After eating, Zhou Fan headed upstairs to take a long rest in preparation for the hiring tomorrow.
When the sunlight fell on him through the window, Zhou Fan woke up. He headed down to have breakfast before leaving the inn.
It wasn't long before Zhou Fan reached the library. Going inside, he walked up to an attendant and asked where he should go.
"Go up to the 5th floor and find a seat. The hiring process will begin in 2 hours."
When Zhou Fan made it to the 5th floor, it was nearly empty. Contrary to the last time he was here, there were no scientists. Instead, there were 4 people sitting in chairs lined up on the floor. Of the four, 3 were old men, and the other was a middle-aged man.
When he walked in, the four of them glanced at him at the same time. When they saw his appearance, they were surprised.
Although he had begun to look older, Zhou Fan still didn't seem a day over 15. In fact, he only started looking after reaching the 10th stage of foundation establishment.
He could literally feel himself aging while he was compressing his foundation. At first, Zhou Fan was terrified. However, he felt no threat to him. Instead, it felt as though the Qi was helping him. After pondering for a while, Zhou Fan had come to the conclusion that his 10-year-old body was holding him back.
He estimated that by the time he finished compressing his foundation, his appearance would change to that of an 18-year-old.
Bringing himself away from his thoughts, Zhou Fan noticed that the 4 men didn't pay any more attention to him. Although a 15-year-old registering for an elite job was weird, it wasn't the first time it had happened. Of course, the four men had no way to tell that he was only 10.
Zhou Fan walked to a seat in the front row and sat down. Since he had two hours to wait, Zhou Fan closed his eyes and started cultivating.
Thinking about it, this was the first time Zhou Fan had ever cultivated in front of anyone. After a while, Zhou Fan opened his eyes to see if anyone was showing a reaction.
Seeing that no one was paying attention to him, Zhou Fan turned back around and continued to cultivate.
Even after cultivating for two hours, Zhou Fan didn't feel any noticeable difference. Maybe it was 3% more complete at most.
A loud bell suddenly brought everyone to attention. Standing on the table was three old men. They all had grey hair and long beards.
"Attention candidates! The hiring will now begin."
After saying that, 5 attendants came up with a stack of papers. They started handing them out to everyone along with a pencil.
"You will have an hour to finish this test. As long as you get half right, you will move on to the next round of testing."
Although Zhou Fan felt that 50% was rather low, he didn't waste any time before starting the test.
The test had 100 questions, and all of them were open-ended. Zhou Fan quickly sped through the test until the 78th question when he finally saw something he didn't know. Clearly, it wasn't information that was accesible on the first through the fifth floor.
Zhou Fan wrote some random nonsense on the off chance he was right and continued on. Besides the 85th, 91st, and the 99th question, Zhou Fan knew the rest of the answers.
Although he had finished in 5 minutes, Zhou Fan waited until 50 minutes had gone by before handing in his test. Even then, he was the first to do so.
The head examiner nodded his head while taking the test from Zhou Fans hands.
"I hope you turned it in early because you're finished and not because you gave up."
Nodding back at the man, Zhou Fan headed back to his seat and waited until the remaining time was up. The examiners collected the test and said that they would be done grading them in 3 hours.
Since he had time, Zhou Fan left the library and found a random stall. He bought a good smelling bun and ate it before he went back to the library. Even with his lunch break, he still had to wait 2 hours before the examiners came back.
Of the 25 people taking the test, only 5 passed. Zhou Fan, two of the three old men he saw earlier, the middle-aged man he saw, and a woman that looked around 35.
"Follow me," beckoned the head examiner before leading us upstairs.
On the way, he mentioned that the highest score was a 96. Although he didn't say it, it was naturally Zhou Fans.
After a few staircases, they arrived at the 8th floor.
The 8th floor looked just like the 5th floor. The only difference was that the lab was bigger and seemed more advanced.
Instead of an empty lab, Zhou Fan and the others were greeted with the sight of three people on a higher surface. It was like a judges booth.
The lady in the middle glanced at them before saying instructions.
"Each of us will take turns asking each of you questions. Our questions will only consist of information on the 1st - 5th floors. If you answer incorrectly, you will be removed. We will continue asking questions until there are only two of you left. Any questions?"
No one said anything. They then sat in one of the 5 chairs before them.
"All right. You in chair number one, this is your question. What is the name of the founder of the wishan kingdom?"
The lady continued like that until she got to chair number 4. Chair number 4 was Zhou Fans chair.
"What is the name of the author of the book - The Rising Emperor -?"
Zhou Fan and the rest continued in this fashion for 5 more rounds before the first person was kicked out.
" Who is the author of - The Black Chairiot-"
"Wang Yuan?" The middle-aged man said unconfidently.
The man was then escorted out by the head examiner.
When the man failed, the others started getting nervous. Zhou Fan, on the other hand, wasn't. Since the questions were based on the first 5 floors, Zhou Fan had absolute confidence that he would win.