Worldwide Class Change: Minimal Effort, Maximum Reward!

The announcement came on a Thursday morning, posted simultaneously to the academy-wide notification system and the physical boards outside the main hall. Lin Yi read it on his datapad before breakfast.

Heavenly Phoenix Academy — First Wilderness Expedition of the New Session

All enrolled students are invited to participate in the upcoming Six hours wilderness expedition to the Mountain Range, a Grade 6 designated hunting zone approximately four hours from Celestial City. Participation is individual, but students who have formed registered sects will automatically operate as a party unit for the duration of the expedition. Students without sect affiliation will operate as solo participants. Expedition scoring will be based on individual contribution data for solo participants and collective contribution data for sect participants, with full distribution to all sect members as per standard policy. Departure is in five days.

Lin Yi set the datapad down and thought about it.

The Mountain Range was a Grade 6 zone. He had looked it up in the academy’s wilderness database during his second day here, when he was building a picture of what the practical assessment landscape looked like. Grade 6 meant monsters ranging from level 25 to level 45 in the primary hunting sectors, with isolated pockets pushing toward 50 in the deeper interior zones. For most first-year students operating in the level 20 to 35 range, even the entry sectors would be somewhat demanding. For the older students, the deeper zones were the relevant territory.

For Lin Yi at level 79, the Grade 6 range was exactly right.

Exactly.

He opened the sect mechanics file he had been reviewing earlier in the week and read the leveling provision again. Party-based leveling at Heavenly Phoenix operated on the same fundamental principle as standard hunter party mechanics. For experience to be gained from a kill within a party, the level difference between party members could not exceed ten levels. Above that threshold, the lower-level members gained nothing from kills made by the higher-level member, and the higher-level member gained nothing from kills within the lower members’ effective range.

The practical consequence of this was straightforward. Joining a sect meant joining a party. A party meant the level cap applied. If Lin Yi joined a sect with students operating in the level 25 to 35 range, which covered most of his class and the bulk of the first-year cohort, he would gain no experience from any kill in their range, and they would gain no experience from any kill in his. They would generate score points through the sect’s collective expedition results, and those score points would distribute equally, but the experience, the actual leveling, would simply not happen.

He knew from openly available information, that the highest level of any currently enrolled student was a third-year student Instructor Fang had mentioned in passing during a seminar on advanced dungeon mechanics, a student named Bai Rong, S-Rank, level 66. That was the ceiling. The known ceiling. Sixty-six. More than ten below Lin Yi’s current 79.

Even if he joined a sect with Bai Rong, assuming Bai Rong was interested, which was an assumption he had no basis for, the level gap still fell short. Sixty-six to seventy-nine was thirteen levels. Above the threshold.

The conclusion was uncomfortable in the way that conclusions sometimes are when they point clearly in one direction that isn’t the most convenient one.

If he wanted to level up, he had to go into the wilderness alone.

If he went into the wilderness alone, he generated no sect score distribution.

If he had no sect, he accumulated individual score only, which compounded more slowly than sect-distributed score and gave him no access to the priority resources that top sect ranking unlocked.

He sat with this for a few minutes. Then he opened the sect registration form on his datapad, looked at it, and closed it again.

The sect could wait. The level could not. He was at level 79. His system’s amplification had pushed him this far faster than any conventional path could account for. Every additional level he could bank before the practical assessments began in earnest was a compound return on future performance. Giving that up for immediate score distribution was a trade he was not willing to make.

He would enter the expedition alone. He would level. When he had done what the wilderness offered, he would form the sect with the right people at the right time.

This decision, it turned out, became much more complicated before the day was over.

....

The first invitation arrived before lunch.

Zhao Tianming knocked on his door with the direct energy of someone who had made a decision and was executing it. "I’m forming a sect," he said, when Lin Yi opened the door. "I want you in it. You, me, and Luo Peng to start. We can pull in more." He said it without preamble, which Lin Yi found preferable to approaches that worked up to the point gradually. "The three of us in the same room during the expedition creates a combined output that none of us can match individually."

"No," Lin Yi said.

Zhao Tianming looked at him. He had not expected the answer to arrive that quickly. "You haven’t heard the full structure yet."

"The structure isn’t the issue. The level gap is."

"The level gap."

"Your level is around 28," Lin Yi said. "Mine is higher. The difference exceeds the party leveling threshold. I wouldn’t gain experience in your effective range and you wouldn’t gain experience in mine. The sect score distribution would work but the leveling wouldn’t."

Zhao Tianming was quiet for a moment, processing this. "How much higher are you?"

"Enough that it matters."

"Give me a number."

Lin Yi ignored his request, and Zhao Tianming looked at him for another moment. He was doing the calculation, Lin Yi could see it, trying to reverse-engineer from the first-class demonstration back to a level estimate. He arrived somewhere and his expression shifted slightly. "That’s." He stopped. "That’s a significant gap."

"Yes," Lin Yi said. "Which is why I’m declining for now."

Zhao Tianming nodded slowly. The honest directness of the explanation seemed to land better than a vaguer refusal would have. "For now," he repeated.

"For now," Lin Yi confirmed. 𝙛𝒓𝓮𝙚𝔀𝒆𝒃𝓷𝒐𝓿𝙚𝓵.𝙘𝒐𝒎

Zhao Tianming left without further argument. Lin Yi respected this about him. He processed new information and adjusted. That was a functional quality in a hunter.

The second invitation came from the Tie Ling City pair together, Zhang Ruoxi appearing at his door with Chen Yanming slightly behind her, their combined energy suggesting they had rehearsed this or at least discussed it extensively beforehand. "We want to build something that lasts past this year," Zhang Ruoxi said. She was direct in a different way from Zhao Tianming, more considered, less instinctive. "First-year base with room to expand as our levels grow. Your examination record makes you the highest-profile first-year in the academy. That visibility matters for attracting quality additions later."

"The level gap," Lin Yi said.

Zhang Ruoxi’s expression suggested she had anticipated this objection. "We know. We also know the gap closes over time."

"After the expedition, possibly," Lin Yi said. "Not before."

She looked at him for a moment, then nodded. "We’ll talk again," she said, and left with Chen Yanming.

Three more invitations came through the academy messaging system before dinner, two from first-year Level B students he had met briefly at orientation and one from a second-year he didn’t recognize, all of which he declined through the system without extended explanation.

Then, at seven in the evening, someone knocked on his door who was not from his class or from the first-year cohort at all.

He opened the door and revised his initial assessment of the situation immediately.

She was a third-year student, visibly, in the way that three years of consistent high-level practical training produces a particular kind of presence in a person. Tall, composed, extremely curvy in the right areas and with the specific ease of movement that came from a body that had been trained past the point where effort was visible. Her sect insignia on her uniform identified her as the leader of Crimson Vanguard, the top-ranked sect from the previous session. Her name, Lin Yi knew from the records, was Xie Yanran.

"Lin Yi," she said. "I’m Xie Yanran. I lead Crimson Vanguard." She paused. "Do you have a few minutes?"

He stepped back from the door. She came in and looked around the room briefly, and sat in the chair by the terminal when he gestured toward it. He sat on the edge of the desk.

"I’ll be direct," she said. "Crimson Vanguard is the highest-ranked sect in this academy. We have been for the past two years. We have nine members currently, which is close to the maximum, but two of them are graduating at the end of this session and we are planning ahead.

Your examination record is the strongest first-year result in the academy’s recent history. Your combat capability, based on what multiple people in your class have described, is not comfortably categorized by your class rank." She paused. "We want you in Crimson Vanguard."

Lin Yi asked, "What’s your level?"