Monster Cultivation

During class, Drew was fully awake but barely paying attention to the lesson. Bein’s constant glaring was starting to irritate him.

Maroon announced, "The next few assignments should be interesting. First, we’ll have a cultivation race like last time. The first to reach levels 4 through 10 will be rewarded. Has anyone advanced past level 3?"

Half the class said yes, earning three points each. Then she asked, "Level 4?"

Shun, Rei, and Drew stood up.

Milia wasn't in class.

Maroon got up to verify. The first one she checked was Shun.

She told him, "Cut your finger."

Shun looked confused. "W...what?"

"Just draw some blood. I can see your Ferna through it."

Shun hesitated, still confused. She hadn’t done this during the first test, so why now?

Drew assumed it was because she believed they’d be too scared to lie on their first day. But now, they might be more desperate. It wasn’t that she doubted Shun—she just needed to set an example for all the students, including Drew.

Rei, annoyed by how long Shun was taking, said, "Can’t you just prick his finger?"

Realizing he was acting cowardly, Shun tried to act tough, though his voice trembled. "I—I can do it myself."

He raised his finger to his mouth and bit down hard. His face twisted in pain as he quickly pulled his hand away. Blood welled up, but it had a greenish tint, with faint green particles floating from it.

"I-is that good?" he asked the teacher.

She didn’t respond, almost as if she hadn’t heard him.

"Miss?" he asked again.

She quickly nodded. "Yes, yes, yes!"

As someone cultivates and weaves their core more, the less human they become. Their blood is eventually replaced by Ferna. When wounded, they no longer bleed like ordinary humans; instead, they bleed energy.

Miss Maroon examined the blood samples of the other three students. But when she looked at Drew's, she hesitated, puzzled for a moment. However, she quickly dismissed it, chalking it up to exhaustion.

Drew, on the other hand, was surprised. He knew his blood looked very different from the others', though it was hard for the others to make out the details from where they stood. Only the teacher could clearly see the difference.

Is she blind? Drew wondered.

Next, she asked about level 5. Rei sat down. Shun and Drew were the only ones still standing.

It was painfully obvious that Drew’s achievement was seen as absurd. The two kids with high-scale cores hadn’t reached that level, but somehow a medium-scale core had?

Everyone thought he was lying.

"What's he doing standing up?"

"Beating up Bein gave him way too much confidence."

"Yeah, he was kinda cool-ish. But geez, lying so obviously? What a loser."

Miss Maroon said nothing, she hadn't awarded points either. Instead, she asked, "Level six?"

They both stayed standing, and the class erupted in disbelief.

Bein shouted, "He’s obviously lying! Drew’s full of shit! Hang him! Hang that sucker now!"

Drew couldn’t help but glance at Bein’s bandaged nose.

"Yeah, Drew’s cool and all, but he can’t be better than Shun," another student added.

"Seriously, Drew. You can fight, but beating Shun? Even surpassing Rei sounds like a joke."

Drew simply said, "We’ll see."

Maroon warned, "Lying will result in a 5-point deduction."

"I'm glad," Drew replied.

Miss Maroon roughly pulled the same bleeding finger of Drew's. She stared at it, puzzled like something was off. His blood had a dense wet green energy around it. More than half of what was supposed to be blood was Ferna, which became very dust-like when exposed outside of the body.

She then pricked his finger with her sharp fingernails, and the results were the same. She pricked again on his other finger, harsher, drawing more blood.

She repeated the action several times, thinking she might’ve made a mistake.

Did Drew cheat? Had someone poured their Ferna into him to cleanse his impurities? Or maybe he used drugs to speed up the process.

These were things she couldn’t prove at the moment.

Maroon said slowly, still in disbelief, "He’s telling the truth."

While Rei, Shun, and Milia were biologically built to clean Ferna more efficiently than Drew, he was simply far better at it.

If they could cultivate for twenty-four hours straight like Drew, instead of getting mentally exhausted after just two to three hours, they would’ve surpassed him.

Shun, for instance, was constantly distracted by the attention of other students, so he didn’t want to cultivate all the time like Drew. Rei didn’t have that issue, but his pride was so bruised from losing to Drew that he couldn’t focus for even half an hour without getting frustrated.

Plus, they were taking other classes, which cut into their cultivation time.

Bein jumped up from his seat, shouting, "That makes no sense!"

Rei, who had been quiet until now, spoke up, "Miss, you know it doesn’t add up. He’s either cheating or getting some kind of help."

Maroon sighed. "If he’s cheating, he’ll be punished. Don’t worry."

Drew sat down and, instead of paying attention to the conversation, started cultivating right there in his seat without moving into position.

They kept talking about him, but he heard nothing. He didn't care. All it did was make him smile on the inside.

When he came out of his mind space, the classroom was empty, except for Miss Maroon, who seemed to be asleep. She likely had a monster that allowed her to go much longer without rest than normal.

Drew stood up to leave, but just as he stepped outside of the classroom, Miss Maroon said, "Stop."

He turned toward her. "Yes, Miss?"

Miss Maroon stood up, pushing her chair back, her face serious. "The class is gone, so there’s no risk of embarrassment if you admit how you cheated or who helped you."

"If I admitted to something like that, I’d be expelled. That’s not something you can change."

"So, did you cheat?"

"No. I cultivate almost all the time when I’m not eating or in class." He half-lied; he also cultivated during class.

"Are you at least using drugs to increase your focus? At your age, with so little experience, it’s hard to believe you can maintain focus without mental exhaustion every few hours. Even I can’t focus for more than seven hours straight."

Even the clan patriarch could likely only cultivate for 12 hours before hitting mental exhaustion.

"I’m not using drugs—yet. But even if I were, that wouldn’t break any rules."

"... I see. So you did all this by hard work?"

"Hard work and determination." He grinned. "Nothing more. Nothing less."

Miss Maroon found his grin off-putting and simply nodded. "If that's the case. Keep up the good work."

There wasn't much genuineness in her voice.

Then Drew remembered something and said, "Miss?"

"Yes?"

"My Core points for passing the assignments. I'm missing them."

She stared at him like he was taunting her. After a couple of seconds, she smiled, saying, "Of course..."

Drew got an additional twenty-four core points, thanked her, and left the classroom.

Miss Maroon went to the investigation office. She had reported Drew before, regarding his ability to hold a rare monster, and was now providing another report about his cultivation levels.

A medium scale surpassing all other development scales was unheard of. Such a thing could discourage students who were blessed by the heavens.

Hierarchies existed for a reason. However, Drew’s "cheating" might push other students to work harder, encouraging them to cultivate more.

But it could also give them false hope, making them forget their place and bite off more than they could chew.

The man in the office, the lead investigator, reviewed the papers and said, "I told you, we’re already busy with another student investigation."

"This one is urgent! Did you read it?" Miss Maroon quickly said.

"I did and--"

"It can't wait!"

"...Fine. I’ll look into it myself."

Drew closed The Book of Memories after making some edits. That was the second thing he rushed to do after leaving the class. The first was purchasing some essential items from the item shop. The order didn't matter. What mattered was having preparations done as fast as possible.

Afterward, he went to search for Milia. She wasn't at class which was suspicious and he needed her to help him find the hidden trials. He was still missing about twenty points to unlock the library, but if he got Milia, who was a walking library in regards to legends and history, he wouldn't need it.

However, asking her could reveal his interest in the trials, and if she joined, it would lessen the rewards he’d earn. But it was better to share some of the loot than to never get it.

But no matter how hard he looked, up and down the campus, he couldn't find her. When he asked around the other students wouldn’t talk to him.

They were convinced Drew was a cheater, someone who had outshined Shun—a loser in their eyes.

Drew wasn’t fazed. It made sense they’d react this way. But it was very annoying.

Asking Rei was pointless. So it seemed finding Milia wasn't an option at the moment. Which meant it was back to gaining more points to unlock the library.

There were three main ways to earn points: class assignments, achievements, community service tasks, or assisting an instructor.

Class assignments were the easiest, but they required attending the other classes. Survival, diplomacy, and martial arts classes, which consumed precious cultivation time.

Then he had an idea. Why attend the classes when he could just show up for the assignments to earn points?

How would he know when there would be assignments? Shun.

At that moment, the martial arts class was in session and nearly finished.

There might be an assignment.

Jiman, the martial arts instructor, annoyed Drew, but there was no avoiding it.

The class took place in a large open area. Poles were positioned in a rectangular formation.

Milia wasn’t there either—probably not even on campus.

Everyone was sparring with partners, and judging by the looks of it, they were almost done.

Bein and Rei were particularly ruthless—not causing serious harm but enough to leave someone sore for the day.

Maybe they were preparing for a second round.

Jiman stood with his arms crossed, watching. When the final bout between the two randoms ended, he said, "Good, good!"

Shun had some light bruises and was breathing hard. He wasn't really focused on the fight so he was looking around and saw Drew.

Shun announced, "Drew’s here."

Everyone turned to look at him, their expressions full of disgust.

Jiman glared at Drew. "Drew... just in time. We’re about to start another assignment."

"What is it?" Drew asked.

"Whoever can subdue you wins four points."

"And what do I get? I can’t subdue myself."

"Two points if you can avoid being subdued."

"Then no."

"Excuse me?"

"Your bias is showing, and that’s against the rules. Points should be fair, based on the difficulty of the assignment. Since I’m the target, I have the hardest job and should get the most points."

"Seven, then."

"Still too low," Drew replied.

"Too low?! Either do it, or I’ll deduct points!"

"You can only take points if I cheat during an assignment or break a school rule. Attending class isn’t mandatory—the final tests are."

"A cheater and a coward?" someone shouted.

"Just fight, stop being a coward!" others chimed in.

Shun said nothing, quietly observing. Rei, hearing the insults directed at Drew and noticing how unfazed he was, couldn’t help but compare it to how Drew didn’t care about getting their approval.

Drew had gone from being admired to being hated in less than a week.

But how long would it last? When would these fools go back to cheering for him, desperately seeking his attention?

They were mindless, like zombies. They said he cheated, that it was immoral and unfair, that he was disrupting the natural order. But how many of them secretly wished to know how he cheated so they could do the same?

At the same time, Rei thought, if Drew fought and performed well, he might regain some level of respect. But the more Rei considered it, the more he realized that the respect of these "background characters" was worthless. They were sheep...

And that angered him.

Rei left the class, drawing the attention of the other kids. Many of them wanted to be around him, pretending they hadn't abandoned him when Drew embarrassed him earlier.

"That loser pissed you off too, huh?" one kid asked, grinning. "Damn coward must’ve been afraid you’d beat his as--"

Rei elbowed him, breaking his nose. He didn’t bother to look back as the boy collapsed, screaming in pain.

He was done with those empty praises. He had no use for people who jumped from one person to another, thinking he was too naïve to see their real motives.

Rei needed to get stronger. He believed Drew cheated, but without proof, what was he supposed to do? Keep whining about it or surpass him?

Surpassing him was the only option.

Drew felt a little regret about turning down the points. He would’ve accepted the challenge if it wasn’t him against 98 kids—some of whom likely had monster-like strength or toughness.

He knew his limits, and that was one of them. There was no shame in not getting his ass stomped out because of pride.