Tavish spoke again, his tone dripping with unearned confidence. Money? He didn't care about money. His ancestor was a [Great Grandmaster (Rank 5)]—wealth was an afterthought for his lineage.

  As his offer hung in the air, Selina finally turned her gaze toward him.

  The onlookers whispered among themselves, assuming that given Tavish’s staggering offer, the girl was about to accept.

  Buzz!!!

  Suddenly, the atmosphere shifted. A bone-chilling fluctuation erupted from Selina’s body. Without warning, a tidal wave of terrifying frost surged forward, engulfing Tavish.

  Crack!

  In a heartbeat, a jagged tomb of ice entombed Tavish where he stood. The suddenness of the attack left the surrounding crowd paralyzed with shock.

  But it wasn't over.

  BOOM!

  A dull explosion echoed through the hangar. The ice sculpture that was Tavish detonated, and with it, Tavish himself was reduced to glittering, frozen dust.

  The silence that followed was absolute.

  "He’s... he’s dead!?"

  "Impossible! Tavish was strong enough to beat an average [Gold Tier, Rank 7]. How could he be deleted so easily!?"

  "Who is she? Where did she come from!?"

  Outcries of disbelief rippled through the hangar. Even the top ten scorers on the leaderboard looked toward Selina with grim, focused expressions. None of them were confident they could have one-shot Tavish with such casual ease.

  At their level, the gap between adjacent ranks was usually razor-thin. A win today could easily be a loss tomorrow—except, perhaps, for the two monsters at the very top.

  But now, as they watched Selina, even the rankers at the peak felt a cold knot of uncertainty in their chests.

  "Wait... she’s Selina, isn't she?" someone gasped.

  The name sparked instant recognition. Selina—the girl who had climbed from the bottom of the rankings into the top ten in the final thirty minutes of the exam. Everyone realized that if she had been hunting for the full twenty-four hours, the first-place spot might very well have been hers.

  Though no one knew why she waited until the final moments to start, one thing was certain: her combat strength was on par with the absolute best of the year.

  "First Lance, now her. Where are these monsters coming from?" Kaelen muttered from the crowd, looking thoroughly defeated. "Lance just killed one [Grandmaster] demon, uploaded the video, and sat on his 100,000 points the rest of the day. I spent twenty-four hours grinding my soul out and I’m still stuck behind him."

  Kaelen’s reward was gone. Despite his desperate efforts, Lance’s 100,000 points had loomed over the leaderboard like an immovable mountain.

  "Hello. I am Chase, the first-place ranker," a youth with a longsword strapped to his back said, stepping forward with a friendly, if somewhat arrogant, smile. "I see you’re a swordswoman as well. Perhaps we can spar and exchange insights once we're settled at the Academy."

  As the current number one, Chase’s sword proficiency had reached the [Master - Early Stage]. He was a genuine prodigy, a student of the [Sword Sovereign]—one of the Federation's few [Planetary Class] powerhouses. He was widely considered to have a high chance of being certified as an S+ genius.

  Selina’s sword skills, having regressed to [Novice] due to her sudden power jump, would normally have been no match for him. But according to Sovereign Glacia, she only needed a few days to acclimate to her new energy levels before her [Proficient] mastery returned.

  Selina looked at him, her eyes as cold as the void. "Your sword... is too weak."

  Chase’s smile vanished instantly, his face turning dark. As a sword prodigy, being told his blade was weak was the ultimate insult.

  "Whether it’s weak or not... perhaps you should feel it for yourself!" He snorted, his hand flying to his hilt.

  SHING!

  A streak of azure-blue sword light flickered and vanished in a micro-second.

  By the time the crowd registered the movement, they gasped in horror. Selina’s blade was already resting against Chase’s throat.

  The speed was incomprehensible. Not a single person in the hangar had seen her draw.

  The onlookers sucked in a collective breath. Chase—the disciple of the [Sword Sovereign], the boy who had been trained by a [Planetary Class] legend since childhood—had been defeated in a single breath.

  Chase stood frozen, the biting chill of the blade against his skin snapping his pride into a thousand pieces. He couldn't believe it. He had lost to a peer who used the same weapon, and he hadn't even seen the strike coming.

  "I... I lose," Chase muttered, his voice hollow as he sheathed his weapon in defeat.

  Unauthorized reproduction: this story has been taken without approval. Report sightings.

  Selina didn't offer a word of comfort. She sheathed her own blade with a crisp click and walked toward a quiet corner of the hangar. The crowd parted before her like the Red Sea. In that moment, the title of the strongest genius of the Solaris Intermediate Sector had unofficially shifted to her.

  "You’re finished too?"

  Selina stopped in front of Lance, who had been leaning against a bulkhead in the shadows.

  "You’ve gotten even stronger, Selina," Lance said with a small smile.

  "Hmph. No matter how strong I get, I still haven't caught up to you," she replied, a faint blush creeping onto her cheeks as she spoke with a hint of a pout. "You're still way ahead of me, aren't you?"

  The sight of the cold, untouchable goddess suddenly acting like a shy schoolgirl sent a shockwave through the room.

  Who the hell is this guy?

  The "young masters" in the hangar felt a surge of collective envy and resentment. To have a goddess like Selina look at someone with that expression... who was this Lance?

  Of course, anyone with a brain had already connected the dots: this was the Rank 3 powerhouse who had claimed the 100,000-point [Grandmaster] kill earlier.

  "I just have better luck than most," Lance said, trying to maintain his low profile, though he knew it was a lost cause.

  He could sense the aura radiating from her—a paradox of absolute zero and incinerating heat. It was the [Ice Spirit Star Flame]. It was the perfect complement to her frost affinity, patching the natural weaknesses of a pure ice-type user.

  Rumble!!!

  The Tier 6 warship shuddered as its massive engines flared. The return journey had begun.

  The vessel transformed into a streak of light, vanishing into the starry void. Hours later, the majestic silhouette of Planet Solaris loomed large in the viewports. They had arrived.

  The sky above Planet Solaris was choked with vessels. Hundreds of thousands of warships, representing over a million habitable planets, swarmed like metallic locusts. Since most star systems were governed by a single Speaker, they shared a collective fleet, but the sheer number of Tier 4 and higher ships remained a staggering testament to the Federation’s might.

  Rumble!!!

  With a thunderous groan, the Tier 6 warship carrying Lance and the survivors touched down on the reinforced landing pad.

  Lance and the others filed down the ramp, stepping onto the solid ground of the capital.

  BOOM!!!

  In that exact instant, a suffocating pressure erupted from the sky. The aura was so dense it felt physical, a crushing weight that slammed into the gathered geniuses.

  The vast majority were pinned to the ground instantly, unable to draw breath. Only a handful remained standing, their bodies trembling under the strain. Even Chase, the disciple of a [Planetary Class] legend, was gritting his teeth, his muscles bulging as he fought to keep his knees from hitting the pavement.

  Lance and Selina, however, stood perfectly still. They weren't just standing; they were entirely unbothered. Nevertheless, the blatant provocation of the aura caused both to narrow their eyes in irritation.

  "Tch. Not bad. Seven or eight of you actually managed to withstand my pressure," a mocking voice called out from above.

  A young man drifted down from the sky, his hands tucked behind his back in a posture of supreme arrogance. Behind him followed a dozen other youths, their chins tilted upward with haughty indifference. Every single one of them was a [Grandmaster], and they all wore the distinctive Tactical Gi of Solaris Academy.

  The newcomers were Academy students—specifically, Year 1 students. The examinees were rocked by the revelation.

  In Solaris Academy, advancement through the "grades" or "years" followed two criteria: age and rank. If a student finished their first ten-year term without reaching [Grandmaster (Rank 2)], they were still forcibly promoted to Year 2. Conversely, if a student reached Rank 2 before their ten years were up, they could jump ahead.

  By definition, Year 1 students were the weakest in the entire Academy. Yet here they were, nearly forcing a million elite geniuses to their knees with nothing but a shared aura. The realization of the Academy’s true depth hit the examinees like a physical blow, and many swallowed their budding resentment in a sudden surge of awe.

  Solaris Academy also enforced a brutal "survival of the fittest" rule: if a student’s rank fell more than five levels behind the average of their class, they were summarily expelled. There was no room for stagnation; if you were eighty years old and still at [Grandmaster (Rank 3)], you were out.

  "Everyone who passed the entrance exam, step forward. You're coming with me to register," the lead student commanded, his voice cold and dismissive. "The rest of you? Get lost. Go home and practice until you're actually worth something."

  In his eyes, anyone who failed to enter the Academy was simply trash, regardless of whether they were the top genius of their home planet.

  With a casual flick of his will, he retracted the crushing aura. Chase and the others finally drew a ragged breath, relief washing over them as the weight lifted.

  The top one hundred scorers stepped forward. The youth who had been ranked 101st was the luckiest of all; because Selina had deleted one of the top rankers earlier, he had been bumped up into the final slot.

  "This year’s batch is passable," the leader noted, giving the one hundred winners a brief, evaluating glance. "Better than the last two, at least."

  "My name is Corbin. I am the Rank 1 student of Year 1. I’ve been assigned to process you new recruits. Move."

  Corbin didn't wait for a response. He turned and flew toward the heart of the city, followed by his entourage.

  The names sparked a flurry of hushed whispers among Chase and the others as they followed.

  "Corbin? Isn't that the S+ genius who entered the Academy nine years ago? Why is he still in Year 1?"

  "I heard he purposefully delayed his promotion. He pushed his mana to the 3rd Rotation before he finally advanced to [Grandmaster]. It took him a few extra years, but as soon as he broke through, he crushed the previous Rank 1 student. He’s arguably one of the most powerful Year 1 students in the last century."

  "It makes sense. An S+ genius is a rarity across all three thousand intermediate star systems. Finding one in a single year is a miracle, even for Solaris Academy."

  "Wait... if he’s S+, what about Selina and Lance? Are they S+ too?"

  The geniuses stole glances at the two teenagers flying together. Selina had just one-shot Chase, a half-step S+ prodigy. And Lance was someone Selina had openly admitted was stronger than herself.

  Everyone had seen Lance’s 100,000-point jump. It was common knowledge now that he had achieved [Grandmaster (Rank 1)] strength before even entering the school. The probability that both were S+ Rank paragons was staggeringly high.

  The realization was dizzying. An S+ genius appeared in the Solaris Intermediate Sector once a century at best. For twenty years, Corbin had been the only one.

  Before him, twenty-one years ago, there was Sienna—a monster who reached S+ status after entering the Academy. She was now thirty-nine and ruled the 7th-grade rankings as its undisputed champion.

  But if Lance and Selina were S+ from the start, their potential was even higher. Having two such monsters emerge in a single year was unprecedented. It felt as if the very laws of probability were breaking.

  Under Corbin’s lead, the group crossed the Imperial Capital until they arrived before a gargantuan gate that towered thousands of meters into the sky.

  The crowd came to a halt, staring at the structure in bewilderment. The gate stood isolated in the center of the plaza, a massive freestanding structure with absolutely nothing behind it.

  "A spatial teleportation array! It’s one of the legendary arrays!" a candidate gasped.

  The color drained from many faces. Spatial arrays were Tier 6 constructs at minimum. In the entire human race, there was only one person capable of building a formation of this complexity: the sole Tier 6 Array Master, the [Array Sovereign].

  System Notification: A massive stockpile has been detected!

  28+ Advanced Chapters on my Patreon.

  https://www.patreon.com/yivan