Chapter 15 – School Celebrity

Liu Siyan quickly reacted as well, unwilling to fall behind, and said:

“I want to exchange contact information too, Lin… Lin Ze-gege…”

Her skin wasn’t as thick as Zhang Xiaoyun’s after all, and by the time she finished speaking, her cheeks were flushed red.

Lin Ze didn’t know whether to laugh or cry, but he had no choice but to exchange contact information with them.

The Apprentice Assessment had come to an end, and the outcome was satisfactory for everyone. The four of them didn’t linger and found a place nearby to have lunch.

During the meal, Zhang Xiaoyun and Liu Siyan took turns handing him water and picking food for him, fawning over Lin Ze with an enthusiasm that was almost embarrassing.

Guan Ning watched from the side and felt a twinge of jealousy.

It wasn’t that she had never seen other girls fawning over Lin Ze before.

After all, Lin Ze wasn’t bad-looking himself—he was actually quite popular with girls.

But back then, she hadn’t felt anything when she saw it. Yet now, for some reason, she felt a knot of displeasure in her chest.

Her mouth felt sour, as if she had bitten into a green tangerine.

In the evening.

Lin Ze and Guan Ning returned to their residence.

As they were about to part ways at the door.

Lin Ze took out his keys to open the door while casually saying:

“Sleep early. We still need to go back to school to register tomorrow.”

Guan Ning glanced at him, seeming to want to say something, but in the end, she just obediently acknowledged with a soft “mm.”

Lin Ze didn’t notice the girl’s expression and walked into the house after opening the door.

Sitting down on the living room sofa, he immediately summoned his Personal Panel.

【Lin Ze】

【Constitution 5.0 / Soul Strength 8.8】

【Level: Apprentice】

【Soul Power: 880/880】

【Soul Art: None】

【Pet Beast: Ice Crystal Soul】

【Achievement Points: 203】

The Soul Crystal rewarded from the 【Apprentice Beast Tamer】 achievement had already been used by him.

His Soul Strength had successfully grown to 8.8.

Aside from that, there were also the 200 Achievement Points rewarded.

“Ice Crystal Soul is still 16% away from max Growth Rate, so only 80 Achievement Points are needed.”

Lin Ze thought it over and decided not to raise the Growth Rate to 100% for now.

His main reason was that he wanted to run an experiment.

In reality, Pet Beasts could grow through battle.

To describe it in system terms, Pet Beasts could increase their Growth Rate through combat.

Lin Ze wanted to actually test how much combat could boost a Pet Beast’s Growth Rate under the system’s enhancement.

If the results were good, he could save a lot of Achievement Points in the future, using them instead to unlock Pet Beast skills or improve his Constitution and Soul Attributes.

“Let me unlock those two new skills first.”

Lin Ze summoned the Pet Beast panel and looked at the skill list at the bottom.

【Ice Shield】: Defense-type Skill. Manipulates Ice Element to form a shield of ice, freely defending against attacks from any direction. Unlock requires 60% Growth Rate, 50 Achievement Points.

【Frost Nova】: Area Damage-type Skill. Compresses a large amount of Ice Element in a designated area into a single point, then instantly releases it to create explosive ice-attribute damage. Unlock requires 80% Growth Rate, 100 Achievement Points.

The two skills cost 150 Achievement Points in total.

Lin Ze didn’t hesitate and unlocked them both at once.

【Name】: Ice Crystal Soul

【Attribute Type】: Ice

【Level】: Tier 3, Stage 1

【Growth Rate】: 84%

【Skills】: Ice Spike, Frost Breath, Extreme Ice Chain, Ice Shield, Frost Nova

【Empress Path, next Evolution Form 【Snow Maiden】, requires meeting the conditions: 100% Growth Rate, Intermediate Ice Element Essence x20, Ice Snow Heart x1】

“I’ll keep the remaining 50 Achievement Points for now.”

“Only 16% more until max Growth Rate. It shouldn’t take too long to reach it.”

“Next, I need to figure out how to get my hands on the evolution materials.”

Lin Ze rubbed his brow with some frustration.

He had looked up the prices online.

The unit price for Intermediate Ice Element Essence was 20,000 Credit Points per crystal.

Twenty crystals would cost a full 400,000 Credit Points.

The Ice Snow Heart was even more absurdly expensive.

A single one cost 150,000 Credit Points.

All told, to purchase the complete set of evolution materials for Ice Crystal Soul, he would need at least 550,000 Credit Points.

His current savings weren’t even a tenth of that amount.

“And buying a new Pet Beast will cost a pretty penny too.”

Pet Beast prices fluctuated wildly.

Depending on Potential Rating and Stage, beasts of the same tier could differ in price by more than tenfold.

An E-rated second-stage beast averaged only 100,000 Credit Points.

But a B-rated second-stage beast with multiple Evolution Forms could sell for as much as a million Credit Points.

Of course.

With his Cheat, Lin Ze could easily set his sights on lower-rated beasts that possessed Hidden Evolution Paths.

That would drastically reduce the money needed.

Even so, he’d probably still need several hundred thousand Credit Points.

Adding both expenses together, the total would approach a million Credit Points.

For someone who had only just accumulated a little over a hundred thousand Credit Points in savings, that was undoubtedly an astronomical figure.

“And this is just the Apprentice Beast Tamer stage. Further down the line, the places that need money will only multiply, and the expenses will only grow.”

Lin Ze winced as if he had a toothache.

“It’s a bottomless money pit.”

Fortunately, although Beast Tamers were famous for spending money like water, they were equally famous for their ability to earn it.

Lin Ze already had a plan for that.

“I’ll make time to visit the Beast Tamer Association tomorrow and take on Bounty Missions to earn money!”

Beast Tamers at the Apprentice level and above could accept Bounty Missions at the Beast Tamer Association, receiving a set reward upon completion.

The higher the Mission Level, the higher the bounty reward.

Even the lowest-level missions typically paid tens of thousands of Credit Points.

It was one of the fastest ways for Beast Tamers to make money.

After a moment of thought, Lin Ze had already settled on his course of action.

Closing the panel, he summoned Ice Crystal Soul and played with his Pet Beast for a while, then got up to wash up and prepare for rest.

The next morning.

Guan Ning knocked on Lin Ze’s door to wake him up and dragged him over to the Guan residence for breakfast.

Guan Chongshan and his wife had learned from Guan Ning the night before that Lin Ze had been promoted to Apprentice Beast Tamer.

They were both shocked and delighted that he had passed the assessment at Ultra Difficulty, grinning from ear to ear.

Guan’s mother had gone all out and prepared a lavish breakfast spread, calling it a celebration.

So much so that on the way to school, Guan Ning was still grumbling playfully that Lin Ze was more like their son than she was their daughter.

“Isn’t this a celebration for you too? Don’t forget, we passed the Apprentice Assessment together.”

“Who said that? Mom only decided to make a big meal after she heard that you passed the assessment.”

The two joked around and soon arrived at Pinghai No. 1 High School.

The moment he stepped through the school gates, Lin Ze sensed something was off.

In the past, when he came to school with Guan Ning, they would attract quite a bit of attention, but the vast majority of gazes were directed at her.

After all, the girl was Pinghai No. 1 High School’s famous genius beauty.

But today was different.

Lin Ze keenly noticed that most people’s eyes were fixed on him.

Many students around were pointing at him and whispering.

He could faintly make out snippets of conversation.

“Look, Lin Ze is here!”

“Ah, he’s the genius who passed the Ultra Difficulty assessment?”

“Unbelievable, he actually managed to conquer even the Ultra Difficulty!”

“I never thought our school had such an incredible figure hidden away!”

“Wow, he’s pretty handsome too. Let’s go ask for his contact info.”

“You go if you want—I wouldn’t dare. Haven’t you seen Guan Ning standing right next to him?”

“……”

Lin Ze’s mouth twitched.

News sure spread fast.

In just one day, it had already reached the entire school!