In just half a month,
Though this score still fell a bit short of the very top geniuses, the gap had shrunk to under a thousand points.
In other words, if Jiang Chen kept up this pace for the remaining month and a half of the cycle, his total would reach a jaw-dropping 5000 points.
That kind of score would absolutely crush every top genius.
As a result, the entire Heavenly Spirit Zone was gripped by a vague sense of panic once again.
They felt this secular prodigy was nothing but a troublemaker, stirring up chaos and unsettling everyone's peace of mind.
"This guy is doing it on purpose, isn't he? He won't be satisfied until he's turned the whole Heavenly Spirit Zone upside down?"
"Well, what do you expect? They shut him out of the Alchemy Zone, so he went to the Mental Strength Zone. That's perfectly reasonable. You're being a bit much."
"How am I being a bit much? He's just some secular martial artist—what gives him the right to be so high and mighty? Is he deliberately slapping our sect geniuses in the face?"
"He doesn't even seem to know who you are, so how is he slapping your face? Who do you even think you are? Besides, he's quietly racking up points on his own merit. If you can do better, go ahead. If you can't, stop whining."
If the Alchemy Zone frenzy had drawn a lot of hostility toward Jiang Chen, then this heaven-defying performance in the Mental Strength Zone had actually swayed many of the previously neutral observers to his side.
A genius who could perform this spectacularly in two different domains—that was a true genius.
The martial world belonged to the strong.
Jiang Chen's crazed performance was slowly earning him respect.
However, most of that respect came from martial artists ranked in the middle and lower tiers. Those with higher rankings—even the top-tier geniuses—grew even more hostile and resentful toward Jiang Chen's display.
In their eyes, this secular monster was practically issuing them a direct challenge!
If they let him continue like this, in another month everyone's names would be trampled under the feet of this secular freak, watching his name race far ahead on the leaderboards!
In the Heavenly Spirit Zone,
"That beast—he got put down once and still wasn't satisfied? He's actually gone and thrust himself into the spotlight again, daring and unafraid. He's asking for death!"
Though Long Juxue thought this, deep down she had a nagging feeling that if Jiang Chen was left to develop like this, he would truly become a serious threat.
"That beast—the alchemy talent alone was terrifying enough. But what's with this mental strength? He's the son of some second-rate vassal lord. What right does he have to such a powerful mental strength realm, breezing through the Mental Strength Zone like it's nothing?"
Long Juxue asked herself—even with her Innate Constitution, if she went to the Mental Strength Zone, the most she could manage would be challenging level four tasks. Attempting level five carried far too much risk.
For top geniuses like Long Juxue, the point gaps between them were razor-thin. Nobody wanted to risk challenging a level five task.
Because level five tasks were so brutally difficult that a single failure meant a penalty of 160 points. For a top genius, that was absolutely unacceptable.
Losing 160 points could mean being left far behind in the rankings in one fell swoop.
So up to now—out of twelve assessment cycles over three years, with only the third currently underway—nobody wanted to push too hard this early.
They all preferred to lay low, build up strength quietly, and then unleash everything in the later stages for a final sprint.
Originally, there had been an unspoken understanding among these top geniuses: no one would be the first to upset the balance. Not because they didn't want to, but because none of them had any particular confidence they could succeed.
But then this anomaly named Jiang Chen appeared, and he'd thrown the entire Heavenly Spirit Zone into complete disarray.
Now, lying low was no longer an option. If they didn't step up their game, being overtaken by Jiang Chen was just a matter of time.
Among these geniuses, rankings fluctuated slightly, with small shifts that everyone could accept. But at Jiang Chen's point-earning speed, if they let him run wild for another three months, the gap would become so enormous that catching up would be impossible.
"Hm? What's this?" Long Juxue suddenly reached out and snatched something from the air—a voice transmission talisman. She opened it, and a frosty smile crept across her lips. "So it seems Jiang Chen's vile presence has finally aroused public outrage. A Summit, you say? That means the top geniuses of the Heavenly Spirit Zone can no longer stand him. This summit must be about that beast Jiang Chen. I have to go—I absolutely must attend."
The Summit, in the Heavenly Spirit Zone, was essentially a gathering of the elite geniuses.
Put bluntly, it was a bunch of top-tier prodigies getting together to talk shop.
But the summit was of very high standing, and the entry requirements were extremely strict. Only the top sixteen ranked individuals in the Heavenly Spirit Zone were eligible to attend.
Those top sixteen corresponded to the sixteen spots in the final tournament.
In other words, this group of summit attendees was dead set on monopolizing those spots.
Distributed among the various sects, that averaged out to roughly four per sect. But in reality, the distribution was far from even.