Five days later, Chen Chuan received a thick stack of papers. Gao Ming had asked an employee of Mi Law Firm to send the papers in person in order to prevent the information getting leaked. After Chen Chuan signed the form and said goodbye to the employee, he returned to his room and opened the envelope with a knife and took out the sealed package inside. Then, he brought out the neatly stacked papers. He read through them carefully. The top page had the record of the commoner who got the recommendation to go to Central City, but Gao Ming was still looking into whether the commoner had anyone supporting him and whether there was nothing more to him. Aside from this, he also received a basic record of the recommended students. He could bring them to Cheng Zitong and discuss with him whether he should sit for the unrestricted defense permit earlier. Gao Ming had prepared all of it exactly for that purpose. But the most important thing was the case file that came after. The case was from two years ago, and it involved Lei Guangcheng, the director of Yangzhi City’s Cult Investigation Bureau. The Cult Investigation Bureau was in charge of reviewing and managing secret religions and cults. Since the government constantly cracked down on and broke up the local religions and cults in the Great Shun Republic, most of them had already been reorganized into something else. Now, they were only religions in name. Some of them retained old ceremonies and knowledge passed down from ancient times, but they no longer enforced strict rules on their followers. So, the Cult Investigation Bureau mainly targeted the cults and followers coming from abroad. The department usually went unnoticed, and if their name hadn’t appeared on the case file, Chen Chuan wouldn’t have remembered there being such an organization in Yangzhi City. The case was simple, but it involved a lot of bizarre things. Two years ago, Lei Guangcheng’s ex-wife accused him of performing an evil ceremony on his son. This was a severe accusation, because it was pointed at the director of the Cult Investigation Bureau. The top officials soon sent experts over to investigate. Lei Guangcheng stated that he never did anything to his son, and that his son was only sick because some evil cultist was taking revenge on him. He was just trying to save his son. The one who defended Lei Guangcheng back then was a lawyer from Mi Law Firm. Under the lawyer’s skillful maneuvering in court, Lei Guangcheng was declared innocent. But that was not the end of the story. After the case concluded, Lei Guangcheng’s ex-wife and her family did everything they could to seize custody of the son. However, something happened, and after half a month, the ex-wife died a strange death. The ex-wife came from a powerful family. They suspected Lei Guangcheng of doing something in secret to kill her and sued him again. Once more, Mi Law Firm defended Lei Guangcheng. After the investigation, they found no proof that Lei Guangcheng was the one who did it, and he was declared innocent again. After this entire fiasco, Lei Guangcheng regained the full custody of his son and retained his position as the director. Clearly, he had powerful backing. Otherwise, he would not have been able to act like the two lawsuits meant nothing. While Gao Ming was looking through the case files, he found a record stating that Lei Guangcheng’s son had many strange signs on his body. They were vague hints that it was related to a supernatural being. Lei Guangcheng himself had an influential background. He had been the director of the Cult Investigation Bureau for more than a decade. While the law firm helped him with his lawsuits, they found that he was someone who never forgot any kindness or slight dealt to him. So, Gao Ming believed that if Chen Chuan could help his son, he would get some evaluation points from the Cult Investigation Bureau. Of course, the only reason he mentioned it at all was because he knew about Cheng Zitong. If Chen Chuan had been alone in his quest to go to Central City, he would not have the ability or knowledge to tackle such an issue. Once Chen Chuan finished reading, he sat in his chair in pensive silence. The case was complicated, and he could not take things at face value or blindly believe what was written on the case file. Also, no matter what, Lei Guangcheng was the director of a governmental department. Chen Chuan could not get in touch with him. He needed someone with status to pull strings for them to meet. He read through the case file a few more times before organizing the pages into a neat stack and putting them back on the table. Looks like I’ll need to talk about this in depth with Mr. Cheng once the new semester starts, he thought. Ten days passed in the blink of an eye, and the holiday came to an end. It was time for the new semester to start. Chen Chuan had gone back with his luggage two days before the new semester. He was not the only one. Most of the students chose to return ahead of time. Feng Xiaoqi and Luo Kaiyuan were back as well. The only exception was the resident of the last room in their area. It was still unoccupied. On the last day before the start of the new semester, the dormitory supervisor knocked on their doors and said, “Students from Areas One to Four of the seventh floor, please come out. I have an announcement to make.” Chen Chuan stepped out once he heard this. The doors in Area Two opened as well. Zhuang Zhi, Feng Sheng, Zhuang Chongshan, and Wei Dong walked out. Chen Chuan exchanged glances with them before walking forward. Aside from Wei Dong, the rest of Area Two had joined the Mutual Aid Group. They were either from the Takedown Department or the Weapons Department, so Chen Chuan seldom had any interaction with them. They maintained a distance and did not bother each other. Wei Dong walked straight past them to join Chen Chuan, making it seem like he was part of Area One. The three of them plus Wei Dong came to their floor’s shared training hall. When all the residents of the seventh floor arrived, the dormitory supervisor said, “A group of exchange students from Merka will be staying on this floor. “They’re here on an exchange program and will join some of the goodwill events the Department of Administrative Affairs will host. Their habits are different from ours, so if they do anything out of line, ignore them. We’ll step forward to rein them in and deal with them.” The students were not surprised by this. Such events happened quite often. The Great Shun Republic’s martial arts were among the top in the world, so they often had foreign exchange students coming over. Merka was a relatively small island country on the Great Ocean with only around one million people. They were on friendly terms with the Great Shun Republic and every year or so sent their students to learn. Three hundred or so years ago, quite a number of Merkarians lived in the Great Shun Republic, but most of them had assimilated by now. Some of their lecturers had Merka blood in them. Chen Chuan’s heart stirred, because he remembered reading that the Flying Head Cult was a secret cult from Merka. The Flying Heads started appearing, and Merka sent its exchange students as well? Was this just a coincidence? “Sir, what if these foreigners get into a fight with us while you’re not around? Can we fight back if that’s the case?” Zhuang Zhi asked. The dormitory supervisor regarded him with a scowl. “Fight back? You’re Martial Valor University students. Can’t you exercise more control? Is using brute force to solve your problems the only method you know? We’re the hosts, so tolerate them. We can’t bully our guests.” An idea struck Feng Xiaoqi, and he asked, “Sir, do we need to hold back during sparring, then?” The dormitory supervisor gave him a look as if he was being weird. “It’s a spar. If you don’t show your real skills, the exchange students would have come here for nothing. That would be rude.” Nᴇw novel chapters are publɪshed on 𝙣𝙤𝙫𝙚𝙡⁂𝔣𝔦𝔯𝔢⁂𝘯𝘦𝘵 The students exchanged glances to show their understanding. One of them said, “Right. We have to respect them.” The dormitory supervisor gave each of them a form so that they could give marks to the lecturers of the public lectures and invitation-only classes they attended during the previous semester. After Chen Chuan took the form, he made a few ticks before handing it back. He had only gone to a single public lecture and one invitation-only class. But at least he had gone somewhere. In comparison, the student in the empty room next to his had not only never attended any lectures, but he had never even come. Chen Chuan wondered where he took his mid-term and end-of-term exams. Once the dormitory supervisor was done with them, he left, and the students dispersed. Some of them wondered how strong the exchange students were and considered approaching them to figure out how skilled foreign martial artists were. Chen Chuan, Feng Xiaoqi, Luo Kaiyuan, and Wei Dong headed back while chatting with each other. They returned to their rooms while Wei Dong went back to Area Two on his own. Just then, Zhuang Zhi, Feng Sheng, and Zhuang Chongshan came back as well. Zhuang Zhi suddenly turned to him and asked, “Wei Dong, why are you always with those guys from Area One? Have you forgotten that you’re part of Area Two? You might as well just move in there. They have an empty room, don’t they? That’s just perfect for you, isn’t it?” “I don’t care. I’m just a few steps away from Area One, anyway,” Wei Dong said. “You won’t get through to him like that.” Feng Sheng chuckled and pointed at his head before making a few circles. “He’s up here.” Wei Dong turned to him. “Was that an insult?” “Oh? And what do you intend to do if I say it was?” Feng Sheng shot back. Wei Dong clashed his fists together and said eagerly, “I’ll beat you up? You can also beat me up. I don’t mind.” Feng Sheng narrowed his eyes. “Focus on what’s important,” Zhuang Zhi said. He then looked at Area One. “We’ll get our chance.” Feng Sheng cast a scathing look at Wei Dong before returning to his room. Disappointed that he did not manage to get a fight, Wei Dong grumbled under his breath and returned to his dorm room. Once Chen Chuan returned, he took some medicine and began his daily training. His current goal was to reach the peak of the First Limit. The peak was supposed to exist only in theory. It was impossible for a normal human being to reach that state, because everyone had limited tolerance. The more medicine they took to stimulate the growth of their mutated tissue, the more harm they would do to their bodies, after all. Also, as they used more medicine, their bodies would begin building resistance. For example, the effect of the medicine Chen Chuan usually used was dwindling. Since he was not naturally gifted but had to keep improving fast, he used a lot more medicine than others. As the effects continued dwindling, he had to start using even stronger medicine, but the university imposed certain restrictions in order to prevent the students from hurting themselves due to impatience. Underclassmen who did not fulfill the requirements were not allowed to buy them. Even if Cheng Zitong could get some, not only would the medicines be much more expensive, but the amount would also not be great. But Chen Chuan had discovered another path—getting the supernatural beings to stimulate his mutated tissue. If he overlooked the prolonged, unknown damage dealt to him around them, they stimulated his mutated tissue much better than the medicine. After killing the two Flying Heads, his second self had remained blurry for the next three days. At the same time, some force was continuously stimulating the growth of his mutated tissue. While it did not last long, he did take into consideration the fact that he had killed only regular Flying Heads. What would happen if he met the source of the Flying Heads?