Curtain Fall

Perhaps before the school anniversary event was held, Chu Lian still had some doubts about whether she could complete the task. Although she had prepared everything she could possibly anticipate to the best of her ability, standing on such a stage for the first time still made her nervous and fearful.

However, after receiving the "White Rose" skill following the class performance, she felt reassured. In terms of ability, she was certain to take first place in this school celebration.

That said, victory can be a strange thing. It might change due to someone's fleeting impulse. So she couldn't just rely on her skills alone—she had to take additional measures.

Fortunately, the entire afternoon's performances went smoothly, without any major issues. She was confident that she had done her best. Even if she had to do it all over again, she might not be able to achieve the same effect. This made her all the more certain of winning first place.

To be honest, Chu Lian was not someone who needed to win at everything. If not for the system's task, she might have simply chosen to play the guzheng to prove herself, without performing the xiao, erhu, and pipa.

Originally, those were skills she planned to reveal gradually as her hidden aces. Unveiling them all at once certainly had a powerful effect, but it would also bring a flood of doubts and questions.

These doubts might not target her actual abilities anymore, but they would definitely raise questions like: "How did she learn all these talents?" and "Does she truly have the energy to master four instruments at a master-level by age thirteen?"

She had no way to answer these clearly trap-laden questions. She could imagine that once she gave even one response, people would start tearing it apart, finding endless flaws.

This was one of the reasons why she had decided to step back for a while—to avoid the limelight and divert attention. Once the storm had passed and she had time to settle down, she would surely bring more surprises. By then, fewer people would fixate on this issue.

Maybe it would take three years, maybe five. But so what? As she had already said, after this performance, she would not appear in public events for a while.

However, she had also said she would continue posting her work online. That way, she could maintain her popularity and show people her steady improvement.

The best disguise is often what people witness with their own eyes.

She believed that anyone who had seen her performance would find themselves unable to resist following her—whether on Weibo or M Station.

She had calculated that, given her skill level and the buzz generated over the past few days, the video of her performance would likely rack up a significant number of views across major platforms. The total view count could easily reach into the tens of millions.

Even if many people rewatched it several times or didn't pay attention to what she said, as long as even a fraction of the viewers followed her, it might just be enough to help her complete that once seemingly unreachable Fantasy-level task.

Last night, she had only stayed in the large gymnasium for a while before it was time for the awards ceremony for individual talent performances. As the first-place winner, she would naturally be the last to appear. Unfortunately, in her exhausted state, she hadn't noticed who the earlier awardees were. Only when her name was called did she snap back to reality.

When Chu Lian stepped onto the stage with an extremely pale face and an expression that couldn't hide her fatigue, the audience erupted in wild cheers.

Those cheers quickly converged into a single name: "Chu Lian."

The school administration exhausted every effort to calm the frenzied fans, but they had little effect.

With no other choice, Chu Lian had to step in herself. She quietly walked to the microphone, coughed a few times, and once the crowd realized it was her speaking, she said, "Could everyone please quiet down? It's already nighttime—no need to waste so much energy. Thank you all for your love and support. Without it, I wouldn't have been able to stand on this stage..."

After finishing her sentence, she gently began to hum "Moonlit Ripples on the Jade Lake" for about a minute. The soft melody finally calmed the crowd, allowing the award ceremony to continue.

Unsurprisingly, Chu Lian received an overwhelming number of votes. Even though each person could only vote three times and each vote had to go to a different person, Chu Lian still received nearly four thousand votes thanks to her massive fanbase. That was three times more than the second-place contestant, who had just over a thousand.

Chu Lian was the undisputed winner of the day—not only taking first place in the individual talent competition but also helping her class win the final available slot for the study tour reward.

She wasn't particularly surprised by her personal victory, but she was taken aback at how narrowly her class had secured their win—only a few votes ahead of Class 2 of Grade 7. It made her marvel at the hidden talents within this globally renowned school.

Indeed, this school was worthy of its world-class reputation. It was full of hidden dragons and crouching tigers. Even her first-place finish could be attributed, at least in part, to some geniuses still choosing to remain in hiding.

After learning she had taken first place, Chu Lian could no longer fight off the exhaustion that swept through her. The moment she stepped down from the stage, she blacked out.

When she woke up, she found herself lying in her own bed at home. The clock on the nightstand read 9:00. Sunlight streamed warmly through the windows, and a steaming cup of milk sat on the nightstand.

She only had to think for a moment to realize that her parents had brought her home. They had told her they would come to see her performance, and although she hadn't seen them all day and assumed they were busy, it now seemed likely they had hidden in the crowd to avoid distracting her.

Her teacher had probably gotten in touch with them, which was how they managed to bring her back home.

Thinking this, a warm smile appeared on her lips. It felt good to have someone who truly cared about her. The days of being sick with no one knowing, hungry with no one asking, or having no one to talk to after a bad day at work were now a thing of the past.

She hadn't yet checked the task rewards. This time, without the curse of "Luck E" hanging over her, things should finally go smoothly.

Opening the system, a flurry of messages flickered on the virtual screen. She tapped into the task menu and began to read:

Completion of Goddess Quest: Win the individual talent award at Sudi High School's tenth anniversary celebration and help your class earn the study tour reward. Upon completion, receive one reward based on performance.

Task Completion: First place in individual talent award; class earned the study tour qualification. Task Rating: Perfect (Enhanced rewards beyond standard level.)

Reward: Innate Spiritual Body. Your body will be refined by the essence of heaven and earth, transforming into its most perfect form. The purification process lasts three months and will not affect your daily life. Goddess Value +3 (Current Goddess Value: 13).

Innate Spiritual Body: Purifies the body, removing impurities and restoring it to a pristine, innate state.

Effects: Learning ability +50%, learning speed +50%, cultivation comprehension +50%, cultivation speed +50%, abnormal status resistance +30%, movement speed +25%, strength, constitution, and agility +10%.

Completion: 1.1%, Time Remaining: 89 days. (Perfect Rating: Maximum enhancement of Innate Spiritual Body.)

She had expected the Innate Spiritual Body to be powerful, but she hadn't anticipated it being this good. While it didn't directly boost combat capabilities much, its auxiliary effects were incredibly beneficial for someone still in a growth phase.

She also noticed that her Goddess Value had increased. It had been at 7 before—after receiving 3 from this task's reward, she now had 13. That meant her actions yesterday alone had earned her 3 Goddess Points.

It seemed that every action she took led to different consequences. Gains didn't mean there couldn't also be losses. Therefore, she needed to always maintain the demeanor of a goddess in front of others...

For someone who once asked, "Integrity—can you eat it?", her public goddess persona was now her most perfect image.

More lovable than a musical or literary prodigy—that's probably a universal weakness: an excessive obsession with appearance.

Class Task Completion Reward ①: Spirit Cat Cub. Spirit Cats are rare magical beasts from a fantasy world. They usually appear as normal cats but transform into Thunderstrike White Tigers during battle. Extremely intelligent, capable of understanding human speech, though they retain cat-like personalities. Gentle and fiercely loyal—ideal as spirit pets. (Perfect Rating: Accelerated growth phase.)

Class Task Completion Reward ②: Harry Potter and the Philosopher's Stone (English edition). The Harry Potter series by J.K. Rowling is a globally popular fantasy novel.

The series generated tens of billions in revenue and is considered one of the most lucrative literary works in history. (Perfect Rating: Award includes 37 region-specific, optimally translated editions.)

Class Task Completion Reward ③: Hogwarts Admission Letter. Congratulations—you've been accepted into Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry. Please report to the school before the new term begins. (Perfect Rating: Upon entering the Dungeon Space, you will become a student the same age as Harry Potter.)

Seeing the cascade of perfect-rating rewards, Chu Lian couldn't help but leap for joy. All the exhaustion from the past few days—it had all been for these rewards. Now that the two tasks were finally complete, and with the best possible outcomes, how could she not be thrilled? How could she not jump and twirl in glee?

After running around in excitement for a bit, she felt tired again. Collapsing onto her bed and staring at the ceiling, Chu Lian fell into contemplation. This task... was it really going to be that simple?