"Hello, please show me the contract proof between you and your spirit."
Contract proof... what the hell is that?
Su Hao pondered.
It felt like... proving that your son is indeed your son.
Sure enough,
the process of getting a spirit ID card was practically designed to discourage people.
The staff member then added with a professional smile, "It's the proof issued by a spirit nursery or related facility when you purchased the spirit."
"If you, sir, can perform spirit control, using a clearly identifiable spirit technique would also prove your contractual relationship with the spirit."
Got it!
So the instructions meant needing a spirit master to accompany you.
Su Hao considered which spirit technique to use.
Acceleration? Not obvious enough.
Endurance? Endurance my ass!
Guard? Doesn't show the connection to the spirit.
"Looks like I'll have to use Summon."
Just then, Instructor Xiong said from the side, "Just take out the temporary certificate you got when you registered as an official spirit master."
Su Hao: "..."
He pulled out a piece of paper... the certificate given during registration.
The official ID hadn't come through yet, but this temporary certificate was stamped.
It also had his registered spirit information.
Silkworm Baby and Little Fire Crow.
After successfully registering the information, Su Hao heard the staff member say again,
"To apply for an ID, your spirit needs basic behavioral capabilities. There will be a small test for your spirit later..."
Su Hao looked at Instructor Xiong.
This too?
Instructor Xiong stared back, his eyes clearly saying "I didn't know either."
He coughed awkwardly, "Well, I've never handled spirit IDs myself, just heard things, heard things."
He'd completely misled Su Hao!
But since the registration was done, backing out now would be too awkward.
He could only blame himself for trusting the instructor too much and not reading or asking clearly—it was all written right there!
Fortunately,
Su Hao didn't have to wait long.
The staff member led him, Silkworm Baby, and Little Fire Crow into a large room.
The tall, sturdy Instructor Xiong was stopped at the door.
Su Hao looked around; the whole room was like a classroom.
A children's classroom.
Small spirits of various sizes were squatting, crawling, or sitting in seats, while the spirit masters, like Su Hao, stood behind like parents.
As soon as he entered, Su Hao saw a little Earth Wolf let out a "woof woof" and dash out.
A middle-aged woman behind it shouted, "Hey, where are you going! Sit down! Come back!"
That was probably one of those with insufficient behavioral capabilities.
A staff member approached, "This little test won't take much of your time. To keep it brief, please welcome our examiner, Lady Dancer."
A spirit about 1.3 to 1.4 meters tall walked in with elegant steps. Its head resembled a blooming purple flower, with a few small petals and sepals drooping down to form arms and legs.
Its torso was covered by two overlapping bright red petals.
Like a slit dance skirt, revealing pale... stems as it moved.
A rose had come to life!
Rose Dancer.
Su Hao recognized this spirit.
It was the evolved form of Rose Bud.
Its final evolution, Rose Queen, had very strict conditions.
Not much to do with strength or age.
But rather with "beauty level."
Only the most beautiful among a group of Rose Buds or Rose Dancers could evolve into a Rose Queen.
And only one could exist.
Even if that Rose Queen left the group, no other Rose Dancer in that group could evolve until it died.
A fascinating species.
A fascinating spirit.
This Rose Dancer was out "working," so it had definitely given up on becoming a Rose Queen.
Stepping to the front, the Rose Dancer crossed its hands over its chest and bowed slightly, "Fwiji~!"
It felt more like a performer than an examiner.
True to its name as a dancer.
But it didn't dawdle and started the behavioral test.
It tested intelligence, cognitive ability, and mental state.
Commonly known as a trivia quiz.
The staff member displayed an image on the projector.
"Fwiji~ fwiji~ fwiji fwiji~"
So, the Rose Dancer was communicating with the spirits.
Many spirits could understand human speech, but humans—unless they were the contracted spirit master—could barely understand what spirits said.
Spirits, however, could understand each other.
Though,
Su Hao didn't get how a "fwiji" and a "guno" from different languages could communicate.
He couldn't understand what the Rose Dancer was fwiji-ing, but he could read the text on the image.
[Question 1, Look at the picture (1001.jpg) and answer]
What type of building does the picture represent?
Hospital, station, spirit nursery, or police station.
"Fwiji fwiji~"
Silkworm Baby answered first, "Guno!"
Little Fire Crow had also picked up some basic knowledge and knew that places with vehicles were called stations.
Inside the large room, spirits' calls rose and fell.
There weren't many spirits applying for IDs this batch. Including Silkworm Baby and Little Fire Crow, there were only ten spirits total, and one little Earth Dog... er, Earth Wolf had run off before it started.
Only nine spirits remained. For an entry-level Rose Dancer, it could easily tell who answered decisively, who hesitated, who was right, and who was wrong.
But there was one Little Fire Crow it couldn't quite figure out.
Intuition told the Rose Dancer that this Little Fire Crow was clearly a bit confused when faced with more complex questions.
Yet it answered very decisively, firmly, and forcefully.
Only slightly slower than the well-informed Silkworm Baby.
It didn't seem like a spirit just echoing others.
After all, the answers to each question weren't revealed, so they didn't know whose accuracy was higher.
There were spirits that answered wrong and led others astray.
This Little Fire Crow wasn't one of them.
"Fwiji fwiji!"
No spirit could outsmart this Rose Dancer!
It raised a pre-prepared cardboard sign for the human staff on the side to see.
On it were written the words: Step it up... ah, no, increase the difficulty.
A new image appeared on the projector.
"Fwiji~!"
The Rose Dancer began reading the question.
The image shows: Is it a bus station, train station, high-speed rail station, or coach station!
This question was incredibly hard!
The Rose Dancer had trained for quite a while before starting this job to figure out the differences between the stations.
How could that silly crow possibly know!
It fixed its gaze on Little Fire Crow.
It saw Little Fire Crow tilting its head, covering its crown with a black wing, looking like it was frowning in thought.
But its response speed was second only to Silkworm Baby.
Its voice was exceptionally firm.
"Yah! Yah!"
The Rose Dancer conceded defeat.
In the end, out of the nine spirits, only three were judged to have basic behavioral capabilities.
The Rose Dancer made this judgment based on the accuracy of their answers during the questioning.
Besides Silkworm Baby and Little Fire Crow, the third was an entry-level Ape of Strength.
Its spirit master, a young man in his twenties, came over to greet Su Hao.
"Impressive! You're clearly a top-notch spirit master focused on your spirits' all-around development in morals, intelligence, physique, aesthetics, and labor."
"Not at all, not at all. You're impressive too."
But Su Hao was puzzled.
Logically, Little Fire Crow loved to space out... ponder, so how was it a cultured crow?
Little Fire Crow circled above his head, "Yah yah, yah yah," calling out.
Then it flew over to Silkworm Baby.
Showing its respect for the boss.
Whatever the boss said, it followed firmly and forcefully, all the way through.
Without a moment's hesitation.
Su Hao: "..."