True spirits do not fear challenges—like General Bard the elephant. The silkworm nibbled at the book page, flipping open the thick tome. From the table of contents, it spotted the combat section... skipped it. The lifestyle section... pending. The art section... the silkworm paused. The finance section... the silkworm’s eyes lit up. And, Three hundred tips for living in the human world. The silkworm felt it had found its direction. ... When Su Hao snapped back to reality, he saw the silkworm deeply engrossed in learning, unable to tear itself away. He smiled faintly. "As expected, a spirit reflects its master—everything stems from my excellent qualities." He pretended to be seriously reading a book. His mind, however, was immersed in the panel. With a soft *ding*... "Panel upgrade complete." It took less than a minute in total. Su Hao glanced at it—the intelligence value hadn’t changed. He picked up another masterwork to browse, and the growth rate was about the same as before. "So, where’s the change from the upgrade?" Su Hao tapped the contracted spirits section. In the training plans, rows of unlocked or locked options appeared. ① Basic Training (Unlocked); ② Speed Enhancement Training (22[30] intelligence points to unlock) ③ Strength Enhancement Training (24[30] intelligence points to unlock) ... "Upgrade equals a discount?" Su Hao stroked his chin, as if pondering some question in the masterwork. "Since unlocking intelligence values means acquiring new knowledge, if the unlocked knowledge includes things I’ve already encountered, a discount makes perfect sense. "Just the discount is a bit small." As if struck by an idea, Su Hao found a nearby spirit on his minimap. He tapped to open it. [Spirit: Ten-Thousand Vine Turtle] [Basic Info: Wood-type, Adult Stage.] [Contract Holder: An Yushan.] [Description: This is a 40-year-old Ten-Thousand Vine Turtle, with 333 green vines and 28 purple vines on its shell. The purple vines were cultivated through special methods, offering high toughness and lethality...] [Detailed Info: Physique: 3K~5.5K; Spiritual Power: 1W+; Traits: Thorns (click to view); Learned Moves: Entangle, Ten-Thousand Vine Forest, ..., Unknown, Unknown, Unknown, ...] [Evolution Path: Moss Turtle → Thorn Turtle → Ten-Thousand Vine Turtle] [Training Plan: ① Basic Training (5[15] intelligence points to unlock); ... ...] So this is a top-tier spirit! "It must be a Transcendent-level spirit!" Transcendent-level was already the main force or sole ace of a Master-level Spirit Master. How strong it truly was, Su Hao didn’t know. On TV or online, the highest-level battle videos he could find were Elite-level; anything higher seemed restricted by the Spirit Alliance and rarely leaked. "Who knew President An was a Master-level Spirit Master." Even more surprising, the panel displayed the Ten-Thousand Vine Turtle’s detailed info without needing to unlock it. "Thinking about it, with my current knowledge base, I could analyze a spirit’s status info with about eighty-seven, sixty-five, forty-three... twenty percent of the panel’s power. "Not needing to spend intelligence points to unlock it is perfectly reasonable too!" "And, since I unlocked the silkworm’s basic training, the discount for unlocking other spirits’ basic training is much bigger. "Maybe... if I unlock enough in the future, I can get it for free?" Su Hao secretly looked forward to that day. He also noticed, Some of the silkworm’s evolution paths were already lit up. These were the ones currently available in the Alliance, but they still needed unlocking, just at a slightly lower cost. "What’s unlocked here should be the perfect evolution plan." Spirit evolution wasn’t just a matter of accumulating enough and then *poof*—it evolved. It required material assistance and a certain amount of time. "The more perfect the plan, the more it taps into the spirit’s potential, and the greater the power boost after evolution... I’ll go with the panel on this." ... Saturday afternoon and all day Sunday, Su Hao soaked in the Yunhua Association’s library. Before leaving, he borrowed a few books, including *The Spirit’s Accomplishment*. Then he returned to An City. "Mom, Dad, I’m back... Hey, where is everyone?" "Guno?" Pushing open the door, the house was silent. A sticky note was left on the table. "Son, figured you wouldn’t be home, so your mom and I went on a trip. Don’t worry. Oh, and there’s no food left in the fridge. You’re old enough to handle meals—just don’t let Silky starve. "Also, don’t be discouraged if you bomb the certification exam. It’s expected. A boy needs to stand up bravely." Su Hao: "..." He saw the note was left on Saturday morning. "No wonder—when I texted that I wouldn’t be home for dinner, Mom and Dad agreed without a second thought. Turns out they weren’t even here!" "What’s this about bombing the exam being expected? Your son is at least a mid-tier genius." Actually, Su Hao knew, The reason his parents felt comfortable leaving for a trip was that there was nothing left to worry about with him. Whether or not he got the Spirit Master certification, his written exam scores were solid. At school, he got a scholarship every month (selling jade powder), and getting into a Spirit University was almost guaranteed. What else was there to fret over? Because they were at ease, they took off on a whim. ... The next day, as soon as he walked into the classroom, Dozens of eyes turned to him. "Su the big shot is here!" "Su, did you pass the retest?" "Su, was the Spirit Master exam hard?" Liu Ren appeared beside him in a flash, his face full of grievance. "Su Hao, are we still bros or not?" Su Hao nodded. "Then why didn’t you reply to my dozens of messages?" Su Hao glanced at his phone—unread messages had piled up to 99+. He remembered setting his phone to silent to focus on studying. So he paused for a moment. "No, we’re not bros." Liu Ren: "???" Liu Ren launched a glare attack. Su Hao activated thick skin—Su Hao nullified the attack. Liu Ren slumped. "For real, Su Hao, how did your retest go? I heard the retest venue was packed with freaks?" Su Hao nodded slightly. From a fourteen-year-old kid to an old man who’d been taking the exam for decades—weren’t they freaks? At least he couldn’t do that. "So, how badly did they crush you? Were you eliminated in the first round?" Liu Ren had asked about the exam process, and his eyes slowly turned into ?乛?乛?. Su Hao shook his head slightly. "Not that bad. I just... got a perfect score." "Perfect... perfect my ass! Why don’t you brag that your excellence broke through the sky and the examiners couldn’t resist poaching you?!" Su Hao fell silent. After a moment, He casually moved his hand off the book on his desk, revealing a delicate card underneath. Liu Ren froze. His eyes slowly dropped, his expression shifting from doubt to shock, then to utter bewilderment, before he let out a shriek. "Y-you-you-you actually got the Spirit Master certification!!!!"