Translator: Atlas Studios Editor: Atlas Studios
“Damn!”
His dashed hopes made Lin Yao collapse on the bed, not wanting to move in the slightest.
This collapse lasted for a long time. Lin Yao’s energy only returned gradually after the time for resting and culture learning had passed.
‘The sky hasn’t fallen, and I won’t starve to death even if the system is useless. If I’m mediocre, so be it.’
After perking himself up, Lin Yao carried on with the military boxing training in the room.
Although he did not study that day, Lin Yao trained once before going to bed. He wanted to train more, but it would be too much for his body to handle.
After training, Lin Yao instinctively entered his Sea of Consciousness and observed the sapling calmly.
To Lin Yao’s surprise, the sapling in his Sea of Consciousness had changed this time.
There was no addition of points, neither did that one gram of energy increase. Instead, the attribute interface had changed.
Lin Yao remembered very clearly. When the interface had first appeared, the words “Ordinary Person: Human Body Limit (89.37%)” had been written under the realm column.
According to Lin Yao’s understanding, this Human Body Limit was the best that a human could reach by relying on their body alone. 100% would mean that a person’s potential had been fully unleashed.
Sadly, due to differences in body constitution, even if he fulfilled 100% of his potential, he might not be comparable to some people who had only fulfilled 80% of their potential.
Hurdlers such as Liu Xiang and Usain Bolt and boxing champion Tyson all belonged to a group of people that surpassed ordinary humans.
However, this was not a normal world and a Human Body Limit of 100% was just the beginning.
When one reached the Human Body Limit in this world, one could start to absorb the spirit energy and then advance to a martial artist. 89.37% had been Lin Yao’s earlier realm.
Now, the realm column read “Ordinary Person: Human Body Limit (89.38%)”. The last decimal point had increased slightly.
‘Is it because of my earlier training? Can every round of military boxing training increase it by one decimal point? It’ll be great if the energy point could also increase by one decimal point.’
As he thought about this, Lin Yao held a last glimmer of hope while he directed the energy point with his mind, wanting to add it to the Human Body Limit. Even if that one gram of energy could increase by 0.01%, Lin Yao would still feel content.
It was a pity that nothing good happened. As Lin Yao controlled his mind, the familiar words were heard again.
[Ding! Prompt: The host does not have enough energy points. There is no seed either. A minimum of 100 grams of energy is required to plant trees in the Sea of Consciousness.]
‘Forget it. If it doesn’t work, so be it. It can act as a display interface. Let me count. If one round of training increases it by one decimal point and I train 10 times a day, this will lead to an increase of 0.1% per day. My current realm is at 89.38%. In that case, it will only take a bit more than 100 days for me to reach the Human Body Limit. Well, I should be able to advance and become a martial artist before the college entrance examination… I can’t slack off. It’s not easy to advance, so I might fail. If I fail, I’ll have to rest for more than a month before advancing again. It’ll be troublesome if I don’t become a martial artist before the college entrance examination.’
The weakness of the system, his lack of talent, and all kinds of behavior had reduced Lin Yao’s desire to be the top dog, but he did not want to be the lowest rung on the ladder either.
According to his plan, Lin Yao would take the college entrance examination as a martial artist. As long as he could score well in the culture class, he could attend a general martial arts school, though he could not enter a major university. This way, he could still have a good start after graduation regardless of whether he joined the army or not.
However, it would be troublesome if he could not learn martial arts, as a good starting point could save him many years of effort. At the same time, although military boxing was a golden technique, one always had to strive for continuous improvement.
Lin Yao would like to have diamond or king techniques. However, without several years of experience, it would be difficult to obtain the core of this kind of training even if he joined a dojo or another force.
The universities were different. As the country’s base for cultivating talent, first-class and major universities taught diamond techniques. There was also no shortage of king techniques in top universities.
Lin Yao did not hope for a king technique at the moment, but he could touch a diamond technique.
‘My talent is just ordinary, and the system is useless. I can only work hard. I can’t give up on the culture lessons. I will get additional points for those.’
At the thought of his future, the exhausted Lin Yao gradually pushed away the indignance in his heart and fell asleep on the bed.
At five o’clock the next morning, Lin Yao had recovered from the blow of the useless system and gone back to his normal calm self. He led his brother and sister, Lin Ye and Lin Xiaodie, to the lake for training.
After a round of training, Lin Yao felt slightly satisfied when he saw the decimal point of his Human Body Limit increase by 0.03. Watching himself getting stronger bit by bit was great.
‘Although planting trees is useless, my physical condition is still fairly good.’
He got up early in the morning, trained, and then went to class. In the culture class, he had little to note except for the addition of the beast index and herb identification. In the afternoon was the martial arts class. Before the class, he would train under the guidance of the instructor. There was also a fighting match that day.
During the match, he wore special, armor-like protective gear. In combination with a set of protective equipment, the gear made it hard for one to get seriously injured.
After a fierce match, Lin Yao exited the arena.
“Woo, 19th place! You’ve made a comeback!” said Zhang Heng. What he meant by “made a comeback” was that although Lin Yao had the right physique, he’d lost miserably the past few times because he’d had no combat experience.
Fortunately, this era placed a lot of emphasis on one’s body. With a good physique and weeks of training, Lin Yao was able to familiarize himself with the skills quickly. The mistakes made during those few weeks had also been brushed off with the excuse that he had fallen out of love.
“Yes.”
The two of them had lost the fight. They stood aside and chatted as they watched the ongoing matches.
As they chatted, time passed quickly. Soon, there were only four people left in the arena.
Lin Yao’s school was in fact not bad and ranked fourth in the city. However, he was not in the top class. Thus, there were only three martial artists in his class.
“Three martial artists and Zhou Yang. This ranking has not changed for two months. All four of them, especially Zhou Yang, may enter major universities in the future. Although he has not become a martial artist, I heard that he has already been recruited.”
As the two of them conversed, another match came to an end. A brawny man called Zhou Yang was fighting against a martial artist. Zhou Yang eventually won.
Although this was not the first time he saw this happen, Lin Yao still felt a little stunned.
“That guy has great physical talent.”
The main purpose of martial arts training was to develop one’s body. Although they could absorb spirit energy, one needed to rely on one’s physical foundation as well. After all, humans could have very different physiques.
With a strong body and spirit energy, one could absorb and retain more spirit energy than others during the same kind of training.
Some people had a good physique. For example, in his past life, if a 2.3-meter man and a 1.4-meter man had fought, their strength would have been different even if they had both used their maximum physical strength.
Zhou Yang was obviously the tallest one. Although they were at different levels, with his natural “divine power”, the 2.1-meter-tall man was holding onto that new martial arts student and beating him brutally.
“He’s also a genius. His body only started growing rapidly in the past couple of years. Otherwise, he would have been noticed and recruited by major universities.”
Lin Yao sighed. Next to him, Zhang Heng said enviously, “Your news is outdated. Zhou Yang has already been noticed. I heard that he has been trained by the school as a key seedling. He is provided with nutrient drinks every day, and there are coaches who specially train and guide him. Several dojos are also looking for him, hoping that he will practice their techniques. For this reason, those dojos have spent a lot of money.”
“Uh…”
The dojos were begging Zhou Yang to learn their techniques. On the other hand, he was still worrying about picking up diamond techniques, Lin Yao felt the malice of the world again.
“Sigh.”
As two envious sighs were heard, the match ended. Zhou Yang was second, mainly because this martial artist had been a martial artist for two months and had learned combat skills. Although Zhou Yang had exceptional talent, it was obviously harder to surpass that level.
However, this was already amazing enough. Furthermore, given Zhou Yang’s physique, he would certainly absorb more spirit energy than ordinary martial artists after he advanced to a martial artist. His basic attributes were also significantly higher than those of ordinary martial artists. This was also why many dojos were eyeing him.
In this world, strong people would always win.
What Lin Yao cared about was ability. After the match, a large number of girls in the class surrounded the four of them, handing them water and wiping away their sweat. A brawl even broke out. This made Lin Yao see the advantages of being a super-genius.
“Forget it, let’s go.”
Shaking his head, Lin Yao was about to leave that place to train a little. No matter how good the treatment of super-geniuses was, it had nothing to do with him.
However, before Lin Yao could leave, the one-eyed class instructor came.
With a loud bang, the instructor clapped his hands thunderously. His random clap attracted everyone’s attention. When he saw everyone staring at him, the instructor said with satisfaction, “Listen. Tomorrow is the 7th of August, the day of the Spirit Energy Festival. There will be seven holidays. However, you have to train properly during these seven days. If you idle around, I’ll show you what cruelty is when you come back. Get it?”
“Yes.”
“Didn’t you guys eat? Louder!”
“Yes.”
After hearing everyone shout loudly, the one-eyed instructor nodded in satisfaction. He then smiled and said, “There is also some good news. After the holiday, our city will organize a major assessment. It will be a class assessment, followed by an overall cohort assessment. Finally, under the observation of the city leaders, we’ll conduct the assessment for the entire city’s third-year high school students. The city will give out many huge rewards, and some business associations and dojos will also provide resources…”
Upon finishing his words, the instructor realized that everyone present, including the few martial artists and Zhou Yang, who were at front, did not seem very interested. The instructor knew why. Although the three students who had become martial artists could be considered geniuses, they were still far from being super-geniuses.
Even though Zhou Yang was quite talented, he was a late bloomer. He might not even get a ranking during the school assessment, let alone the city assessment. There were also key classes above the ordinary classes. Yan Yan was one of the powerhouses taking the key classes. She was one of the advanced martial artists who possessed superb talent.
The instructor, who knew this, smiled and said quickly, “Listen. On this occasion, as long as you can manage to get a ranking, you’ll get resources and help on combat skills even if you get a class ranking. However, there are only three places in our class. You’ll have to work hard if you want them.”