Eternal Supreme

Chapter 1: The Outer Courtyard Slacke

Linzhou City, outside the outer courtyard of Tianxing Academy.

The autumn morning carried a hint of chill, and all the students in the outer courtyard were anxiously awaiting the final trial. The success or failure of this trial would determine their performance in next month's final assessment.

"Someone has fainted during the trial!"

At the entrance to the trial grounds, a young man was being carried out.

Xu Yi, the chief instructor of the outer courtyard and also the instructor of the fifth group, quickly arrived with his team. When he saw the young man lying on the ground, his face turned ashen. This wretched slacker! To avoid him dragging down the fifth group's overall performance, Xu Yi had deliberately placed him in the second trial, where the success rate was higher. Yet, he had still fainted during the trial.

He often skipped basic cultivation classes, and even when he did attend, he slept during meditation. Every month, his assessment scores were always at the bottom of the outer courtyard.

Xu Yi's eyelid twitched as he listened closely, hearing only the heavy breathing of Lin Mo. Xu Yi clenched his fists, the veins on his forehead throbbing.

This slacker—

No, calling him a slacker is an insult to slackers. This guy is nothing but trash, utterly worthless trash, and he actually fell asleep during the trial.

Xu Yi wondered if the person responsible for the admission test two years ago had been blind. This trash had ranked first in the test and was even found to possess a rare mutated spirit.

What was once thought to be a piece of uncut jade turned out to be nothing but dung.

Two years had passed, and the students who joined at the same time as him had all reached at least the fifth level of cultivation, with some even reaching the eighth.

But this piece of trash, after two whole years, had only advanced from the first to the second level of body refining, setting a new record for the slowest cultivation speed in the history of the outer courtyard. This had become the greatest shame of Xu Yi's teaching career and a joke among the other instructors.

Fortunately, after next month's final assessment, this trash would be gone from the outer courtyard forever. Thinking of this, Xu Yi smiled, not even bothering to glance at Lin Mo again. He instructed a few students to watch over Lin Mo and then turned to leave.

"This trash is holding our fifth group back again."

"How about we strip him naked and give him a beating? He's already passed out, so he won't know who did it." One student smirked, winking at the other two.

The two others grinned in understanding, cracking their knuckles in anticipation.

Suddenly, all three students felt a chill run down their spines, as if a sharp blade was pressed against their backs. Slowly, they turned around.

In the distance, a young man with snow-white hair was approaching, and the temperature around them seemed to plummet. The three students shivered involuntarily.

An icy aura surrounded the young man, like eternal, unmelting frost.

As he raised his head, his exquisitely beautiful features caused passersby to stop and stare. His breathtaking appearance could incite envy in any woman. If not for the fact that he wore the robes of a male cultivator, he would surely be mistaken for a peerless beauty.

"Leng Wuyan..." The three students swallowed hard.

Among the outer courtyard students, Leng Wuyan was undoubtedly the most popular, not only because of his looks but also because of his formidable strength. His cultivation had already reached the seventh level of body refining, and during the admission test, it was discovered that he possessed a rare dual-element spirit of water and fire.

Cultivators with a spirit were far superior in both potential and strength compared to ordinary cultivators. Possessing even a single-element spirit was considered a rare blessing.

To have a dual-element spirit, like Leng Wuyan, was exceedingly rare.

A person of his caliber had already been pre-selected for Tianxing's inner courtyard. Even if he didn't participate in the final assessment, he would still easily enter the inner courtyard.

"He...he fainted during the trial. Instructor Xu told us to watch over him," the lead student stammered.

"Leave!" Leng Wuyan uttered a single word.

The three students didn't dare say another word and quickly turned to leave, secretly relieved. Luckily, they hadn't acted on their earlier impulse. If Leng Wuyan had caught them, they'd have paid dearly.

All the students in the fifth group knew that Lin Mo, despite being trash, had managed to survive two years without anyone daring to mess with him, primarily because of the terrifyingly powerful Leng Wuyan by his side.

Logically, a genius like Leng Wuyan shouldn't associate with trash like Lin Mo, yet the two were close, and Leng Wuyan listened to Lin Mo's every word.

"Awake?" Leng Wuyan's voice was distinct.

Lin Mo rubbed his temples and looked up. "How long was I asleep?"

"You were already asleep when I arrived." Leng Wuyan suddenly asked, "How do you feel? Any signs of your spirit awakening?"

Lin Mo checked his dantian, where his mutated spirit lay dormant, and shook his head. It had been two years, and still, there was no sign of awakening.

He had poured countless hours and effort into trying to awaken it, channeling all the spiritual energy meant for his cultivation into it. Even his frequent bouts of drowsiness were due to the spirit draining his energy.

In these two years at the outer courtyard, Lin Mo's cultivation had stagnated at the second level of body refining. For two long years, he had endured endless scorn and ridicule. Though he didn't care about the opinions of others, the uncertainty of when—or if—the spirit would awaken was torturous.

"I'm beginning to think I should give up," Lin Mo sighed.

"Basic spirits correspond to gold, wood, water, fire, and earth. From these five, five mutated spirits can emerge: sharp gold, vitality, ice, crimson flame, and thick earth. Throughout history, those who have manifested even one mutated spirit have been rare geniuses, seen perhaps once in a century.

I believe your mutated spirit will awaken sooner or later," Leng Wuyan said with certainty.

"It's not that easy. The chances of successfully awakening a mutated spirit are less than one in ten thousand," Lin Mo shook his head.

"Even without a mutated spirit, you're still strong!" Leng Wuyan replied.

To the students in the outer courtyard, Lin Mo was a failure, but Leng Wuyan knew better. If Lin Mo wasn't so focused on awakening his mutated spirit, with his talent, he would have already been promoted to the inner courtyard.

What's more, Lin Mo had always been exceptional.

When Leng Wuyan was eight, as an orphan spending the night in Tianxing City, he had a fateful encounter with a low-level demonic beast that was gravely injured.

Even now, with his seventh-level body refining cultivation, Leng Wuyan wasn't confident he could kill a low-level demonic beast, especially not back then. He thought he was doomed to be eaten alive until Lin Mo, a boy of the same age, suddenly appeared.

At that moment, Lin Mo's eyes blazed like the sun. He hovered in the air, his robe billowing wildly, his body covered in mysterious markings, resembling a deity descending to the mortal world. With a single finger, he struck the beast's forehead, sending a golden light piercing through its skull, killing it instantly.