Jue Zhu

I resisted—barely—the urge to stare at Jue Zhu as though he was a tall grey alien with a smooth round head and huge bulbous eyes. "What planet are you from?" I blurted nevertheless, "Because on the one I know, the last thing the strong do is stick together. They're too busy suppressing the ones below them and scheming against the ones above."

He gave me a funny look, then one of realization. "That's right, you said you were a pro gamer. It's really that cutthroat?"

"We'd better pick this up later," I said, noticing Hasegawa heading back toward us. We went back to concentrating on the strength control exercises. Next, indeed, was lunch.

"So you're here after all?"

"I wanted to continue our conversation from earlier," I said.

"Right, our backgrounds."

"In a way. Before, I was about to explain that it wasn't really a gamer thing. Even school for me, like, when I was actually this age, was extremely competitive. I mean, there weren't as many chances for students to sabotage others as I've seen in pro gaming, but other than that people would do just about anything to avoid becoming a mandatory laborer."

"So that's really how it is for that class of citizen." Jue Zhu had a faraway look in his eyes at these words. "I'd heard things, but...well, I never had any other option myself."

"Huh...come to think of it, a few others in the class said they were laborers when we did the whole introduction thing. But laborers hardly even get money, how did you even afford to come here?"

"A few months back, there was an announcement that this PVE was looking for volunteers to join among laborers. I jumped at it."

"What? Like, for free? That makes no sense on multiple levels. The entire point of PVEs is that the poor can't join them. Like, the high-ups don't even try to hide it, I was taught that in school! Why would they even allow a PVE to do that?"

"Huh...you know, I didn't question it before because the people running it gave a lot of details about how brutal this PVE is, but I was surprised that a lot of the people in Class B had proper occupations. How much did you pay to come here, anyway?"

"A quarter of a million dollars. And I had to endure terrible living conditions—relatively, of course—to be able to save up that much even over 10 years of a gaming career."

"There's definitely something strange! It doesn't seem like most of the others would care, though."

I nodded. "Seems to me it might be worth keeping in touch with you after all. If either of us manages to find something out about this..."

Jue Zhu nodded back. "Let's find out what we can."

"We should take it slow, though. Most likely we'll need merit with these Dimension Governors before we can even think about gathering info."

Several months passed, and my acquaintanceship with Jue Zhu gradually advanced. Mere days after our first lunch together, I'd mostly dropped my suspicions of him. He was naïve in some ways, though not as many as I'd thought on first impression. He really had approached me simply because he was lonely. Everyone else was either openly contemptuous of his obvious talent or trying to suck up to him. As someone who was used to the idea of there being many more talented than me, but not fully lacking (at least now) in it myself, I was the only one in Class B who did neither. He didn't dare make fun of or kid around with me, after the first time I expressed annoyance at it, so he wasn't bad company. There was also the fact that we had been the first two, not just in Class B, but altogether in the year, to begin cultivating. 

Still, the others in Class B followed after not too much longer, and by the time a month had gone by, everyone had at least started. At the start of the day, Elder Hasegawa told the class that today's History and Politics lesson would be special. I went a little easy in combat practice, so as not to tire myself, since this was most likely the exposition on the Sects accepting Academy graduates as new members.

As it turned out, the lesson didn't begin quite like that. "Now that you've all begun cultivating, it's time to talk about the Academy's ranking system. Every cultivator starting out here is closely observed, and placed into a rank with all others in his or her year starting after the first midterm test. I'm sure you've all been wondering what the requirement is to enter the coveted Inner Court of the Academy. At the end of your second year, the top 10 students only in the rankings will join the Inner Court for special advanced coursework, and the remaining 90 will be assigned a junior class based on their rank.

This ranking is extremely important for your near future in the Heavens. After you graduate, you will join a real cultivation sect. In total, there are nine sects that accept graduates from the Academy. Four of these are high ranking sects, and will require their own entry tests—that is, if they even allow you to take them. If you do not maintain a rank at least placing you in senior Class 1, you can forget about even trying to join a high-rank sect. As for the truly elite sect, the Rank 3 Azure Flame Abbey...only those who reach the Inner Court are even eligible to attempt to join them.

Now, we'll go over each of these nine sects one by one. I advise you to pay attention and consider carefully which might suit you.

First, there is the Balming Zephyr Sect. They are a relatively new sect, and they specialize in healing methods and techniques, though of course they are not devoid of ways to fight. They have a fairly secure position in the Lowest Heaven thanks to providing their healing to a varied number of stronger sects.

Next is the Dancing Steel Sect. There isn't much special about them, but they have competent weapon masters and a decent foundation. Then there are their longtime rivals, the Burning Muscle sect. They specialize in unarmed combat techniques and styles, and are said to teach those who become Inner Court Disciples an excellent movement technique. Next higher-ranked from them are the Pack Hunters, a sect with the rare specialization in taming and contracting Magical Beasts, so if you want to fight with companions, I'd go with them.

Finally, there is the Thorned Lily Sect. They may not be one of the high rank Sects, but that is only relatively. To be considered high rank in the Lowest Heaven, a Sect must rank #100 or higher. Thorned Lily is Rank #137, with at least 100 ranks between it and the next lowest sect the Academy recruits to. However, there's a catch--they are an all-woman Sect. Essentially, they're a safe haven for those who no longer want anything to do with men.