Xero had already long heard about the great deeds of Teacher Aiko Hōtaru. As a leading teacher at No. 70 High School who had come back to work after retirement, she had trained quite a number of students who had potential to break Golden Core Stage. Unfortunately, though they were quite close to breaking Colden Core, by the time they graduated, they had never broken that milestone.
But Teacher Hōtaru was absolutely not to blame.
As the saying went, if you lead a horse to a pond, you cannot make it drink; if you are too lazy to practice cultivating, then you'll regret it in your old age.
Despite countless cases of failure, Teacher Aiko Hōtaru was able to clutch at one last straw the year she was going to retire — No 70. High School's legendary figure, Odd Akira.
Yup, that's right. The same one that graduated from No. 70 High School and became famous for killing the sky-swallowing wolf with just one blow, used to be Teacher Hōtaru's student.
Because of this, the school leaders had their upmost trust in her. Thus, though she had the lowest realm compared to the teachers that returned to employment after retirement, she was the leading teacher with the highest salary.
Whether or not this was the result of some back-door connection, Xero didn't really care.
He just silently hoped that Teacher Hōtaru was a little more keen. After all, he was trying hard to become a transparent existence!
Like all teachers in charge, Teacher Hōtaru always had sharp eyes and ears.
An example would be when she heard the students in class laughing and chattering whilst she was in her office.
Also, when she had walked down the corridor, she saw how the students from the other classes were learning diligently, but her own class was a mess.
As a result, Teacher Hōtaru was furious; as soon as she entered class, she slapped her roll book on the table loudly, wordlessly communicating her dissatisfaction. "This'll be my seventieth year teaching at No. 70 High School. I've been in charge of fifteen advanced classes, and you are the fifteenth! Out of all of them, you are the worst!"
Everyone was taken aback by her words, but somehow felt that they had heard them before…
Nonetheless, as the most difficult female teacher in No. 70 High School's history, no one dared to get on her bad side, especially at the first day of school. Of course, Peony Aoi might be an exception, but Teacher Hōtaru wasn't stupid enough to provoke her for no reason.
She didn't know any of the other students, so in that sense, she swiftly decided to choose a student to be an example in front of everyone, in order to demonstrate her authority as teacher-in-charge.
"Which one is Student Xero?"
Xero was startled as everyone looked at him in unison.
Teacher Hōtaru: "It was you, I heard your voice from down the corridor!"
Xero: "…"
"No matter how any of you got here, whether by strength or luck, since you're already here in my class, I hope each and every one of you advances listen! You must not be late, nor can you leave early, and don't make any disputes! If you really want to dare me, I won't have any problem inviting your parents over to school!"
This was the typical routine before the start to a new class. As the reticent one in class, Xero had almost always experienced this unjust treatment from a young age.
He remembered that the worst incident was during Qi Conservation Prep Class, when he had directly summoned a gamma ray burst which had smashed into the sports field, causing classes to be suspended for a week.
Luckily, Xero had now knew how to control his mood.
Otherwise, if he really got crazy, he himself wouldn't know the outcome.
…
Teacher Hōtaru was mainly in charge of teaching the Dao Talisman course. Apart from some of the basics of making talismans, the gist of it was aimed at teaching advanced class complex content.
Marcasite, yellow talisman paper, spirit water and a writing brush — these were the four basic raw materials for drawing a talisman.
The advanced class didn't spend much time on the course basics, so the class moved in a much faster pace. It was just the first class, but Teacher Hōtaru had already brought the four main raw materials with her as she lectured, "I don't know if any of you have drawn a talisman before, but in my class, we start from scratch. Now I'm going to teach you how to draw a spirit-summoning talisman."
The spirit summoning talisman, as the name suggested, was a talisman for summoning spirits, and belonged to the summoning category of talismans.
After she spoke, Teacher Hōtaru mixed the marcasite with spirit water, spread open the yellow talisman paper, and lifted her writing brush.
"Now, I'm going to show you how to draw a spirit-summoning talisman."
Everyone's gaze was fixated on Teacher Hōtaru as she skillfully lifted the writing brush, and seemingly drew randomly on the yellow talisman paper. Just like that, the standard talisman was successfully created. The final step, was to gather spirit energy and toss the talisman up into the air..
In the next moment, they witnessed a miracle.
The spirit-summoning talisman, which had been floating in the air, suddenly burst with a soft glow.
Everyone could see the translucent silhouette hovering in the air.
This thing, was a so-called spirit.
Teacher Hōtaru pointed to the greenish, grayish thing and said, "I controlled the release of my spirit energy. What you're seeing now, is the weakest of all spirits, the hollow spirit with no killing intent. Because novice students can't control their spirit energy, they are most likely going to summon aggressive and violent spirits of a higher rank. But don't worry, if anything unexpected happens, I will personally deal with it. Since I've already summoned the hollow spirit, I'll explain plainly how to release it."
As she spoke, she dipped the tip of her forefinger into the blend of spirit water and marcasite on the table, then quickly swiped at the area between the hollow spirit's eyebrows.
The hollow spirit let out a wretched cry and tore into two parts, which then formed into wisps of vapor and faded out of existence.
"The area between the eyebrows is a spirit's weak point. Cultivators can easily release spirits using marcasite and spirit water, with the addition of a little spirit energy. As for what's available n the market, to throw salt, urine or chicken blood… all of these are completely untrustworthy."
Teacher Hōtaru waved her hand and light flowed through the air as four raw materials for making talismans were distributed to each student. "Now all of you, get to work and try and follow the steps I just demonstrated."
Instantly, the classroom exploded as many kinds of spirits were being summoned.
The hollow spirit which Peony Aoi had summoned was a male student who has slipped and fell from the top of the No.70 High School building. Technically speaking, this male ghost was their senior brother.
Super Ryo had summoned an ancient gladiator with still had 7 knives stuck to his head. He had died when the family members of a death row inmate that was going for a death penalty, had stormed into the police grounds, mistaking him for the accuser, and so. The man was stabbed to immediate death.
Master of Rubie Knight Gen summoned a skeleton dog with no flesh, drawing strong condemnation for the dog lovers in class.
There was a saying that the purer a person was in mind and heart, the easier was it to attract dirty things. This just happened to be verified, by what the class commissary, Little Pindar summoned.
It was a hollow spirit, that had evolved into malicious spirit. It has bloodshot eyes, one eye popping out and dangling from its eye socket, and it radiated a strong sense of resentment.
But as one of the vanguard teachers of the school, she had earned her reputation.
It seemed like the instant the malicious spirit appeared, it dashed forward. She pulled at the eyeball and snapped it off, and in front of everyone present, she crushed its head in her hands.
In their hearts, everyone gasped in admiration. "…"
So f**king cold!
Almost the whole class had successfully summoned a spirit using the materials provided.
Xero was the only person slow to act.
He had already taught himself this skill while he was in the womb. It wasn't the least bit difficult for him — the number of talismans Xero could summon, was beyond any of the teachers or leaders at this school could comprehend.
The most difficult part lay in the fact that he could not precisely control the release of his spirit energy.
Staring at the four raw materials on his desk, Xero was lost deep in thought…
Who the hell knew what he could possibly summon?