Chapter 13: Such a Strange Request

Chapter 13: Such a Strange Request

"This guest wishes to participate in the examination?"

Zhou Hui raised an eyebrow.

Even as the Overachiever, he had never done something like going to a neighboring school and asking to take their final exams. This made the Tireless Immortal give the visiting guest a second look.

He Yong and Su Xin stood respectfully at the foot of the jade steps of the Wordless Palace.

Even someone as arrogant and willful as Su Xin appeared well-behaved and charming in front of the Tireless Immortal.

—Just as Su Xin himself claimed, he knew exactly how to handle Tribulation Transcendence Stage cultivators.

In any case, one wouldn't guess that this child harbored ambitions of taking over a neighboring school.

Zhou Hui immediately realized who was responsible and glared at his eldest disciple, Yu Wenxuan, who wore a look of innocence.

He never should have taken that guy down from the mountain gate just because it looked bad to have him hanging there when guests arrived!

Zhou Hui thought, his head throbbing.

Every teacher encounters a few troublemakers in their teaching career, and without a doubt, Yu Wenxuan was the one who got under Zhou Hui's skin.

That guy was a born agent of chaos, having made it his life's mission to wreak havoc since he was a kid.

Moreover, he only responded to force, not kindness—sweet talk was useless; only a good beating would straighten him out.

Zhou Hui was a teacher who already hated corporal punishment, but he had been forced to take drastic measures by this good-for-nothing disciple.

When Yu Wenxuan was little—like, before age three—it was manageable. Zhou Hui just had to grab the back of his neck to settle him down. As he got older, he had to be hung up somewhere to think about what he'd done. Later, he moved on to the Immortal-binding Rope, and eventually, even that couldn't hold him, so he had to resort to physical restraint—like shattering his neck bones.

But ever since Yu Wenxuan hit the Great Perfection of the Deity Transformation Stage, even shattering his neck bones didn't seem to do the trick anymore.

This time, he'd been hung up for half a month, and when he was finally let down, not only had he learned nothing, but his Cultivation Level had actually gone up a notch, and he was even showing signs of breaking through his bottleneck.

Seeing this, Zhou Hui didn't dare let Yu Wenxuan take the exam either.

—Zhou Hui had learned this in another world: never mix geniuses with ordinary people.

Putting them together might not hurt the genius, but it would definitely mess with the ordinary folks.

Especially since Zhou Hui had just begun implementing the examination system. If this bastard made the disciples think "exams don't matter for cultivation" or even "the worse you score, the stronger you get," everything would be ruined.

After all, if everyone cultivated the way Yu Wenxuan did, all the disciples would have to be hung from trees.

Zhou Hui excused Yu Wenxuan from the exam, but then worried he'd go cause trouble somewhere else. In the end, remembering that this guy was an expert at eating, drinking, and having fun, Zhou Hui assigned him to host the guests.

That was obviously a bad call.

Zhou Hui never expected Yu Wenxuan to bring the guests straight to the exam hall.

Zhou Hui wrapped Yu Wenxuan in his Divine Sense and demanded directly in his mind: "What's going on? Didn't I tell you to host them? I didn't tell you to bring them here to take the exam!"

"But the guests saw all the commotion at the Wordless Palace from far away and looked like they wanted to ask about it the second they got out of the carriage. I figured trying to explain it would just confuse them, and giving them a tour would mess with everyone's focus. So I thought, why not just let them take the test?" Yu Wenxuan reasoned confidently in his mind. "It also keeps the Heavenly Dao Alliance from getting the wrong idea about us."

"You always have a reason, don't you?"

Zhou Hui sneered and said flat-out to the guests from the Heavenly Dao Alliance:

"You must have misunderstood. I'm just testing my disciples' cultivation progress. This is a totally normal exam. My disciple is a troublemaker—last time he scored dead last and lost to his juniors. He's probably bitter about it and looking for someone to mess with."

With that, Zhou Hui glared at Yu Wenxuan and said, "Apologize to the guests right now!"

But the guests weren't buying it.

Your sect's internal exam is this big a deal, with all the disciples taking it and a Tribulation Transcendence Stage ancestor personally watching over it?!

There's definitely some heavenly secret they're hiding!

Su Xin got even more excited.

But he didn't let it show. Instead, he put on the look of a sincere, studious good kid—the kind that elders just eat up: "Even if it's a misunderstanding, I'm really grateful to Senior Brother Yuwen for this chance. My parents always taught me not to stay cooped up and work in a bubble, but to learn from the strengths of others. I've always admired the Tireless Immortal and would love to see how the Celestial Spirit Sect teaches."

Listening to Su Xin talk, He Yong got goosebumps.

If He Yong hadn't seen this little menace act all sweet in front of his parents after causing trouble back in the Heavenly Dao Alliance, he might have almost bought it.

Zhou Hui turned to look straight at Su Xin: "You are..."

"I'm the son of Su Mei and Xin Zhu, the Guardian Elders of the Heavenly Dao Alliance." In front of Zhou Hui, Su Xin dared not hide his identity.

"Daoist friends Su Mei and Xin Zhu?" Zhou Hui mused.

Once you've cultivated to the Tribulation Transcendence Stage, age and status don't matter anymore.

Zhou Hui was a few thousand years younger than Su Mei and Xin Zhu, so they weren't from the same generation and he didn't know them well. However, since they were all at the Tribulation Transcendence Stage, he had attended several gatherings of fellow cultivators at the same level and was deeply impressed by how affectionate the couple was.

But the most recent gathering—which was over twenty years ago—was unusual. The couple rarely failed to show off their affection, but instead spent the entire gathering boasting about how adorable, talented, and obedient their child was. This made Zhou Hui, who was constantly troubled by Yu Wenxuan, quite envious.

So, this was that child?

He did look quite well-behaved, and seemed to have a genuine desire to learn—even coming to this remote place for fun, he didn't forget to participate in the local school's examination.

Zhou Hui was deeply moved.

He also wanted to see what level of excellence a top-tier institution (the Heavenly Dao Alliance) produced, to avoid being out of touch with the normal educational standards of the cultivation world. So he nodded.

"In that case, go ahead and try!"

"Yes!" Su Xin said joyfully.

He Yong watched Su Xin walk away anxiously, wanting to stop him but also not wanting to.

Previously, Zhou Hui's Heavenly Tribulation had been like a tornado. The Celestial Spirit Mountain at its core had suffered the least damage, but the entire Abyssal Sea beyond the mountain—even extending to half the Central Region—had been swept by a spiritual energy storm for a full week. Many cultivators had been affected, and a major incident had even occurred—which was why Su Xin had been dispatched to the Abyssal Sea.

So He Yong had been keeping an eye on the Celestial Spirit Mountain's condition all this time. Naturally, he had heard the rumors about the "heavenly secret," which was why he had come now, pretending to be "coincidental" while actually wanting to know the Tireless Immortal's condition.

As it stood, the Tireless Immortal seemed fine, just behaving a bit unusually.

The one who disliked extravagance was now holding a grand sect examination with such massive scale—surely it was related to the "heavenly secret"?

He Yong was curious about what that "heavenly secret" was, but also worried it might be a trap. If anything happened to his grandmaster's precious son here, it would be disastrous.

After much hesitation, He Yong gritted his teeth and requested Zhou Hui: "Immortal Venerable, please give me a copy of the exam paper too!"

"You want to take the exam too?" Zhou Hui looked at He Yong in surprise.

"Ahem, I just want to take a look." He Yong said awkwardly.

I see, so a fellow sect wants to check out our exam papers! Man, the Heavenly Dao Alliance really lives up to its name—not only are the students studious, but the teachers are into academic exchange too.

Zhou Hui nodded and motioned for his disciple to pass a copy of the exam to the other guy.

"This paper can match Nephew Su's... ahem, I mean, it's the same set of questions."

He Yong didn't really get what "match" and "the same set of questions" meant:

If they're all taking the exam together, wouldn't the papers all have the same questions anyway?

He looked over the paper, confused:

Hmm, why are all these questions at the Qi Refining and Foundation Establishment levels? And they seem way too easy?

He Yong frowned. Like most people who don't know anything about education, he totally misread the point of multiple-choice and fill-in-the-blank questions. And that got him thinking: if Zhou Hui really had the "heavenly secret," would he just hand it over that easily?

Maybe he deliberately gave Su Xin an easy paper just to do my grandmaster a favor!

That was He Yong's judgment.

It was no wonder he thought that way.

Most sects, once they learned who Su Xin was, would do the same kind of favor. That's how the rumor started that "Daoist Su is gifted, inheriting his parents' cultivation talent" and was a top student.

He Yong let out a sigh of relief. He hadn't found the heavenly secret, but at least the little ancestor was safe.