Eternal Ascendancy. Central Academy Auditorium.
Hearing Sanya words, Not only Silas was stunned.
Others in the hall were equally stunned. Same as Silas, they also thought Sanya was a real cultivator—and likely had connections to the academy. But they weren't scared. They were excited! They now badly wanted to make some connection with her!
At that moment, Jina suddenly turned toward Rudra. "Hey, Rudra. Tell me, how old are you? You're not twelve years old, right?"
She knew Rudra was younger than Roxa, but how much younger? Rudra looked like a 17-year-old boy. What if he was also like Roxa? So she asked directly—not wanting to remain in the dark about them.
Hearing this, Rudra awkwardly glanced at Sanya, hoping she would answer. Sanya understood and spoke calmly. "Well, he's just six months younger than me."
Everyone sighed in relief hearing this. They didn't want any more surprises today.
But they didn't know Sanya had lied. She didn't want to scare them on the very first day.
Galaxy sighed too, then moved to follow the teacher.
Silas—who had stopped to listen to the group's talk—also began walking, following the teacher quietly.
After a short silence in the hall, a few students from those still remaining stood up from their places and moved to the platform where the speech had been given.
Among them were Ruyi and Jina.
A middle-aged man—a first-batch student—stepped forward.
"Hello, juniors. Let us, your seniors, make you familiar with the academy. Make groups of five people and follow your assigned senior. They will show you everything, explain your classrooms, and tell you the timings for your lectures. After that, you'll attend your normal classes. Then, once those finish, Your cultivation session will begin in the training grounds. Your day in the academy will then end with the cultivation session.
Best of luck, Juniors. We wish to see you thrive in the cultivation path. Now, let's go. Make yourselves familiar with the academy."
He then took a group with him. Other seniors also took their groups. Ruyi took a group with her.
Jina guides Sanya's group. In Sanya's group were Sanya, Rudra, a girl, a boy, and the little girl.
Jina slowly led them to explore the academy. She had already been here—the teachers had made the old students familiar some time ago. She explained as they walked.
"Look, this is the cafeteria of the academy."
"At that side are the cultivation chambers."
"And there are two libraries over there. One with normal books. The other with cultivation knowledge. It probably contains professions and martial techniques too. I haven't explored it fully yet."
"And look—this will be your classrooms. My classroom is different. I chose the agricultural field. I love it. My teacher is awesome—she's good at everything and has already started teaching us agriculture using cultivation. It's really magical. Anyway, you can't choose any field yet. You can only pick one to explore after turning 16. Before that, you'll be taught general things.
5 to 10-year-olds are taught basic stuff: manners, behavior, history, and general knowledge about the world and everything.
11 to 15-year-olds begin learning real things. At this age, you can start taking on tasks to earn contribution points, participate in battle with enemies without any supervisor, and train survival skills. It is the stage where you truly build your understanding of world by personally experiencing it. Theory ends here. Real experience begins. You face challenges, make mistakes, survive them, and grow stronger from every step.
16 and above get a specific field, like me. Of course, you can choose as many fields as you want. But if you're not good at them, it will affect your academic scores. Some students even choose not to take any field. It wasn't like this before. But after the cultivation system arrived, the academy changed it. Otherwise, it would be a problem for students who only want to focus on cultivation."
Just as she was going to say more, Sanya interrupted excitedly. "Can I really choose to ditch studying and only focus on cultivation?"
Jina nodded her head.
Sanya's face immediately lit up with joy. "It's good. Very good…"
But her excitement stopped short when Jina added, laughing lightly, "But you can only ditch studying after turning 16. You still have to wait a few years."
Sanya's excitement died instantly. She still had to suffer through years of studying.
Jina continued, still smiling at Sanya's disappointed expression. "And there's one more thing—our academy doesn't have any exams. Sanya, don't get excited yet, let me finish first. The academy doesn't have exams, but it has a different system: academy scores. Teachers give you these scores, and once you reach a specific point, you graduate. If you can't reach it, you won't graduate.
And don't worry. There's no bias or cheating here. Students can check their academic scores anytime. If they do something bad, they see their scores go down. If they do something good, their scores go up. There hasn't been a single mistake in evaluations so far. Don't know about the future, though."
Sanya and others blinked, processing it all.