Chapter 266: Chapter 24: A Powerhouse’s Leeway and the Prelude to Chaos
Su Zhou, a professor in the Practical and Exploration Department of Qinxing Academy—in name, at least—was already waiting on campus. He stood on the second floor of the library, watching parents and students walk through the academy gates in the distance. Their faces, a mixture of nervousness and anticipation, made him feel rather emotional.
"Ah, this is the life!" he muttered to himself, a smug look on his face. "As expected of me!"
Years ago, Su Zhou had imagined what it would be like when he first entered an academy, but even his wildest fantasies weren’t as bizarre as reality. Just moments ago, he had been in a meeting with the academy leadership, discussing how exactly he should balance his work and Cultivation during his time on campus.
The chancellor, a man surnamed Zhu, was at Awakening Peak and a former deputy director of the National Security Bureau. He had told Su Zhou with a pleasant smile to relax now that he was at the academy and to treat it like his own home.
So naturally, Su Zhou didn’t stand on ceremony. He asked for a cafeteria meal card with no spending limit—after all, who has to pay for meals in their own home?
This just goes to show, a man’s destiny is forged by his own hard work, but he must also consider the course of history.
’These new students are pretty strong. They’re all at the Awakening Tier.’
Glancing over the newly enrolled students, Su Zhou was rather surprised to find that every single one of them had reached the Awakening Tier. But on second thought, it wasn’t that strange. After all, the three A Class Cultivation Academies only accepted a little over ten thousand people in total. Each new student was a local Cultivation genius with an affinity of at least 55%. With ample resources and the ongoing Spiritual Energy Revival, it wasn’t unusual for them to reach the Awakening Tier in just under a year.
This was evident from the students’ spirit—most of them wore expressions of pride and were brimming with confidence. After all, each of them was a chosen one in their hometown; otherwise, they wouldn’t have been accepted into the Academy.
According to procedure, the new students would be taken away for a month of specialized training right after enrollment to complete their transformation from ’ordinary students’ to Transcendent. During this process, to foster a competitive spirit, the academy had also set up a scored competition. The top ten would receive their own private dormitories, along with corresponding resources and academic credits.
He’d thought it was cliché back when he was reading novels, but now that he was part of the academy’s leadership, Su Zhou realized this competitive method was truly simple and required no brainpower. It was also effective in making these newly enrolled chosen ones understand that the entire Academy was filled with geniuses. Here, they had no grounds for arrogance. By inserting a few projects that required teamwork, a basic sense of unity could be established among the students, and they would get to know each other better.
No wonder everyone did it this way.
Of course, there were no martial arts tournaments. Within the Extraordinary Academy, only departments leaning toward practical application and exploration would have internal combat duels and practical assessments at the end of the year. Most other Transcendent would become professional researchers. They would possess combat abilities, but they wouldn’t specialize in their Cultivation.
During the recent meeting with the academy leadership, Su Zhou had also come to understand something. Cultivating Extraordinary Power could indeed grant an individual martial might comparable to an army. However, if all Transcendent focused solely on martial strength, they would be unable to give back enough to civilization as a whole.
For instance, Su Zhou knew very well that his own martial prowess was already considered extremely high. If the various resources invested in him from the very beginning until his current Extraordinary Tier were converted into food, it would be enough to lift a small, impoverished nation out of famine.
’But can I grow grain? Can I research hybrid Spirit Plant to feed everyone? Can I whip up some high-efficiency generator or other energy source? Can I ignore the entire industrial system and just hammer out a Spaceship with my bare hands to explore the Starry Sky, or build a particle research institute to study high-energy physics?’
’Not to say it’s impossible, but it’s certainly not possible right now.’
Su Zhou knew that with the help of the Wisdom Fruit and Yara’s guidance, he could absolutely learn other skills and one day achieve a level where he alone was comparable to an entire civilization. However, others didn’t have his opportunities or Talent and could hardly be like him; at best, they could only focus on a single area.
For a nation, and indeed for humanity as a whole, that wished to transition from a modern civilization into a new Extraordinary Civilization, immense martial power was necessary. But if everyone chose the path of martial strength, it would only lead to a surplus of force, a decline in the efficiency of resource gathering, production, and utilization, and result in severe internal friction.
This was true for civilization, but for individual Cultivator, human instinct would subconsciously drive them to focus on increasing their personal power. This held true even for those who had no Talent for combat, who couldn’t endure pain, couldn’t react quickly to the unexpected, and even those who themselves were averse to fighting and danger... Yet even so, they would subconsciously pursue individual strength.
It was humanity’s animal nature, the factory setting of the complex biological machine that is a human being. Therefore, it could only be guided by Postnatal education.
This was a problem that any nation implementing a universal Cultivation plan in the era of Spiritual Energy Revival had to face.
’But, in the end, some people need to fight.’
Gazing at the young people his own age who were gradually entering the campus, a flicker of understanding ignited in Su Zhou’s heart. ’I am one of them. In fact, I’m their leader.’
Having been a professor for some time now, Su Zhou had also gained a general understanding of Zhengguo’s current internal situation.
