Chapter 29: The young man who ran for his dream (1/2)

Chapter 29: The young man who ran for his dream

“Today’s test is very simple.”

Out of habit, Huston rubbed his hair that stood straight from too much hair wax, then pointed to a white boulder behind him, as big as a giant. “You just need to run up on it, we’ll just see how many steps you can run on this boulder. Only enough explosiveness and running speed, enough body coordination, will allow you to reach as high as possible on it. According to my usual conventions, you pass the test as long as you can run nine steps in succession on it.”

“Nine steps?”

Most students’ faces became black once they heard Huston’s words.

This test was indeed very simple. It called “wall running” in professional terms. You ran toward the sky along a straight wall, that was something many arcane masters very much liked to do, it gave the feeling of climbing the endless skies.

Almost every freshman also clearly knew that many arcane masters with astounding strength and speed could run up on any upright wall in Holy Dawn Academy without using any arcane particle, run all the way to the top of the highest roof.

But nine steps, that was really a bit too hard for new students like them.

This huge boulder Huston had chosen was even a little tilted inward and didn’t have any obvious foothold. It made things even more difficult for them.

“Too despicable, too insidious.”

Many freshmen started to silently curse Teacher Notebook even harder when they glanced at Ayrin’s belly bulging high.

In this test, the higher you ran, the heavier you fell.

Don’t mention Ayrin not being able to run nine steps, even if he could, with his belly so swollen, would he fall so hard he’d puke out like a fountain?

What the vast majority of freshmen had trouble understanding was, Ayrin actually seemed very excited when he heard Huston’s words, and asked as if he were eager to try, “You can pass with only nine steps? Then teacher Huston, those students you’ve taught who were strong enough to join the academy’s team, how many steps could they run back when they were like us and took this test?”

“So much nonsense!” Huston cursed silently in his mind, but his face maintained its genial appearance as he said all smiles, “The powerful characters of yesteryear were already able to run up fifteen steps when they first took my test.”

“Ok, I have to challenge their record!”

Ayrin resolutely clenched his fist. There was only that rock inside his vision now.

“Pa!”

The sound of a heavy footstep suddenly rose in this empty space inside the Thinker’s Stone Forest. Everyone’s heart thumped fiercely.

Everyone clearly saw the soil under Ayrin’s feet explode out just like a spindrift.

“How could have such a powerful strength!” Huston’s smile stiffened all of a sudden, his heart filled with a bad premonition.

“Pa!” “Pa!” “Pa!” …

The sound of rapid footsteps banged like a drum, heavily explosive at first then lightening very quickly.

Aryin dashed at flying speed under everyone’s astonished stare, producing a blurry trail behind him.

“How could he have such explosiveness, such speed?” Huston was naturally different from these freshmen, he could ascertain that Ayrin’s strength had entirely exceeded his imagination with the first step of his full-strength dash. And when Ayrin ran faster and faster, his face turned from complacency to complete shock.

“Ah!”

Ayrin issued a great excited yell at the same time he landed his first step on the giant white rock.

While the freshmen looked on as if they were watching a monster, he yelled “Ah, Ah!” nonstop and ran nonstop, charging toward the sky!

His body soared up at flying pace. Once at a height that made everyone incredulous, he issued a strange peculiar yell. His body fell down.

“Plop!”

What made everyone’s astonished was that he didn’t tumble down. At the highest point he could reach, he’d flipped over and then dropped on the ground, but he merely cushioned his hands on the ground, then stood up without any harm.

“You ran up so many steps, how can you still stand up so steadily when you fall down!”

Huston’s hysterical’s screech echoed in the empty space.

When a man fancied himself a great schemer, but again and again lost to the same person, the ravages to the spirit were truly too great. The current Huston was a perfect example. This Notebook Teacher even began pulling his own hair.

“How many steps did he actually run?”

All the freshmen subconsciously rested their gazes on that huge white boulder.

Dusty footprints were clearly left behind on the white rock.

“One, two, three, four… eleven, twelve, thirteen, fourteen, fifteen, sixteen!”

Someone shouted in alarm.

Sixteen steps!

Ayrin was also very single-mindedly counting when Huston’s hysterical voice sounded. When he found out he ran up a full sixteen steps in succession, he immediately yelled out loud with incomparable excitement, “Teacher Huston! Teacher Huston! I ran sixteen steps! I broke the record!”

Huston’s heart was bleeding already, and when he saw Ayrin’s excited look, he felt as if he’d again been stepped on the face.

“Some enemy clan must have sent him on purpose to toy with me, right?”

Such a thought emerged inside his brain.