Why are ferocious beasts called "ferocious"? Besides their cruel nature, these creatures possess a special aura of savagery. If compared to humans, this aura resembles that which emanates from professional assassins, for whom taking a life is as easy as eating a rice cake.
An ordinary person, encountering such a professional assassin, might experience intense fear or even freeze up from just a glance. Ferocious beasts possess precisely this kind of special aura.
Therefore, most Awakened, when first encountering a ferocious beast, often fail to exhibit even a third of their strength under the influence of this oppressive aura. Some even freeze completely, forgetting how to attack, use their abilities, or wield their weapons.
That is why, before the martial arts exam, families with sufficient means hire professional Superpower User bodyguards to accompany their children into the Wildlands for prior adaptation to battling ferocious beasts.
Xu Jingming, of course, did not have such opportunities. So, before the exam, he often imagined how his body might react upon a real encounter with a ferocious beast. However, when faced with the Shadow Cat, he felt no impact from this savage aura whatsoever. Moreover, he was able, as in a normal situation, to accurately calculate the trajectory of the Shadow Cat's jump and pin it to the ground with a single spear thrust!
"They say that Awakened, when encountering ferocious beasts for the first time, need to survive several battles to overcome the feeling of fear toward these powerful creatures. But there are also people who are naturally insensitive to this aura. It seems I'm just such a special case," Xu Jingming thought, sharply pulling his right hand and extracting the black spear from the Shadow Cat's neck.
The beast's body fell to the ground with a dull thud, kicking up a cloud of dust.
"It seems this Shadow Cat has never seen a weapon like a spear. To jump like that is simply suicide," Xu Jingming mused.
Unlike the clumsy Iron Boars and Sabre-toothed Tigers, Shadow Cats possessed incredible agility and could achieve a terrifying speed of up to 17 m/s. Faced with the former two types of beasts, an Awakened could still flee if they couldn't win. But upon encountering a Shadow Cat, even running away was not an option—only death from pursuit remained!
That is precisely why Shadow Cats were nicknamed the "Novice Killers."
Under normal circumstances, without using superpowers and relying only on physical strength, Xu Jingming would hardly have been able to kill the beast with a single strike. Especially considering his lack of experience in battling ferocious beasts. But the Shadow Cat made a fatal mistake—it leaped, attacking with its claws!
Against Awakened armed with longswords or sabers, such an attack might have worked. After all, by the time the sword or saber reached the Shadow Cat, its claws would also be within striking distance of the Awakened. But Xu Jingming's black spear was a full 2.1 meters long!
As the saying goes, "a foot longer, a foot stronger". Therefore, the Shadow Cat was impaled by Xu Jingming's spear before it even reached attacking distance.
"Speaking of which, if it weren't for the system notification, I would have almost forgotten that you can gain ability points for slaying ferocious beasts!" Xu Jingming thought, looking with enthusiasm at the 3 new ability points that appeared on his system panel.
This meant that if he could accumulate enough ability points in the upcoming battles, his strength could increase even further!
"However, slaying an unranked ferocious beast grants too few ability points. I need to move to the Middle Zone faster," Xu Jingming decided.
Just like Superpower Users, ferocious beasts were divided into nine ranks, from the First to the Ninth. Beasts that hadn't reached the First Rank were called unranked and corresponded to human Awakened.
Initially, Xu Jingming, who lacked experience battling ferocious beasts, planned to spend more time in the Peripheral Zone for adaptation. But since the beasts' aura didn't have a strong effect on him, lingering there made little sense.
Therefore, Xu Jingming grabbed his black spear and sprinted with all his might toward the Middle Zone of the abandoned town.
Compared to Zhou Mingyang, who possessed a wind elemental superpower, Xu Jingming's movement speed wasn't particularly fast. However, he continued to slay ferocious beasts along the way.
"Unranked ferocious beast, Iron Boar, slain. +5 Ability Points."
"Unranked ferocious beast, Shadow Cat, slain. +3 Ability Points."
"Unranked ferocious beast, One-Horned Rhino, slain. +6 Ability Points."
In his battles with the ferocious beasts, Xu Jingming did not use his superpower. On one hand, he wanted to hone his spear mastery and gain combat experience. After all, using the S-level Purple Sky Divine Thunder against these unranked beasts would only result in an instantaneous kill, providing no training benefit.
On the other hand, the rarer the superpower, the more energy its use required. Xu Jingming's former E-level ability, "Weak Electric Discharge," could be sustained at full power for more than three hours. But the S-level ability, "Purple Sky Divine Thunder," could hardly be maintained for even an hour at full power.
It's worth noting that the martial arts exam lasted a full twelve hours. If Xu Jingming were to exhaust all his ability energy in the first part of the exam, he would be left with no other means of attack upon entering the Central Zone and confronting Mid-Rank or even High-Rank First-Stage ferocious beasts.
Therefore, he decided not to use his superpower for now, saving it for the Central Zone.
Moreover, after each battle, Xu Jingming felt his strength growing. These battles, in aggregate, were increasing his combat consciousness and spear mastery at an incredibly rapid pace!
The progress in his spear technique was especially noticeable—his movements were becoming increasingly fluid, reaching a level where the weapon seemed to become an extension of his body. He had never had this feeling before.
"Could my spear mastery have achieved a breakthrough without me realizing it?" Xu Jingming thought.
The body of a ferocious beast lay at his feet on the broken old road. This beast was the size of a small car, with a horn as sharp as a knife adorning its head, and four powerful legs supporting its massive body, covered in black-brown hide. Even in death, it still exuded a powerful aura of savagery.
It was a One-Horned Rhino—the ferocious beast that examinees feared the most!
The One-Horned Rhino's body was covered in bowl-sized wounds, but the fatal blow landed on its head. The black spear had pierced the beast's eye socket with incredible force, penetrating straight into the brain and destroying the vital nerve centers. The One-Horned Rhino was dead, and could not be deader...
Splorch!
When Xu Jingming pulled out the spear, something red and white shot out of the rhino's head with it. An ordinary person, suddenly faced with such a sight, might immediately vomit if they had a weak psyche. However, Xu Jingming remained calm and even opened his system panel right on the spot:
[Name]: Xu Jingming
[Level]: Awakened
[Superpower]: Purple Sky Divine Thunder (S)
[Physique]: 141 Vitality Units (+)
[Spiritual Power]: } 160 Spiritual Power Units (+)
[Skills]: Spear Mastery (Intermediate Level+), Lightning Burst (Beginner Level+)
[Ability Points]: 213
"It's true, my spear technique has reached the Intermediate Level!" Xu Jingming's eyes sparkled, and he couldn't help but sigh: "It seems real combat truly provides the greatest boost to strength."
His predecessor trained with the spear for over six years but only reached the Beginner Level. Yet, he, after just a few dozen battles with ferocious beasts, had already elevated his mastery to the Intermediate Level. Although accumulated experience undoubtedly played a role here, it still showcased the importance of real combat.
"Intermediate-level spear mastery already gives me a sense of complete control. What will happen if I raise my mastery even higher?" Xu Jingming wondered.
More than three hours had passed since the start of the exam. During this time, although Xu Jingming hadn't actively sought out encounters with ferocious beasts, he had clashed with over forty of them. Among them were relatively weak Shadow Cats, as well as stronger Saber-toothed Tigers and One-Horned Rhinos.
He received a certain number of ability points for slaying each beast. Xu Jingming hadn't been tracking the total closely, but now, glancing at the counter, he was surprised to find he had accumulated 213 points—enough to upgrade a skill level.
"213 Ability Points is just the beginning. When I enter the Middle Zone and start using the Purple Sky Divine Thunder to slay ferocious beasts, the rate of point accumulation will be even higher! So..." After pondering for a moment, Xu Jingming couldn't resist the temptation and pressed the '+' sign next to the Spear Mastery skill!
At that very instant, countless techniques related to spear mastery flooded into his consciousness like a tidal wave. These infused memories were not like fleeting movie clips that are forgotten soon after viewing. They felt as if Xu Jingming himself had truly trained with the spear for several decades!
As soon as the deluge of spear technique memories concluded, Xu Jingming abruptly thrust the spear forward!
In the next moment, within the short span of a single second, the black spear cut through the air four times with lightning speed!
Black Lightning—swift and lethal!