Chapter 135: Minor Cultivation (2)
After about an hour, the group returned back to their block.
That night, Su Yu grabbed a simple dinner before doing some cultivation and reading. In this academy, strength was the most important factor. To earn merit points, strength was required. To gain resources, strength was required. To show off, strength was also required. Without strength, one was nothing.
Additionally, even experts like Chen Feng would step out of the way politely upon facing a number six student like Jiang Mu. They weren't even that respectful when facing researchers.
Generally, the researchers would not pay any attention to people like them. But that was not the case for these young students that were still full of youthful vigor. It was far easier for them to take offense to how others behave around them.
Chen Feng and the other guards were well-experienced. Thus, they knew to be even more cautious toward these students than the researchers. That was one of the reasons why everyone was so envious of the top 100 students. Everyone had to show them respect.
Su Yu no longer had any source qi liquid on him. As for the final drop of blood essence he had, he did not use it. That night, he mainly focused on reading. He was reading the Lightning Source Blade willpower text written by Liu Wenyan. He had already mastered the second move so he was reading the third move.
Unfortunately, due to the passage of time, the third move was no longer as effective as the first two moves. As for the fourth move, when he tried skimming through it, it was only a tiny bit effective. As for the fifth move and beyond, the contents were basically the same as a regular book instead of a willpower text.
"Third move of the Lightning Source Blade, Lightning Eruption."
"A total of 16 acupoints are required for this move."
Su Yu had already opened 12 of the acupoints for Lightning Source Blade. Thus, he needed to open 4 more acupoints to practice the fourth move. For now, he was only reading it. He was not planning to practice it anytime soon.
Rather than opening four acupoints to master the third move, he might as well open the final three acupoints he needed to open for the War God Art. After that, he could enter the Great Strength Realm if he gave up on the advanced version of the War God Art.
The second move of the Lightning Source Blade in the hands of a Great Strength cultivator was still far stronger than the third move in the hands of a Source Opening cultivator.
"I need to read this text more. It's going to turn into a regular text soon."
Su Yu was feeling very gloomy. The Source Opening Codex written by Bai Feng had already been reduced to a regular text. If the same happened to the Lightning Source Blade before he could read more of it, that would be too much of a waste.
He spent the entire night reading. The third move was rather troublesome to read, but this was a clash of willpower, a perfect way of cultivating his willpower. Before reaching the Skysoar Realm, he wouldn't be able to cultivate the academy's Myriad Text Sutra.
Su Yu's willpower was already 30 percent full. He had grown a lot since his previous meeting with Bai Feng. All that was thanks to the incomplete Great Strength original text that was on the verge of falling apart, the Source Opening Codex, and the Lightning Source Blade.
And when he reached the Mental Tempering Stage, his strength would take a qualitative leap forward. At that point, his Divine Characters would grow a lot stronger.
...
While Su Yu was reading the Lightning Source Blade.
Education Building.
Sounds of discussion rang out from the brightly lit building.
"The pillmaking faction should get a few freaks this year!"
"We can't let all the freaks join the Willpower and Character Faculties every single year!"
"Yeah! Our faculties are on the verge of shutting down! You guys keep sending middle and low tier students our way. As for the high-tier and freak students, those two faculties are getting them all. It is only a matter of time before our faculties go extinct."
With the new students in the academy, the various faculties were starting to get impatient. Based on the convention, most of the freaks and high-high geniuses would choose to join the Character and Willpower Faculties.
As for the other faculties, they were losing members faster than they could train new members.
New students would enter the academy each year, but the more talented ones would all be snatched by the two major faculties. The other faculties were dissatisfied, but there was nothing they could do about it. The person hosting the meeting wasn't Wan Tiansheng. It was Su Ziming, the third vice principal.
The old man was having a headache listening to the arguments. Looking at the shouting researchers, he slammed his palm on the desk and shouted, "Silence."
"High-tier students are allowed to pick their own faculty. We can't force them to join a faculty they don't want to join.
"The Character and Willpower Faculties rely on their own capability to recruit so many talented students. What can I do if you guys are the ones who can't do anything to attract those students?
"You spend all your time in seclusion and your research centers. As for the Character and Willpower Faculties, they have people going around recruiting those top talents every single year. What have you been doing? If you're not willing to put in the work, how can you expect the students to choose you?
"During tomorrow and the day after, the students will be picking their faculties. Try to recruit them during those two days. If you keep lazing around, then it is only a matter of time before your faculties are shut. In that case, we might as well merge your faculties into the major faculties."
Someone in the crowd objected, "Elder Su, there is nothing we can do about that. Willpower and Divine Characters have a very clear effect on one's strength. But how about the other faculties? Take our Pillmaking Faculty as an example. We have a lot of powerful pills on display, but do you know what the students think when they see our pills?"
The old man gloomily said, "They would think that wow, those pills sure are expensive. Let’s grow strong and earn some merit points to buy those pills in the future. But very few of them would actually think of making these pills themselves!"
The crowd roared in laughter.
A burly man said, "It's the same with the Beast Taming Faculty. No matter how powerful the beasts we show off, those little bastards will only think of buying some powerful beasts when they earn some money in the future. Nobody would think of taming their own beasts."
"That's the same with the Talisman Faculty. They will only think about buying the talismans, not crafting their own talismans."
They sounded very resentful when speaking.
An old man from the Pillmaking Faculty said, "That's all the Xia Trade Company's fault! They are spreading their black market into the academy, making all sorts of resources available for purchase. Because of that, the students have the impression that as long as they have enough money, they can buy anything. I suggest we crack down on the black market!"
The old man solemnly said, "This is the best timing. Since the new students have just entered, we raid the black market and make them disappear from the academy. We will uphold the sanctity of our official exchange system. We will let them know that there are some resources that they couldn't buy even with money."
"If we allow this to continue, apart from the combat faculties, all the other faculties would be done for."
"That's right! We need to crack down on the black market!"
That idea immediately gained the approval of the crowd. Someone else said, "With the Xia Trade Company as our main focus, we will tear down the black market in the academy. We will also start supplying our pills, talismans, and mounts to the Xia Trade Company at a higher price. Let's see if they still think that money can buy everything after that."
"Yeah! We'll increase the price! We will force the students to rely on themselves instead of the black market!"
Su Ziming looked at the excited crowd and helplessly said, "Raising our price? Based on how the Xia Trade Company acts, the additional cost would only be transferred to the students."
"Exactly. That way, the students would realize that it's not worth buying from the black market. They would be forced to buy from the academy instead. They would find that they lack the total earned merit and merit points to buy what they want. At that time, we will unveil our special price for our own faculty students. That would naturally attract more students to join our faculties."
The old man from the Pillmaking Faculty smiled and said, "If we give a 20 percent discount on all pills for our own faculty students, do you think we will gain a lot of new students?"
...
One after another, they voiced their agreement to the plan.
Su Ziming was greatly troubled. After a while, he said, "I can agree with the crackdown. I can also agree with the internal discount. But you can only force some unwilling students to join you this way..."
After some thought, he added, "I have been in talks with the principal about allowing the students to minor in a second faculty.
"Apart from focusing on combat, it is always better for the students to learn some additional skills. By allowing them to minor in a second faculty, our students would learn more skills..."
Many pairs of eyes lit up in excitement. One of them said, "Elder Su, this isn't the first time someone is suggesting this. During our previous attempts, the students focusing on multiple faculties would end up spread too thin and failing to keep up with their studies on both sides. How do we solve that?"
Cultivation was very time consuming. It was a good thing to learn more skills, but it was even more possible that the students would simply fail to keep up after spreading themselves too thin.
Su Ziming smiled and said, "For now, we can give this privilege only to the high-tier students. These students have better talent and resources. They would have no trouble keeping up with two faculties.
"As for the middle and low-tier students, you don’t lack those students anyway. The high-tier students are what you want, right?
"What do you think? We'll allow the high-tier students to minor in a second faculty for now."
Everyone looked at each other. Before long, one of them said, "Would the students minoring in our faculty count as our students?"
"Yes."
"Would their results be counted in our performance review?"
"Yes."
"Can the researchers of the minor faculties accept these students as their students as well?"
The crowd started getting excited. One of them asked, "Most of them would already have a teacher from their major faculty. Can they take a second teacher for their minor faculty?"
Su Ziming raised his brow and said, "If you don't mind, sure. But each student can only pick a single faculty to minor in."
"The students in your faculties can also take a minor in other faculties as well. I understand that a lot of the students in the Pillmaking and Talisman Making Faculties have been thinking of changing a faculty."
The crowd nodded. Someone asked doubtfully, "Elder Su, would Principal Wan agree?"
"Yes, he will." Su Ziming said, "The academy is trying to reform itself. Some of the old rules might no longer be suitable. The previous attempt at establishing this minor faculty system had failed because we didn't have this many genius students and resources back then. Thus, it wasn't able to achieve the desired results.
"But things are different now. The collision of different systems might spur even more growth among the students. After all, it has been many years since the academy has produced someone beyond the Mountainsea Realm."
Su Ziming sighed and said, "We are reexamining the way we have been doing things. Have we been too focused on having each student focus on a single path? Is that why we haven't been able to produce new experts? Those above the Mountainsea Realm we had produced back then were all individuals well-versed in many paths. Did our overly strict division of paths cause the stop of progress?"
Everyone sank into silence. Was this really the cause? They didn't know, but the division of paths had indeed been very strict in the academy. Sure, that had allowed the students to grow quickly at the early stages, but most of them would slow down tremendously at the latter stages.
In terms of low and middle end strength, the academy had grown massively. But in terms of high end strength, the academy had been stagnant.
Su Ziming sighed and said, "Let's give it a try. I also want to see if this would change our students. In fact, this is applicable to us as well. I suggest all of you to minor in a different path as well. Otherwise, it is really too hard for people like us to progress further."
"Elder Su, would this really work?"
"We can only give it a try." Su Ziming softly said, "Isn't the process of reform also a process of experimentation? All of you should understand what Principal Wan wants. We are strong enough in terms of low and middle end strength. What we need now are elites, the cream of the crop, those capable of reaching beyond the Mountainsea Realm.
"I'll be honest. Even if we have to ruin some students during the reform, as long as we can discover a path beyond the Mountainsea Realm, everything would be worth it.
"A single individual beyond the Mountainsea Realm is worth more than 10,000 students."
Toward the end, Su Ziming's tone turned cold. This was an experiment. They did not know the result. But if they could really produce even one individual that was above the Mountainsea Realm, it would be worth it even if they have to ruin the next 10 batches of students.