Chapter 216
For example, Di Linna, who hails from Mei Luo City and has a foundation in magic, finds that the exam focuses heavily on knowledge of Alchemy and the Chaos School. Kali, a professional in the Alchemy system, is tested mostly on magic and the Chaos School as well. Meanwhile, Lucy has been assigned specific content on magical plant identification by the paper figure...
Although it was clear that the paper figure was a suitable teacher, Ye Bai never anticipated such precise and tailored instruction before making his decision.
In the quiet library, the only sound was the soft rustle of quills scratching against paper.
The paper figure's gaze swept over the students taking the exam, noting the differences in comprehension and learning abilities among them.
At the front, the top students were all female: Kali, Di Linna, Lucy, and Polly... The first tier of students had a solid foundation gained from their careers and possessed a natural aptitude. In the middle were the average students with lesser comprehension, like Sean, Wade, and Nitya.
As for the completely clueless "underachievers," that title belonged to Felix and Blaze.
Felix, holding his exam paper, had completed most of the questions related to the Chaos School but was now scratching his head over the topics of magic and alchemy.
Even though most of his paper consisted of Chaos School questions, he couldn't be sure that he had answered them all correctly. After a rough calculation, he realized that if he got even two questions from the other schools wrong, he might very well fail.
The nameless teacher had said that any student who failed this exam would be subjected to "flexible learning." Just thinking about it made Felix shudder, as he knew what "flexible work hours" entailed.
Studying from dawn till dusk was already painful enough; he didn't want to lose his evenings too!
Just as Felix was feeling anxious, he suddenly felt a tug on his clothes.
Turning cautiously, he saw a familiar gray-and-white figure.
"Ottofis... I'm in the middle of an exam," Felix mouthed silently.
His past experiences had made Felix well aware of the peculiarities of this lord's mount, which could appear and disappear at will, was hard to spot, and could understand human speech with remarkable intelligence.
The donkey didn’t let go but continued to tug at Felix's clothes.
With a resigned shake of his head, Felix pulled out a piece of bread he had prepared for an afternoon snack and offered it to the creature.
“Nom…”
Only then did Ottofis release his grip on Felix's clothes, satisfied.
While Ye Bai was busy, Ottofis often roamed around the territory and had visited the library many times. Everyone in the territory recognized it as the lord's mount, and whenever they saw it, they would usually offer it some suitable food.
Among all the food, Ottofis loved bread the most.
Felix, with his youthful heart and fondness for animals, often indulged the donkey by feeding it bread whenever he saw it.
After this brief interruption, Felix turned back and glanced at Blaze, who looked just as troubled as he did, which made him feel a bit better.
Then he looked back at his exam paper, and his expression mirrored Blaze's once more.
Before him was a multiple-choice question with four possible answers. Which one should he choose...?
At that moment, a donkey hoof reached out from below and pressed down on Felix's exam paper, landing squarely on the third answer.
“Hmm?”
Felix's eyes widened in disbelief as he stared at the donkey.
Ottofis gave him a look that seemed to say, "You get it now, right?" before retracting its hoof.
Was Ottofis suggesting that this was the correct answer?
Felix looked at the third option, and the more he stared, the more it seemed to resonate with him. He vaguely recalled the sound of the nameless teacher's voice during class.
What the heck, I’ll just go with it!
Ten minutes later, the exam time was up, and everyone set down their papers with a mix of expressions.
The papers were handed to the paper figure at the front, and the score section on each paper was inscribed with basic magical script using a potion.
With a leap, the paper figure dove into the stack of papers, and the magical script in the score sections began to change, transforming into actual scores.
It didn’t take long before the paper figure jumped back to the original scroll.
“I will call out the names of those who have failed, and they will need to undergo ‘flexible learning’... Blaze, Felix.”
Hearing his name called, Felix clutched his head in despair.
The papers were soon distributed by Polly, the study group leader. As Felix looked at the comments on his paper, he thought that he must have chosen the wrong answer for the question Ottofis had helped him with. Clearly, he shouldn’t rely on an animal’s luck...
However, as his gaze fell, Felix suddenly jolted.
The question that Ottofis had helped him with turned out to be the only one he had answered correctly in both magic and alchemy!
Ironically, it was his most confident subject, the Chaos School, where he had gotten a question wrong, which was the key reason for his failure.
“What a pity, just one question short... Don’t worry, I’m here for you!” Blaze leaned over, looking at his fellow underachiever, struggling to suppress a laugh.
At that moment, Felix was engulfed in a wave of self-doubt—
He, he was actually worse off than a donkey!
...
Meanwhile, Di Linna, Kali, and Lucy, the three top students, were also called by the paper figure.
However, the reason for calling them was different.
Looking proudly at her three promising students, the paper figure felt she had not let Lord Bai Ye down: “For this exam, I specifically left each of you a question that allows for creative application related to your professions, and you all did wonderfully.”
The public praise made the three girls feel a surge of confidence, bolstered by the envious and admiring gazes of their classmates.
The paper figure encouraged them, “Do you think you can turn these into complete products?”
“Of course,” they replied in unison.
On the other side, Ye Bai was busy adjusting the import and export trade content within the Merchant Guild, while Ottofis had just returned and was off to play somewhere.
Suddenly, a system notification chimed in her ear:
[Territory professional ‘Kali’ has invented the ‘Micro Energy Extractor’ using knowledge from the library (Magic, Alchemy, Chaos).]
[Territory professional ‘Di Linna’ has invented the ‘Cloak of March’ using knowledge from the library (Magic, Alchemy, Chaos).]
[Territory professional ‘Lucy’ has invented the ‘Eagle Eye Potion’ using knowledge from the library (Magic, Alchemy, Chaos).]
Ye Bai was taken aback, then her eyes lit up.
She had sent the professionals to the library to learn advanced knowledge for this very moment.
The drop rate for world blueprints was low and infrequent; in the later stages, a territory's unique industry could not rely solely on blueprints. It required the professionals nurtured by the territory to learn extraordinary knowledge, which would spark inspiration and lead to inventions.
Inventions were like blueprints that had been directly activated; when created by professionals in the territory, they automatically became unique patents of that territory. Once produced, these patents would become the hallmark industries of the territory.
Ye Bai had initially expected it would take at least fifteen days to produce the first unique industry, but the paper figure had given her a huge surprise!
At the moment the three inventions were announced, other interstellar civilizations monitoring the lord rankings noticed that Bai Ye Town had returned to its normal development speed after two "jumps," with its score surging by another 6,000 points.
Thus, on the lord rankings, Bai Ye Town's score once again returned to a familiar gap of ten thousand points compared to the second and third territories.
---
Chapter 144
In the two territories of Rui Lan Town and Luo Fei Town, which are key development areas for cosmic-level civilizations, both have now reached a significant scale, matching Bai Ye Town as level five territories.
At this stage, Lords Zeta and Xi Mo have also recognized that the requirements for upgrading to a level six territory involve population and general education rates. They are following Bai Ye Town's example by building general education schools and refugee camps to expand their populations.
However, compared to Ye Bai, who had started developing education long before becoming a level four territory, their actions were still quite slow. They had only just completed the second batch of residents' general education.
Fortunately, since these two territories had a large number of players serving as additional labor alongside NPCs, their progress was still quite rapid. It was likely that with the graduation of the third batch of residents, they would meet the upgrade conditions for a level five territory.
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