25: Chapter 25 The Campus Prodigy Competition Begins

The crowd in the assessment classroom gradually dispersed, leaving behind only the chaotic projection sandbox and a deathly silence.

Monitor Zhou Yi was dragged away like a dead dog. His eyes were vacant, and his divine fire was flickering precariously. A once-proud Prodigy had been thoroughly reduced to a joke in just over ten minutes.

Jiang Xun packed up his things and turned to leave.

"Stop."

Xu Qingran's cold voice came from behind him, carrying a hint of unquestionable determination.

Jiang Xun stopped and looked back at her.

A storm gathered in the beautiful girl's eyes. There was shock, confusion, and more than anything, a wariness and scrutiny he could not understand.

She walked toward Jiang Xun step by step, the distance between them less than three feet.

"Your fighting style is very similar to my father's."

She repeated it, her voice lowered as if every word had been carefully considered.

"Who... exactly are you?"

Jiang Xun looked at her, his gaze calm and waveless behind his lenses.

He did not answer the question, but instead glanced at the students nearby who had not yet left and were casting curious looks their way.

"This is not the place to talk."

He turned and walked towards the school gate.

Xu Qingran bit her lip, hesitated for a moment, then quickly followed.

The two of them walked one after the other through the noisy campus, finally stopping by Mirror Lake at dusk.

The twilight of the setting sun dyed the lake surface into a sheet of broken gold. A breeze blew past, willow branches swayed gently, and their shadows were stretched long.

"Can you talk now?" Xu Qingran broke the silence first, her eyes still persistent.

Jiang Xun turned around. Instead of answering directly, he posed a question.

"Before you answer my question, why don't you answer one of mine first?"

"What do you think is the essence of civilization?"

Xu Qingran was stunned. She had not expected Jiang Xun to suddenly ask such a grand question.

She frowned, seemingly lost in memory.

"My father once told me that the essence of civilization is protection."

Her voice carried a hint of imperceptible trembling.

"It is the strong protecting the weak, order protecting fairness, and civilization itself protecting the right of all living beings to continue. Any civilization with 'plunder' at its core is an Evil Path, a cancer on civilization that must be eradicated."

After finishing, she raised her head and looked at Jiang Xun with burning eyes.

"Your power comes from plunder. How are you any different from those demons who destroyed my father's divine kingdom?!"

Facing this almost accusatory interrogation, Jiang Xun's expression did not change at all.

He just looked at her quietly until Xu Qingran's heaving chest, stirred by emotion, gradually calmed down.

"Are you done?" he asked calmly.

"It seems your father only taught you half of the truth."

"What do you mean?!" Xu Qingran was provoked again.

"I ask you, what if order itself no longer represents fairness?" Jiang Xun's voice was not loud, but it clearly reached Xu Qingran's ears.

"If the so-called strong not only fail to protect the weak but instead view them as livestock to be kept, bullying them at will and plundering everything they have, then what should the weak do?"

"Should they kneel on the ground and beg for the mercy of the strong? Or should they take up weapons, fight back, and take back everything that belongs to them?"

Xu Qingran's face instantly turned somewhat pale.

Jiang Xun's words were like a sharp knife, piercing precisely into the core of her beliefs.

She remembered the desperate eyes of those gods struggling at the bottom during the resource tournament. She remembered the helpless pleas when Lin Hao's divine kingdom was easily destroyed.

She also remembered the tragedy of her father, known as the "Guardian of the Human Race," who was ultimately betrayed by his own people, his divine kingdom shattered, dying with hatred in his heart.

"I admit that my power does indeed come from plunder."

Jiang Xun looked at her trembling eyes and continued.

"I plundered Li Ang because he viewed human life as worthless. I plundered Zhao Kai because he aided the tyrant. I plundered Monitor Zhou Yi because what he represents is precisely that corrupt, arrogant, and self-righteous order."

"I transferred their tragedies onto them. I distributed the plundered resources to those low-level gods who were bullied by them. If this is also the Evil Path you speak of, then I have nothing to say."

He adjusted his glasses and looked out at the shimmering lake.

Not far away, several students from an ordinary class were huddled together, arguing until their faces turned red over how to distribute a lowest-level crystal of Divine Power.

This scene formed an incredibly ironic contrast with the scene from the Key Class assessment that had just ended, where Jiang Xun had taken half the resources.

Xu Qingran's lips moved, but she could not make a sound.

Her beliefs, which she had been so proud of, were shaken violently for the first time.

"When order cannot bring fairness," Jiang Xun's voice drifted over, "chaos is the only weapon of the weak."

Boom!

This sentence exploded in Xu Qingran's mind like a thunderclap.

Her pupils constricted sharply, and her body trembled uncontrollably.

Because before her father died, while looking at his shattered divine kingdom, he had murmured almost the exact same words to her!

She stared fixedly at Jiang Xun's profile, wanting to see something in it. But there was nothing there, only the indifferent gold dyed by the setting sun.

Just then, a loud broadcast suddenly shattered the peace of the campus.

"Attention, all students and faculty! To prepare for the upcoming Jiang City Prodigy preliminary tournament, our school has decided to officially launch the annual internal Prodigy Tournament next Monday!"

"The champion of this Prodigy Tournament will directly qualify to represent our school in the city-level preliminary tournament and receive a resource reward worth one million Faith Points!"

"All interested students, please register at the Academic Affairs Office within today!"

As soon as the news came out, the entire Jiangcheng No. 3 High School instantly boiled over.

Countless students rushed out of their classrooms, their faces filled with excitement and desire.

The internal Prodigy Tournament!

That was not just honor, but a ladder for ordinary students to ascend to the heavens in one step!

The broadcast interrupted the silence by the lake and also interrupted Xu Qingran's train of thought.

She took a deep breath, forcibly suppressing the raging waves in her heart, and when she looked at Jiang Xun again, her eyes had changed.

Suspicion and wariness were replaced by a more complex emotion.

It was a Battle Intent mixed with competition, scrutiny, and a hint of expectation.

"I will also participate in the Prodigy Tournament."

Xu Qingran looked in the direction of the registration notice and said to Jiang Xun.

"In the tournament, I will see for myself whether your 'Dao' can truly go all the way to the end."