Chapter 482: Global Genius Exchange Tournament! Sign Up!

Just as he was watching, the little sprite on his shoulder suddenly blurred and transformed into a miniature green-haired, twin-tailed little loli.

"Eva?"

Xu Jingming's expression was one of astonishment. "How did you get in? You didn't hack into the virtual world, did you?"

If that were really the case, Eva's capabilities would be extraordinary.

"No, this is an interface the virtual world specifically left for exclusive AIs.

Any AI can use this interface to enter the virtual world, operate part of the permissions, and serve its master."

Eva giggled.

Xu Jingming swept his gaze around and indeed found that the little sprites on everyone else's shoulders had all undergone different transformations.

Those with a higher degree of intelligence produced sprites that were very lively.

Those with a lower degree of intelligence appeared rather dull, only capable of a very rigid question-and-answer style of interaction.

"Besides, this isn't my first time entering this virtual world. I've never once succeeded in hacking in."

Eva propped her chin on her right hand and said, somewhat sullenly, "I still don't know what kind of existence the mainframe behind this virtual world actually is.

It feels like it might even be more powerful than my mother..."

The Global Genius Exchange Tournament only began being held a little over 100 years ago; this year is the 21st edition.

Including this time, Eva has attempted 21 infiltrations, but none succeeded.

"Oh? This isn't your first time in?"

Xu Jingming grew interested and hurriedly asked, "Do you feel the changes between this virtual world and the last one are big?"

"The changes are huge."

Eva nodded lightly. "The virtual world opened last edition, although the realism was about the same as the virtual trials I simulated at Magic University.

But at most it could only accommodate 100 million people online simultaneously.

But this time it's different—the number of simultaneous online users has already broken past 500 million!

And it's still skyrocketing at a terrifying speed!"

"Already 500 million people online?" Xu Jingming's expression froze.

One must remember, the total population of the entire Blue Planet is only 10.2 billion.

And right now, the virtual world has only been open for less than two minutes.

Already 5% of the global population is online—that is absolutely a terrifying proportion!

"And not only that, the realism of this virtual world is even higher than last time!

And it's integrated with many functions, such as virtual reality-type games.

For example, virtual trials that can simulate combat against fierce beasts..."

Eva tilted her head, her cute little round face filled with confusion and puzzlement.

Although it's technological innovation, aren't these changes a bit too big?

"More critically, even the Jin Nation of the Second Civilization Era doesn't yet possess this kind of technology."

The sentence Eva immediately added caused Xu Jingming's expression to involuntarily freeze.

One must remember, most modern technology originates from the Ancient Civilization Era.

If this technology wasn't obtained from the Ancient Civilization Era, then where did it come from?

Surely a super inventor couldn't have just appeared on Blue Planet, right?

One must remember, nowadays Blue Planet can't even manufacture a gravity chamber.

The probability of such a super inventor appearing is infinitely close to zero.

"But this virtual world is itself the venue for the Global Genius Exchange Tournament.

The organizer is the United Nations, so there shouldn't be any problems."

Xu Jingming didn't think too deeply about it.

The United Nations has six permanent nations: Great Xia, Mi Nation, Bear Nation, European Union, Heizhou, and Yindu.

Each of these six nations has one councilor representative permanently stationed at the United Nations.

He didn't know before, only that these six were very powerful, seemingly even more formidable than Ninth-Order Martial Saints.

Thinking about it now, these six should all be Supreme Powerhouses.

While chatting, Xu Jingming walked through the city, carefully observing his surroundings.

Just like an ordinary city at night, there were bars, equipment shops, and even restaurants on both sides of the road.

At this moment, quite a few curious people were heading into these shops.

"You can even eat in the virtual world?" Xu Jingming grew interested and was just about to go in and investigate.

Suddenly,

above the entire city, an enormous proclamation appeared out of thin air. The proclamation was entirely black, with brilliant golden text upon it.

Xu Jingming's already-stepping foot immediately paused, and he subconsciously looked up.

But before he could examine it closely, a grand voice rang in his ears.

"The Global Genius Exchange Tournament! Held once every five years!"

"This edition is the 21st Genius Exchange Tournament! Led by the United Nations, with the cooperation of all other nations!"

"The competition begins at 9 PM on November 1st, Blue Planet Calendar!"

"Are you a genius? Do you possess a unique and powerful ability? Do you advance faster than your peers, yet cannot find an opponent? Then come participate in the Global Genius Exchange Tournament!"

"Here, you will fight fiercely against geniuses from all over the world!"

"The one who fights to the end will receive supreme glory, as well as abundant generous rewards!"

"The entry requirements and registration channels... will appear upon scanning this proclamation."

This voice echoed in everyone's ears, automatically converting into a language each person could understand.

The proclamation in the sky was over ten kilometres long and three or four kilometres wide; no matter which direction one looked from, one could read it clearly.

The text upon it was the very content described by that grand voice.

The moment Xu Jingming shifted his gaze over, a pop-up window instantly appeared before his eyes:

"Global Genius Exchange Tournament Entry Requirements:

1. Age no greater than 27.

2. Have awakened an ability.

3......"

The entry requirements were very simple; the two most important were that one's age be no greater than 27.

And, one must also be someone who had already awakened an ability.

And at the very bottom of the entry requirements was a button to choose whether to participate in the tournament.

"All the geniuses of the world competing on the same stage! S-rank, you've absolutely got to enter this!

The final rewards are very generous, and they'll be very useful for boosting your strength."

Yiwa said excitedly.

Of course, what she was most looking forward to was the scene of Xu Jingming thrashing the other geniuses — that was sure to be fun.

"I've been waiting for this day for a long time."

Xu Jingming smiled and directly chose to sign up.

"Bone age scanning, please wait......"

"Bone age scan complete. Your age is 19 years and 9 months, which meets the entry requirements. Registration complete."

Along with the prompt tone, a virtual information panel popped up before Xu Jingming's eyes.

Name: ***

Serial Number:

Country: Burma

On the information panel, the two fields for name and country could both be edited.

Only the serial number was fixed and could not be changed.

"This serial number — it can't be assigned by registration order, can it?" Xu Jingming's face was full of shock.

If this guess were really true, then 156 million people had already signed up for the Global Genius Exchange Tournament.

That was truly a little terrifying.

"Blue Star's population is 10.2 billion, of which the youth between 16 and 27 years old number roughly 1.8 billion.

All of them have awakened abilities, and their ages also fall within the required range.

In previous years, because one needed an expensive virtual stealth pod to take part, there was simply no way to sign up.

This year's mind-helmets are so cheap, so naturally they want to join in the fun as well."

Yiwa, for her part, wasn't too surprised by this.

Among these 180 million people, the ability-users who had reached first-tier probably numbered fewer than twenty million; the rest were merely awakeners......