Chapter 258: One Hundred Thousand Points
Chapter 258: One Hundred Thousand Points
Jim moved slowly towards the altar. All the eyes fell upon him but he didn't care.
He knew Hector gave him a ring containing what was salvaged from the pit for sure. That meant at least he would get a score equal to Hector, or a little higher.
Even if he wasn't the king, he would end up being the first in the grade one list and one of the top ten ever in the academy.
And that was more than enough for him.
"Put your hands on the pillar," the master said once Jim reached the rounded base of the altar. "Both hands please."
Jim stood there for a moment before he stepped on the base. "It's cold," he muttered to himself while feeling the altar base with his feet.
"We have no time, move now or be disqualified," the master said in a harsh tone.
"He might be afraid," the last dragon kid suddenly said before laughing in mockery, "I bet he is going to piss his pants. Is this the one rumored to be a king? A king of what? A bunch of losers?"
He laughed and his words instigated the mocking laughs of many others. Jim turned to glance at those laughing at him with cold eyes.
They were all belonging to the core campus one way or another.
"We'll see about that," Jim confidently said before turning to the pillar. "Once I become your king moron, then it means you are a loser."
Jim placed both hands over the pillar and totally ignored the curse that dragon kid said and wouldn't be punished upon.
Jim knew the ugly face of the academy now. They would treat you nicely if you were part of the pack, leaning your head to them and letting them step over everything you got.
Fight them back and you would be considered an enemy, no questions asked.
"Let's see what score I will get," Jim said to himself the moment the pillar went silver.
And he waited for the ray to be released.
However what he didn't notice was that his own body was shining with the same silver light like the pillar.
He didn't feel a thing or notice anything different, however everyone else was just glaring at him with puzzled expressions over their faces.
"Should that... happen?" the master supervising over this said to the dean and other masters.
But he got no answer, only silence and shock was what he got.
"I was sure this boy is special," Igory couldn't help but laugh, "see? A kid in the inner campus bested all your fancy kids of the core campus... Amazing, isn't it?"
"Watch your language Igory," the dean said in a deep tone, "a few weeks ago you were part of us."
"I bet you are now feeling terrified," Igory didn't stop but he even moved a couple of steps forward. "You tried everything you got to stop this boy, and see? Even the judge is sympathizing with him."
"That light doesn't mean anything," the dean said in a casual way like he was trying to demineer the importance of that light.
"It doesn't mean anything for us because no one knows what's going on, right?" Igory laughed, "I can only applaud your keen eyes Hector boy. You said it like a prophet, our boy will be the king."
"The score isn't out yet," one of the masters belonging to the Chimera clan and part of the core campus said, "don't put any hope before the score appears or you might get a heart attack."
"I bet you will have one when the score appears," Mark stepped in to help Igory.
"Enough!" The dean's voice showed how upset he was. His shout made everyone realize he wasn't that collected and calm after all.
He might even be, like Igory described, terrified.
As for Jim, all he could feel was a rare moment of peace out there. The pillar seemed to release some sort of energy to cool him down, making him feel safe.
Then a strange sting began to happen over his skin from time to time.
'What's going on here, old man?' Jim got a very painful sting and couldn't help it anymore.
'I believe the pillar is trying to assess your own powers,' the old man answered after a long moment of silence.
'Shouldn't it assess the cores, not my powers?' Jim got another sting and this time he couldn't help but think of drawing his hand off the pillar.
'Don't!' Yet the old man managed to stop him from doing that.
'It's... torturing me,' Jim got another sting and cursed. 'Damn! That hurt!'
'You need to endure,' the old man said what Jim didn't want to hear.
'I won't until you explain what's going on.'
'It's assessing your power, told you already.'
'Yeah, you said,' Jim took a deep breath, 'but I asked another question and you didn't answer.'
'The answer is in front of you, can't you see it?'
'Old man, I'm not in the mood to do this,' Jim took a deep breath before adding, 'I want you to tell me in a direct and simple way what's going on here. What's wrong with that pillar? Why is it assessing me?'
'It's because you got the core of that monster,' the old man slowly said.
The answer made Jim slightly puzzled before a thing jumped into his head. 'That seed... damn! It must be it!'
'It's not necessarily a bad thing, right?'
'What's good will come from... Damn, can't this pillar give me a break?'
'It should be almost over,' the old man said, 'but assessing that score alone is enough to grant you an incredible score.'
'Seriously?' Jim got another sting and that made him feel the pain deep down his spine.
'Don't think about it,' the old man knew what he was planning to do, 'despite having that ring from Hector, the score you will get won't be far away from their reach.'
Jim sighed as he planned to pull his hands off and end the assessment. 'I don't need that king's place,' he thought, 'all I need is just to be in the top ten.'
'You don't understand,' the old man slowly said, 'being the king isn't just about fame and glory. The king carries power, or why else would he be called the king?'
'I dunno,' Jim shrugged, 'I thought it was some kind of useless title.'
'In an academy filled with mythical creatures and fierce clans? You gotta be kidding, right?'
Jim knew his old man had a point but the pain that he kept feeling made him quite impatient.
However, for everyone else, they only saw him standing there shining in a silver light like a pillar for almost ten minutes.
They didn't know he was getting tortured by the pillar, and all they cared about was the score he would get.
And just when Jim was getting the worst pain he could even imagine, the light off his body simply vanished.
A sliver ray was shot in the sky while he finally felt the energy emitted from the pillar vanishing off.
"At... last," he even staggered a couple of steps backward while panting for breath. Only part of his team and a couple masters plus the dean noticed his weird state.
But the window that came above and the number written on it attracted everyone's attention.
"Holy... sh*t!!!" many curses like this one appeared all over the place while Jim turned his head finally to see what he scored.
"One hundred thousand points!!! That's insane!" he muttered to himself before turning to glance at the shocked and appalled white faces around.
Those arrogant kids and masters of the core campus stood there with ashen white faces. They were petrified and Jim noticed some trembled out of shock.
"Hell yeah! Our inner campus ace did it!"
A shout came from Hector that alarmed the entire inner campus and let them all whistle in salute for him.
"Stop... Stop it!" yet the dean couldn't stand seeing such numbers. He shouted to silence everyone before landing towards the judge.
"What do you want to do?" Mark didn't stand still as he felt some threat coming from the dean.
And he wasn't alone.
At once several masters appeared beside Jim. They all stood in a small circle while Mark, Rana, and Igory stood inside beside the weakened Jim.
"Stand out of my way," the dean landed on the outer rim of the base. "You are blocking my path."
"You should have some dignity," Igory spoke first, "he got this score fair and no rule in the academy allows you to lay a single finger on him."
"Who said I want him?" the dean slowly moved his head around while the tension in the air started to rise. More masters began to gather up from both sides.
Any small mistake and the entire place would be turned into a brutal war.
"Then why are you standing here?" Mark aggressively asked.
"I can say the same thing about you all," the dean seemed collected.
"We are here to escort our king back to the inner campus," Rana slowly said.
"And I'm not blocking your way, and I'm not here for him," the dean simply said before pointing all of sudden towards the pillar, "I'm here to see how the hell that kid got such a biased score."
"Biased... what are you even talking about?!" Rana couldn't help but comment in an aggressive way.
"This mark... no one can have it," the dean pointed to the high above window, "the number of monsters and their value at places disciples could reach can't allow for more than fifty thousand points to one disciple."
"Nonsense," Mark instantly disagreed.
"The proof is easy to acquire if you are slightly smart," the dean said in a rude way before adding, "step aside, I need to unveil the mystery behind this kid's hideous cheat here."