<h4>Chapter 2: Golden Amulet</h4>
“Did you hear? Guan Xue and Li Fuchen are dissolving their engagement.”
“Such a poor thing. First his talent vanished, now even his fiancée is gone, this must be the most devastating blow one can receive.”
“Hmph, he should have just humiliated himself. Now, he has even sullied the Li n.”
“Hush, here hees.”
On the side of the road, all the murmuring stopped abruptly.
Li Fuchen walked pass these people with an emotionless expression on his face.
Regarding the dissolution of the of the betrothal, Li Fuchen was not at all in shock. But when Guan Xue showed the talents she possessed, it all began to slowly change. Although she still retained that gentle and respectful expression, the pride within was difficult to mask. It was the kind of pride that only an absolute prodigy possessed. Being the inept that he was now, he wasparable to that of a peasant to her, which made his heart feel slightly sour.
The only thing he couldn’t ept, was that the Guan n burning the bridge after crossing the river.
When the Guan n first arrived in Yunwu City, they were constantly oppressed by other ns. If not for the support of the Li n, the Guan n wouldn’t have been able to establish themselves in Yunwu City. By supporting the Guan n, the Li n even offended one of the other four major ns, the Yang n.
“Is this what they call human nature?”Li Fuchen thought to himself.
***
As usual, Li Fuchen arrived at the peak of the mountain behind the Li n’s quarters.
He relished the heights, it may have been due to his desire to have strength, overlooking all beings.
Today’s weather seemed a bit strange, the winds were ripping the clouds rapidly, and streaks of gold could be seen within.
“If therees a day, where I could punch through the clouds, I would be able to die with no regrets.”
Li Fuchen made a fist and punched towards the sky with a perfect form, imagining that his punch was prating the golden ranks of the clouds, going straight to the stars.
As heughed to himself, Li Fuchen decided to descend the mountain.
All of the sudden, he stopped, stunned.
He saw the ranks of golden clouds shoot open, a beam of gold had pierced through. The ray tore through the sky towards him at the speed of light, it felt as if time had stopped. Between the heavens and the earth, all was silent.
Li Fuchen wanted to run, but his body didn’t respond.
The golden ray was blinding, forcing Li Fuchen to shut his eyes. In the next moment, he felt an intense heat between his brows before cking out.
Li Fuchen was in a dream, in this dream he was galloping across thends, invincible and unmatched. With a flick of his sword, the light produced shone throughout the heavens. The strength of one of his punches prated the grounds through the depths of hell.
“What a pleasant dream!”
Un-furrowing his brow, Li Fuchen’s expression was full of vigor.
When Li Fuchen finally awoke, the sky was not even dark yet.
“What just happened?”
Puzzled, he touched his forehead, he could feel his soul’s consciousness being sent into his mind.
Boom.
A tremor shook within his mind, a scene that was never before was in his consciousness. Everything was in a mess and in the center, was a bunch of grey mist. Amidst the mist was a small golden amulet, which caused his soul spirit to feel better than ever. The grey mist seems to have condensed and formed into a ball of grey light.
“This within my mind… Is this grey mist my soul spirit? What is that golden amulet?”
Li Fuchen’s heart was full of doubts, such a scene had defied what he knew.
With a shift in vision, he was pulled towards the golden amulet.
The amulet had no signs of wear or tear, but revealed an endless feeling of simplicity. It felt as though it had been here since the beginning of time, and would continue to exist forever.
Not knowing how much time had passed, with his willpower waning, Li Fuchen’s consciousness was expelled out of the space in his mind.
“It’ste, I should head back first.”
With a sense of doubt, Li Fuchen headed back home.
***
Passing through the training grounds, Li Fuchen saw Li Yunhe. He was sparring with a Li n disciple. With great ease, Li Yunhe used only a single palm strike to send his opponent flying. He then turned and looked at Li Fuchen with a smile.
“Li Fuchen, interested in sparring? I just broke through to fifth level of the Qi Realm and amcking a target, you seem like you can take more punches.”
As one advances, it bes harder to breakthrough the Qi Training Realm… Seeing how he could break through to fifth level, it must be rted to him having achieved breakthrough to the fourth rank of the Red Jade technique.
“I have some business to attend to, maybe in a few days.”
After finishing his sentence, Li Fu Chen left right away.
“This fe.”
Li Yuehe’s expression turned dark. This was the first time Li Fuchen did not spare any respect.
“Hmph, an inept will always be an inept, seems like not being able to cultivate for a whole year has destroyed his will. He did not even have the courage to fight with me.”Li Yunhe mocked.
***
After dinner, Li Fuchen hurried back to his room.
When his consciousness entered his mind, Li Fuchen was surprised to find that the originally grey mist had be a grey ball of light with only a streak of mist surrounding it.
“Does the grey mist bing a grey ball of light benefit me?”Li Fuchen pondered
Leaving these thoughts aside, with his consciousness leaving his mind, Li Fuchen began to cultivate.
Fifteen minutes passed…
Half an hour passed…
Li Fuchen opened his eyes. He was both astonished and pleasantly surprised.
Previously he could only concentrate his cultivation for a short span of time, but tonight, he persisted for half an hour and there was no pain in his head. “Could it have been because of the grey mist in my soul spirit? Now that it is gathered into a ball of light, it made cultivation easier?”, Li Fuchen’s perceptiveness brought him to reach this conclusion.
This night, would be a night to remember.
***
At first, Li Fuchen thought the amulet was only there to keep the soul spirit gathered and not dispersed. But in the next few days, he knew he was wrong.
Not only could the amulet gather spirit, it can even evolve it.
Now his soul spirit had fully formed into a ball of light and was slowly mending into a pale green state. With the evolution of his soul spirit, his head felt clearer like endless blocks in his head were cleared. Not only was his perception better, he could understand analogies much faster.
***
Night time…
He was revolving the Red Jade Technique, Li Fuchen’s palm was facing the sky, gradually absorbing the Qi that was within the heaven and earth.
Half an hourter, three new meridians were flowing freely within Li Fuchen’s body. These three meridians with Red Jade Techniquebined, formedplex channels of Qi flow.
“The Red Jade Technique is at the fourth rank already?”Li Fuchen was shocked.
With the progress of each rank, it would get harder to cultivate the Red Jade Technique. Without grasping the essence of the technique, even with the three meridians unblocked, it would still be hard to cultivate. But he actually broke through to the fourth rank before unblocking his three meridians.
“Not cultivating the Red Jade Technique for one year, I predicted I would require at least a few months before breaking through. I didn’t expect to only need three days.”
Li Fuchen was filled with excitement, not only did the evolution of his soul spirit make him more nimble, it improved his perception. In the past, his perception was good, but it is now unprecedented.
***
Li Fuchen would cultivate Red Jade Technique at night and study martial arts during the day.
Snap!
In the yard, Li Fuchen executed a palm strike on the sturdy wooden stake, the force of the strike prated deep within, causing the top half of the stake to split wide open. If this strike were to be performed on a human, it would result in casualties.
“Stone Shattering Palmpletion, not even Li Yunhai has aplished this right?!”
The Stone Shattering Palm was a low-tier, yellow ss palm arts, strong and overbearing. Li Fuchen Qi Realm was still low, if he was at the seventh or eighth Qi Realm, a single palm strike could shatter even giant boulders.
While the cultivation of palm arts was done in the yard, Li Fuchen preferred to cultivate his sword arts behind the Li n’s back mountain.
At the peak of the mountain, with the raging wind, the trees were swaying forcefully.
Wielding the steel sword, Li Fuchen’s form was perfect, at this moment, his expression was as cold as ice, his eyes were imbued with sparks. There was no hint of emotion, only passion for the arts of the sword.
Stab!
The sword stabbed into the trunk of the thick tree, and with a flick of his wrist, Li Fuchen did a horizontal sh and the top half of the tree flew upwards. Before it started falling, Li Fuchen followed up with a jump as shes pursued.
Swish, sh!
In mid air, the sword produce a sh in the form of a cross and cut the trunk into pieces.
Low-tier, yellow ss sword art, Tiger Fang Cross shpletion.
In five days, the Stone Shattering Palm and Tiger Fang Cross sh achievedpletion. With this, Li Fuchen’s perception had reached an unprecedented state, every martial art seemed unable to hide it’s secrets from his eyes. Using only a short span of time, he could cultivate them to thepletion stage.
“Sword arts is the base of all fundamentals, it is the key if one wishes to enter the Cang Lan Sect, it seems my perception for sword arts is better than palm arts.”
Although they had the same ss and tier, sword arts were harder toprehend than palm arts. This is due to the sword being an object, which will always be harder to wield than using one’s own hands. But once one’s sword arts was atpletion, its strength cannot be matched by any palm arts.
With a stroke of the sword, there would be death if not wounded at worst, that’s how menacing it is.
“My Li n is the weakest among the four major ns of Yunwu city. Now that the Guan n has drop all ties with us, the Yang n will be eyeing us now. The city lord has a better rtionship with the Guan and Yang n, but if I can enter the Cang Lan Sect, it will help put my Li n back to the top.”
Taking in a deep breath, Li Fuchen’s eyes shed a menacing look, “I will surely enter the Cang Lan Sect and let everyone see that my Li n is not to be looked down upon.”
In the past, the Cang Lan Sect was nothing but a goal for Li Fuchen, but right now, it was his ambition.
The one in control of the world is the high and mighty sect.
Yunwu city, where the Li n resides is just one of the many cities that the Cang Lan Sect governs.
The Cang Lan Sect is a sword art sect, seventy percent of the sect practices the way of the sword, be it the n’s people or the peasants that look up to Cang Lan Sect disciples. One must know, once one bes a disciple of the Cang Lan Sect, one can rapidly rise up in the world.
In the past years, the Li n has been on decline, it is due to not having anyone joining the Cang Lan Sect for the past ten years. Yet, the other three major ns would have at least one or two of their descendants join the sect every other year. Comparing such, the Li n is naturally weaker, so their priority among the ns gradually slipped away.
Note:
Martial Arts sses
Yellow ss, Mystic ss, Earth ss, Heaven ss
Each ss is separated into:
Low-tier, Mid-tier, High-tier, Peak-tier
Each martial arts have a learned stage:
Subpletion, Completion, Sub-perfection, Perfection, Trance
Cheers!