The Card Apprentice

The standoff between the Central Repository of the Classics and the Federation Comprehensive Academy was lasting quite a bit longer than the fatty had expected. Pomelo was peaceful, though battles would break out in the outskirts. Seeing there was no way to enter Pomelo, the Central Repository of the Classics’ reinforcements simply took advantage of a little trick. They started to relentlessly take shots from ambush at the reinforcements of the Federation Comprehensive Academy. They were holding nothing back with those ambushes, given their power.

If the technology in Ren Wenzhou’s hands were to fall to any of the Big Six, it would enable them to rapidly pull away from the other five. How could the Central Repository of the Classics be willing to allow that technology to be diverted into someone else’s hands?

Moreover, the one being surrounded was the beloved disciple of the lord of the Central Repository of the Classics, Mi Xiaqing. It was said that in order to rescue his younger disciple, he and the other two disciples were boldly leading the troops in person to cut off the Federation Comprehensive Academy’s reinforcements.

Of course, the Federation Comprehensive Academy didn’t wish for the technology to fall into the hands of the Central Repository of the Classics. If they were to fall back, not only would that be a blow to their prestige, but their previous losses would have been in vain. The Federation Comprehensive Academy strove to dispatch only aces at the time, and they relentlessly sent out troops of card artisans. To increase the difficulty for the Central Repository of the Classics’ ambushes, they split them into a large number of small units, all deployed at once.

The state of war spread rapidly.

Up until that time, however, all the battles had taken place in the ordinary residential districts. The five flourishing districts remained calm. Nothing caused people to lose more hope than the attitude of the Federation Comprehensive Academy. The federation government issued a tepid statement, hoping the two sides could quickly end their fighting and keep the peace.

The weak display from the Heavenly Federation government drew a lot of dissatisfaction from the people, pushing its reputation to an historic low. The powerful in quite a few places started a mass aggregation of force to protect themselves, which severely weakened the government’s ability to moderate those forces.

Under the impact of the fighting, requests for applications to enter the five flourishing districts abruptly increased. By far, most of the applications were rejected. Not only that, but tourist access to the five flourishing districts was shut down.

Having nothing else they could do, the gazes of the people fell onto the ordinary residential districts that were relatively crime-free. Some of the ordinary residential districts with rudimentary social structures and lagging development became the key objectives of the migration.

The prestige of the Central Repository of the Classics and the Federation Comprehensive Academy had also dropped off steeply in the minds of the citizens of the ordinary residential districts. Their utterly unprincipled fighting in those districts, along with their indifference to the wounding of ordinary citizens, had enraged them.

That made number of students applying to those two academies that year abruptly plummet, and admissions levels were far from what they had been. Even the Star Academy, which had remained low-key ever since the affair of the exchanges with the Eastern Wei Academy, was a big winner with applications. And, because of having successfully repelled the challenge from the Gemini twins of Desert Camp, Moon Frost Island’s applications also surged that year. Because of its strict rules and ascetic ideals, applications to the Bitter Solitude Temple remained about the same as prior years.

Applications to the Central Repository of the Classics, the Federation Comprehensive Academy, and Desert Camp were quite far from what they had been.

Along with suffering a major recession, the population shrank dramatically among three ordinary residential districts—the Ming Zheng District, the Western Sheng District and the Bai Dong District—due to the fighting.

Many people felt fortunate that so long as the five flourishing districts hadn’t turned chaotic, then the federation still hadn’t become completely ungovernable.

No one was paying attention to the newly constructed base on the outskirts of Pomelo.

Because of a significant reduction in the demand for cards, Chen Mu restarted his own training. He built a new pool that was 20 meters deep; when he was in it, the water pressure would make him feel like he was really struggling. Because of that powerful pressure, though, the rate of increase to Chen Mu’s perception soared.

With the increase to his perception, all other aspects of his training level also showed an obvious improvement.

Only Wei-ah looked on when he trained. No one else knew about it. Even someone as strong as Jiao Si hadn’t seen that Chen Mu was actually a card artisan.

But Chen Mu had to face yet another kind of trouble.

There were 20 card masters from the Origins Academy standing in front of him. Every one of their faces was livid. Having been oppressed for so long, they finally stormed out! Even Jiao Si found it a little tricky when they stormed out together like that.

Their faces were as black as the bottom of a wok, and their gazes toward Chen Mu were as though they were waiting for the enemy.

“What is going on here, Mr. Cao? Do you resent that we don’t have enough skills? You’re having us make power cards day after day. If not that, then we’re doing the work of an underclassman, preparing materials. While we’d like to honor the president’s promise of cooperation, for you to treat us this way is really unspeakable!”

The one speaking was Professor Wen, who had been losing a lot of weight. The clothes on his body were so dirty they looked like they hadn’t been washed in months. He didn’t have any of the style of a high-grade card master; it looked as though he’d become an old street vagrant.

Looking at the rest of them, no matter where he looked, they all had miserable expressions and reddened eyes.

Seeing how those card masters looked, Jiao Si didn’t say anything for a moment. He squinted as though he were somewhere else. He didn’t express what he was thinking.

“But we require power cards right now.” Chen Mu spoke calmly. Power cards were what he needed most just then. The daily consumption of power cards had increased since those 400 card artisans had begun their regimented training.

Professor Wen said with a cold smile, “If your honor only wants us to make power cards, I don’t understand why you look down on us with such contempt. If power cards are the only thing you need, you could surely find someone better at it.”

The rest of the card masters were glaring at Chen Mu with the same hatred. They looked like they were itching to pierce him through the heart.

Seeing their expressions, Chen Mu finally understood how dissatisfied they were making power cards. Although he didn’t understand why, there wasn’t much he could think of doing since they had already refused to make them. They had only come to help, and he hadn’t invited them.

Chen Mu couldn’t help but think about what a waste of resources it was having so many idle card masters.

“What are you good at?” Chen Mu asked.

“Any kind of card apart from power cards!” old Wen said with pride.

Taking a look at them, Chen Mu activated his apparatus. “Xi Ping, could you prepare a list of ordinary materials, and send it over? The ones that were sent last time.”

“Yes, sir.” Xi Ping didn’t ask why, and after half a minute, the list had been quickly transmitted to Chen Mu’s apparatus. A long list of materials appeared on the screen when he opened it.

“Here is a list of materials. What can you make from it?” Chen Mu asked. He adjusted the screen to a large size, so everyone could see it clearly.

Casually looking over the list, a card master said, “I can make the single-line fiery beam card, the serial shredded moon card, and the accurate cone card.”

Chen Mu had never heard of a single one of those cards’ names and could only ask, “And their parameters?”

The card master looked at Chen Mu askance and said with a cold snort, “The accurate cone card has a standard damage rating of 721 and a firing frequency of two per second.” He had deliberately selected the card with the highest destructive rating among the three.

The Accurate Cone was a four-star card, and it could emit a kind of cone-shaped energy body. The destructive value was greatest at its tip. Among four-star cards, it was a pretty good one.

“What materials does it use?” Chen Mu continued to ask.

This guy isn’t even clear about the materials for the accurate cone card! The card master looked at Chen Mu with a gaze naturally full of contempt as his tone became haughtier. “You don’t even know that? Some chen stone, red-lined crystal, gamma enzymes…” He rattled off more than ten kinds of required materials in a single breath. Evidently, he was rather familiar with making that sort of card.

Chen Mu looked at him placidly and said, “I am sorry; I’ll have to retract this scheme.”

“Why?” the card master asked in anger as his eyes widened. The gazes of the rest of the card artisans turned even less happy toward Chen Mu. Old Wen’s face darkened, and his repressed rage could be heard in what he said. “I believe your honor owes us a reasonable explanation.”

“Indeed! What is the meaning of this? What do you think we are?”

“Don’t think you can keep us satisfied with some petty skills. We’ve eaten more salt than you’ve eaten food. You need to study a few more years, boy!”

“Pushing us around like that…”

All the card masters were livid as they called out their complaints toward Chen Mu. Behind him, Ru Qiu had nearly opened her mouth to say something a few times, though she shut it, not knowing what she would say.

Chen Mu kept calm as he was berated by that gang, though he was getting a little impatient. He suddenly felt those card masters had become like the princelings of the wealthy, so finicky and afraid of hard work. They would complain about any little thing. How could he have known what kind of position a high-grade card master enjoyed in society? Perhaps they been diligent when they were students, but they’d become pampered after so many years of their superior life.

Chen Mu knew if he didn’t settle things with that troublesome gang this time, they’d get even pickier when the time came. Not only wouldn’t they be any help, but they would become an annoyance.

Thinking of that, he furrowed his brow for the first time as his expression turned rather cold. Seeing that, Ru Qiu abruptly became a little concerned and wanted to shout down those card masters, but she was stymied when she saw the president give her a look.

That was when Chen Mu said something.