Easy questions, difficult test

Aether walked through the gate and joined the queue. A few people threw some condescending gazes and he could hear some rude comments here and there. But since nobody said anything directly to him, he decided to ignore it for now.

The reason Aether received such stares and comments was obviously thanks to his looks. He covered neither his face nor his hand, so everybody could see his injuries. He did, however, wear a white patch over his blind eye.

After waiting for about half an hour, it was finally Aether's turn to register.

"You have to pay one gold coin and state your name." A shoddy clothed man said grumpily.

Aether simply said his name and took a gold coin from the pouch and handed it over.

"Go to the building on the right and enter room 150. The theoretical exam will start in two hours." The man said while handing over a plate with the number 1563.

Aether took the plate and started walking to his designated examination room.

"Why do you let someone like that participate?" A man clothed in bright yellow robes asked the first one.

"He paid the gold coin so there is no reason he shouldn't be allowed."

"It doesn't matter anyway, there is no way he can pass."

"How are you so certain about that?"

"He didn't have any energy whatsoever, his body has multiple injuries and his blood felt weak. If trash like that can pass, anyone can."

"You shouldn't judge a person's capabilities like that. Besides, he still has a soul, hasn't he."

"Are you going to teach him? Then I hope he does fail indeed, otherwise his life will be worse than death."

"Bastard, you better shut up, or else…"

"Or else what, are you going to turn me in a vegetable as well?" the yellow robed man said in disdain.

The other teachers who were also registering student candidates looked at the two of them and slowly shook their heads helplessly.

From their reaction, it appeared the two men were at odds quite often.

Aether didn't notice any of the drama between the two teachers, and even if he did notice, he wouldn't have cared about it.

His sole goal right now was to enter the academy and find the best way to fix his crippled body, but that was not all. These past six years learning made him realize his blessing was way stronger than he previously suspected.

He had an almost perfect memory and his reading speed was ridiculous. He never told this to Old Herb, but he had only needed three years to understand everything in the study.

Only three years!

Nobody would believe that, even if you beat them to death.

But then, why did he stay so long? Was he just sleeping or wasting his time away doing nothing?

No, he kept going through everything again and again. Not because he liked to do so, but because he believed he could find hints, however small, that would lead to something great. Something that would allow him to not only fix his blood and body, but also his Energy Centers and Veins.

Everything you need for Energy Cultivation is located in the body. Aether believes that if he creates a special Body and Blood Cultivation technique, it could assist in his Energy Centers and Veins restoration.

Of course, he could just cultivate his body and blood like Old Herb suggested, but he would never possess Energy this way. Since every type of cultivation pushes the other three as well, it would leave him with a fatal weakness he didn't want to possess.

Just imagine, every enemy you face has a main type they cultivate, and the other three as support. Aether would only have two as support, giving him way weaker battle power compared to others.

He refused to believe there is no way to restore his talent, or maybe even increase it. His blessing gave him the capabilities of thinking of some truly outrageous things.

Walking through the main corridor of the building, he quickly found room 150.

When he entered the room, a female teacher asked to see his plate. After confirming Aether had entered the correct room, she pointed to an empty seat before closing her eyes and waited for the next examinee to enter.

After counting, Aether realized there were sixty-two other examinees in the room. It appeared every examination room had one hundred participants.

Some of the youths looked at him with strange gazes or gave him condescending looks, the same as he had received before entering through the gate. Unfortunately, this time not everyone stayed quiet.

"What a pity, such a beauty ruined."

"What beauty, she has neither a chest nor a butt."

"Her face should've been a sight to see. Unfortunately…"

"…"

All of them thought he was a girl!

This was honestly not that surprising. Even the people in his birth village originally thought he was a girl. It was only when his parents cleared up the misunderstanding that people started calling him a boy instead of a girl.

Aether didn't know who they were talking about until he heard the comment about the ruined face. He had spent so long with Old herb, who knew he was a boy from the beginning, that he had almost forgotten how much he looked like a girl.

But even when he realized the misunderstanding, he didn't say anything to fix it. He closed his eye and started thinking about the possible solutions he could use to repair everything. It would still take some time for the test to start, so there was no reason to waste time entertaining some idiots.

In the six years Aether had spent in Old Herbs study, he had learned a few tricks with his soul. Firstly, he realized he could enter his Soul Space at will. He had discovered this relatively quickly.

His second discovery made him ecstatic. When he subconsciously wanted to compare some things he had read in a book with his own body, he realized he could send his thoughts everywhere in his body. Everything was visible to him, his bones, blood, organs and energy Centers and veins.

But the last thing he had learned had shocked him. Inside his Soul Space, he could conjure anything he knew of and could simulate the result between certain interactions.

This meant that Aether could theoretically create anything he wanted if he had all the information necessary.

'If I make those two bloodlines and absorb them both, their reaction will destroy me from the inside out.'

He had long since deduced the best possible bloodline to restore his body, but he didn't stop there. Aether had realized that it should be possible to carry multiple bloodlines, but he seemed to miss some information necessary to succeed.

'Let's just keep trying, I'll find it sooner or later.'

While Aether kept trying to come up with a solution to his idea, examinees kept entering the room until there were one hundred.

The few who had shouted at Aether were quiet after having lost interest. There was no fun to be found in getting ignored.

Slowly but surely, time passed. After a bit more than an hour, the female teacher suddenly waved her hand, causing paper sheets to fly through the room until every desk had one.

"The theoretical entry test starts now. You have two hours." She said in an evenly tone.

Aether opened his eye, took a look at his test sheet and scoffed inside.

'Such basic knowledge, are there actually people who fail these?'

He was confident he could answer all those questions in less than half an hour, and yet they actually had four times that amount of time?

Most of the questions were either difficult or impossible to answer for normal people, but nobody here was normal.

Aether could feel the power every youth in this room possessed, so they should all have enough knowledge to at least pass such an easy test. But, why did so many fail each year if this was al you needed to know?

Sure, there was a practical test as well, but they shouldn't have any problems since they already started their cultivation.

It was then…

'The atmosphere changed.'

Aether was a bit confused. Something had changed, and it made him a bit uncomfortable.

He then looked at the front of the room and saw the female teacher standing there with swaying hair and robe, as if there was a gently breeze going thought the room.

'She is releasing her pressure.'

Pressure, something that every cultivator possesses. The greater your power, the greater your pressure.

Pressure is a type of aura, just like killing intent, soul pressure, bloodline pressure, …

Most of the time cultivators would restrain their pressure, as not to annoy other people or accidentally injure weaker cultivators. But during a fight it could be used as a weapon of intimidation. If you have truly tyrannical strength, you could even use it so injure someone.

'So the reason so many fail each year is because the teachers release their pressure during the test.'

People with low willpower suffered the most under the pressure. But someone like Aether, who had suffered a lot, had no problem against pressure from this level.

Of course, the teacher didn't fully release her pressure. If she did, every youth in the room would at least faint, or at worst even die.

Put under so much pressure, a lot of the examinees couldn't think about their questions and started to become uneasy, while Aether leisurely filled in his sheet.

He had absolutely no problem with the pressure except the slight discomfort. However, it seemed the pressure from the female teacher wasn't the only distracting event they were going to experience during the exam.

Suddenly a high pitched sound rang from somewhere all throughout the room, causing a splitting headache to everyone who heard it.

Aether grimaced heavily when the sound penetrated straight into his soul. Suffering from both the pressure and the sound attack to the soul at the same time was difficult to bear, even for him.

After enduring this hellish torment for around five minutes, both the pressure and sound suddenly abated. Every examinee let out a deep breath and visibly relaxed, preparing to once again start answering the questions.

When the female teacher saw this, she all of a sudden smiled and said, "activate."

Everyone's expression changed when they heard this. The pressure and that annoying, soul grating sound wasn't the end of it?

A bright light flashed, forcing them to close their eyes. When they opened their eyes again, they couldn't help but be stunned.

All their answer sheets had been emptied, the question's answer fields empty once again.

Aether frowned when he realized what happened. He had actually already completed almost a third of the questions, but now his work had been deleted. Nobody would feel elated about that.

'What are you supposed to do in this test?'

He didn't have enough information to find a solution right away, so he decided not to think too hard about it right now and started answering the questions once again.

Most of the examinees made the same decision, while a few were visibly annoyed. But who could blame them, this was truly an annoying entrance test.

Five minutes after they started answering the new test sheets, the female teacher released her heavy pressure again. Naturally, the soul scraping sound also made its reappearance. Only, this time they seemed to be a little stronger.

Aether's frown deepened. If things progressed the way he thought they would, he would truly be in for a headache.

Unfortunately, he was right.

Five minutes later, the pressure vanished and the sound subsided.

"Activate", the female teacher spoke.

All the answers got erased from the answer sheets, the questions blank once again.

'Seems I was right, we are truly inside a loop caused by an illusion array,', Aether silently mused while his mouth curved into an exited smile.