Chapter 11 - The Palace Piercing Through the Clouds

Chapter 11: 11 - The Palace Piercing Through the Clouds

"This... is this really an academy? How high are your tuition fees that you can build a place this ridiculous?"

Although he had never been to luxurious places, King had seen plenty of pictures of places like this before. Aside from rare and expensive materials or some elaborate designs, there was nothing about those places that could make him as shocked as the magnificent structure before his eyes.

Just after he finished asking, a lump immediately appeared on his head from Iris punching him. She did not answer, but one punch was enough for King to understand that his question was too ridiculous.

"Tuition fees for what? Do you think we’re short on money? No matter how powerful the cultivators in this world become or how big a clan they establish, they will always have some connection with the Cultivation Academy."

King did not care about how powerful the academy was, as Iris said. What he cared about was the free tuition.

From King’s understanding, he compared this place to a university. Even top universities had scholarships, but the tuition was still very high.

Not to mention, by the standards of the place he used to live in, no university had the monopoly and huge power that the Cultivation Academy had. Logically speaking, this place should be charging insanely high tuition fees to make sense.

"So you really don’t charge tuition?"

Hearing King bring up the matter of tuition once again, Iris’s eyelids twitched. Wasn’t he supposed to pay attention to the academy’s greatness instead of this trivial matter?

She finally understood. King probably wasn’t some rich guy before, so even after coming to another world, he still cared about money.

Perhaps with the mindset of a reader, King did not care too much, but compared to many other things, this still mattered more.

"That’s not exactly right. If you’re not considered talented, you’ll have to pay an extremely high tuition fee. These people are mainly children from wealthy families who come here to build connections.

If your corruption resistance is at least 80%, you have a chance to get part of your tuition waived or have the entire tuition waived by the academy."

The Cultivation Academy had an enormous influence, so they did not need tuition fees. But because too many people wanted to enroll, they had no choice but to set high tuition fees to limit the number of students.

"This makes more sense. I thought you guys were crazy enough to make it free for everyone."

Seeing King nod with a self-satisfied look, Iris had no intention of shattering his understanding. After all, whether King knew about this or not was meaningless because the path he walked was completely different from that of ordinary people.

While talking, the two of them had already flown to the top of the skyscraper and gone straight into the palace that pierced through the layers of clouds.

The security below was extremely strict, but the security above was just as lax. There were no guards or modern security systems on this top floor at all.

Clearly, this palace was an extremely meticulous structure made entirely from expensive materials, but they could not be bothered to protect it because no thief could make it all the way here anyway.

"Hey! I brought him back. Just let him live a little longer, and I guarantee he’ll become stronger than me."

While flying, Iris shouted. This place looked like a solemn place, but the way she behaved was simply far too casual.

Flying into the center of the palace, Iris suddenly slammed on the brakes, sending King flying. His face smashed into the stone floor, and he slid for several seconds before jumping back up.

"Bastard..."

Just after jumping back up, King opened his mouth to curse Iris but shut it because he was stunned by the luxury of this place.

The entire space was built from massive blocks of natural stone, so rare that each slab was enough to become a treasure in a museum.

White marble, obsidian, transparent quartz, and stones in shades of blue and dark purple were assembled into walls, pillars, and floors, creating a grandeur far beyond any palace ever built in human history.

The massive stone pillars were carved with elegant patterns depicting clouds, mountains, stars, and the spirit beasts of legend.

Natural light passed through the enormous glass windows, reflecting off the perfectly polished stone surfaces, making the entire palace seem to be immersed in a layer of cold and clear light.

The palace floor was paved with pitch-black stone slabs alternating with jade-white stones, so vast that every step felt like walking through a plaza in an immortal palace.

In the center of the main hall was a gigantic round stone table, crafted from a single meteorite, with a diameter large enough to accommodate a hundred people at once.

Around the table were hundreds of stone chairs arranged in multiple circles, but currently only fourteen positions had been marked for the principal, Iris, and the twelve elders.

Although it was a little too big, this was not unreasonable either. When it was designed, the designer had no way of knowing how many powerful cultivators would become elders. The world had more than eight billion people, so designing a hundred chairs was not that many.

After looking around blankly for a few seconds, King’s eyes landed on a man and an old man. Before he could even wonder about them, Iris stepped forward and introduced both sides.

"His name is Mark. His age is... About one hour old. He’s always calling himself a ’reader’, so he looks down on all of us simply because he thinks we’re characters in a novel.

This damn guy has an extremely unfair cheat against everyone else called a ’system’ that is always by his side. If you think he’s acting too arrogant, feel free to beat him up because he’s still very weak right now."

"What the hell are you barking about?!"

Iris’s damn introduction made King furious. He did not care about her revealing information about his true identity and the system. What he cared about were the insulting words she had just said.

"That old man is Adrian Vale, just call him Adrian. He’s the principal. His current level is rank V, 2-star. The person next to him is Grand Elder Kenji Arakawa. His current level is rank V, 9-star. In this academy, Kenji is only weaker than me."