The Dumb Flower's body resembled a flowering iron tree. It had a chubby brown body in the center, with four purple petals blooming on its head. Its trunk had two eyes, and it walked on two short, stubby, tree-like legs.
It waddled as it walked, and you could tell at a glance that it was quite heavy. It wasn't fast, which was why it earned a miserable score of 5 points in the Speed test.
Wang Teng wasn't surprised. Since he had formed a contract with this Pet Beast, he had naturally researched the performance of a Juvenile Stage Dumb Flower beforehand.
When it was time for the Power test, Wang Teng directed the Dumb Flower to walk up to the Power Stake and throw a punch.
The face of the stake registered the Dumb Flower's punch and immediately displayed a score of 19 points.
Considering the Yellow Dog from before had a Power score of 32, the Dumb Flower's score wasn't too bad. At the very least, it was a passing grade for the Juvenile Stage.
Next was the most important test: Mana Points.
Of a Pet Beast's three primary stats, which was the most important? Mana Points, of course.
The speed of its Cultivation was a direct reflection of its Star Level potential.
The fact that the Dumb Flower could cultivate to the Four-star level meant it possessed a powerful cultivation aptitude.
"Dumb Flower, touch the Crystal Ball with your petals," Wang Teng commanded, an anxious expression on his face.
Gu Ming also watched carefully as the Dumb Flower touched the Crystal Ball.
'If I remember correctly,' Gu Ming thought, 'Wang Teng came of age thirty days ago, so his Dumb Flower has probably been cultivating for about a month.'
'How many Mana Points could a Pet Beast with Four-star Potential accumulate after one month of Cultivation?'
Gu Ming wanted to use it as a benchmark for his Little Cyan Snake.
'I know the Little Cyan Snake is a Pet Beast with only Two-star Potential, no match for a four-star one. But things are different with my Spirit Stones. Maybe they can make up for its cultivation shortcomings.'
With a low hum...
a cluster of starlight appeared on the Crystal Ball's surface. It slowly took shape, coalescing into a score of 34 points.
"34 points!"
"Whoa!"
"That's 25 points higher than my mutt! It's so strong."
"As expected of a Pet Beast with Four-star Potential."
The surrounding students couldn't help but gasp in surprise.
The homeroom teacher nodded, a satisfied look on her face.
"Not bad. You didn't slack off during winter break. I have high hopes for you, Wang Teng."
"Yes, ma'am!" Wang Teng replied, snapping to attention excitedly before picking up his Dumb Flower and leaving the stage.
"Power 19, Speed 5, Mana 34, for a Pet Beast score of 58. Your final exam score was 273, so your current total is 331."
"You're in the top twenty of the class now. Don't be disheartened. Power and Speed can be improved through scientific training and learning Skills."
"Yes, ma'am!" Wang Teng said, his confidence soaring.
'Among the three primary scores, Mana Points are the hardest to increase.'
'Low Power can be trained. It's only in its Juvenile Stage; it has limitless potential.'
'Speed is the Dumb Flower's weakness, but it can learn the Earth Escape Technique to compensate for that.'
'There will be multiple terrains to choose from during the college entrance exams, so it won't be hard to raise my Speed score.'
'I may not be in the lead now, but that's only because there hasn't been enough time.'
The homeroom teacher recorded Wang Teng's score and immediately called the next student. "Gu Ming, it's your turn."
In an instant,
all eyes turned to Gu Ming.
Bearing the weight of everyone's gazes, Gu Ming walked onto the stage. The Little Cyan Snake coiled around his arm slithered into his palm, raised its head, and faced the crowd, accepting their collective scrutiny.
In that moment, all sorts of strange, shocked, and incredulous expressions appeared on the students' faces.
"Is that a Little Cyan Snake?"
"No way, is that really his Pet Beast?"
"I saw it earlier but didn't believe it. I thought he had a second Pet Beast."
"This is what the top student in our grade has?"
"Heh, looks like the guy who's been number one for three years is finally getting replaced."
For a moment, all sorts of comments echoed through the training hall.
The homeroom teacher was also a little shocked.
"Gu Ming, is your Pet Beast a Little Cyan Snake?" the homeroom teacher asked seriously.
"Yes, this is my Pet Beast. Its name is..." Gu Ming paused. He noticed three other students in the room had also contracted Little Cyan Snakes, and all of them had named theirs "Xiaqing." He quickly communicated with his pet, settling on an official name. "...Cyan Treasure."
The Little Cyan Snake raised its head and happily wagged its tail. It liked the name its master had given it.
The homeroom teacher's expression was complicated. She never expected Gu Ming to choose a path with such a bleak future.
Back when the school only graded based on written exams, Gu Ming had always been number one in his grade, never once falling from the top spot, his scores far ahead of everyone else.
The homeroom teacher, Ling Jun, had high hopes for Gu Ming's future. She thought that someone as smart as him would surely make good use of his scholarship money to contract a Pet Beast with Three-star Potential and return to school with it.
Or perhaps even borrow money from relatives to get one with Four-star Potential.
Who would have thought he'd contract a basic Pet Beast—the most common, bottom-of-the-barrel choice imaginable.
Only people with no money would choose a basic Pet Beast.
'I visited his home once.'
'Considering how much his parents dote on him, this shouldn't have happened. Didn't they borrow any money?'
'Did something go wrong somewhere?'
'Or could it be...?'
The homeroom teacher temporarily pushed the thoughts from her mind and had Gu Ming's Little Cyan Snake test its Power.
"Cyan Treasure, use Head Hammer on the Power Stake," Gu Ming said.
He had only been raising it for five days, so Cyan Treasure hadn't entered the Dream Training Space to train any Skills yet.
The Head Hammer attack was something Gu Ming had it practice in its spare time. The rest of the time, it was either busy with Cultivation or resting and Refining Mana.
Cyan Treasure slithered up to the Power Stake and violently slammed the hardest part of its head against the testing stake.
THUD.
The Power Stake didn't budge an inch, but it displayed a Power score.
"5 points!"
Seeing this, the homeroom teacher began to feel disappointed.
'I was holding on to a sliver of hope, thinking Gu Ming's parents might have bought him a Little Cyan Snake with a mutated bloodline.'
'Turns out I was overthinking it.'
"The 100-meter dash. Move when you hear the whistle."
The homeroom teacher walked over to the 100-meter dash track. Seeing Cyan Treasure was in position, she immediately blew the whistle.
WHOOSH!
Cyan Treasure dashed forward with all its might. However, at only thirty centimeters long, it was just too slow. No matter how it twisted its body, the hundred-meter distance seemed unreachable.
Ten seconds, twenty seconds, thirty seconds... one minute!
Cyan Treasure finally reached the finish line.
It was utterly exhausted. Only a month old, it had never run so desperately in its life.
"Speed score: 6 points," the homeroom teacher said, shaking her head.
'No need to hold out hope. This is just a completely normal Juvenile Little Cyan Snake.'
The students watching the grade's number one showed expressions of either disappointment or glee.
Watching the fall of the number one student, they felt both regret and joy. From now on, they could use Gu Ming as a stepping stone.
"Mana test. Come touch the Crystal Ball. Then, next student."
The homeroom teacher waved her hand dismissively, as if just going through the motions. She could already guess the Little Cyan Snake's Mana score—it would probably be zero, or one or two points at best.
'Don't be fooled by the five or six points the Little Cyan Snake managed in the Power and Speed tests.'
'Its subsequent Power growth will be incredibly slow. This is already the Peak for a Little Cyan Snake.'
'The reason the Little Cyan Snake is the most basic of the basics is that its Mana Points are pitifully low.'
'Even if you lavished money on it until it reached the Adolescent Stage, right up to the One-star bottleneck, you'd probably only get twenty or thirty Mana points out of it.'
But then, the starlight inside the Crystal Ball began to flicker intensely.
From the crowd, a student subconsciously cried out:
"The Little Cyan Snake... Mana... 39 points!"
She stared at the shining test ball on the stage, where the Little Cyan Snake's tail rested on the Crystal Ball. 'How is this possible?' she thought.
The glaring "39" didn't drop in the slightest, which meant its Mana was extremely stable—not a temporary boost from some potion.
And the Little Cyan Snake itself was only thirty centimeters long, about a month old—the very earliest phase of the Juvenile Stage.
"Gu Ming, this must be a Little Cyan Snake with a mutated bloodline, for its Mana Points to be so high." After her initial shock, the homeroom teacher felt like things were finally starting to make sense.
'Now *this* is the kind of Pet Beast that meets my expectations.'
'What kind of family would watch their own son become number one in the grade and not sell everything they own to get him a good Pet Beast?'