Chapter Fourteen: Rapid Advancement

After the students had completed a brief warm-up, the testing began.

“Number One, Paulin!” With Jason’s call, a male student stepped forward.

The purpose of the strength test was to measure pure physical power; the student was allowed a single blow—either punch or palm—against the test apparatus within the designated area. No running start, no combat techniques, no weapons or tools.

Paulin stood inside the small white circle before the machine, summoned the internal force from his body, and with a loud shout, struck the tester with his fist.

A soft beep sounded as a string of numbers appeared on the apparatus. The force displayed was nearly twice as powerful as the legendary punch of a famous ancient boxer named Tyson, but in the current era, it was considered average—middle-tier among the students of Class Six, year three.

Jason jotted down the result, then called out loudly, “Your score this time is better than last, Paulin. Good progress. Keep it up!”

“Yes, Mentor Jason!” Paulin wiped the sweat from his brow and retreated to the ranks, relieved not to have embarrassed himself.

Jason continued, “Number Two, Diana!”

A female student stepped forward, delivering a palm strike to the tester.

It was an impressive score; Diana had always been among the top students in Class Six, nearly reaching the fifth level of spiritual power.

“Excellent progress, Diana. Very rapid improvement. Keep it up!”

“Yes, Mentor Jason!”

Next was a boy named Ampere. His score was decent, but a little lower than last week’s, and he had hovered around the same numbers for several weeks without obvious improvement. He was quite dejected, but Jason was not a harsh instructor. His teaching style favored encouragement over criticism, supervision over reprimand. Gently, he said, “Ampere, it seems you’ve reached a bottleneck in your Qi Condensation technique. Seek guidance from Mentor Hog more often, and don’t get stuck in a rut.”

Ampere replied gratefully, “Thank you for your guidance, Mentor Jason.”

“Number Four, Mulin!”

“……”

“Number Five, Morse!”

“……”

The testing continued. The numbering at Winston Academy was based on enrollment order, not performance, so the scores varied from top to bottom. The last person, without question, was the special recruit.

“Number Sixty-two, Luo Chen!”

When Jason spoke out this name—a name that had become the talk of the academy—all eyes turned to Luo Chen.

Luo Chen walked forward slowly and stood before the test apparatus.

Many students were thinking: this guy skipped class for two or three days, hasn’t been around the academy—he must be in poor form. When he embarrasses himself in the test, we’ll boo him together!

Even Jason was waiting for Luo Chen’s result, ready to use it as an opportunity to reprimand him. Though he had a good temper, Luo Chen’s conduct required some criticism, or he would lose authority as a homeroom teacher.

Luo Chen sank his body, firmly assuming a horse stance, his spine bent into an arc. His left foot withdrew, right foot stepped forward half a stride, then his right fist shot out with explosive force.

When the numbers appeared on the tester, both the students and instructors of Class Six stared in astonishment.

The result was above average, not exceptional, but Luo Chen had always been a mid-tier student. Paulin knew this well—during last weekend’s strength test, Luo Chen’s score had ranked just below his own, a difference of barely a dozen pounds.

Jason looked at the record sheet, paused, then announced, “Your score this time has increased compared to last.”

The data showed improvement.

All the reprimands Jason had prepared evaporated.

Normally, a student’s strength would increase by a few pounds every two weeks, but there were some special cases.

The first was a breakthrough—a leap in spiritual power level, which would result in a significant increase in a warrior’s strength.

The second was a bottleneck—if a student hit a plateau in spiritual practice and relied solely on physical training, their progress would be painfully slow or even stagnant.

The third was chemical stimulation—such as taking Berserk Pills, which could cause a rapid surge in strength, but was against the rules.

The fourth was the use of combat techniques, also forbidden.

Judging by Luo Chen’s rate of improvement, the second possibility could be ruled out. The remaining three were also unlikely.

The gap between level three and four in spiritual power was distinct—if someone broke through, their strength could jump by more than a hundred pounds. Two hundred-plus was high, but not impossible. However, all the instructors, including Hog, the breathing technique mentor, were watching closely at the tester. They would have noticed if Luo Chen had broken through to level four; when he struck, there was no fluctuation in spiritual energy flow. Only a super expert could conceal it so well.

Chemical stimulation?

Berserk Pills were extremely expensive. Luo Chen, poor as he was, couldn’t afford them, and even if he could, he wouldn’t waste one on a simple test. Moreover, these drugs left negative side effects, depleting a warrior’s essence. Unless faced with an emergency, no one would casually swallow a Berserk Pill. Even with **, there would be obvious symptoms—such as reddened eyes, swollen veins—but Luo Chen appeared perfectly normal, so ** could be ruled out.

As for using combat techniques, that was also impossible. Combat techniques and martial arts were fundamentally different. Only moves driven by spiritual energy flow could be called combat techniques, while martial arts could be used by anyone. Before reaching level four, spiritual warriors had no energy flow; their spiritual power was stored in muscle, granting greater explosive force but unable to condense into a flow. The mentors all judged that Luo Chen remained at level three, and thus could not use combat techniques.

Thus, Luo Chen had neither broken through to level four nor used combat techniques, nor had he undergone **. Yet his test score had risen by over two hundred pounds—without even counting the surplus!

Occasionally, negative states caused by illness or other factors could lead to wide fluctuations between two tests. But Luo Chen’s scores had been stable and normal for weeks. This time, his improvement was genuine.

But how could that be?

[Still updating three chapters today. Here’s the first, and I’d like to ask for some hot-off-the-press recommendation votes~~~]