Armipotent

Chapter 1947: Offering Guidance

Tang Shaoyang looked up and saw the "veterans" that Zaneos talked about. He used his Detection, and as Zaneos said, the highest rank was Myth Rank, and there were only two Myth Rank. Below Myth Rank was Ancient Rank, and there were only seven Ancient Ranks.

It had been more than two years since the Game started, and he expected there would be more ranked people. Especially for those who had a first-hand experience of the initial game where they were forced to fight.

They should easily reach the Primordial Rank since they were forced to fight and survive. Not just that, they also fought each other with all these territories and factions. Killing players gave them experience to level up, and he was quite disappointed that the foreigner had such a low standard.

"Disappointing, huh?" Zaneos immediately picked up the disappointment in Tang Shaoyang’s expression.

"I expected dozens of Myth Ranks, and more than a hundred Ancient Ranks for them to be called veterans..." Tang Shaoyang nodded.

"If you hear their situation, then you will understand," Zaneos had the same thoughts as Tang Shaoyang. He thought these people were in the coward category and did not dare to take the risk, but he was wrong. It was the opposite, all their fights had been life-and-death battles. The difference was that their scale was much smaller than the one the Emperor had gone through.

"They didn’t have access to the smart base. Most of them did not have a talent when they got to the empire, and their class was terrible. Their equipment was much worse. It’s a miracle that they could pass the Epic Rank trial. I think these people are the people we need in Tarrior, Your—" He almost outed Tang Shaoyang.

Tang Shaoyang nodded understandingly, and it made sense why it was so hard for them. Then he shifted his attention to someone else. He spotted three different groups, and they seemed to be keeping a tab on the people in the veteran program.

Each group was composed of five people, and they seemed to be in a discussion with a board and a paper in their hands. It looked like they were taking notes for each individual. One of the groups seemed to be in a heated discussion.

Tang Shaoyang was curious and could not help but eavesdrop on what they were talking about. He was surprised to find out that they were from TEID, and they were in a heated discussion about whether they should recruit the Myth Rank or not. He quickly found out the other two groups were from TEIS and Tarrior. They were here to recruit the people from the veteran program.

He furrowed his brow and recalled that this was these people’s first month in training. It was still another eleven months before their final test, and they could only recruit them if these people passed the test. He was surprised they were already here to scout the people.

"You will be surprised how competitive Tarrior, TEID, and TEIS are. They will send their scout team every month for monthly evaluation. I let them be because their presents have a positive impact on our trainees."

"Their presents made our trainee work harder, knowing there was an evaluation from the three most highly-regarded departments from the empire, they worked harder so they could get into their desired department."

Tang Shaoyang never heard of this part, and maybe it was trivial to be included in the report. The idea of scouting their recruits was interesting and also brilliant. It made the trainees get even more competitive which would bring a better result from the training.

"All of them managed to learn Sword Mastery, but only a few of them managed to rise to a high level. The scouting teams are paying attention to them as well, not just to the people with the high rank." Zaneos added.

"In the third month, they will receive the talent if they haven’t gotten a talent, and we will start with more practical training. Such as culling monsters and beasts in our hunting ground, and we also have a scheduled dungeon delving, around two or three times a week, depending on the dungeon availability. For now, I am just teaching them the basic swordsmanship and have them sparring among themselves."

Zaneos furrowed his brow when he mentioned this part, "We only have two Myth Ranks, and their Sword Mastery hardly increased because of the lack of their sparring partner variety. I am trying to help them out, but the differences in our stats are so big that it makes a spar with me useless."

Tang Shaoyang rubbed his chin, nodding, "Why don’t you let me spar with them?" He usually never had an interest in fighting with someone much weaker than him, but this was an exception.

Zhang Mengyao kept scolding him, telling him to show some of his goods to his people, to show that he cared about them. He did not know where this came from when what he did was always for his empire.

Her reason was that his people did not see what he had done, and she was afraid that he might lose the support of his people. That would cause unrest and maybe another stupid rebellion since they were accepting a lot of new people.

"You are joking, right?" Zaneos almost rolled his eyes when he heard the suggestion, "I clearly told you that the stats gap between me and them is too big made the spar useless, and you are suggesting yourself to be their sparring partner?"

"Do you forget about my skill, Attribute Shift? I can shift my attributes and match them with them. They would have a proper sparring partner," Tang Shaoyang decided to help out his old mentor, as well as listen to his wife’s suggestion. At the same time, he had free time to spend while waiting for his daughters to go back from their school.

"Are you sure?" Zaneos asked for confirmation that Tang Shaoyang was not joking with them.

"Yeah, I am sure, and you can tell them my real identity as well. There’s no need to hide it from them," Tang Shaoyang nodded.

Zaneos grinned as he stepped out to the training ground. He clapped his hand hard enough for everyone to hear and made the announcement. They were all surprised when they heard the Emperor was there.

The three scouting teams were looking around to find where the Emperor was, but they only found a cloaked figure. It did not take long for them to figure it out. The three scouting teams rushed toward him and were about to bow.

"There’s no need to be formal. I am here for an unofficial visit!"

They did not say anything, but they still bowed toward him. Only then did the trainees find out who the cloaked figure was that had been staying with their instructors for a while. Aside from the combat-related teaching, they had received a basic etiquette class as well. The majority of them did not like the class despite how short the class was.

The class taught them how to greet the Emperor and his family. Not just that, the class also showed them the face of the Emperor, telling them to remember the face. There were a lot of instances in which people acted rudely to the Emperor because they did not recognize the Emperor. It was weird how people could not recognize the Emperor, but they found out that the Emperor rarely made a public appearance.

The first one to move was the two Myth Ranks. They stepped out from the line and bowed toward Tang Shaoyang.

"Your Majesty."

Only then did the others follow in tow, and their tones were quite awkward and disharmonious. It sounded janky to the ears.

Tang Shaoyang waved his hand and stepped into the training ground, "Let’s skip the formality. I will be your sparring partner for today."

"But..." The Myth Rank was nervous and so was everyone else. No one did not know that the Emperor’s rank, a God Rank sparring against a Myth Rank, was ridiculous.

"Don’t worry about the stats gap. Your Majesty has a skill that can adjust his stats to match yours. He will dump the other stats into Vitality, so it will not affect the sparring. This is a rare chance for you to experience an actual veteran fight," Zaneos encouraged his students, "You might be worried about Your Majesty’s skill arsenals, but you don’t need to worry. He would not use his active skills."

Zaneos stepped in front of his students, "If you are comfortable sharing your current stats with me, you can send your stats, and I will relay the message to Your Majesty so he can adjust his stats. If you are lying and purposely alter your stats lower, you will be dead!"

The demon let out some of his Demonic Energy that startled his students.

"And don’t need to worry about hurting Your Majesty. None of you can hurt him because of his passive skill and how high his Vitality is." The demon added.

Tang Shaoyang thought the first one to step up would be the Myth Rank. He thought they might want to take this chance to impress him and also the scouting team, but he was wrong.

Four people stepped up, three Epic Ranks and one Ancient Rank; three men and one woman.

"Oh, as expected of the Joes Family," Zaneos responded jokingly. The demon seemed close to the four, and one of them looked away in embarrassment.

"The Joes Family?" Tang Shaoyang asked.

"Ah, yes. They are former mercenaries, and they changed their family name to Joe after the Game. He is the leader, John Joe. He is Sam Joe, Cody Joe, and the girl is Amy Joe. But they are not actually a family by blood."

Tang Shaoyang went with "ah" and took out his Azure Dragon Blade. The moment he took out his sword, everyone was amazed. Everyone could tell with a single glance the sword was a high-ranked equipment. The moment he pulled his sword, everyone was in a daze with how beautiful the sword was.

"Nope! You can’t use your God Rank sword in this spar, Your Majesty. The training sword will break apart," Zaneos thought Tang Shaoyang wanted to use the sword in the spar.

The moment the word of God Rank equipment came out from their instructor’s mouth, everyone gasped in shock. They hardly could get Epic Rank equipment, let alone Ancient Rank equipment and the God Rank equipment was like a myth to them.

Tang Shaoyang shook his head as he struck the sword down to the ground, "If you can hit me once. I will give you the sword. But it only applies to the Joes Family since they have the courage to be the first ones to step up to fight me."

The Joes Family exchanged glances, and Zaneos smiled playfully. It was a good way to motivate the trainees even though the demon knew that it was just impossible to hit Tang Shaoyang even once. The Emperor might match the stats, but he had the sense of the God Ranks.