"Mission complete. Time elapsed: 1 minute and 40 seconds. Clearance Rating: [Perfect]. You have received 3 Contribution Points as a clearance reward."

"First clear of [Little Inferior Demon Camp] on Normal difficulty. You have received 4 Contribution Points as a first-clear reward."

"Congratulations, Junior Sergeant Fang Zhou. You are the first student in your grade to clear [Little Inferior Demon Camp] on Normal difficulty. You have received 10 Contribution Points as a grade-first-clear ranking reward and obtained the achievement blessing: Simulation Battlefield Loot Drop Rate +1% (Total: 3%)."

"Congratulations, Junior Sergeant Fang Zhou. You completed [Little Inferior Demon Camp] on Normal difficulty in 1 minute and 40 seconds, ranking 1st on the all-time speedrun leaderboard. You are expected to receive 6 Contribution Points as a monthly ranking reward."

"Loot drop triggered. You have received 3 Contribution Points."

"After a 5-minute cooldown, you may challenge Hard difficulty."

A series of familiar notifications chimed in Fang Zhou's ear, and he was already getting a little tired of hearing them.

Fang Zhou tallied his gains. With almost no effort, he had made a net profit of 24 Contribution Points.

Lying in the simulation pod, he used the instance cooldown to open the Simulation Battlefield interface on his personal terminal.

By now, the first-clear leaderboard for [Little Inferior Demon Camp] on Easy difficulty had been updated.

Fang Zhou browsed through the list. These freshmen, who had managed to get on the first-clear leaderboard by beating out tens of thousands of competitors, were all extraordinary in their own right.

1st place: Fang Zhou, Undead Mage, Middle-rank Apprentice (Projected Strength Suppressed to Lower-rank), 1 min 30 sec

2nd place: Ye Fan, Demon Hunter, Lower-rank Apprentice, 3 min 40 sec

3rd place: Meng Hongzhuang, Natural Summoner, Lower-rank Apprentice, 4 min 20 sec

4th place: Gu Zhiqiu, Storm Mage, Lower-rank Apprentice, 4 min 50 sec

...

100th place: Zhao Yuan, Earth Knight, Lower-rank Apprentice, 8 min 10 sec

Fang Zhou raised an eyebrow. Ye Fan placing second was within his expectations.

After all, his [Demon Hunter] Profession was a natural counter to Little Inferior Demons. Under Fang Zhou's training, his combat ability had also become quite strong, and he had even mastered his ultimate skill, [Fallen Heaven Strike]. A single, heavily injured Little Inferior Demon was hardly an obstacle for him.

However, what surprised him was that 3rd place went to a Natural Summoner he didn't recognize.

Moreover, this female student named Meng Hongzhuang had cleared the instance faster than Gu Zhiqiu, the artillery Mage. Her strength was not to be underestimated.

The leaderboard wasn't filled exclusively with Rare Professions; a good number of ordinary Warriors, Archers, and Mages also ranked high.

For Zhao Yuan, an Earth Knight who focused heavily on Defense, managing to place 100th was already quite commendable.

On the other hand, pure Support Professionals like Bai Xiaochan were still struggling in the Simulation Battlefield.

The solo-mode [Little Inferior Demon Camp] was indeed not very friendly toward support Professions. This was a deliberate choice by Sea City Military Academy, intended to improve the self-preservation skills of their support-class students.

In subsequent Simulation Battlefields, the vast majority would be team-based.

By then, these Support Professionals would be highly sought after and would never have to worry about finding a team.

On the contrary, many Combat Professionals would struggle to attract powerful teammates if their own combat prowess wasn't up to par.

Fang Zhou then turned his attention to the all-time speedrun leaderboard for [Little Inferior Demon Camp] on Easy difficulty.

1st place: Fang Zhou, Undead Mage, 1 min 30 sec

2nd place: Wen Jiu, Flame Dragon Knight, 2 min 40 sec

3rd place: Qin Lie, Shadow Dancer, 2 min 45 sec

...

Seeing the somewhat familiar name in 2nd place, Fang Zhou was slightly surprised. A Flame Dragon Knight? Her clear time was only 1 minute and 10 seconds slower than mine?

Wen Jiu is that strong?

Curious, Fang Zhou then checked the all-time speedrun leaderboard for [Little Inferior Demon Camp] on Normal difficulty.

Wen Jiu was still right behind him in 2nd place.

A few years ago, when Wen Jiu was a student at Sea City Military Academy, she had always been busy. She only returned to the Cloud Welfare Institute to visit on rare occasions. Whenever she came back, she was only focused on teasing and playing with Fang Zhou, never showing off her true strength.

Because of this, Fang Zhou had guessed that Wen Jiu was doing well at the academy, but he never expected her strength to be as formidable as her stature.

Unfortunately, by the time he enrolled, Wen Jiu had already graduated.

Since he couldn't ride her coattails, he'd have to become strong enough for others to rely on him.

「...」

In the conference room, Su Xinyan watched Fang Zhou's clean and efficient slaughter with a look of admiration. "Now that is the style an Undead Mage should have! Based on his performance, I see no problem in designating him as the number one seed right now."

Lu Hu immediately chimed in, "Major Xinyan is absolutely right! I think Fang Zhou might even clear all difficulties of the [Little Inferior Demon Camp] in one go today."

Su Tiankuo snorted softly. "Fang Zhou's combat ability is decent, but the difficulty of the Simulation Battlefield takes a qualitative leap on Abyss Difficulty. His projection is still suppressed to a Lower-rank Apprentice. You're getting ahead of yourself."

Shen Hongyu tried to smooth things over. "Besides Fang Zhou, the other new students in this batch have performed quite admirably. Ye Fan, Meng Hongzhuang, and Gu Zhiqiu have all shot to the top of the all-time speedrun leaderboard. They still have immense room for improvement. It looks like the upcoming sequence battles will be very exciting."

Su Tiankuo nodded slightly. "All of you, keep a close watch on the students with outstanding performances. Over the next month, we need to screen and select 200 potential candidates for the seed list. Then, through the sequence battles, we will determine the final 100 seeds. Sea City Military Academy is counting on these seeds to compete for resources against the other nine major military academies. We must ensure we pick the very best!"

The instructors all nodded in agreement.

They shifted their focus from the monstrously talented Fang Zhou and began observing the other students.

「...」

Five minutes had passed, and Fang Zhou prepared to challenge [Little Inferior Demon Camp] on Hard difficulty.

After paying the 3-point entry fee, Fang Zhou guided his projection into the Teleportation Gate.

"Mission: Kill the cunning Little Inferior Demons and destroy the Little Inferior Demon Camp."

Fang Zhou looked at the Little Inferior Demon Camp 30 meters away and was somewhat surprised.

Compared to before, this camp was no longer just a dilapidated prop.

Three grotesque Little Inferior Demons were cowering behind a wooden fence, roaring at Fang Zhou.

Two of them, the melee types, wielded steel pitchforks. The third, a ranged type, held a stone throwing rope.

Fang Zhou shook his head slightly. No wonder they're called 'cunning' Little Inferior Demons.

Not only did these three monsters have a balanced mix of melee and ranged units, but they were also turtling despite their numerical advantage. This forced any challenger into a frontal assault.

However, this wasn't a problem for Fang Zhou.

He held up his Magic Staff. "Come forth, my warriors!"

Several black whirlpools materialized, and forty skeletons quickly charged out.

With his high proficiency and the bonus from the [Domination Skeleton] skill, these skeletons' combat ability might not have been a match for the Little Inferior Demons, but they weren't far behind.

What followed was Fang Zhou's forte—the Sea of Skulls tactic.

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