Chapter 72: Advancement

The sword was hailed as the foremost of all weapons under heaven. A longsword could slay enemies, while a shortsword could be used for self-defense. But for cultivators, a sword’s length, weight, and size were not the keys to victory.

What mattered was the person wielding it.

When Senior Brother Zheng had given him the reforged Folding Wind Fan, he had explained his thinking behind its reconstruction. Unexpectedly, he believed Wen Xu possessed extraordinary talent for swordsmanship—and had even tried to brainwash him.

“You have no talent for swordsmanship? No, no, no. As an artifact refiner, I’m rarely mistaken about these things. Junior Brother Wen, you’re simply too impatient. You’re eager to cultivate and eager to achieve quick results, so someone as clever as you immediately avoided the path of the sword.”

“You have a good friend who uses a saber, so you know perfectly well how much time and effort it takes to master a weapon. And as someone with a mutated single spiritual root, you could easily choose a less demanding path.”

“But Junior Brother, once people start taking shortcuts, they can easily become addicted and lose their way.”

A shortcut?

Wen Xu did not think studying arrays counted as taking a shortcut. Arrays were merely easier for him to grasp than swordsmanship.

There was one thing he had to admit: he still had a scholar’s mind and had yet to completely correct his attitude toward life.

Compared to taking up a weapon and fighting someone head-on, he naturally preferred defeating enemies from a distance.

Still, Senior Brother Zheng’s brainwashing had worked to some extent.

In other words, Wen Xu had realized that even with his friends supporting him, if he wanted to win a one-on-one battle, he would be better off putting some effort into learning the sword. Otherwise, he would simply be offering his head to the enemy.

Besides, the Folding Wind Fan could be used in conjunction with sword techniques and stacked arrays. Wen Xu could not stand seeing something fail to be used to its fullest potential.

In all fairness, Wen Xu considered himself a selfish person. He could not understand those who would stake their lives on the Sword Dao or Saber Dao. His childhood experiences had made him especially protective of his life.

Only by remaining alive could a person possess anything at all.

Once someone died, enlightenment and immortal cultivation alike became nothing more than reflections upon water.

After reading more than a hundred sword manuals, Wen Xu found himself even less capable of understanding how one was supposed to comprehend the sword. He therefore cast all those questions aside and focused solely on practicing the Nine Revolutions Sword Art.

The Nine Revolutions Sword Art had only six forms in total, and its sword moves could be considered simple.

During this period, he had practiced them no fewer than a thousand times every day. The movements had long since been engraved into his muscle memory. Even without engaging his heart, mind, or spiritual power, as long as he held a sword, he could move however he wished, and the sword forms would naturally emerge as his spirit sword danced.

For some reason, the transitions between the Nine Revolutions Sword Art’s moves had recently become increasingly smooth.

Wen Xu even felt as though the sword forms themselves were driving his movements forward. When he had practiced the previous day, his body and spirit sword had entered a strange synchronization with the wind.

The sword forms had completely merged into the wind. Had Wen Xu not sensed it himself, he might have thought there was no wind around him at all.

The wind had attached itself entirely to the spirit sword.

It even propelled the blade, allowing him to unleash three consecutive moves within the span of a breath—sometimes even four.

Simply put, Wen Xu had discovered that his sword had become faster.

It was not being accelerated by an array, nor had he used spiritual power to force out that speed. He had genuinely achieved it through the strength of his own body.

The instant he became aware of it, the wind abruptly surged from his hand and coiled wildly around the blade. The sword gave off a silent, low hum.

It seemed he had inadvertently completed a practice session in which he moved in rhythm with the sword.

The sensation could not exactly be called wonderful. In fact, it felt strangely weightless, like walking along the edge of a sword high above the clouds. It seemed that the slightest mistake would send him tumbling down, leaving him badly wounded.

Yet when he examined the feeling more closely, it was remarkably stable.

Practicing the sword seemed to be something both exceedingly simple and exceedingly complicated, both remarkably easy and impossibly difficult.

Wen Xu did not understand it.

But there was no point in overthinking.

He had once asked his Master about the way of weapons. His Master told him that he could teach himself the simple foundations, but any deeper enlightenment had to come from within. What others passed down would ultimately remain theirs. Even if one learned it and made use of it, one was merely picking up something another person had already learned.

In other words, his Master had no intention of teaching him the Sword Dao.

Later, Wen Xu had spoken with Xia Ying about it. Xia Ying had also said that practicing the sword was an extremely personal path.

Unless the art was passed down within a family, even a master would generally offer only pointers on how to practice and study the sword. Anything deeper had to be comprehended by oneself.

Wen Xu had only half understood the explanation. In the end, he decided to continue practicing.

Perhaps one day, everything would suddenly become clear.

…

Now, standing in the arena, with his stacked arrays completely countered by his opponent’s strategy of draining them with spirit stones, Wen Xu decided to try using his sword.

This was merely an experiment.

He had not considered what would happen if he lost. Compared to the terrifying consequences of his past gambles, when losing could have cost him his life, he did not place nearly as much importance on victory or defeat in Yonglu Mountain’s sect tournament.

“Look! The Folding Wind Fan turned into the Folding Wind Sword! Is he going to—”

Bian Chunzhou had originally thought Wen Xuxu intended to unleash another instantly fatal array, just as he had during his last match against Senior Sister Huo Shengyin.

But he quickly realized...

That did not seem to be the case.

Wen Xuxu was genuinely using a sword.

Was a pay-to-win strategy really that difficult to fight?

“Break it with force. His sword is different now.”

Chen Zui’s eyes lit up instantly.

“Look. His sword doesn’t feel as hollow as it used to. Can’t you see it?”

Bian Chunzhou was speechless.

Wasn’t a sword just a solid lump of iron? Where was this supposed hollowness coming from?

It looked about the same to him. At most, it was just...

Fast...

“Holy crap, that’s fast!”

That hand speed had to come from at least a hundred years of being single!

“It is fast, but I think he can go even faster.”

Chen Zui’s eyes shone even brighter.

Compared to Chen Zui’s eagerness, Han Yu, who was currently fighting Wen Xu, was not nearly as delighted.

His opponent had abruptly changed his method of attack. Worse still, Wen Xu’s sword was so fast that Han Yu’s talismans were actually beginning to fall behind.

His talisman attacks had been defeated by many people before, but no one had ever beaten them in terms of speed.

This was bad.

He had thought that drawing Junior Granduncle-Master this time might give him a slightly better chance of winning.

Who could have known—

Were geniuses really this impossible to deal with?

Victory had clearly seemed close at hand, yet now he could no longer see it at all.

Han Yu estimated the amount of spiritual power remaining in his Sea of Qi and was dismayed to discover that his specialty—prolonged battles—was apparently about to be broken through.

But he had never heard that Junior Granduncle-Master practiced the sword.

Could it be...

Had he been concealing his true strength earlier?!

Han Yu had a healthy attitude toward the competition. His goal had merely been to enter the top ten, and he had already achieved it.

There was nothing shameful about losing to Junior Granduncle-Master now.

After calming himself, he managed to drag the battle out for another incense stick’s worth of time before a single sword strike sent him off the platform.

Wen Xu, however, had also exhausted his strength.

As a scholar who had once moved only his brush and never practiced martial arts, using a sword at such intensity placed an enormous strain on his physical condition.

Although he tempered his body every day, the gap between him and someone like Chen Zui, who had practiced body tempering since childhood, was still far too large.

Fortunately, he had won again.

“For body tempering, I recommend reclaiming spirit fields.”

Why was his Master suddenly so enthusiastic?

In the past, when Wen Xu asked ten questions, he would receive answers to one or two at most. Sometimes, he did not receive even a single definite response.

Wen Xu instinctively sensed a trap.

“Wouldn’t cultivators with earth or water spiritual roots be better suited to reclaiming spirit fields?”

“Spirit Herb Peak isn’t picky. Even if your Master went there personally, they would happily arrange a whole pile of... work for me.”

That sounded even more suspicious.

“Go experience it yourself if you don’t believe me. Reclaiming spirit fields is publicly acknowledged throughout Yonglu Mountain as the task that best tempers the Dao heart. It’s also simpler and less dangerous than entering the secret realm behind the mountain.”

Wen Xu remained skeptical, and then...

Sure enough.

Yet if one claimed that his Master was wrong, every word he had said was perfectly reasonable. Not a single statement had been a lie.

Besides, since his Master had mentioned it, Wen Xu could not simply refuse to go.

He decided that after the final matches ended, he would accept a task reclaiming spirit fields.

“You’re really going? Then I—”

Bian Chunzhou steeled himself.

“Then I’ll risk my life to accompany a gentleman!”

After speaking, he looked toward Chen Zuizui beside him.

This fellow had never been a master of controlling his expressions. Besides, Chen Zuizui was always the most enthusiastic whenever something could improve the Dao heart.

Why had he suddenly gone silent today?

“Hey, why aren’t you saying anything?”

Chen Zui’s gaze darted around.

“You two can go. I’m not going.”

What?

He had actually refused?

Bian Chunzhou immediately darted over.

“Did you go behind our backs? What was it like? Tell us! We promise we won’t laugh at you.”

Wen Xu nodded at the appropriate moment.

The innocent Chen Zui immediately believed them. For once, a faint note of complaint entered his voice.

“The spirit fields on Spirit Herb Peak aren’t very large. I thought I could finish in half an hour, but the Senior Brother supervising me had too many requirements. I clearly did exactly what he said, but he claimed I couldn’t understand human speech, that I had grown nothing but muscle without a brain, and that I couldn’t even tell XX apart from XXX.”

“He said I was ruining the spirit fields and that I would be permanently forbidden from accepting spirit-field tasks!”

Well...

That actually sounded perfectly reasonable.

After all, apart from saber practice, Chen Zui’s mind was barely quick about anything. Even his cultivation had advanced through practicing the saber.

If someone asked how many insights he had gained into cultivation, he might have fewer than a novice in the early stage of the Qi Refining Realm.

“Incredible. You couldn’t possibly be the first disciple Spirit Herb Peak has blacklisted, could you?”

“Of course not,” Chen Zui immediately retorted.

“You actually went and investigated that?”

“No. The Senior Brother from Spirit Herb Peak who scolded me into leaving told me himself.”

Bian Chunzhou rubbed his hands together.

“Who else is there?”

“Lots of people. I can’t remember them all. Their names are written on the noticeboard at the entrance to Spirit Herb Peak,” Chen Zui said frankly. “There’s also some kind of persistence ranking beside it. It records the total number of days people have worked and the number of consecutive days they’ve reclaimed fields.”

Good grief.

Bian Chunzhou had always heard things about Spirit Herb Peak, but he had never properly visited it.

When he negotiated supplier partnerships for the hotpot restaurant, he had only dealt with Planting Peak.

There was no helping it. Spirit Herb Peak was devoted to precise and meticulous research, and its cultivators generally possessed relatively high cultivation.

Most were at least in the Golden Core Realm.

There were some in the Foundation Establishment Realm, but reportedly not many.

For someone in the Qi Refining Realm, the only way to enter Spirit Herb Peak was to accept a spirit-field reclamation task.

After listening to their conversation, Wen Xu suddenly said, “In that case, I’m actually more interested now.”

Bian Chunzhou fell silent.

The scheming Xuxu had appeared!

…

At the same time, all the results for the top-ten matches had been decided.

After Chen Zui and Wen Xu both advanced, the outer-sect civil war also reached its conclusion. Huo Shengyin proved the more skilled of the two and defeated Li Anqu.

Meanwhile, the highly anticipated match between Liu Zheyan and Rong Xiaoling from the inner sect ended with both sides suffering heavy losses.

Liu Zheyan and Rong Xiaoling both came from Beast Taming Peak.

They could no longer continue fighting, not because their spiritual power had been depleted, but because the strength of their respective tamed beasts had been completely exhausted.

Since neither side had won, the match was declared a draw.

Considering that their beasts needed time to recover, the two of them decided not to participate in the remaining matches.

The Beast Taming Peak civil war thus came to a somewhat hasty conclusion.

But something even more abrupt and astonishing occurred—

That Senior Brother surnamed Shi, who stood at the very center of the gossip swirling through the inner sect, had advanced to the Foundation Establishment Realm on the eve of the sect tournament finals.

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