The next morning, he arrived at the same square he had visited the day before and noticed several notices on the board. Scanning them all he quickly surmised "Arts, languages and other worldly skills are examined in any of the first three towers by the Wisdom Palace. Weapon and any combat skills are examined by the Martial palace in a training ground located near the farthest tower."

Wu Guang continued, while counting the points he should try to attain, "The maximum points from the extra exams are 100 and no marks can be gained, while no more than seven exams can be taken in total. Basic ones can be taken by simply arriving and give out up to 10 points if passed while the advanced tests need to be registered for and will give up to 25 points each."

As he looked at sky which indicated it was still early morning, he continued recounting the information he'd read. "The registration process is during the first half of the day and only one hundred registrations per area are allowed. Registered tests will have an exact time for them during the second half of the day and will be held alongside the normal tests".

With a thoughtful look, he muttered under his breath, "It seems the scroll was mistaken or the process changed so I will need to adapt a bit. I need to take five basic tests and two advanced ones to get full marks, so let's go with language and bow for the latter as planned. Spear and sword for basic weapons, calligraphy, and weiqi for arts. And completing the points with whatever is avalaible"

As he finished organizing his thoughts, Wu Guang walked towards one of the towers and registered for the advanced Wildlands language one. After getting assigned the test time which was at the start of the monkey hour he applied for the basic ones for both of the arts.

He was shown into the Weiqi room right away as there were no people in the queue. Basic level weiqi was really an insult to his real skills so he cleared the 10 board problems before the incense stick even burned for a tenth. A quarter of an hour later he also passed the caligraphy test, which was untimed and solely consisted of painting several seal script characters without using any extra strokes or making any errors.

Surprisingly he found out that accounting was considered a skill and also applied for it after thinking for a moment. There were already two people before him for this one but after waiting for some minutes he passed it easily just by using the original memories of the body.

While walking towards the martial area he guessed that as most of the applicants were commoners their skill set was a bit off for the Wisdom palace extra tests. When he arrived at the entrance of the grounds used for the Martial palace extra tests his guess was confirmed as it was already packed with people. He quickly walked towards one of the disciples that accepted registrations for advanced tests and managed to get a spot for an advanced test for bow skills. The time assigned was during the rooster hour so luckily he had no issues arriving. Applying for both basic exams he walked towards the sword area first as the disciple who accepted his application mentioned that the spear queue was already enormous, so he should be able to pass the sword test before his turn arrived.

Only a few people were standing near the area for testing the sword training that one had. When Wu Guang arrived he managed to observe two tests before his turn and gained a full understanding of how it was applied. A palace disciple would show a set of movements and two applicants would need to replicate them. Only the first one to do it correctly would pass, while the other one failed and lost one extra test opportunity.

Wu Guang held the provided training sword for a moment before nodding indicating readiness. His opponent was dressed richly and judging from his manners came from a minor noble family. Normally nobles would train with the sword even if they did not use it as a major weapon, so the match should be at least interesting thought Wu Guang before clearing his mind and concentrating fully on observing the movements of the examiner.

He repeated the set almost perfectly after watching it only once, resulting in the Martial disciple nodding in appreciation while announcing him as the one who passes, but the noble who did not manage to even complete the first part of the set correctly suddenly shouted that Wu Guang knew the set and cheated.

The face of the Martial disciple turned disdainful as he said

"Cheated? Impossible. All sets used during the tests are part of the basic Palace training and are unknown to anyone outside the Sect. Or are you implying an instructor from the Martial palace taught this applicant? Then he would not need to be here, entering directly as an in-waiting disciple"

"It's impossible for someone to repeat that after seeing it once! I Chun Fang still stand that this lowborn bastard cheated!"

"You dare to accuse the Martial palace?!" Shouted the disciple angrily, then suddenly calmed and added

"Well, if you do then let me call the Discipline palace to rule this out" Saying this and ignoring the panicked attempt of Chun Fang to stop him from throwing out a small message glyph.

Almost instantly after the glyph disappeared from sight an Elder with the 'Discipline' character on a badge strapped to his arm appeared accompanied by two inner disciples. Standing outside hearing reach he motioned and after approaching the examiner explained something to him while pointing at both applicants.

After a glance at both teens, the Elder approached and spoke in a cold tone

"Accusation of treachery is an extremely serious matter. Normally cheating during the tests is considered impossible but to confirm the fact of false accusations I will need to ask the accused to show his skill once more" Turning towards Wu Guang, he asked

"Applicant, do you agree?"

Wu Guang simply nodded and after the group moved a bit as to leave the other applicants the Martial disciple demonstrated another set of moves. This one was a lot harder than the previous one and had some movements that looked bizarre but finished with extremely fine strokes. Wu Guang observed carefully and even slightly activated his consciousness, not intending to use it for this but to learn more details as the movements looked interesting to him.

He repeated the movements after watching the demonstration at a decent level and he grew even more interested in the manual from which a set like this came.

Seeing this the noble that called himself Chun Fang grew pale while the Martial palace disciple smiled with a hint of appreciation in his eyes, even the elder nodded approvingly.

He then turned towards Chun Fang and said

"Discreditation of the sect is a punishable offense. As you are not a member of the sect, the Discipline palace can not punish you directly, but your application will be canceled as stated by the rules of the entrance tests"

"No! Wait! My grandfather is an elder of the Wei Auction house! You can not..."

"Shut up! Your identity does not matter before the sect rules. If you dare open your mouth again I will lock you in the Punishment hall" Barked the elder and motioned for the disciples that accompanied him

"Take him to where he was staying and let him gather his stuff. Then throw him outside"

With the latter silently obeying their orders Chun Fang was quickly taken out of sight.

"In the name of the Discipline palace, I rule the accusations towards the applicant with the number 871 false" This was actually said in a far less frosty tone than before. Right afterward he nodded and left Wu Guang alone with the palace disciple.

The latter congratulated Wu Guang on his sword skills. He also told him to not worry about this matter and concentrate on entering the tests. Wu Guang decided to ask about the second set and was told that it was part of an advanced manual called 'Joking Sword' from the Martial Palace. To his question how could one obtain a copy the disciple explained that training was provided by the palace but also could be paid for with contribution points by approved disciples.

Thanking the disciple for the information he returned towards the area where the basic tests were taken and recovered his plaque. Thankfully this did not take much time and so he was right on time to continue. The spear test was the same as the sword one so Wu Guang deliberately slowed down while demonstrating the movements he was shown to evade a similar situation.

***

When the time for his language test Wu Guang was already waiting near the location. He was unsurprised to find some of the clansmen amongst the people who applied for it, after all, this could be considered as free points for them. His turn was near Lang Juan's one, so he chatted a while with her about the tests.

When it was his turn he entered the room and started right after greeting the elder responsible for the examination. Although the language came not from his past life memories but from the original ones he absorbed from the body owner he had already grown accustomed to it, adding the fact that his Saint-level memory and comprehension would make him able to understand any language, it wasn't surprising for him to complete it quickly and with a perfect score.

With this done he left the room and walked towards the martial area. The advanced bow test he had registered location was at the far end of the training grounds and when he approached, his turn was less than an hour away. Lang Juan had told him that Duqi and the clansmen from the Bear clan will be taking part and they actually were the only ones except him standing nearby. After greeting each other he found out that Duqi had already passed and was actually waiting for the two Bear brothers to finish. Wu Guang did not intend to prepare but as he had come early he observed the two tests anyway.

A common short bow was provided and the applicant had to prepare it before shooting five targets. The targets were standing 100 feet distance from each other, so the maximum distance was 500 feet. The test wasn't easy as only six arrows were provided and the bows were unknown. The Clan's warriors had a decent experience with the bow but only got four of the five targets, getting 20 points each. Their aim and stance seemingly were good, but the last two arrows only barely reached the fifth target, giving them no points. Duqi also said he had the same score but did not explain anything about the reasons.

Wu Guang first examined the bow carefully when his turn arrived. As Duqi had said the bow provided had low quality. The provided string was simple and made of linen, so the force and speed of an arrow would also be affected negatively. The arrows were simple as well, made from common wood and with a simple iron triangle head.

After tensing the bow several times, he shot two arrows successively towards the closest targets, scoring both with no problem. Before the third, he slowed down to aim and scored it perfectly as well. The fourth arrow hit the center of the square target as well in a similar way to the third. Although it looked like he had no problems, internally Wu Guang tensed. He saw that the arrow was already on it last after flying for the four hundred feet and found why the clansmen did not manage to actually score on the fifth one.