Receiving so much explosive information in such a short time left Bella a bit dizzy. She clasped her hands behind her back, circling in place twice: "So... so what's my genetic concentration at? I mean, the Isu genes you mentioned."
A golden thread lit up on Number Three's surface. Bella sensed no danger but still refused to let it touch her body. She extended her hand, letting the golden thread quickly scan across her fingers.
"Using your current Earth human calculation methods, your genetic concentration is approximately 2.9%."
Is that high or low? Bella didn't have the nerve to ask.
Number Three revealed the answer for her: "It's already very high. Only Sages can reach 5%. Ordinary human genomes contain only 0.0002% to 0.0005% fragment information. Exceptionally outstanding individuals might reach 1%."
Bella examined her hands, seeing no difference from ordinary people. She pointed at the Golden Apple: "So what help can you provide me? I told you, I basically have all your abilities. Unlike your previous holders, I don't have much need for you."
"Your Highness, you need knowledge. Your sixth sense requires systematic training and mastery. The Brotherhood and Templars have genetic concentrations far below yours, but their development and application of bloodline abilities are very practical. Their combat skills, fighting techniques, and experience are all things you urgently need."
Bella pondered for several seconds, feeling somewhat tempted.
She'd long recognized her shortcoming—close combat ability was still weak! Without using magic, relying on martial skill alone, she could barely beat Natasha anymore! And it hadn't been that long!
Barbossa's swordsmanship wasn't enough. She couldn't find a teacher, so she could only pick up combat techniques from Natasha, but didn't really learn anything—those techniques didn't suit her at all.
"All right, I'll leave the upcoming training period in your hands, Number Three."
Golden Apple: "..."
What the hell was "Number Three"?
Knowing she wouldn't turn into an eight-foot Isu giant, Bella relaxed. This sounded alarming but had no real impact on her. She should keep copying books, attending classes, and training as usual.
The Assassin Brotherhood's techniques leaned toward assassination, while the Templar Order's were relatively more open and aggressive. Each had advantages and disadvantages—hard to say which was superior.
She practiced the famous Leap of Faith a couple times in her spare time. No good! Modern society was all concrete surfaces—where would she find haystacks? She struck the pose and jumped from the tenth floor, realized mid-air something was wrong, and frantically grabbed the fourth-floor railing to climb back up.
Jumping into water was acceptable—her affinity with water was extremely high, and her physical condition was excellent. She could barely handle the water's surface tension...
But absolutely no jumping in cities!
The Assassins' Eagle Vision was itself an application of the sixth sense. She learned it easily.
Using sensory perception to distinguish friend from foe was even simpler—she'd had similar abilities before.
After extensive martial training, Bella defeated Natasha again in their grove sparring sessions. Hard to say about the long term, but if she maintained her current learning pace, she could keep suppressing her convenient sister for another two years.
With Eagle Vision, even her sister's prized marksmanship got edged out by Bella. This skill really did depend on talent, but good talent couldn't compete with good eyesight!
With Bella's smug smile, the cheater-type player ultimately defeated the natural-talent player.
In Stanford's lecture hall.
Bella was sneakily doing eye exercises. Practicing Eagle Vision made her eye muscles extremely fatigued. The Brotherhood had special potions for conditioning, but she was too lazy to bother—she relied on her own constitution to recover.
The white-haired old professor continued lecturing. The old man was famous in small circles, so many came to his classes.
"These stone statues are enormous, generally four to six meters tall, weighing twenty to thirty tons. The tallest statue is nine meters high and weighs ninety tons. It's hard to imagine how they carved these statues with the processing methods of that time. So to this day, we cannot explain the purpose of Easter Island's stone statues—why they were carved, for whom, what purpose they served—we know nothing..."
Bella listened from below. Easter Island's statues were incredibly famous. She found it fascinating. Behind her, several young men and women were muttering—some saying it was evil ritual ceremonies, others claiming aliens.
If it were ritual ceremonies, she might go look. If it were aliens, she had zero interest.
She felt like she was practically becoming an alien herself—why would she care about aliens!
The classroom atmosphere was good. The old professor knew what students liked to hear, citing historical records at will. Before anyone realized, class time had ended.
"Want to go rock climbing later?" If the busty Heather was Bella's first Stanford friend, then the future Mockingbird, Barbara Morse, was her second.
Swimming, ice skating, fencing, parkour—this woman should have been an athlete. Her athletic abilities were too developed...
Without her exceptional physical condition and high-intensity combat training, Bella couldn't have kept up with so many activities.
"Uh..." She hesitated, about to agree, when she noticed the silver-gray pickup parked not far away waiting for her. Seeing her figure, the headlights even flashed twice.
Shaw had business? She quickly declined Barbara, who nodded indifferently and left. Bella hurried into the vehicle.
"Take me home." Shaw appeared in the passenger seat.
After being left alone for a while, Shaw increasingly resembled a living person, though she could still only say those two sentences—you had to understand her meaning yourself...
Bella placed her books in the back seat and pondered carefully before showing surprise: "You mean... you encountered another of your kind in San Francisco? That's impossible, isn't it?"
No matter how lively she became, no matter how much of her living memories she recovered, Shaw was still a female ghost—a female ghost housed in a vehicle body. This essence couldn't change.
In modern society, many died in car accidents, but those ghosts mostly stayed where they died or where their bodies were last placed. Who would bind to a vehicle! This wasn't spooky at all!
"Take me home!"
"Okay, okay, I trust your judgment. Should we go look?"
"Take me home."
"Fine, you drive while I organize my class notes..."
The pickup left Stanford, merged into traffic on the main road, and entered San Francisco proper.
The vehicle turned left and right, finally stopping before what appeared to be a scrap collection station.
"This is it?"
Shaw nodded.
"Take me home."
"Hm? ...You discovered a yellow Volkswagen Beetle? All right, I'll go ask."
Bella fussed with the mirror, letting her hair down, making her lipstick color slightly more vivid, spraying some perfume, and changing her bag—looking several years older out of nowhere.