On the Subject of Attributes

Xiao Lin sent the message after deliberating it for quite some time. "Hello, Senior Chen Yu. I'm the acting monitor of the Freshmen Class Seven. I wanted to ask you something about our attributes."

A few minutes later, he received a response containing a few words: "Freshmen can consult instructors or tutors."

Xiao Lin shook his head helplessly. How half-hearted was that excuse. The sophomore class leader had expressed great concern for the acting monitors the day before, but his attitude had changed rather quickly a day later.

Xiao Lin suddenly remembered that he had the numbers of more sophomores on his phone, aside from Chen Yu. It was the couple who was in charge of welcoming new students in the dormitory building the previous day: Gu Fantian and Zhang Tingting.

Xiao Lin was well-prepared when he dialed Gu Fantian's number. He placed the magical phone on the table in advance and a virtual image of the young man soon appeared.

Gu Fantian remembered the freshmen class monitor and even expressed surprise that Xiao Lin took the initiative to call him. "Xiao Lin, right? Haha, why the sudden call?"

Xiao Lin expressed his confusion without much ado.

Gu Fantian was a little surprised. "Wasn't the tutor supposed to explain that in your lesson?"

"No, it's a bit complicated. Our teacher today, uh, how do I put it?" Xiao Lin rubbed his head, smiled bitterly, and said, "Our Basic Meditation teacher is surnamed Li. She's a petite girl who doesn't seem to have that great a temper. The point is, I didn't hear her explain it before."

"Surname Li, huh?" Gu Fantian frowned and his expression changed suddenly. "Could it be Li Meiling? I'll be damned, why is she teaching the freshmen Basic Meditation?"

"You know her?"

Gu Fantian shook his head. "Li Meiling is our fourth-year senior! I can't possibly get to know such a person, but if she's teaching you Basic Meditation, I'm not surprised that you wouldn't know the true meaning of our attributes. There are pros and cons when people of that level teach freshmen. The upside is that you'll gain a deeper understanding of the course, and the downside is that they might skim through many of the most basic things."

Xiao Lin was not too surprised and did not express much shock that she was a fourth-year senior.

Gu Fantian continued explaining. "The attributes of Dawn Academy are based on Planet Norma's rules. For example, intelligence does not refer to our traditional IQ. As far as I understand, the intelligence of some big figures in the New World can go up to several hundred points, but it doesn't mean that their IQs have reached the same amount of points. The intelligence attributes in Dawn Academy refer specifically to the ability to communicate with the world's basic elements through spirit, perception, and concentration."

Xiao Lin pondered for a moment, and humbly asked, "I'm still a little confused. You said a couple of things. What does intelligence represent?"

Gu Fantian felt a sense of superiority. After all, he was teaching a class monitor, someone who stood a chance of going to the New World in the future. Such an opportunity was very rare for him, so he continued to explain more carefully.

"Attribute values actually represent a lot of things and they aren't unique in themselves. Take strength for example, aside from the traditional sense of the word, strength attributes also represent your muscle strength, blocking strength, immediate explosive power, and much more. Meanwhile, agility attributes don't just represent your physical attack speed, quickness of movement, balance, and flexibility—for example, people with a certain level of agility might even be able to climb a steep peak as though they were walking on the ground, but those with low agility cannot. Lastly, physique attributes aren't just the health bar we see in games, but a combination of physical fitness, tenacity, and willpower."

Xiao Lin felt enlightened. His understanding of the various attribute values had been rather skewed and, in fact, he was not alone in understanding it from an erroneous perspective. Their tutors should have explained all that, but unfortunately, the student union attached far too much importance to the new students and sent high-quality professors to teach them. In the end, it was like asking doctoral students to teach elementary school students—certain things might not be explained in detail and there was a higher chance of missing some basic information that was deemed unimportant.

"Then, how do we increase the meditation value? Um, I don't know if you've taken any spell courses, but the Basic Meditation value starts from LV0..."

"My girlfriend's elective is a spell course. Wait a minute, I'll get her on the line."

Gu Fantian disappeared from the magical projection. Xiao Lin shook his head, unsure whether to laugh or cry. Gu Fantian was really enthusiastic with him, but would he continue to be that kind after finding out that Xiao Lin was a class monitor with a total attribute value of only 10? Xiao Lin was not so sure.

About ten minutes later, the figure of Gu Fantian's girlfriend—Zhang Tingting—appeared in the projection. The girl's messy hair was still wet and she clasped her hands together while flashing an apologetic smile. "Sorry, I was just in the shower. Fantian told me everything. In fact, the most difficult step in Basic Meditation is to get the XP from zero to one. For many people, increasing it from one to fifty might only take a week or two, but the process from zero to one might take one or two months!"

Although Zhang Tingting was only an ordinary student, she was a sophomore after all. Gu Xiaoyue might not understand as much as her when it came to the most rudimentary of knowledge. After speaking animatedly for some time, Zhang Tingting realized that he was just a freshman and stopped to ask, "Um, that might've been a bit too fast. Did you catch all that?"

From behind her came Gu Fantian's slightly reprimanding tone. "What are you talking about! He's the class monitor. How could he not understand it!"

Xiao Lin smiled awkwardly and motioned to Zhang Tingting so she could continue.

"Actually, there really is no shortcut to meditation. The initial intelligence value almost certainly determines the difficulty of your first entry into meditation. Of course, as long as your intelligence value isn't 0, anyone can enter meditation sooner or later."

Xiao Lin sighed. "Yeah. So, In theory, anyone can learn spells, but if their initial intelligence is too low, it doesn't make much sense to continue taking such courses, right?"

Zhang Tingting agreed. "That's for sure, but Dawn Academy's admission standards have always been very high. People with attribute values that are too low can't enroll at all. People who manage to attract the attention of the Admissions Department must have a certain attribute value that is higher than that of ordinary people. If your intelligence score is too low, you can always just take other courses."

Xiao Lin paused for a moment and asked suddenly, "What's the attribute value of an ordinary person? "

Gu Fantian leaned over and replied, "Let me explain this one. I've been in the Admissions Department for a few months, the total attribute value of ordinary people is usually around ten points. Those ranging about twenty points are considered to have met the Admission Department's standards. Anyone who exceeds thirty points basically surpasses an ordinary person in terms of physical stamina, speed, or strength."

Xiao Lin was slightly surprised. He finally had an answer to a doubt that had been lingering in his mind for the past two days. The fact that he was a loser otaku did not contribute entirely to his low basic attributes; the main reason was actually because the recruits' qualities were generally better than an ordinary person's.

Even so, why was Xiao Lin the only exception? To be more precise, why was he recruited into Dawn Academy when his attribute value was lower than an ordinary person's? Xiao Lin did not think that his SS-level talent had been detected before he even entered the academy.