Chapter 338: Grandmaster Realm Heavenly Dao Technique

The potent poison invaded his blood vessels, and Lu Chong felt as if he were going mad.

Intense pain surged into his mind, making it unbearable.

“Father, mother, sister, little brother…”

Figures swirled in his mind, calling out to him, and a powerful suction seemed to pull at his soul, threatening to sink it forever into darkness, never to rise again.

“No, I can’t pass out. If I can’t hold on, all of Teacher’s efforts will be wasted… How could I face my parents and the others?”

He clenched his fists and cried out inwardly.

For two years, he had forcibly held back from speaking, not because he didn’t want to, but because… his enemy was too powerful. He feared being discovered before he had achieved any cultivation, and then being silenced.

At the age of a teenager, when one loves excitement most, he had forced himself to act like a silent, taciturn old man. The pressure he felt was unimaginable.

What was all this for?

The hatred in his heart!

Father, mother, sister, little brother… all one hundred and thirty-seven members of his family had died tragically… If he hadn’t happened to be away, he too would have become a corpse.

He had thought that avenging them would take many years, or even be hopeless for life… Now Teacher Liu had given him a chance, and he must not let it slip!

“Persevere! I must persevere!”

He roared in his heart. The will tempered over more than two years grew stronger, and his spirit, which had been on the verge of collapse and sinking into drowsiness, revived.

“Not bad!”

Seeing that this fellow could endure such pain, Zhang Xuan nodded in satisfaction.

His guess was correct; the other’s willpower was indeed beyond imagination. If he persisted like this, the Poison Body would likely be successfully cultivated, greatly increasing his strength.

“The effects of the poison will last all night. You will suffer this pain throughout. Find a way to hold on, and you will find that all your efforts are worth it!”

After instructing him, Zhang Xuan covered Lu Chong with a blanket, turned, and walked out of the room.

The cultivation of the Poison Body had begun. Whether he could persist depended entirely on himself; no one else could help. Staying here was useless, so he might as well leave.

Stepping out of the room, he realized that it was already completely dark.

He found a place to eat something.

“Tomorrow I have to teach Zhao Ya and Mu Xueqing swordsmanship and saber techniques. Let me practice first…”

He had promised to teach the two girls martial techniques, but he didn’t know them himself yet. He had to hurry and practice to master them thoroughly before he could teach them well.

“Let’s start with swordsmanship!”

Connecting his mind to the library, he gathered all the sword techniques he had seen in the Mentor Hall.

“Correct!”

With a low shout, a complete sword technique manual formed instantly.

“The sword, the gentleman of all weapons, light and agile, like a snake, like a phantom…”

It detailed a complete set of sword cultivation methods.

He picked up a tree branch at random and circulated his true energy strictly according to the manual.

After practicing for a short while, he stopped and frowned.

“No… these sword techniques have flaws; they’re incomplete…”

The martial techniques left in the Mentor Hall were relatively advanced, with the worst at the peak of the Mortal rank, and Ghost grade low-grade techniques were everywhere.

High-level martial techniques were scarce. In the entire library, there were only a few dozen sword technique manuals. Collecting the correct ones from them couldn’t form perfect moves, let alone Heavenly Dao martial techniques.

“Forcibly practicing such fragmented sword techniques might lead to Qi deviation…”

Looking at the incomplete sword manual, Zhang Xuan felt frustrated.

He had thought that with the sword technique manuals in the Mentor Hall, he could merge them to form a Heavenly Dao sword technique. Now it seemed he had oversimplified things.

Fortunately, he hadn’t taught this sword technique to Zhao Ya. If he had, she might have trained herself to death before even sparring with others.

“Let’s look at saber techniques…”

Suppressing his frustration, he focused on the saber techniques.

Soon, his face grew even more melancholy.

Like the sword techniques, the collected manuals were too few to form complete moves.

Others cultivated martial techniques; the higher the grade, the better. He was different; he needed quantity, not grade.

As the most powerful profession on the continent, mentors naturally looked down on ordinary martial techniques and didn’t collect them.

This was fine for other mentors, but for him, it was troublesome.

“Where can I find some basic sword and saber technique manuals?”

After pondering for a while and finding no solution, Zhang Xuan scratched his head.

“Oh, this is Tianwu Academy. There must be plenty of basic sword and saber techniques here!”

His eyes lit up.

Finding such manuals elsewhere might be difficult, but in an academy, there were certainly many of this level.

With that thought, he stopped worrying. He asked a student for the location of the teachers’ library and strode over.

Before long, he arrived at a huge library.

He showed his identity token and quickly entered.

As expected of an academy’s book repository, though not as large as the Mentor Hall’s library, it was still considerable, packed with countless cultivation techniques and martial arts manuals—at least a million at a glance.

The Mentor Hall’s library had many books on other professions, but here, most were techniques and martial arts; others were scarce.

Techniques below the Grandmaster realm were useless to Zhang Xuan, so he skipped them and looked for sword techniques.

Soon, he found a section on sword techniques—a whole row of at least several thousand books.

He absorbed all the books into his mind.

“Correct!”

This time, the sword technique that emerged was complete and could be practiced easily.

Without rushing, he found the saber techniques and absorbed them into his mind as well.

“Hmm? Grandmaster realm cultivation techniques?”

Walking along the bookshelves and absorbing many other martial technique manuals, his eyes suddenly lit up as he spotted a row of books.

They were… Grandmaster realm cultivation techniques!

According to the rules of Tianxuan Kingdom, Grandmaster realm manuals were extremely precious and should be stored in a separate library accessible only to elders. He hadn’t expected to find them here, in a library open to all teachers.

He picked up one at random and flipped through it, then shook his head with a bitter smile.

He had thought that Tianwu Kingdom advocated education for all, treating elders and ordinary teachers equally. After reading it, he realized he had overthought it.

Although these manuals could cultivate one to the Grandmaster realm, the ones piled here were the most common and lowest grade, around Mortal rank mid- or low-grade.

With such cultivation techniques, even a highly talented person would need at least ten years to advance a single level.

It seemed that truly powerful techniques were still stored in a separate library. What remained here were practically useless—like chicken ribs.

It was a pity to discard them, but almost no one practiced them.

However, for Zhang Xuan, this was the best thing.

His fingers swept over them, quickly absorbing all the techniques into his mind.

“Correct!”

He had already collected many Grandmaster realm techniques in Honglian City. Adding these, the library instantly formed a Grandmaster realm Heavenly Dao technique.

“Let’s go out first and then practice!”

Suppressing the urge to practice immediately, he walked around the library once more. Finding nothing else he wanted, he turned and left.

Returning to the classroom, he saw Lu Chong still resisting the poison without any slack. Zhang Xuan nodded approvingly, walked into the small classroom, and sat down cross-legged.

He casually opened the Grandmaster realm Heavenly Dao technique and began to cultivate with his eyes closed.

Zizi zizi!

As his true energy circulated, the spiritual energy in the surrounding air surged in, entering his meridians through his acupoints.

“Hmm?”

After cultivating for a while, he opened his eyes.

This cultivation didn’t seem as smooth as before, where leveling up was like drinking water. Instead, it felt like drowning, as if he were a greedy patient constantly wanting to devour things, but what was before him was too scarce to satisfy him.

“It’s the spiritual energy…”

After thinking for a moment, he understood.

For the first seven realms of martial arts—Qi Gathering, Dantian, True Energy, Skin and Bones, Cauldron Strength, Aperture Opening, and Meridian Unblocking—the demand for spiritual energy was not high. For example, the Aperture Opening realm only required opening acupoints to increase strength; Meridian Unblocking only required clearing meridians; Cauldron Strength focused on tempering the body…

The Grandmaster realm was different; it involved the accumulation of true energy and spiritual energy.

Every small advancement required a massive amount of spiritual energy.

If you think of a Grandmaster’s dantian as a pond and spiritual energy as water, to fill it, the larger the water flow, the better.

High-level techniques made the water flow larger. The Heavenly Dao technique was like a vast river; pouring it into a pond would certainly be faster than a small stream… but the prerequisite was that the river had water.

Without enough water, even the widest river wouldn’t be much faster than a stream.

In other words… there was nothing wrong with the Heavenly Dao technique; it was just that relying solely on absorbing spiritual energy from the air to advance was too slow.

It was impossible to break through a major realm in an hour like before.

“Given the thinness of spiritual energy in the air, cultivating like this, it would take at least three to five months to reach Grandmaster realm peak!”

Zhang Xuan pondered.

Although the Heavenly Dao technique was still powerful, the spiritual energy in the air was too scarce. Relying solely on this absorption to accumulate the power of a Grandmaster peak would take at least three to five months, which was too troublesome.

Of course, if others knew what he was thinking, they would want to kill him.

Going from Grandmaster initial stage to peak in three to five months was already terrifying, okay? And he was still dissatisfied…

“Forget it. Tomorrow I’ll go to the Alchemist Guild and see if I can find some pills containing spiritual energy. With their help, I should be able to advance quickly…”

Knowing that cultivating like this was slow, Zhang Xuan stopped worrying.

If spiritual energy was insufficient, pills could substitute. The Alchemist Guild had many medicines rich in spiritual energy.

Instead of cultivating the Grandmaster realm technique, Zhang Xuan focused on studying the sword and saber techniques.

Two hours later.

Whoosh!

He casually took a long sword from the weapon rack in the classroom and, following the true energy circulation method recorded in his mind, gently thrust.

Sssss!

True energy shot out straight, forming a dazzling sword aura at the tip of the blade, flickering.

He lightly slashed!

The sword energy extended forward for over ten meters before stopping, leaving a deep groove in the hard floor.