[Hey guys, been a long ass time I wrote notes in the chapters, you miss me, right? HEHE; I KNOW IT! Okay so I want to announce that I began writing a new novel, in my opinion, it is very good and I am planning to make it as long as Imperial Eunuch, which isn’t that long yet, I know… but I am writing! My patreon is 25chapters ahead, and I try to make some stash so that I can upgrade it to 50chapters ahead someday (no promises, gonna take a long time).
Anyways, the RoyalRoad readers have probably seen it in the pre-chapter note, Webnovel readers will find it in the post-chapter note. That novel will also be up to patreon soon, so if you take a liking, please give it a chance even though the published chapters are very few.
Like always, I am happy about any and all comments, edit-suggestions and feedback. For taking your time reading all my babble, this chapter is a bit longer than usual. Enjoy!
PS. Some of you guys might wonder why I don't use chapter-titles anymore. Well, I felt it was a bother for both of us. I would have to somehow summarise a 1.600+ chapter with a few words, while you guys will just be spoilered of the coming content. So, I stopped! Simple as that.]
Slowly approaching the still standing Ji Li, it had thought that the enemy was frozen from the shock and already opened its mouth, then closed it quickly. Inside of the jaguar, the shooting stars tip, which was frozen and pierced into the skin, became unfrozen from the first impact of the essence breeze, which was sent by a windflower.
The second impact of the breeze gave the seeds inside of the bud of the flower at the tip some strength to sprout, to which they did. The third and final breeze send in enough essence to fully sprout the flowers, but had not let them grow more, or the jaguar would have felt more than a pinch.
Unfortunately, the jaguar ate the Dahlia, which was full of essence. And before the jaguar could feel the sprouts growing, it had already hit the shooting stars stems, feeling cold as the stick was frozen, making it slightly numb.
The sprouts inside grew fast, and when the jaguar finally came into the range of Ji Li’s essence, he shot a silent last windflower into the jaguars open mouth, which made it close it again. The essence that was inside of the windflower was even more than the one in the Dahlia, as Ji Li had concentrated a very strongly.
The breeze of essence was the last bit that flew through the beast’s stomach and stopped midway, as it pushed all of it’s contained essence into a certain direction to the side, towards the fully grown shooting stars. The essence gave them a last push and froze them slightly as they exploded.
The jaguar had ignored the itches in the confused and numbed state, but as the flower exploded, it felt the cold energy flowing through his body. In response, he rushed towards Ji Li in a final attempt to his him, but Ji Li took his large hibiscus shield and blocked the open mouth, which nearly bite through the shield from the sides.
Using all of his strength, Ji Li pushed the jaguar towards the semi-circular five-meter-long root field of the Dahlia, while also putting in a lot of essence. The jaguar was pushed back a little and was about to stand up, when his skin was pierced from below.
The root field had moved towards him from the sides as he was frozen slightly at his right back paw. The Dahlia field that seemed to shield was actually in a trapping position the whole time, and quickly circled the jaguar, making it unable to move even though it was barely a step away from Ji Li.
The roots went around its whole body while it kept its mouth open the whole time, screaming, but only cold air came out, which also stopped, as the lungs were pierced together with the vocal cords. Frozen from inside and outside, the jaguar slowly died, still confused about how the lowly creature, one that didn’t move at all, killed him.
Ji Li didn’t think much of it and just spread his essence around the field, slowly pulling back the essence from the flowers as they grew back into seeds. This time ability of the Talent was surprisingly not essence consuming but rather absorbing it back, making his Talent even more valuable.
The seeds empty of essence, and as he had already experimented and came to know that the seeds that grew out of an artificially enhanced seed couldn’t be used again, he left them there and looked forward to the balcony above the gate, where the man from before was watching.
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The man had a thoughtful expression and seemed to be thinking of the fight, maybe even grading it. So, as he saw that Ji Li was finished with everything, he just looked at him and commented “Your talent is very fitting with your fighting style, or your fighting style was made based off of it.”
He didn’t go deeper into that part, and focused more on Ji Li’s behaviour, so he asked, “You did act very meticulously, every step with thought, but what if the jaguar didn’t act the way you expected?”
Ji Li naturally had an answer, so he kept it short “I wanted him to move as I wished, so I made him.”
The examiner nodded at the answer and gave his opinion to the fight “You have fought with precision and thought, while also with a certain risk and courage, as you didn’t blink twice and instantly acted the moment you saw the jaguar.
In a situation in the wilderness, you might not get the chance to prepare as much as you did now, as the beasts there would be much more cautious than one that was captured and basically gave up.”
Ji Li nodded but refuted “That may be true, but I was fighting a beast in an exam, so naturally I had to change the way I planned and responded such, forcing the situation to be like that of the wilderness, when I have a better plan for the current situation is less efficient.”
The man was happy at the answer, as efficiency was truly much more important than showing off one’s ability in an exam, just to feel good about it. He then sends Ji Li away “You may go now. The results will be delivered to you personally.”
Turning around, Ji Li left the man on the balcony alone, or to be specific, for the group to be alone.
After examining, the man turned and bowed towards the inside of the building, saying “I apologize for being so intrusive and talkative with the junior, esteemed high eunuchs.”
Inside the building, there were three people. Two of them were known to Ji Li, as they were his elder brothers, while the other person wasn’t someone he saw before.
Yu Bao waved his hand, replying nonchalantly “It’s fine, it was good you asked, Head Eunuch.”
That’s right, the person that held the examination wasn’t a Senior Eunuch, such as those that would be grading the written exam, also not a Palace Eunuch, that was in place of overseeing early examinations such as this one – no, it was a Head Eunuch, one that lead the whole examination hall.
The Inspection Palace was split into several Major Halls, which had their own Minor Halls, which were led by Head Eunuchs. The Head Eunuch of the Examination Hall was the person that oversaw the examinations of Palace Eunuchs personally, so it was obvious that being here for Ji Li was too much.
The reason he had to do so was because Ji Li’s elder brothers and their friend had joined as spectators while Ji Li was taking the written exam, so naturally he had to cater to the High Eunuchs, which were truly strong and worthy of their authority, much higher than himself, although the difference was only one rank.
Having dismissed the apology, Yu Bao looked at Yu Wei and his friend as he said, smiling brightly “Didn’t I tell you? Our Ji Li is worthy of directly being promoted, as an examination was useless! Although we, the Eunuchs of the Emerald Brilliance Empire, have always been part of the strongest in our realm, when have you seen a low fight a high?”
Yu Wei was just as excited, so he continued “With the easy he did it, he could most certainly also slay a peak, taking just a bit longer.”
The friend of the two sighed at their enthusiasm in front of a stranger, but he still answered them “Fighting a peak is different, as their Talent might have already partly been awakened or at least strengthened the Awakening Element, so you can’t just say it like it’s a gradual system.
Still, you were right. He had not moved at all during the whole time, but he did have strength, so it wasn’t because he wasn’t able to do so. My guess is that he partly wanted to show his might, but also baited the Demon Beast with that. Our evaluation shouldn’t be too different.”
The two nodded happily but didn’t continue talking about why they had come, or their suspicions about Ji Li’s extraordinarily large essence reserves, as there was an outside present, and some things were better kept hidden by each person.
…
Ji Li had just left the Exam Hall and went towards his own yard, this time with a carriage, making haste but not talking too much on the way.
As he arrived, he went towards the front yard, to find that neither Shixuan nor Qianyu had come back, his guess was that they were still busy and didn’t think he would finish that quickly.
He went deeper into his own bedroom, sat on his bed, before he collapsed back, letting out groans of pain. The whole journey from the hall to his own bedroom was very destructive and harming to his already over-exerted body. He had taxed it too much with his calm acting.
The truth was, he had used all his strength in that one push, while his essence was very low because he had used nearly all his own reserves, excluding the beads, of which he kept most full to the point of breaking. The reason was simple – he couldn’t be too abnormal.
But that in turn left his body empty of any essence that could heal his strains passively, making the pain even more unbearable to the body. He curled and rolled around his bed, trying to lessen the pain with the soft outer stimulation. The pain was too much for him to even sit still.
He thought of the fight and could only say he was satisfied. This fight wasn’t bad at all, he spent his energy for once after gathering it for so long and it felt good to fight. He was not planning to be come a fighter, but it would become inevitable, so it was better to just be open up for it and experience some pain for the future gain. In the best-case scenario, he would only have to support and not attack himself, but who knew what the future held for him. He could only take the reins of his present and prepare for the future.