"What do you mean, as much time as possible?" said Jue Zhu. Of course, his greatly enhanced strength meant he wasn't actually taking D.O.T. from being in the heart of a volcano. He caught on pretty quick though, and we backed out. We took healing pills to speed up recovering (fortunately we collectively had quite a few left), so it was about 6 hours later that we tried again. More ants tried to stop us, though they were much fewer than last time, so we hurried ahead to where the queen lay, a large pile of eggs just behind her. We very quickly figured out that we needed to prioritize that pile, because if we didn't, the queen would accelerate their growth with spiritual energy and swarm us with minions. I had to admire Jue Zhu for throwing himself into the task despite how disgusting it was. Jong joined him while I joined Shokoya and Quan in holding off the Queen and distracting her from them.
By the time that was done, I felt like, and I was able to take a moment to check the System and confirm that my Health was down quite a bit. However, without her minions, the Metal Ant Queen had no method to attack from a distance, so I was better off than the others, able to focus on maximizing damage by placing shots at vital areas. Other than the constant drain on our vitality by the heat, the battle played out much like hundreds of dungeon boss fights I'd undertaken before. Three of us were former VR gamers, and one was a former soldier. Only Jue Zhu had too little experience in team-fighting for us to be a well-oiled fighting machine, but his "higher level" compensated for that. From the moment we stopped more mobs from appearing, we were pretty much unthreatened.
Once it was finally done, the four of us headed back up while Jue Zhu searched the thing's body for the third piece of the Jade Ox Medallion. Jong actually slapped me on the back. "I think you got the most kills out of any of us."
"Yeah, and broke over 3/4ths of my supply of special arrows. Half my contribution points this summer are going to have to go to resupplying…maybe not counting whatever points I get from this whole ant nest expedition. I mean yeah, I'm nearly at the 4th Stage but how much difference will that make next year, really?"
"It could," said Shokoya, "we're not even allowed to know anything about the place we'll go for the 'Field Exam', so the stronger you are to start with, the less you should struggle while everyone's still figuring out what they're doing."
"Well yeah but, how many people outside us Inner Court seniors will even be at the 7th Realm? That kind of struggling will happen a lot more to them. Eh, maybe I'm thinking too far ahead. All I'm saying is, it probably won't give me an edge when it comes to what my cultivation level reaches by the time we're testing to enter the elite sects."
"Yeah, if you're going to worry about that, taking a hit in Academy Points isn't really something to fret over," said Jong, and I nodded. We continued talking, telling stories about what we'd faced on Crucible Island before we'd met up, until Jue Zhu returned. Then it was his turn for back slapping, as he showed us the now 3 pieces of the medallion. Our "summer homework" had been completed quite a bit early this time, so we were in high spirits as we headed back to the main camp. As soon as we returned, the year instructor asked to see the medallion too.
"So, you were successful. Since you five won't have much more to gain staying here, the Head Instructor left me orders in this event to allow you to return to campus early. He said that you may also freely spend time in Diklon City for the rest of the summer, provided you don't violate the usual curfew. You are, of course, expected to attend the banquet at the end of summer on time to welcome the new Inner Court students."
Nuts to that. Most of the entertainment there was listening to music or things that probably shouldn't be being done with teenage bodies. The campus library was totally deserted except for a single custodian, so I had a delightful couple of days there instead. On the morning of the 3rd day of break, I heard Jue Zhu's voice—we'd never taken back any of the communication stones.
"Hey, Zuhui! Are you there?"
"Uh, sure?"
"Shokoya asked me to let you know he found another library in Diklon city. This one has fictional stories enjoyed by people in the Mortal Heaven, and he's also found volumes with detailed information on different kinds of Sacred Beasts. You yourself said at one point you wished the Academy library had that, right?"
"All right, you can let him know I'm on my way."
I contacted him again to get directions once I warped to the city. It turned out to be quite out of the way; over the next several hours Shokoya and I spent there, maybe two other patrons came in. Well, that could have just been the section we spent time in. Other than information on the Sacred Beasts, that part of the library had mostly books and scrolls on times that even a cultivator would consider "ancient history." Diklon City was mostly populated with mortals, who had very little reason to be interested in such things.
So, I was able to spend as much time there unbothered as I wanted. One by one, I learned the identity and many more things about each kind of Sacred Beast:
The Iron Oxen was of course one of them. They were equally formidable of body, mind, and soul. Along with the Rainbow-Scaled Dragon and Great Aura Tiger, they were considered one of the greatest in overall power. Like the other two, they were prideful creatures, but where the dragons' pride was in their power, and the tigers' pride was in their peerless versatility and ability to seize victory in battle, the pride of the Iron Ox was intertwined with their sense of honor. To break their word was a living death to an Iron Ox even over the smallest of things, and the only thing they despised more than an oath-breaker was someone who bullied and oppressed the weak with their power, with the slightest hint of someone questioning their honor coming a close third.
The Thunderhoof Warhorse and Sun Monkey seemed almost as fearsome, the former possessing a body nearly as formidable as a dragon's, with incredible skill and speed, and the latter possessing the greatest possible aptitude for the manipulation of mystic forces, to the point it was rumored that in the field of soul techniques they surpassed even the Great Aura Tiger. Shadowcoat Rat, Fortune Rabbit, Prophet Pig, Jade-Horned Goat, Sunscale Serpent, Guardian Mastiff, Dawn Rooster—I read as much as I could about all of them, and from everything I read, each of them had their own ways of being as fearsome as the others.