50: Chapter 50 I Have a Friend

In the classroom, Teacher Qin Lin stood on the podium, holding a freshly printed report card.

It had been a full month since Gu Han awakened his Divine Kingdom Core.

Teacher Qin Lin began by setting the tone, "The scores for the new round of prosperity assessments are out. This time, it's different from the past; the level of civilization evolution of the species has also been included in the assessment criteria."

The students below whispered among themselves. As long as a species was sentient, they basically had a civilization. Most of the sentient species on the market came from Divine Kingdoms with stable civilizations.

After purchasing reproduction, they could quickly form their own civilization. It was rare to see someone like Gu Han starting from zero, unless they didn't have enough money and chose to start with Ape-men.

Chu Yue, Zhao Xu, and the others who possessed sentient species remained steadily in the top tier of the rankings.

Teacher Qin Lin read out a few names, then changed the subject, "However, in this test, one person has made significant progress, even surpassing the vast majority of students in the class."

Teacher Qin Lin looked toward the back row: "Gu Han, fifth in overall score."

The whole class fell silent for a few seconds, then turned their heads in unison to look at Gu Han.

Zhao Xu, sitting in the front row, gripped his pen tightly. He had already awakened his Divine Kingdom Core, and spent a fortune purchasing a large number of breeding cards to rapidly expand his Lizardman population, yet he was only second.

He hadn't expected Gu Han to leap to fifth place. Weren't the inhabitants of his Divine Kingdom all Insectoids?

His father, Zhao Kun, had repeatedly warned him not to have any open conflict with Gu Han. His family had already paid off all their debts, even the millions in loans.

Perhaps the Tang Family had changed their minds and secretly invested in Gu Han.

How hateful. Every time he felt he had the upper hand over Gu Han, he would always do something unexpected.

Teacher Qin Lin looked at Gu Han, feeling very satisfied. Successfully persuading a student as stubborn as Gu Han gave her a great sense of accomplishment.

After Gu Han's insect swarm tactics were crushed by her in last month's practical combat class, she had advised him to focus on troop coordination and civilization development. Now it seemed the kid had taken her advice to heart; he had likely decisively abandoned those mindless bugs and switched to a sentient species.

Teacher Qin Lin put away the report card: "Grades are just a reference. For those who have signed up for the professional league, we will conduct a Divine Kingdom combat power test this Saturday. After the test, I will divide you into Team One and Team Two based on your combat characteristics. Those with higher strength will directly serve as team captains."

As soon as these words were spoken, the expressions of the students who had signed up for the league changed.

A boy raised his hand and shouted: "Teacher Qin, fighting again? In the last class competition, more than half of my believers died, and it's only just now recovering. If we fight again, what will I have left to participate in the league?"

"That's right, Teacher, it's too damaging to our foundations!"

Teacher Qin Lin pressed her hands down, signaling for silence: "Rest assured. This test will use a data simulation system. Your believers will not actually die."

The whole class was stunned for a moment, then burst into exclamations.

"A simulation terminal? The school actually has one of these!"

"That's high-end equipment that only the professional league has!"

Teacher Qin Lin smiled: "The school spent a huge amount of money to import this equipment, which perfectly replicates your Divine Kingdom data. Our key class gets priority use. Future practical exams will also fully utilize the simulation terminal to maximize the training of your command abilities without damaging the foundations of your Divine Kingdoms."

The whole class cheered. To be honest, they had always been jealous of the simulation terminals at Jiangcheng University, but since they hadn't gotten in and were just making do at Dongjiang University, they hadn't expected to be able to use one now.

Speaking of which, Teacher Qin Lin asked a rhetorical question: "Do you know why I insisted on making you fight for real when you first awakened?"

No one answered.

"It was to make sure you learned your lesson." Teacher Qin Lin tapped the podium, "If I didn't let you see with your own eyes the tragic sight of your believers dying in droves, at least ninety percent of you hot-headed youths would have gone down the War God path."

Gu Han sat in his seat, silently calculating.

The simulation terminal was indeed a good thing. If every Ant-man in his Divine Kingdom died of old age, he could perform sacrifices.

If he had a simulation terminal, he could completely let go, not fearing the death of his believers, and test the ultimate combat power of the coordination between Shield-Armored Ant-Men and Hidden-Armor Ant-Man, while also seeing how the poison performed in actual combat.

After class, Gu Han didn't rush to leave, but instead went to Teacher Qin Lin's office.

The changes in the Divine Kingdom during this period had been too great. After the cross-bred precious herbs he planted matured, the Queen Ants practicing the Swallowing Heaven Bloodline Method had already mastered the basics. The most direct manifestation was that the newly hatched Ant-man offspring perfectly inherited part of the maternal physical strength.

In terms of physical fitness and strength alone, this new generation of Ant-men definitely exceeded the average level of first-level believers.

But that was where the problem lay.

Gu Han discovered that no matter how much the strength of these Ant-men increased, or how abnormal their physique became, they just couldn't cross that threshold and step into the transcendent realm.

He had checked a lot of information and couldn't find the reason, so he had no choice but to come and ask his homeroom teacher for advice.

In the office, Teacher Qin Lin was flipping through test data. Looking up and seeing Gu Han come in, she pointed to the chair opposite her.

"Sit. Do you need something?"

Gu Han sat down and got straight to the point: "Teacher Qin Lin, I would like to ask a question about believers breaking through to the transcendent realm."

Teacher Qin Lin stopped her pen: "Oh? Have your believers touched the threshold of transcendence?"

"No, I have a friend." Gu Han carefully chose his words, "He fed his believers quite a few strengthening spiritual plants and also guided them in some physical training. Now, the overall physical fitness of his believers is definitely much stronger than ordinary first-level believers, but they are still not breaking through to the transcendent realm. What's going on?"

"A friend?" Teacher Qin Lin was puzzled, but thinking about it, it made sense; Gu Han's believers shouldn't have reached transcendence that quickly.

Getting stuck at the threshold of transcendence was very common among freshmen.

"Breaking through to the transcendent realm cannot be achieved by piling up physical strength alone." Teacher Qin Lin put down her water cup, "The breakthrough conditions for different races are vastly different. For example, Orcs need extreme life-and-death stimulation to activate their Berserk bloodline, and the Elf race needs to feel the resonance of natural elements."

She looked at Gu Han: "What species is your friend mainly cultivating now?"

Gu Han paused.

"It should be... the Sapiens, I suppose." Gu Han gave a vague answer.

"Sapiens?" Teacher Qin Lin raised an eyebrow, "That shouldn't be the case. Breaking through to the transcendent realm is essentially a path to obtaining life evolution, constantly breaking through the shackles of life to reach a higher level. Sapiens are intelligent and have strong plasticity; they can basically achieve something on any transcendent path."

"Your friend is probably too impatient. The stats have been piled up, but without enough insight, they cannot find a path suitable for them. You can view the Divine Kingdom as our own transcendent path; if we hadn't entered the Divine Kingdom era, we would just be ordinary people now."

Gu Han listened and was lost in thought. Every beginning is hard; he had indeed been a bit impatient.

The transcendent path for the Ant-man Race still required them to comprehend it themselves.

As for the three mainstream transcendent paths of the Sapiens, excluding the conditions where civilization is not yet developed enough for technology, the body-refining cultivation techniques had already been mastered. Now that the Divine Kingdom had the beginnings of spiritual energy, it was entirely possible to introduce immortal cultivation methods and expand the transcendent paths.