Mid-term Exam, Part 10

Su Qing landed steadily on the first floor from the second.
She looked up. For some reason, Orange King’s silhouette seemed to have grown even larger.

A sudden thought struck her:
The more he devoured, the bigger he got?

The cafeteria only had three floors.
He already occupied the entire third and second floors.

If he kept expanding until he filled the first floor too, then every remaining examinee would either be swallowed into the cat’s stomach or squeezed outside the safe zone and shredded by the toxic wind and sand.

She had already tested it: Orange King had no health bar.
He was literally invincible in here.

Which meant the exam had an invisible timer:
Finish the fight and decide a winner before Orange King’s body filled the entire cafeteria.
Otherwise, the final victor might very well be Orange King himself.

That plump, fuzzy orange mountain, backlit by the light, somehow radiated pure evil.

If the final boss had been anyone else, fine.
But Orange King? She wasn’t scared at all.

To be honest, with that waterfall of drool cascading three thousand feet and the shiny crust at the corners of his eyes, he was just a little too grubby.
Her hands itched—she really wanted to grab a towel and scrub his face clean.

No wonder.

A cat that round probably couldn’t even groom himself properly anymore.

She’d seen Orange King roll around begging for food, seen him rub against people’s pants while meowing cutely, but never once had she seen him lick his paws or wash his face like a normal cat.

Of course Orange King wasn’t a normal fat cat.
What kind of normal fat cat could teach a breath-concealment art that actually worked?
He clearly had an extraordinary background. Plus, he and Jiang Xiaocao got along suspiciously well (though Orange King vehemently denied it).

Su Qing had a vague feeling Orange King might also be from the Back Mountain clans.

But no matter who he really was, as long as he was willing to keep being a happy little kitty, she was perfectly happy to treat him like one.

Correction: a happy little tank of a kitty.

He really did need to go on a diet.

After multiple circle shrinks, the cafeteria was now the only safe zone left.
And with the second and third floors completely occupied by Orange King, the only playable space remaining was the first floor.

Of course, anyone immune to the sandstorm could hide outside the circle, but at this stage the erosion damage was brutal—step out and lose a huge chunk of HP in seconds.

So everyone still alive should be gathered here by now.

When Su Qing dropped to the first floor, the grand hall was in total chaos.
Less a free-for-all, more a one-sided siege.

Roughly fifty people remained, half second- and third-years.
She spotted many familiar faces:
Third-year Body School Senior Sister Ling Yunxiao, second-years Cui Huai and Zhang Mingliang, all in the thick of it.

She didn’t know most upperclassmen by face, but she recognized nearly every first-year.

The scene was a mess, yet oddly familiar—half the people fighting were people she knew.

Talisman School: Xie Ying, Lin Ziyue, Tang Jiu, Tang Xueshan, Xu Yao
Array School: Pei Jingzhi, plus Zheng Qi and Ji Tianxuan (names she knew but had never spoken to)

Beast School: Xie Fengxing, Hua Ling, Wang Ji
Artifact School: Jiang Xiaocao, Xie Changge

Body School: Tian Ning, Tang Yueling, Chen Minjing, Lin Qiuhan
Pill School: You Zhaomu, Qiao Zhiyi

Body and Talisman Schools had the most survivors; the rest were roughly even.

Talisman School’s damage was decent, and so many surviving could only mean they’d stuck together from the start.

In fact, before the exam even began, the easygoing Talisman School juniors had already sweet-talked their seniors into leaking key info and prepared accordingly.

Getting an information advantage was also a skill. All’s fair.

But the real weirdness: only seven third-years remained, and all seven were furiously ganking a single black-clothed figure.

Killing intent thick enough to choke on.

Sword qi tore through the air, artifacts boomed, spell lights and explosions dazzled the eyes.

Under the eaves it was storming—rain, lightning, thunder—nonstop.

Talismans, artifacts, arrays, and spells rained down like they were free. Swords hummed, sword qi and sword intent crashed like a hurricane, all directed at the lone black-clothed swordswoman in the center.

Yet compared to the flashy barrage, she wielded only a single longsword.

She was long accustomed to such chaotic assaults. Her face was ice-cold, her movements flawless.
A casual horizontal slash, a vertical cut—two streaks of terrifying sword intent formed a cross that effortlessly shredded every incoming attack into harmless fragments.

The best defense is a good offense.

Her footwork was light and graceful; she danced through the encirclement, dragging the Golden Core third-years’ rhythm into complete disarray.

What started as a proper siege turned into friendly fire chaos—someone’s spell blasted their own ally into vomiting blood, another’s artifact blocked their teammate’s sword intent.

Curses flew among the third-years:
“Never seen teammates this trash!”
“You miss every enemy but hit allies with 100% accuracy—why don’t you just defect?!”
“Shut up or I’ll cut you first!”

Black clothes, snow-white sword.
Who else but Tian Ning?

Su Qing was puzzled—why were the third-years so triggered?

Then she spotted the glowing title floating above Tian Ning’s head, in dazzling VIP colors that screamed “pay-to-win”:
【1v3 ×10】

Su Qing: …
No wonder.
So she’d already solo-killed ten of the twenty Golden Core bosses.

The fight was a meat grinder.

If Tian Ning hadn’t absorbed the resources of ten Golden Cores and powered up insanely, she’d have been eliminated long ago.

Even now she was barely holding on, no strength left to break the siege.

If someone helped, maybe.

But the third-years had gone berserk; anyone who wanted to jump in felt helpless, unsure where to even start.

The second-years watched eagerly, waiting to pick the carcass.
The first-years looked nervous, at a loss as Tian Ning carved a storm through the hall.

Su Qing slipped into the first-year group. With second- and third-years busy fighting each other, her year miraculously maintained a temporary truce—no infighting.

Seeing her arrive, the first-years gathered around.

The Array School students hung back awkwardly.

Su Qing glanced over.

Pei Jingzhi tensed the moment he saw her face—he instantly recalled the pain of cracked ribs and immediately declared,
“We understand the principle of not losing the big picture for small gains. Regarding Friend Qi’s matter, Array School will absolutely not sit idly by.”

Tang Yueling rolled her eyes at him, about to speak, when Xie Ying and Chen Minjing both paled and shouted in unison:
“Crap—one more incense stick’s time has passed!”

The earth-shaking battle suddenly froze.

An eerily sinister voice drifted down from above:

“Time’s up~
Hurry and offer tribute to this king!”