Our Association Is Truly Thriving, Huh

Amid the surging sound of the tide, an awkward, dead silence abruptly fell. The two stared at each other in silence—one brimmed with enthusiasm and eager anticipation, while the other looked utterly drained of the will to live, thoroughly fed up. At this moment, hearing what the examiner had just said, Ji Jue was almost angry enough to laugh. You just refuse to listen to a word anyone says, don't you? And besides, what did he mean by *go kill the Nether Sea Worm*? "Me?" He pointed at his own face, utterly baffled. "Go fight the Nether Sea Worm?" Are you serious?! He was a blank slate—and one whose ceiling was hard-locked with zero chance of advancement to boot. Without Non-Offensive, without Masterwork Nature, he was supposed to go fight a worldly calamity that wrought large-scale disasters and produced boundless corruption? Why not just tell him to go back to the Wild Gathering and play manned spaceflight instead? At least there was a slight chance he might actually take the syndicate to the moon! "Can you win?" the examiner asked, full of hope. "I'm guaranteed to die!" Ji Jue rolled his eyes. "Besides, I've been taking this damn exam for so long, and all I did on Luye Island was sit around watching the Nether Sea Worm pollute the environment, pissing and shitting everywhere. I don't even fucking know what it looks like or where it is!" "Hmm, that truly is my oversight." The examiner nodded thoughtfully. "It seems there was a misunderstanding in comprehension. Fallen into ordinary mental ruts, even you failed to notice?" "Notice what?" "The Nether Sea Worm—that name is merely a designation. Calling it a worm doesn't mean it's truly a worm. At the same time, it's called the Nether Sea because... it can genuinely create a Nether Sea." At that moment, the examiner lightly clapped his hands. *Clap!* A soft crack resonated. The brilliant sunshine, azure ocean, and golden beach vanished without a trace. A rolling tide of all-devouring darkness rose from the earth, blanketing everything. Violent gales and torrential rains burst forth in an instant, and a surge of corrupted pollution engulfed all creation. The world once more welcomed its doom. All things plunged into the nether. Yet Ji Jue was already ascending alongside the examiner. Going upward like a phantasm that did not belong here, he easily broke free from gravity and looked down from above the vault of heaven. In just the snap of a finger, they arrived in the outer space of the mortal world. The primordial darkness of the surrounding cosmos lay within arm's reach. A star drifted past before his eyes, sparkling brightly before wandering elsewhere and vanishing from sight. Turning around to look down at the world beneath their feet, he saw a pitch-black tempest shrouding the azure surface of the ocean at the edge of the mortal realm. Like a layer of black felt, it was slowly creeping outward in all directions. Doomsday was spreading. "Tainting the world, mutating everything, plunging the vast ocean into the nether—what you see before you now is the Nether Sea." Beside Ji Jue, the examiner slowly reached out. As if drawing back a stage curtain, he effortlessly dispersed the overarching storm clouds, then gave another flick of his fingers. Instantly, winds churned and clouds gathered, rain poured and tides rose. Every shift in the celestial phenomena and terrestrial leylines was highlighted with glowing markers before Ji Jue's eyes. Infinite darkness swirled. The ceaselessly mutating spiritus pollution circulated between sea and sky like blood vessels, blanketing everything. Looking at it all, it was practically... a worm?! A jet-black worm slowly writhed within the tempest, coiling, rooting itself into the earth and shrouding the sky, parasitizing the world. From beginning to end... Ji Jue and the others had been inside its body all along without realizing it. The storm clouds they saw when looking up, the tides born from the Nether Sea, the raging winds that blew—they were all part of the worm! "This entire Nether Sea is its incarnation. "To use an analogy, the worm right now is still in a stage of metamorphic development. Just like reverting to an embryo, it has dispersed itself across the mortal realm to gestate once again," the examiner said. "It is inherently an agglomeration of numerous massive abominations from the mortal realm. From the moment it was born within the projection of the Vortex in the mortal realm, it was worthy of being deemed a worldly abomination. What a pity it suffered from inborn deficiencies. "It was forged from the remnant carcasses of countless abominations, and for that reason, it lacks purity. It is exceedingly vast in 'quantity,' but it falls far short in 'quality.' "That is why it needs to regestate and undergo Metamorphosis. "Back when the various factions joined forces to eradicate it, it was only a single step away from undergoing Ascension into a genuine apocalyptic calamity and attaining the form of destruction. "Had it succeeded, it wouldn't be called the Nether Sea Worm today; it would be called the Nether Sea Dragon." The more Ji Jue listened, the more absurd it sounded. "You made it sound so terrifyingly badass, and you expect me to deal with it?" The examiner looked back at him and suddenly smiled. "It's not like you have anything else to do anyway, right?" With that, he tossed an object that looked like a remote control over. It landed in Ji Jue's hand. "What's this?" "One of the internal cores of Celestial Craft: Myriad Transformations. Well, basically the remote control for the fictional world you're currently in," the examiner said casually. "Pressing the red button rewinds time and returns you to a save state. The blue button fast-forwards time." Ji Jue thought for a moment and asked out of curiosity, "What happens if I press red and blue together?" "You exit," the examiner answered frankly. "Like I said, this is a bonus question. If you don't feel like playing, you can leave at any time. I won't stop you." "Heh." Ji Jue glanced at him with a cold smirk, suddenly understanding Young Master Lou's feelings a little better. "What gave you the illusion that you could manipulate me however you please? "Even if I had to jump from right here today..." Before finishing his sentence, he decisively raised his hand. Yours truly isn't playing with you anymore! I'm out! "Oh, right." The examiner added offhandedly, "If you're willing to cooperate with me, I won't tell Ye Xian about your plan to break away and start your own sect." Ji Jue's fingers froze midair. He couldn't press down. Sweat began to pour down his back. He glared daggers. You bastard, you fucking... Although Ji Jue's original intention was not to drag Professor Ye into trouble on his account, he knew his teacher too well. Taking matters into his own hands wouldn't earn him any gratitude. No, she definitely wouldn't appreciate it. In fact, she would definitely hang him up and beat him... beat him to death, heal him, and beat him again until he wished he were dead! He hesitated, took a deep breath, summoned his courage, and shakily lowered his trembling fingers toward the buttons. So what if she beats me to death! I'm escaping first and— "Ah, there's one more thing I forgot to mention!" The examiner turned around, his smile growing even more radiant. "I just unlocked all the materials from the Association's standard database for you, as well as every single blessing in the Record of Myriad Phenomena." "..." "No points required, unlimited redemption." He tapped his temple, recalling the term. "It's what you young people call 'Creative Mode,' right?" Ji Jue's fingers were already resting on the two buttons, but he couldn't bring himself to press them. His heart sank straight to the bottom. It was over. There was no running away. He couldn't help it—the guy was simply out of his league. He couldn't beat him at his own game... Though he couldn't figure out the man's identity or purpose, to be able to bypass the established protocols and deliberately mess with his head at this critical juncture of the Association's artisan examination, the other party was very likely some top brass in the Association—at least a council member. If this person wanted to use Kanemoto to hold something over him or stir up trouble, there was no need to go through all this hassle, let alone waste an exorbitant price just to set up an all-access sandbox trial of Celestial Craft: Myriad Transformations. Now, the guy was playing good cop, bad cop, brandishing both the stick and the carrot to mess with his head. The stick wasn't necessarily a real stick—after all, at most Ji Jue would just get beaten half to death by his teacher. If the man truly wanted to threaten him, wouldn't laying his cards on the table and crushing Ji Jue outright be much simpler? But this carrot was truly sweet, fragrant, and crisp... A simulated world with Creative Mode enabled, where he could do whatever the hell he wanted and freely experiment with every kind of blessing and craft? If this were any other place or occasion, what was there to hesitate about? Ji Jue would have dropped to his knees right then and there, knocking his head against the ground, muttering about high purines and begging him to be his godfather. So... To hell with it! He might as well have a blast first! "Mm, looks like you've made your choice." Having waited for quite a while, the examiner offered one last smile and waved goodbye. "Well then, have fun!" Just like that, with a *swoosh*, he vanished. "Holy crap, like a ghost..." Ji Jue jumped in surprise, his heart tightening immediately afterward. *Dammit, did the Tower of Myriad Transformations gain a spirit of its own? An alchemical specter refusing to move on? Why the hell is it haunting me?* "Hmm? Are you talking about me?" A puzzled voice suddenly came from behind him, startling Ji Jue so badly he nearly leaped into the air. He whirled around in shock. "Didn't you leave?!" "I didn't go far." The examiner spread his hands again. "Besides, wasn't that just to give you a sense of uninhibited freedom? If anything comes up, you can actually call me at any time." He patted his chest reassuringly. "On call around the clock!" Ji Jue couldn't hold it together anymore, his composure completely shattering. "Bro, what the hell is your actual job?!" "If you really want to put a label on it, I'm just a working stiff who occasionally moonlights for the Association. "If the examiner has business, I can fill in as the examiner. If you need customer service, I don't mind moonlighting as support either." The examiner showed a textbook corporate smile, flashing eight neat teeth that gleamed with utmost sincerity. "By the way, once this is over, could you leave a five-star review? "My negative review rate has been pretty high the past few years, to the point where I'm embarrassed to go outside." "Sure, absolutely." Ji Jue's face twitched as he forced out a smile. "Seeing how the Association is truly thriving, I'm sure you'll get rave reviews!" *Snap!* The examiner vanished once more. Yet Ji Jue felt a chill running down his spine, like thorns at his back. He could completely imagine that, in a blind spot he couldn't see, some guy was stealthily trailing behind him, watching his every move, maybe even peeping on him while he used the toilet! "You don't need to use the toilet in the simulation," a voice chimed in defensively right on cue. "You really *are* peeping, you bastard!" Ji Jue raged, "Peeping is one thing, but how the hell are you reading my mind too?!" "The Tower of Myriad Transformations doesn't have that function, but based on what I know about you, that's most likely what you'd be thinking," the examiner explained. "Don't worry, I'm really not a bad guy. I'm very easy to get along with. "And by the way, if I were you, I wouldn't call an innocent good person a 'bastard' in my head." "Don't worry, I'm not that kind of person." Ji Jue's smile twitched. "I don't just curse in my head; I can say it to your face too. Do you mind?" The examiner chuckled softly. "Take a guess." Guess my ass! I might as well guess you're a four-foot-seven, blonde-twintailed, flat-chested, thigh-high-wearing tsundere legal loli! Ji Jue didn't want to say another word. The outer space before his eyes vanished. He was back inside the simulated world, beneath the gloomy sky, on the island teeming with mutations. Looking around him now, while a chill lingered in his heart, a rare fire was also kindled. "Starting with nothing but a dog, and all gear depends on scavenging, huh?" Muttering to himself, with that bastard 'dog' in tow, he strode toward the illusory world. Ready to raise some hell. *** Ten minutes later, Ji Jue blew himself up. In fact, it wasn't even ten minutes.