Jiang Cheng raised a direct question: “What about the military then? Setting aside intelligence for a moment, just in terms of physical fitness—I’d say every soldier’s physical condition is absolutely better than ninety-nine percent of the people here. And yet the military still had a considerable number of people turn into zombies. That was the case last time, and it’s probably not much better this time either. I’ve already lost contact with Li Feng.”
At the mention of Li Feng, Zhao Yi let out a sigh. He knew Li Feng well too. Even though he could now face life and death, he still hoped that family and acquaintances would survive.
Zhao Yi explained: “First, note that we’re only discussing those who ‘didn’t fail.’ We’re now defining turning into a zombie as failure. Why that failure happens is outside the scope of our discussion.”
“Because this mutation must be at the genetic level. And as everyone knows, genes are called the domain of the gods.”
“At such a highly complex level, there are far too many reasons for failure. Anyone who’s worked in a lab knows that maybe you just opened the door one extra time today, or the incubator got one extra flash of light, and the sample you’ve been cultivating for months is completely ruined.”
“The more complex the experiment, the easier it is to fail.”
“What we’re discussing here is this: if we define ‘not turning into a zombie’ as the passing line, then above that passing line, there’s another threshold line. If your composite score meets that threshold, then you have the possibility of acquiring a superpower.”
“Note that I said ‘possibility.’”
“That is to say, passing the threshold doesn’t guarantee you’ll get a superpower. Rather, through observing the results, we’ve deduced backward that such a threshold exists.”
“This can only explain why those below the threshold cannot acquire superpowers.”
“But why those above the threshold still haven’t acquired superpowers is something we can’t possibly know. For now, we can only attribute it to ‘random luck factor.’”
“You pass the threshold—you have a probability of gaining a superpower. You don’t pass the threshold—your probability of gaining a superpower is zero.”
“According to this theory, we can say that every soldier in the military is physically strong, but there will still inevitably be a considerable number who fail and mutate into zombies.”
“But among the soldiers who didn’t fail, it’s the same as with us—only those with the random luck factor will gain superpowers.”
Sure enough, someone in the crowd said: “Then wasn’t all that strength for nothing?”
Zhao Yi had been waiting for that question. He pointed a finger over immediately: “No, no, no—you’re wrong.”
“That brings us to the second topic we’re going to discuss: the influence of physical foundation on the strength of superpowers.”
“Although our observable sample size is small, the contrasts are very striking.”
“Both are fire-type, but everyone has seen that Cao Jiacai is stronger than Wu Jiancheng.”
“We all know Jiancheng is no slouch. Who dares say Jiancheng is weak? With his height and build? Who dares?”
“So Yu Xuan and I specifically went to interview Cao Jiacai, and we found out—he looks pretty ordinary, but turns out he came from a martial arts school background and has been doing horse stances since childhood.”
“Jiancheng, be honest—if you went up against Cao Jiacai, who would win?” Zhao Yi called out directly to Wu Jiancheng.
Wu Jiancheng: “Are you trying to set me up? I was born looking like this—I didn’t train to be like this. When it comes to someone with real martial arts training, don’t drag me into it.”
Cao Jiacai had become the center of attention.
He could hear a lot of people talking about him, praising him. Some of the female residents were even letting out “Wooow~” sounds after hearing others describe him.
It gave him a tingly feeling all over.
Cao Jiacai’s face was beaming with pride.
Cao Jiacai and Wu Jiancheng formed one control group, and Zhao Yi brought up another pair: “Sister Pan and I are both earth-type.”
“The height and hardness I could only achieve after practicing all night—Sister Pan’s superpower crushed that the moment she awakened.”
“I spent another whole morning and finally managed to make the concrete floor bulge up a bit—Sister Pan went straight to stone spikes.”
Sister Pan interjected: “I was trying to make ground spikes and failed, that’s all.”
Everyone finally broke out laughing again.
“Yu Xuan and Master Guo—we jokingly call them the difference between a little snake and a giant python.”
“And Brother Zhou from Jixiang Jiayuan versus Old Dong from Mai Duoduo—running the same lap, Brother Zhou was a full 8 seconds slower. 8 seconds!”
Brother Dong had originally planned to go home today, but after hearing Zhou Wang say that the Youth Apartment crew was going to talk about superpowers, he decided on the spot to stay and listen.
But listening to this—why was Zhou Wang, who was older, called “Brother Zhou,” while he, who was younger, got called “Old Dong”?
Tsk.
“When everyone is lucky enough to draw the winning ticket and become superpower users, the gap in physical fitness not only directly affects the initial strength of the superpower, but also affects the speed of its advancement.”
“It’s absolutely not for nothing—absolutely not.”
Zhao Yi said: “I’m thinking—with physiques like Cao Jiacai’s, Sister Pan’s, Master Guo’s, and Master Dong’s, their superpowers are already this much stronger than us ordinary office workers. I really can’t help but imagine—just how strong would the superpowers of soldiers in the military be?”
“Just how strong could they be?”
Zhao Yi was now obsessed with superpowers. Every word he spoke came from genuine feeling, and it was especially infectious.
Hearing him say that, everyone couldn’t help but let their imaginations wander.
No one questioned this point anymore.
Because the examples were right beside them—the people named were sitting nearby, and you could see them just by turning your head.
The differences in comparison were truly visible to the naked eye.
Those who had already acquired superpowers quietly made a mental note: they couldn’t just practice their superpowers—they also needed to exercise.
You have to build the stage before you can put on a good show—that was the principle.
It was both scientific and logical.
The next topic was: “Next, let’s talk about the classification of superpowers and their causes. This one’s really interesting.”
Gao Yuxuan wrote on the whiteboard while Zhao Yi explained alongside him: “First, the basic superpowers—we classify them according to the traditional Five Elements: Metal, Wood, Water, Fire, and Earth. Now we’ve got all five.”
“Huh? What? Why does it match the Five Elements?”
“Don’t get the cause and effect backwards, classmate!” Zhao Yi was so absorbed that he actually blurted out “classmate,” drawing a wave of laughter.
“It’s not that superpowers are catering to some human cultural tradition. Rather, the elements of the natural world were observed by our ancestors, recorded, and classified into the Five Elements.”
“The five types of superpowers also correspond to natural species and elements, so of course they’d match up with our ‘Five Elements.’ Got it?”
The one who asked the question was Security Guard Xiao Fang, who suddenly understood: “Oh, so that’s it.”
Everyone let out good-natured laughter. Zhao Yi continued: “Beyond the Five Elements of Metal, Wood, Water, Fire, and Earth, there are also special superpowers.”
“Brother Zhou and Master Dong’s wind-type. Actually, although wind isn’t in our Five Elements, that’s just a matter of classification differences. Other countries have descriptions similar to our Five Elements, but they have four elements—let’s call them the Four Elements.”
“They are: Wind, Fire, Water, and Earth.”
“Wind is also an element that objectively exists in nature—it’s just that our ancestors didn’t include it in our records. As for foreign cultures, they didn’t include Wood and Metal in theirs.”
“But wind is essentially the same as the Five Elements.”
“So, the ones that truly count as special superpowers are actually just four people: Jiang Cheng, classmate Xiao Huang, Su Yu, and Zhang Lesi.”
“Here, we’ll set aside Jiang Cheng first—I can’t explain hers, so we’ll have to exclude her as a unique special case.”
Someone from below cracked a joke: “Exclude the highest score.”
That drew another round of laughter.
Zhao Yi: “As for classmate Xiao Huang, Su Yu, and Zhang Lesi—although their superpower manifestations are completely different, they share a common essence.”
Zhao Yi pointed to his own head: “All three of their superpowers are related to the mind, not to natural elements. So we collectively classify their superpowers as ‘mental-type’ superpowers.”
Xiao Huang, Su Yu, and Zhang Lesi all thought about it for a moment, felt the classification was reasonable, and indicated their acceptance.
So the current superpower classification was:
Five Elements (Metal, Wood, Water, Fire, Earth) + Wind.
Mental-type.
Jiang Cheng.
Jiang Cheng was also thinking.
She was now starting to suspect that her space wasn’t even part of this evolution caused by the zombie virus at all.
It might have been something she brought from her original old world into this one.
That is to say, she might not actually be a superpower user at all—she just happened to have a space and was mingling among superpower users.
Because both natural elements and mental powers had logical and scientific foundations.
But a spatial ability couldn’t be explained at all.
From any angle, it was unexplainable.
Unless there was another spatial superpower user, which would prove that space was also caused by the zombie virus.
And there was another possibility—
Could it be that both the space and the zombie virus were things she, as a transmigrator, had brought over from another world?
Now that would be interesting.
Jiang Cheng suddenly felt a gaze on her.
She turned her head and saw Cao Jiacai sitting on the ground as well, his triangular eyes cutting through the gaps between people and landing on her.
Staring straight at her.
Jiang Cheng narrowed her eyes.
She remembered now. This Cao Jiacai had secretly peeped at her before.
But Jiang Cheng, as the leader of the interim committee, had always been the focus of the crowd—many people looked at her. She’d never paid any attention to the gaze of an insignificant nobody like Cao Jiacai.
And she recalled that whenever she happened to glance his way, Cao Jiacai would immediately avert his eyes, not daring to meet hers—like a thief.
But now, when Jiang Cheng looked back, Cao Jiacai didn’t look away. Instead, he stared even more intently at her.
Like a provocation. Like an invasion.
Superpowers had given him courage.
Jiang Cheng didn’t look away either. She stared back at him calmly.
Her eyes glinted like crushed ice in the sunlight.
There was no trace of the fluster or panic of a young girl being gazed at with malicious intent by a man.
Only sharpness and coldness.
Even the black cat on her shoulder fixed him with a pair of cold green eyes.
Damn, she looked like some kind of female demon.
Cao Jiacai cursed inwardly.
In his heart, these city girls—the ones he couldn’t dominate, couldn’t match, couldn’t reach, the ones who wouldn’t even give him a second glance in normal times—were all demons.
They all needed to be subdued with magic.
And he was the mage.
Even so, this self-proclaimed righteous mage, Cao Jiacai, still averted his face in embarrassment under Jiang Cheng’s calm stare.
He didn’t dare look back again.
“Next, let’s talk about why you got this superpower and not that one.” Zhao Yi perked up. “This is the most interesting part.”
Gao Yuxuan: “Right!”
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