasn’t even a desk ced anywhere.
Li Yao actually knew that this was special treatment given to them.
On a crystal battleship, only officers can enjoy the benefits of having a personal room. The average enlisted sailor lived in four-people, six-people, or even eight-people rooms.
Li Yao grew up in the Artifact Graveyard. He was able to sleep perfectly fine even in a pile of garbage. The environment here was luxurious in his opinion. He walked in withrge strides, tossed his luggage into the corner, and smashed himself ferociously onto the bed, letting out a sound of satisfaction.
“Puji puji. Puji puji. Student Li Yao, hello. I’m your personal Puji Critter, Puji Critter Number 2899. You can call me 2899, or you can call me Small Ji.”
A chubby, plump, and charmingly innocent Puji Critter had squeezed out from under the bed with great difficulty, giving Li Yao a scare.
The white Puji Critterboriously pped its wings to fly into the air, speaking, “Starting from now all the way until the end of thepetition, Student Li Yao will always have Small Ji at his service. Small Ji will exin the rules of thepetition to you, answer your questions, help you get in touch with scouts from the Nine Elites, and shoot pictures and videos of every action you do in thepetition, which will be transmitted to our monitoring center. If you encounter some sort of mortal crisis, Small Ji will even yell for cultivators toe save you! So contrary to my dull-witted appearance, I’m actually Li Yao’s good assistant in thispetition!”
Li Yao stared unwaveringly at the white Puji Critter for a long time before asking suspiciously, “Small Ji, are you speaking of your own ord? Or is there someone controlling you from behind the scenes?”
The white Puji Critter began flying, orbiting around his head. It spoke cheerfully, “Small Ji isn’t saying these words by himself, and there is no one controlling me from behind the scenes. It’s that Small Ji’s body has been installed with thetest CPU system. 100,000 telepathic functions were programmed in advance so that Small Ji can perform the proper response in real time towards certain sorts of situations. Small Ji is the product of a joint R&D coboration between Deep Sea University and the Empyrean Capital School of Medicine. I’m not your ordinary Spirit Beast! I’m the most advanced ‘Crystal Beast’ — a Spirit Beast controlled by a Crystal Processor!”
“Oh, so it was like this all along! You’re quite advanced. So they increased the intelligence of Spirit Beasts in this fashion. This way, they don’t need to worry about losing control over Spirit Beasts like with Demon Beasts!”
Li Yao’s resolution to enter into Deep Sea University hardened even further. He continued asking, “Then Small Ji, please exin to me the rules of the Limit Challenge Competition.”
“Sure thing.”
The hair on top of the Puji Critter’s head shook to and fro. A meaty pink antenna extended out, and on the tip of the antenna was a flickering and shiny synthetic crystal stone.
A beam of light shot out from the crystal, forming into arge 3d hologram right in front of Li Yao. With a re of spiritual energy light, the holographic image of Devil Flood Dragon Ind appeared in front of Li Yao’s eyes.
“The Limit Challenge Competition is a time-honored traditionalpetition of the Federation. Its purpose is to allow the Nine Elites to select young talent gifted in cultivation. At the same time, it also gives the opportunity for students whose expertise are more focused on practical use rather than theory to show off their talent.”
“The annual Limit Challenge Competition has always been held two months before the university entrance exams. The entire Federation is divided into nearly 1000 different exam regions with each area containing 3000petitors.”
“Floating Spear City and its surrounding area are Cultivation Cities in the Federation. Quite a few cultivation geniuses have emerged from here. So, exam region 571 has an extremely vicious environment, gaining the nickname as an ‘Exam Region of Death’.”
“Three thousandpetitors must do their best to find a way to survive for five days on Devil Flood Dragon Ind along with the rampaging Demon Beasts… Student Li Yao, try not to underestimate Devil Flood Dragon Ind. Back in the day, this was the location of the final battle between Star Glory Federation and the Far East Demon Kingdom. Countless corpses are buried in the depths of the ocean. Demonic aura permeates the air!”
“The Demon Beasts of Devil Flood Dragon Ind absorbs this aura year round. The Demon Beasts here are far more vicious than those in other ces.”
The white Puji Critter flew to face Li Yao. It shook its stubby wing, speakingpletely cheerfully, “The five days of the Limit Challenge Competition are divided into two parts: the preliminaries and the finals. The first three days are the preliminaries, and thest two days are the finals.”
“Tomorrow morning at 9 AM, three thousandpetitors will be tossed together into Devil Flood Dragon Ind. You will be wearing the most in of clothing: a sports tank top and shorts that contain no defensive capabilities whatsoever. You won’t have weapons. You won’t have food. You won’t have water. You won’t even have shoes! Each person will only have a single Puji Critter.”
“And what you must do is survive for three days under the attacks of countless Demon Beasts.”
“Of course, you won’t always be unarmed and defenseless. Several dozen ‘supply points’ are scattered all around Devil Flood Dragon Ind. Large amounts of artifact parts and supplies are prepared there. If you have the ability, you can assemble the artifacts yourself to use to fight against the Demon Beasts.”
On the hologram, Devil Flood Dragon Ind was being zoomed in without end. The hologram turned transparent, and concrete coordinates of several dozen supply points appeared.
The white Puji Critter continued speaking, “In thepetition, the most important thing to keep in mind is your ‘total points’. Your final ranking is determined solely by your total points.”
“You can get points by killing Demon Beasts. The stronger the Demon Beast, the greater the number of points.”
“In order to test thepetitor’s overall ability, many methods were incorporated for thepetitor to earn points. For example, if you specialize in artifacts, you can repair and assemble artifacts as much as you want. If you’re gifted in synthesizing drugs, you can discover all sorts of herbs in the forest. To summarize, as long as you demonstrate a gift in an aspect of cultivation through an action you do on Devil Flood Dragon Ind, you will receive points for it.”
“And another important thing to keep in mind is the ‘Trade System’. This is a rule that is set up forpetitors who aren’t fighting specialists.”
“In thispetition, you can use your umted points to perform trades. For example, say you are gifted in crafting artifacts. You assemble and craft a dozen flying swords at a supply point. You can trade these flying swords to apetitor who is a fighting specialist. As long as both parties make an oral agreement on the price, the Puji Critters will automatically conduct the point transfer. You don’t need to worry about being cheated by apetitor. This way, it’s fair for non-fighting specialists in thispetition.”
Li Yao raised his right hand, putting out a question, “Let me interrupt you for a moment. I want to ask something… In regards to the non-fightingpetitors who y a supportive role, when they gather resources on Devil Flood Dragon Ind, will their lives be endangered?”
The white Puji Critter shook its small furry tail, “Student Li Yao, please do not worry. When thepetition begins, there will be over twenty cultivators patrolling in the air above Devil Flood Dragon Ind, and inside Small Ji’s body is a specially refined gel sack. As soon as apetitor is about to receive life-threatening injuries or the umtion of his injuries reach critical status, Small Ji will automatically belch out the gel to envelope thepetitor in a stasis, and Small Ji will notify the patrolling cultivators in the air.”
“This gel is a super amazing artifact. It can protect thepetitor topletely guarantee his safety. It’s impossible for the level of the Demon Beasts on Devil Dragon Ind to break through the gel. Just rx already!”
Li Yao nodded his head. The Limit Challenge Competition has been held over a hundred times. They had adopted perfect protective measures long ago. He was just overthinking things.
Thinking for a bit, he asked again, “You just talked about the preliminaries… What rules are there in the finals?”