Chapter 27: Contract Law Test

The exam lasted an hour and a half, but Xueqiu finished in under an hour.

The questions weren’t hard—almost too easy.

Maybe that’s why Xia Yin always had that “don’t panic, your senior’s got you” attitude when mentioning the exam.

The classroom held only five people, including the two proctors.

Xueqiu didn’t dare look around, but the other two examinees—Chang Mu and Chisaki Takanotsume—sat just ahead and to her left.

Chisaki had finished her test, while Chang Mu was still scribbling furiously.

“Time’s up. Please put down your pens,” the green-haired, waist-length proctor said, collecting their papers.

She lingered a few seconds at Chang Mu’s desk.

He hadn’t finished.

Xueqiu recalled the test’s only section requiring heavy writing was the subjective questions at the end—things like “Is your worldview materialist or idealist?”

Xia Yin didn’t have that part of the question bank and had warned her about it.

“Is it hard for Little Rain?” Chisaki asked curiously outside the classroom.

“Tragic. Absolutely tragic,” Chang Mu sighed.

Xueqiu trailed behind, recalling Xia Yin’s words: besides the written Subjects One and Two, they had Subject Three today—the Contract test.

“You can’t leave yet,” a familiar, calm voice said from behind.

Carlos stood empty-handed, apparently uninvolved in handling the tests.

“The Contract test?” Xueqiu asked.

Carlos met her gaze, his sea-blue eyes mirroring hers. “Yes, Contract testing and comprehensive evaluation. But not here.”

Xueqiu didn’t know how big the Spiritual Academy was, but it took only five minutes to go from Teaching Building 9 to the “rank exam” site.

The site wasn’t what she expected—no imposing fortress or serene clock tower, but the school library.

She stood before its glass doors, a cool, non-drying breeze brushing her face.

Beside her were the equally dazed duo.

Chang Mu was anxious from earlier; Chisaki, less dazed, stared curiously through the glass.

Carlos led them inside, bypassing facial scanners or main entrances, taking a side exit.

Xueqiu, at the back, expected a silent library but heard commotion from upstairs.

It sounded less like an argument and more like a one-sided scolding.

“What’s wrong with you?! The Arcane Arts lab’s stuff isn’t for a librarian to mess with! What are you trying to do, kill us all?”

On the fourth floor, she saw a scrawny, bald old man in a white coat at the corridor’s end, his hunched frame like a dead shrimp, his voice sharp and piercing.

Across from him, a silver-gray-haired young man—Bing Shi Nagi—stood with his head bowed, silently enduring the tirade.

Xueqiu didn’t know him well but remembered his name.

At the same time, the elevator at the corridor’s other end opened, revealing an old man and a younger one—Xia Yin, yawning, looking exhausted.

He spotted her, his signature dead-fish eyes blinking twice as he waved.

Before Xueqiu could react, Chang Mu waved back, nearly shouting to vent about his exam struggles.

The fourth floor wasn’t the test site; they had to go higher.

As a freshman, Xueqiu wondered why Carlos made them take the stairs when an elevator was right there, but the question faded in two minutes—they’d reached the library’s top floor.

“Ugh… I’m… out of breath…” Chang Mu panted after the climb, but seeing the two girls unfazed, he swallowed his complaints.

Carlos led them into a corridor.

Perhaps isolated from the lower floors and unlit, it was dimmer, relying on a few windows.

Though dim, Xueqiu could see numbered rooms lining both sides, starting at “01” and exceeding “20” at the end.

“Chang Yi, begin the rank exam for early-admission freshmen,” Carlos said suddenly, not to them.

Xueqiu recalled “Chang Yi”—the AI Xia Yin mentioned when she first arrived, dazed before the convenience store mirror.

As Carlos spoke, speakers in the corridor blared, and rooms “01,” “02,” and “03” lit up, their silver-gray metal doors sliding open.

“Please enter the rooms in order,” a soft female voice said.

Xueqiu hesitated, then stepped into Room 02.

Only after entering did she worry “in order” meant a strict sequence, not random choice, and she might have to slink out.

But the worry was unnecessary—the door locked behind her, just like before.

Then, the lights went out.

Xueqiu stood frozen, unable to even glimpse the room’s layout in that brief moment.

It wasn’t large, maybe the size of a high school teacher’s office.

A faint lemon scent filled the air, but she saw nothing.

Had something gone wrong?

Why put her in a dark, confined space?

Was this part of the rank test?

In ten seconds, countless thoughts raced through her mind—some baseless, some self-soothing, like “maybe the light just broke.”

Suddenly, as abruptly as it went out, the room lit up again, the sudden brightness forcing her eyes shut.

The lemon scent grew stronger.

Was it finally starting? Xueqiu thought.

But when she opened her eyes, the white walls were gone.

She was no longer on the library’s top floor, or even in the school.

She stood in a dim forest.

Trees of varying heights and thicknesses surrounded her, the smell of earth and leaves filling her nose.

Moonlight streamed from above, illuminating her and the dry grass beneath.

Xueqiu looked ahead.

Before her, a figure appeared from nowhere, black smoke seeping from a tattered, pitch-black cloak.

ps: Got swamped today. I’ll thank for monthly tickets and tips on Saturday.