Chapter 27 – Peerless
Were the questions difficult?
All the questions on the paper were all written by Master Yi himself and he was very strict when it came to recruiting a new apprentice. The questions were designed to be challenging even for experienced scholars who have been studying runes for decades.
Seeing how Ye Wei froze up, Lin Zi Yan frowned and was getting a bit nervous. ‘What is going on? Is it too hard for him?’
They should not be easy, but he should be able to pick a couple easy questions and write a couple of lines!
Lin Zi Yan looked straight at Ye Wei while she was gripping her hand tightly, hoping Ye Wei would be able to handle the pressure; there was faith in her bright eyes.
Master Yi thought Ye Wei was still a bit too young. No matter how strong his soul sensitivity was it would not make up for his lack of runic knowledge.. Master Yi wanted to humble Ye Wei with this impossible challenge so he would become an obedient apprentice and focus on learning.
“If you want to become a Runemaster you have to develop not only your soul sensitivity, but runic knowledge, and consonance all at the same speed with no exceptions. There is no simple and easy path!” Master Yi said calmly he had assessed thousands, if not tens of thousands, of youngsters and every one of them was gifted and extraordinarily intelligent. However, there were only a few of them who could satisfy his high standards, satisfy but nothing more.
Ye Wei was calm and collected, he expected himself not to know the answers to all the questions that was normal and acceptable for a thirteen year old.
However that wasn’t the case, as Ye Wei looked through the questions, the golden spark appeared in his Sentient again, the answers to the questions suddenly appeared from deep inside his mind where all kind of runic knowledge was etched not long ago from that strange dream.
He naturally picked up his pen and his writing hand flew over the sheets, composing line after line of information he was aware of.
Answering the questions exposed him to other perspectives than what he knew about runes, and he slowly started to understand the purpose of every curve and line of different rune.
‘I wonder if they have started fighting yet… hope nobody is hurt!’ Ye Wei was completely focused on the task at hand.
‘Hang in there cousins! I will come back with help very very soon!” Ye Wei held his pen with a tight grip and resumed answering the questions swiftly.
His eyes were glued to the exam while his hands were writing sentence after sentence at an incredible speed.
Master Yi was saddened by the scene and he shook his head in disappointment. He was starting to think Ye Wei was just scrawling in a panic.
It would take around two hours for a qualified Runemaster to answer all these question, but judging by Ye Wei’s speed he would have the whole thing done in around ten minutes. In Master Yi’s mind, Ye Wei was just scribbling irrelevant nonsense.
It’s okay if you don’t know the answer, you don’t have to embarrass yourself even further…
Master Yi could not bear to witness it any longer. He closed his eyes and started thinking about how to finish creating the Myst stance he was earlier working on. He didn’t want to read what Ye Wei was writing down.
Zi Yan was aware of Master Yi’s indifference, she smiled bitterly and let out a reluctant sigh. It was obvious the master was not satisfied with Ye Wei.
Lin Zi Yan headed towards Ye Wei and took a peek at the answers on his sheet, she had no idea what Ye Wei was saying at all.
“Master Yi, please take a look!” It didn’t take Ye Wei very long before he put his pen down on the table, he exhaled relaxingly as he finished. After stacking the answer sheets into a tidy pile, he respectfully handed them to Master Yi.
“Sure!” Master Yi responded casually, he was still in his own world of runes and stances, and didn’t really show any interest to his surroundings especially because he assumed Ye Wei was writing nonsense.
Ye Wei didn’t appreciate the apathy as he stared at Master Yi in confusion he then turned his head towards Zi Yan, ‘Why isn’t he checking my papers?’ Trying to telepathically ask Zi Yan if he was usually this cold.
“Master Yi! Fire!” Lin Zi Yan finally did something about it.
“Hey cutie, what’s up” Master Yi snapped out of his daydream and looked innocently at Zi Yan.
“Ye Wei just finished!” Zi Yan said.
“Already?” Master Yi managed to articulate while being stunned for a moment. Taking the papers from Ye Wei’s hands, “If there was anything you didn’t understand while answering the questions, you should write them down on a note while you still remember them and do some research on the topics. The body of runic knowledge as vast and deep as the ocean, you will find yourself still learning something new when you’re decades into studying. You’re still young, use your time well…”
Master Yi stopped talking mid-word and open his eyes wide as he started flipping through the pages and checking the answers. He shivered and his hands started shaking.
‘The first answer is correct!’
‘The second one, correct!’
‘The third… fourth… fifth… are correct!’
Master Yi squinted his eyes in disbelief as he scanned through the pages, his mouth slowly opened subconsciously.
“Uhh, how is this possible!?”
Curious and shocked, Master Yi went through the answer sheets as quick as he could, not only did he not spot any mistakes the answer Ye Wei wrote were very precise and well structured, they were perfect!
Master Yi could not believe his eyes, he flipped through the pages back and forth, carefully re-checking the whole thing three times before he gently place the answer sheets on the table then suspiciously looked at Ye Wei.
An ordinary Runemaster would need two hours to answer these questions with mistakes here and there, but a mere thirteen year old child took only ten minutes to answer the whole thing perfectly. It was absolute madness!
“Master Yi, what’s wrong?” Seeing Master Yi’s complicated facial expression, Lin Zi Yan was worried for Ye Wei.
Ye Wei too turned his head towards Master Yi, he was pretty confident, but in the end it was more or less effortless for him to finish the task.
Ye Wei’s heart was racing while he looked at Master Yi’s strange facial expression. He desperately wanted the Runemaster’s approval so hopefully he could make an impact on the crisis his family was facing, with the aid of the ultimate power in Green Moon City.
“Are you not just thirteen? This is very strange?” Master Yi gave Ye Wei a weird look again trying to remember himself when he was thirteen, even the talented child he was could not have done what Ye Wei just accomplished.
‘His soul sensibility is ridiculous and with this kind of understanding of runes… Even with mediocre consonance this kid is a rare find. He can shine bright like a diamond with a little polishing!’
Genius are always very hard to fathom.
“Ye Wei, you were born to be a Runemaster! This kind of powerful soul sensitivity is rare, despite that I have seen it before, but your understanding about the nature of runes is peerless, if you’re not going to become a Runemaster you are wasting your life!” Master Yi was emotional, he just found the disciple of a lifetime.
