Translated by Rara of Exiled Rebels Scanlations
Seeing An Qiao stomp angrily toward him, You XiaoMo didn't show a least bit of panic. He said sternly, “Truthfully speaking, you reap what you sow. If you hadn’t stolen my item, you would still have another shot. But then if it wasn’t thanks to you, I wouldn’t have discovered the secret behind the black box so fast.”
“You XiaoHa, I won’t forgive you, I will make you regret this!” An Qiao glared at him with eyes that almost popped out, filled with bloodthirsty intent. He knew You XiaoMo did it intentionally, deliberately hindered him from passing, purposely punishing him.
Upon hearing it, Tian Xin lost it even more than You XiaoMo. As she about to open her mouth to mock him, Qiao WuXing who was standing next to her quickly covered her mouth and warned her not to interfere. With An Qiao being all emotional right now, he definitely would take that anger out on her.
This wasn’t the first time You XiaoMo met such unreasonable person. He didn’t take his words or his family to heart. Against this type of person, the more one tried to reason with them, the more aggressive they would become.
An Qiao left on his own after leaving that resentful sentence.
Wan Ya and the others didn’t try to persuade him or give him a thought. They only hoped that after he left, he would come around by himself, although it might be another headache. Luckily An Qiao’s master wasn’t at Zhong Tian currently, even if he wanted to get revenge, he wouldn’t be able to raise any big waves.
“Disgraceful.” Jiu Ye coldly tossed out those words, then turned around and walked to the corner.
Wan Ya and Zhang LanYu looked at each other, they couldn’t do anything but sigh.
An Qiao’s temper needed to be monitored, or else at this rate, the Mage Guild’s reputation would soon be ruined in his hand.
Wan Ya glanced at You XiaoMo’s direction, who was happily talking with an unfamiliar man. Offending a guy with potential even higher than Jiu Ye, the consequences were immeasurable.
While You XiaoMo was talking with Ling Xiao, Yan Hui once again dragged the uncle over, however this time Qiao WuXing and his sister-in-name, Tian Xin, also tagged along.
“Fellow You, congrats!” Qiao WuXing congratulated him the moment he came over.
You XiaoMo puzzled, “Congrats on what?”
The adorable Tian Xin said, “You silly head, how come you don't even know about this? This rainbow rank magic pill is the hidden reward of this test. Anyone able to seize that pill can enter the XiaoYao institute’s Time Wall.”
“What is the Time Wall?” Yan Hui was curious.
Tian Xin explained, “The Time Wall is also called the realm of wisdom. It’s said that the current Beast transfiguration techniques were learned by a mage from within there. However, each individual has different experiences. Maybe with your turn, what you learn probably won’t be the Beast Transfiguration techniques or Soul training techniques, it could be barrier skills or some sort, or maybe nothing at all. In short, the time wall is not a place anyone can go in and out of at their own convenience.”
You XiaoMo asked in doubt, “If so then why hasn’t elder Qing said anything?”
Tian Xin shrugged, “How can I know what inside that old geezer’s head?”
“Tian Xin, how can you call Elder Qing an old geezer? You are forbidden to call him like that next time.” Qiao WuXing rapped her head and then explained, “There is only one rainbow rank magic pill, so it’s not necessary to make a public announcement, so I think Elder Qing must be waiting until the end of the assessment to announce this.”
You XiaoMo silently pulled Ling Xiao to the corner.
Ling Xiao knew what he wanted to say, “Such a pity, I have never heard about the Time Wall.”
You XiaoMo, “…”
Five seconds later, You XiaoMo coughed dryly, “Who wanted to ask you about the time wall ah, don’t overrate yourself, I didn’t want to ask about that.”
Ling Xiao raised his eyebrow, “You sure?”
You XiaoMo laughed dryly, “I'm not sure. Do you think the Time Wall has something to do with the timeline, like seeing into the past and future, stuff like that.” He could smell mystery just from hearing this name.
Ling Xiao touched his forehead, “Doesn’t seem like you have a fever.”
You XiaoMo slapped his hand off, “You are the one with fever, your whole fam…” Thinking himself was also a member of Ling Xiao’s family, he held back his next word.
t/n: What a self-conscious wife
Ling Xiao ridiculed, “If you don’t have a fever, why are you talking in your sleep then? Even though I have never heard about the Time Wall, but no one can simply see the past or future, otherwise there is no way XiaoYao institute would let anyone in.”
You XiaoMo knew it was a wild imagination, so he pouted and no longer mentioned it.
Half an hour passed quickly, Elder Qing appeared once again.
This time, Elder Qing brought them further inside to the last and final round of this entrance exam.
This final round was mainly focused on the control of soul force. Usually it could be tested through the number of times one can distill magic herbs, but this was not the case this time.
Under Elder Qing’s instruction, Tan Ze and some others brought over a bunch of small chests.
You XiaoMo couldn’t help but be curious, the content of the final round is inside this small chest? He thought it would be something like distilling magic herbs.
Because the exam content was different each year, even Qiao WuXing and Jiu Ye couldn’t guess what was inside the chest.
Tan Ze and the others put down the small chests in front of Elder Qing and then stepped back behind him.
Elder Qing looked at the small chest with the faint hint of a smile, and then he looked toward everyone, “The content of this final exam is inside this chest. Now, each of you take one of them, and I will explain the rules of this final round soon after.”
Everyone was staring at each other, wondering what was XiaoYao institute's intention.
After the first, there came the second and third, until everyone all had the small chests in their hands.
You XiaoMo estimated the weight of the chest. It didn’t seem like a heavy object.
Seeing everyone had received their chests, Elder Qing spoke, “Now, open your your chest.”
You XiaoMo put down the chest onto the floor. There was no trace of it being locked. In his curiosity, when he was about to lift up the lid, immediately…
“Ahhh!!!”
With the sudden scream startled him, the half opened lid was shut again. After calmed down, he realized, he wasn’t the only one who got scared by the scream. Like the uncle, his face went especially pale.
Seeing Tian Xin throw herself onto him, Qiao WuXing didn't know whether to laugh or cry. He quickly comforted her, “Tian Xin, that is a fake, it’s not a real human skeleton.” Not like he knew in advance, just that he could see right away this skeleton was different than a real one.
“Ffake?” Tian Xin's small face was as pale as ghost.
Qiao WuXing nodded undoubtedly, “If you look at it carefully, you will see it's a fake.”
Tian Xin in her half-believe half-doubt finally walked over again.
You XiaoMo calmed down his heart beat. It turned out to be a fake skeleton, and he had thought it was something so terrible for her to scream like that. He opened the chest and took a peek inside, only to find a skull smiling at him with a pair of empty hollow eyes. Even if this was a fake, it was still creepy as hell.
You XiaoMo continued to investigate and found other parts of the skeleton, however, they were scattered and smashed, some bones were even missing.
“Those skeletons are duplicates of a real human skeleton, which is also the exam for this last round. What everyone needs to do is that within two hours is that you must use your soul force to glue those fragmented bones into a full skeleton.” said Elder Qing.
“Elder, will we fail if we can’t complete it within two hours?” Zhang LanYu asked.
Elder Qing answered, “No, you will pass as long as the skeleton is more than seventy percent complete.”
Zhang LanYu sighed in relief, the bones in the chest were in too many bits and pieces, he didn’t have the full confidence to put them back in places perfectly.
You XiaoMo thought inside his head, this seventy percent completion limit was a little vague. If he could put back from the head to the crotch, then what percent would it be? Ah, let's just put this high-risk thinking aside first.
Next, Elder Qing asked everyone to carry their chest into the stone room behind him. How to assemble and bind the skeleton could also be considered as a personal ability. Performing in plain sight, others would surely try to compare in secret.
You XiaoMo walked into the nearest stone room with his chest. The stone room was as simple as ever, in the middle of the room there was a half-human tall long square table that was big enough to hold a whole skeleton.
You XiaoMo put down the chest onto the table, opened it, took out the skull and placed it on top, and then took out other pieces of god knows what.
Looking at those fragmented bones, he felt a deep sense of crisis. Had he known this situation would happen sooner, he would have studied the human body and skeleton thoroughly in his biology class.
You XiaoMo let out a big sigh, he had no other choice but to line up and rule out those bones that were easier to distinguish.
Clumsily putting them back together, he finally managed to roughly make out the skeleton basic structure, but those small bone fragments were so troublesome. If he had to compare them one by one, two hours was not enough, what to do?!
This was the first time after he came to this world he felt like sitting through the college entrance exam.
Too late to back out now!
You XiaoMo decisively gave up on putting them back by hand. Soul force spurted out from his glabella and covered every single bone on the table. This time, all the bones were like under the magnifying glass, every section of the bones was imprinted in his mind as clear as day.