3: One certificate for life
“[Awakened Talent: Once Certified, Forever Certified. Grade: SSS;]”
The panel was very clean, with only a single line of text at the top.
It looked like a game panel. Could this be the Talent he had awakened? And it was SSS-grade!
Horrifyingly formidable!
On TikTok, many people were discussing the appearance of grades A, B, C, D, E, and S. Even though Zhang Sheng rarely played games, he could guess the significance of SSS-grade.
It was an extremely high Talent grade.
But what exactly did the Talent ability “Once Certified, Forever Certified” do?
Since he couldn't use it anyway, he could only take things one step at a time. With so many people awakening Talents, someone would surely figure out the correct way to use them soon.
Wait a minute, how do I close this panel?
Zhang Sheng stared at the panel in front of him, and just as he thought about it, the panel disappeared.
He seemed to have discovered something!
Appear, disappear, appear, disappear.
The panel in front of him kept appearing and disappearing. It turned out he could control the panel's visibility through his thoughts, which was very convenient.
He opened his phone again to check the information spreading like wildfire on TikTok.
Zhang Sheng noticed a problem. Although others had awakened Talents, no one seemed to mention an interface like a game panel appearing before them. Was this unique to his Talent?
...In the past, there was usually only one official news item pinned at the top of TikTok's trending topics, but right now, the top ten were all official announcements.
“The use of Talents is prohibited!”
“China has established the Extraordinary Administration Bureau. Please download the Extraordinary Administration Bureau APP promptly to register your awakening.”
“The China Space Agency will launch a lander within 24 hours to conduct an investigation on the Blue Moon.”
...As expected of the state machinery, this series of actions was extremely rapid.
“Four Heavenly Kings: You have unread messages (15).”
Notifications from his dormitory WeChat group kept popping up. He had been so focused on the news that he hadn't noticed.
There were four people in Zhang Sheng's dorm. Although they came from all over the country, they got along quite well.
“Brothers, I've awakened a Talent! And it's Light! Grade B!”
“How about you guys? Have you awakened any Talents?”
The earliest message was from Sun Jie. His personality was always like this—confident, sunny, and straightforward, forming a sharp contrast with Zhang Sheng's reserved nature. He was also the one who had reminded his girlfriend earlier.
Thinking back now, he had been too narrow-minded.
“Wu Xingyang: Brother Jie, congrats, congrats! I'll be relying on you from now on!”
“Li Bin: Relying on you too, plus one.”
“Wu Xingyang: Brother Jie, I suggest you change your name. How about calling yourself Kizaru II from now on?”
“Sun Jie: @Zhang Sheng, son, haven't you gotten out of bed yet? Are you unconscious?”
“Sun Jie: Brothers, quick, tell me about your abilities!”
“Wu Xingyang: I awakened Healing Wind. Please call me 'Healer' from now on.”
“Holy crap!”
“Impressive!”
“Li Bin: Just hearing the name, I can tell it's a healing ability. Brother Yang, you better be careful not to let people know, or you might get kidnapped.”
“Wu Xingyang: (Sweating) No way. I see online that so many people have awakened. With such a large population base, there must be plenty of people who awakened healing abilities...”
“Sun Jie: Bin, my son?”
“Li Bin: Oh! The Talent I awakened is Grade C Shadow Hand. I don't know what it can do yet.”
Of the four in the dorm, Sun Jie and Wu Xingyang were always together. Whether it was eating or showering, they were inseparable. If they didn't both have girlfriends, Zhang Sheng might even have questioned their sexual orientation.
Meanwhile, Li Bin was mysterious every day. No one knew what he was up to, and he always returned to the dorm very late, looking completely exhausted.
After careful consideration, Zhang Sheng decided to hide his ability. He hadn't even told his parents, and he certainly wouldn't tell his roommates.
He would wait until he figured out his ability before making a decision.
Zhang Sheng pretended not to see the messages in the group.
He closed the chat interface directly. Saying more would be useless and might even backfire and affect their relationship.
He continued scrolling through TikTok, hoping to get more information. The Talent awakening was shrouded in many mysteries. Relevant information was the most precious Talent of all.
A livestream he happened to enter caught Zhang Sheng's attention.
A small glass ball was actually hovering in the air above a streamer's palm. The number of people in the livestream room was also skyrocketing.
This streamer's name was Iron-Headed Kid. He was 27 years old and had been a streamer for two and a half years, specializing in acrobatics.
Despite working hard at his acrobatics for several hours a day, the number of viewers rarely broke a hundred, and he had fewer than twenty thousand followers. But at this moment, his follower count was growing rapidly.
The number of people in the livestream room had also reached thirty thousand.
Last night, he had awakened a Talent: Telekinesis (Grade S).
After starting his livestream as usual today, a sudden thought occurred to him: using a Talent might consume energy within the body, and when this energy was depleted, it would trigger the brain's self-protection mechanism, leading to a coma.
This also explained why people who used their Talents excessively only felt dizzy but didn't fall into a coma.
“I've worked hard for so long, but my livestream never took off. I'm going for it!”
He had been streaming for two and a half years but still needed financial help from his family. He hated his own incompetence but refused to give up.
Even though the state prohibited citizens from using their Talents, the Talent belonged to the individual, so how could they control everyone?
To make his livestream go viral, he changed the title to: “Telekinesis Superman Livestream Performance.”
Once the stream started, a soybean gently lifted off his desk under his control.
When his old fans saw this, they instantly went wild.
No dizziness, no coma!
Iron-Headed Kid was incredibly excited, and the livestream room was in a complete frenzy. Comments, likes, sports cars, planes—all sorts of gifts appeared in rapid succession.
The popularity of Iron-Headed Kid's stream instantly took off. With the help of the algorithm, a large number of new fans flooded into his room.
This was a thrill he had never experienced before.
After the success with the soybean, urged on by his fans, Iron-Headed Kid decided to challenge a higher difficulty and began trying to control a glass bead with Telekinesis.
As the glass bead slowly rose from his palm, Zhang Sheng entered the room and witnessed this scene.
However, Iron-Headed Kid began to feel his head spinning, and fine beads of sweat appeared on his forehead.
“Family, give me a follow!” After struggling to say these words, the glass bead fell back onto the desk.
Iron-Headed Kid gasped for air.
The comments in the livestream room scrolled rapidly:
“My god, the streamer didn't faint?”
“I'm going to try using my Talent too.”
Similar comments exploded instantly. People in the stream could easily surmise that Talents weren't unusable; one just couldn't exceed their capacity.
The dizziness in his brain told Iron-Headed Kid that if he tried again, he might fall into a coma.
“Family, don't try to use your Talents lightly. I'm feeling incredibly dizzy right now.”
His Talent was Grade S, yet he could barely withstand controlling a glass bead for a few seconds. Iron-Headed Kid couldn't help but lament that these awakened Talents didn't seem to have much practical use.
However, the effect on the livestream was explosive, and his income skyrocketed.
In just a few minutes, the sheer volume of gifts in the room was more than he had received in the past two years.
Iron-Headed Kid decided to risk a coma to continue performing his Telekinesis.
However,
Zhang Sheng suddenly found his phone screen went black; the livestream room had been closed. TikTok must have banned it directly.
As for the reason, it was all too obvious.
Although Iron-Headed Kid's room was banned, the matter didn't stop fermenting. After all, at least tens of thousands of people had seen the stream.
Continuing to check other rooms, Zhang Sheng soon found another one where someone was using their Talent, but it was also quickly banned.
It was certain that Talent abilities were not absolutely unusable, but rather, one had to control the degree of usage.
As a massive amount of information spread, a trending news item soon became the top headline on TikTok.
Experts had discovered that when Talent awakeners used their abilities, they consumed a certain power within themselves, similar to a mana bar in a game. Experts called this Mental Energy.
Once Mental Energy was depleted, the user would fall into a coma.
This point was quickly and widely accepted, but this 'degree' was hard to gauge; one could easily over-consume it if they weren't careful.
However, this level of danger couldn't stop people's curiosity.