Grade E Spells[/size]
With Chun Lan following, the guards no longer stopped Wang Lin. After getting out of the mansion, Wang Lin took a deep breath. There was an extremely wide street in front of him, with different varieties of exotic-looking buildings standing on each side.
While slowly walking down the street, Wang Lin made a shocking discovery. In the city, he had not seen a single male. All of the citizens were women.
His appearance was like that of a crane in a flock of chicken, capturing many glances from the people walking by. They looked at him with gazes full of curiosity and contempt.
What kind of empire was this? An empire of females? Wang Lin had a weird feeling.
Chun Lan saw Wang Lin’s expression and thought that he felt out of place. Thus, she softly whispered to him, “You’ve never been outside before. You need to know that the men in Spring Water Empire cannot leave their houses. This was a rule set by the Spring Water Queen.”
“Spring Water Queen?” When Wang Lin heard that name, his heart was inexplicably filled with hatred.
“Yes. Spring Water Queen, one of the three queens of the Empress Mainland, our Spring Water Empire’s ruler.”
Suddenly, the sky turned dark. A strange-looking octagonal spacecraft descended quickly from the sky. Wang Lin could feel a strong aura locking onto him. The strength of this aura was comparable to the ones emitted from the mansion’s warriors.
Wang Lin stopped walking. He raised his head and stared into the sky with a serious look on his face.
The entire spacecraft was painted black and made of unknown materials. Its length was about a few metres. The entire design was brimming with malevolence.
“The first rule in the Spring Water Empire law states that unfreed men are not allowed to be out in public. The death penalty falls on those who disobey!” An ice cold voice transmitting from the octagonal-shaped spacecraft.
Chun Lan immediately drew out a badge from her clothes, then reverently and respectfully said,”My Honourable, the Xiao Jie in my house owes this man a great favour. He has already been granted the status of a free man by the Phoenix race.” Wang Lin clearly saw that there was a violet flame engraved on the badge.
The aura that was locked onto Wang Lin immediately lifted. Without further ado the spacecraft, which was no longer interested in Wang Lin, ascended into the sky and disappeared into the horizon.
Chun Lan stored the badge within her clothes again. She smiled and told Wang Lin, “Although Heavenly Water City is far away from the Empire’s capital, the enforcers are very strict. Without this badge of mine, you would have been in trouble today.”
Wang Lin looked towards the direction where the octagonal-shaped spacecraft disappeared to. Although he did not show any unusual expression on his face, a turmoil was forming deep inside him. When the octagonal-shaped spacecraft showed up, he could feel an electric shock going through his brain where, once again, an image surfaced.
In the image, the black-clothed man had a grave look on his face while he was surrounded by hundreds of octagonal-shaped spacecrafts. With the wave of his arm, one by one, the spacecrafts turned into dust.
At the same time, the man sarcastically said, “Is this the Cloud Piercing Ship? Doesn’t seem to be anything special about it.”
“Cloud Piercing Ship!” Wang Lin sounded.
Chun Lan was surprised. Filled with curiosity she said, “What is a Cloud Piercing Ship? This is a Spring Water battleship. It is Spring Water Empire’s unique spacecraft, and it can only be navigated by the Honourables.
“The Honourables that you mentioned, is it a title?” Wang Lin digressed.
“You are from Jian Yu Island. So I don’t blame you for not knowing this. Once a person’s soul power grows to a certain level, he or she would be named as an Honourable. According to the attributes of the soul power, they can be further divided into Physical Honourables or Spiritual Honourables.
After that, the Honourables would be elected by the Empire to become the city’s guardians. It’s a pity that I did not have such potential. I do not have any soul power in my body, not even Level 1. The spells that I have mastered are of the lowest rank, Grade E standard. I have a sister who has already mastered Grade D spells and is currently at Level 2 standard.” While talking about this, an envious look appeared on Chun Lan’s face.
Throughout the journey, Wang Lin and Chun Lan talked nonstop. Wang Lin began to have a better understanding of this world. For example, in this world, spell powers can be classified into five grades, from Grade E to A.
Training with spells of different grades would end with vastly different results. Grade E spells can at most achieve a mere Level 3 standard, while Grade A spells can achieve the highest level of soul power.
To Wang Lin’s surprise, the books teaching these spells are actually available at the bookstores.
In addition, the technology in this world was very advanced. Spring Water Empire was the leader amongst the three big empires; especially in machinery.
The illiteracy problem which troubled Wang Lin was also solved during a conservation with Chun Lan.
There’s a device called a card reader, which would be able to assist him in recognising dozen’s of the more popular symbols for the Empress Mainland language.
During their conservations, Chun Lan was also observing Wang Lin carefully. Her previous few encounters with him did not leave her with a deep impression of him. But currently in her eyes, there was a lot of mysteries surrounding this man. He was the first person to sleep with Xiao Jie and was the first to, not only survive, but also gain the status of a free man.
It was common knowledge that getting an ID as a free man at the Spring Water Empire was exceptionally difficult. Now that Wang Lin had gained the ID, Chun Lan couldn’t help but think,
“He has an ID as a free man now. According to convention, it should not be against the Empire’s law to get closer to him now……”
“Chun Lan, the card reader device that you were talking about. Where can it be bought? ..Chun Lan?” Wang Lin looked at Chun Lan strangely, raising his voice.
“Ah…… The card reader device. It can be bought at the bookstore just up ahead.” Chun Lan was stunned as she was not paying attention.
At this point, the two of them arrived at the herb store entrance.
The store was a huge building with three floors. This was Wang Lin’s first trip to the herb store. Initially, he was worried because he was unsure whether the herbs in his memory were sold here or not. However once he walked in, he was relieved to find that all the herbs needed to treat Corpse Flower Poison were available here.
After selecting a few of the needed herbs, Wang Lin additionally picked out a few other herbs. This was to prevent people from correctly guessing the real herbs required for the treatment.
If San Xiao Jie found out about the herbs he bought through Chun Lan, then for her own sake, she better not try to make the medicine herself. Aside from the actual ingredients needed for the cure, the rest were extremely poisonous.
Coincidentally, among the herbs needed to treat Corpse Flower Poison, there was one which was highly toxic. Thus, it would be difficult to guess which herbs were the right ones. Other than Wang Lin, no one else would be able to prepare the correct medicine based on the herbs which he bought.
As he was about to pay for the herbs, the shop owner, a pretty lady in her thirties, gave him a look and said, “The amount of Blue Ant Powder that you require is a lot. I don’t have that much stock here. Could it be switched out with another herb?”
Wang Lin’s expression was unchanged but his eyes gave a look which made it seem like he was smiling when he was not. He gave the lady a deep stare. The Blue Ant Powder was the most poisonous herb among the ones he picked. Although the shop owner seemed casual when she mentioned the herb, it made Wang Lin suspicious.
With such a look from Wang Lin, the pretty lady suddenly felt that he saw through her intentions. She immediately panicked.
“I will take whatever you have.” The look of contempt in Wang Lin’s eyes disappeared in an instance.
After Chun Lan packed the herbs, both of them left the store.
At this time, there was a person coming down from the second floor. She was the old lady, Wang Popo, from San Xiao Jie’s room.
“Have you memorised all the herbs that he picked?”, the old lady asked after giving a soft sigh.
“In total there are seventeen herbs. Eight of them are medicinal, while the rest are extremely poisonous. The herbs the young man picked were very strange. How can they be used to treat Mandara disease? In my opinion, he is obviously going to make poison.” The pretty lady’s eyebrow twitched. The look which Wang Lin gave her resurfaced in her mind. In her heart, she felt that something wasn’t right. “Wang Popo, this man seemed to know what was going on. Take a look at these herbs……”
“This young man is quite intelligent. Some of the herbs he picked were used to prevent us from figuring out the real ingredients. With the medical knowledge you have, try figuring out the ingredients. In regards to the Blue Ant Powder, I think it might be one of the ingredients. Try to add it in and see.” The old lady frowned, with a sense of strangeness in her dark eyes, she thought to herself,
“This 3000-year-old medicine preparation skill was unique to the ancient world. The current number of people with the know-how today are not many. Looks like this young man is quite mysterious.”
Thinking about it, she recalled that Wang Lin was bought from Jian Yu Island by Xiao Jie. The male slaves produced by Jian Yu Island were all genetically engineered and manufactured. Was she perhaps being too suspicious?
Wang Popo sighed. She didn’t want to think about it anymore.
After Wang Lin walked out of the herb store, under Chun Lan’s guidance he reached the bookstore. After spending some time there, Wang Lin and Chun Lan headed back to the mansion, carrying bags of goods.
Once Chun Lan accompanied Wang Lin back to his room, she left. Wang Lin sat down in the room all by himself. He brought out the two spellbooks and card reader device which he bought from the bookstore.
Spiritual Enhancement Technique, Grade E — Basic, Level 3 is the Highest Level.
Spiral Thrust Power, Grade E — Basic
Initially Wang Lin thought that the bookstore would have all the spells from Grade E to A. However, after entering the shop, he realised that they were only selling Grade E spellbooks. Moreover, the books were public editions, which meant that anyone could get their hands on them.
Through Chun Lan, Wang Lin gained a better understanding regarding spells. He learned that the higher the spell level, the slower the training speed.
For instance, if two people of the same capabilities were to train with different spells for a year, one training in Grade A spells and the other trained in Grade E spells. Then the latter would have attained Level 2 soul power while the first would only achieve Level 1.
This was a strange phenomenon, but no one seemed to understand the reason for this.
By using the card reader device, Wang Lin finally managed to read the spellbook given by San Xiao Jie — Hell Raiser Technique, Grade D — Basic.
Looking at the three spellbooks in his hand, Wang Lin began to think. From what he learned, the best spell to learn would be the Hell Raiser Technique as it was a Grade D spell. However, Wang Lin thought he should be careful after making the deal with San Xiao Jie. If he were her, he would certainly modify the spellbook.
Against Heaven - A great chines novel in English
Re: Against Heaven - A great chines novel in English
The First Encounter
Coming from Jian Yu Island, Wang Lin had been very careful. He knew that any mistake would mean his end. Living in a world of survival of the fittest, he constantly reminded himself to be cautious.
Putting this aside, there was something else that concerned Wang Lin; Grade D spells were high level spells so the time required to train in them was longer than Grade E spells.
Wang Lin knew that what he was lacking right now, was time. Taking all of this into consideration, he decided to train with Grade E spells so that he could reach Level 3 soul power as quickly as possible. Future plans would be made after attaining the ability to defend himself.
Spiritual Enhancement Technique was a commonly seen spell in the Empress Mainland. It had one function, strengthening the body. Rumours were that practising this spell for an extended period of time could prolong one’s life.
This spell had no chants. One just needed to follow the poses shown in the illustrations, and as described in the texts. Because of its utmost simplicity, it became the favourite for people in the Empress Mainland.
Wang Lin began practising by following the illustrations in the book.
The pose for the first illustration was weird.. The arms were twisted to the back while both legs formed corkscrew motions. After a lot of effort, Wang Lin barely managed to make a pose similar to it.
No more than ten seconds later, he immediately felt burning aches all over his body as his breathing became laboured.
According to the requirements for the Spiritual Enhancement Technique, it’s considered a small progress to be able to hold a pose for more than ten minutes. If one was able to hold the pose for more than an hour, it would be considered a success and one could proceed to the next illustration.
After loosening up a bit, Wang Lin reattempted the pose from the first illustration with great determination. Ten seconds later, he could feel every inch of his muscles burning in pain, but he persevered with a strong will. He knew that there was no room to slack off as his time was precious.
After twenty seconds, the pain subsided. But before Wang Lin could even sigh in relief, a sharp pain radiated from his chest. He retched and vomited dark purple blood, before collapsing and falling unconscious.
After some time, Wang Lin slowly regained his consciousness. Upon waking up, he carefully observed his surroundings and gave a sigh of relief when he realised that everything still looked the same.
With the sky already turning dark, it appeared he was unconscious for quite some time. Wang Lin recalled his previous training and felt confused. The pose would explain the numbness and aching. But to think that he would have a sudden onset of chest pain and blood vomiting?
Unable to figure out the root of the problem, Wang Lin once again tried the pose. Ten seconds later, he felt the same aches.
With great focus, he maintained his posture. After twenty seconds, he could clearly feel pain all over the left side of his chest, as though something were tearing and biting through him. Before the pain got any worse, he stopped.
At this point, his face became pale. With every breath, traces of rosy redness returned to his face. It took a while for his facial colour to return to normal.
“Something is wrong!” Wang Lin’s eyes was full of apprehension. He opened his shirt, revealing his chest. He bent his head towards the left side of his chest to take a look while slowly palpating it.
He relaxed his body and shut his eyes. Slowly, his breathing became calmer. His surroundings were silent and he could feel his heart beating, “Lub dub, lub dub……”
Hold on, that’s not right. Wang Lin abruptly opened his eyes. He could feel that with every heartbeat, there was something moving within the left side of his chest.
With a finger, Wang Lin touched the location where he felt the sensation and gave it a good poke. That thing actually moved. It shifted away slightly from Wang Lin’s finger.
“This….. This thing is actually alive!” Wang Lin was horrified.
It must have been this thing that disrupted his training, but how did it enter his body? There were only two possible answers. One, was that it had been inside him ever since Jian Yu Island. The second explanation, would be because of the poison given to him by San Xiao Jie.
Between the two answers, he was more inclined towards the latter.
Wang Lin seemed to be in deep thoughts. He picked up the broken piece of clay from his bedside and put it under his foot. He knew very well that if he was not able to solve this problem, he would be unable to continue his training. Clenching his teeth, he took a deep breath and repeated the pose shown in the illustration again. Twenty seconds later, there was an extreme sensation of pain as expected. Wang Lin grabbed the piece of clay and unhesitantly stabbed into the location of the moving thing.
He disregarded the pain and the fresh blood flowing from his chest. With one quick movement, he explored the wound with his right hand. After a sharp shriek from inside the wound, Wang Lin sat weakly on the floor. In between his two fingers was a black, half bean-sized body of a worm.
“What a cunning worm.” Still shivering, Wang Lin brought out one of the herbs he bought. After munching on it, he applied it to his chest.
He felt drowsy and drained of energy.
“Lucky for me, one of these herbs is an excellent blood coagulant.” After a long time, Wang Lin’s pain slightly subsided. He then bandaged the wound with his shirt.
This slight movement caused the wound to start bleeding again. Wang Lin leaned on the side of his bed with both eyes closed. His face was unusually pale.
The worm was still alive and was hiding deeply inside Wang Lin’s body. Wang Lin tried searching for it, but was unable to detect the worm anymore. It must have realised Wang Lin’s brutality, thus it did not want to show itself anymore.
After resting for a bit, Wang Lin ignored the pain and once again made the pose. Twenty seconds later, even though there was still numbness and weakness all over his body, the pain caused by the worm did not recur.
This time, Wang Lin managed to hold the pose. The night slowly passed by.
That night Wang Lin’s wound reopened a few times, making him use up half of the blood coagulating herb. With unwavering persistence, he managed to extend the pose duration to 1 minute and 20 seconds before dawn.
Even though he hadn’t slept, Wang Lin realised that, apart from the pain coming from the wound, he did not feel tired at all. In fact, he was full of energy and his body felt quite well. This undoubtedly increased his confidence about the efficacy of the Spiritual Enhancement Technique.
In the morning, Chun Lan sent him some breakfast, but Wang Lin did not touch the food. After Chun Lan left, he took out one of the herbs he bought. It was a herb which could increase blood production and with spiritual energy restoration properties. He put a large chunk of it into his mouth and swallowed it to fill his stomach.
He had decided not to consume any food that was prepared in the mansion. If he was hungry, he would take some of the herbs he bought. Otherwise, he would walk to the street and buy some food himself. This was to deny San Xiao Jie any opportunity to poison him.
Initially he thought of asking Chun Lan to not bring him any food in the future. However, after thinking about it, he decided to not tell her. He would instead secretly dispose of the rice and dishes after Chun Lan left.
Sitting in bed cross-legged, Wang Lin was not willing to waste any more time. He continued to do the pose from the first illustration. This time, he set a target for himself. His goal was to hold this pose for more than two minutes today.
Previously, after Wang Lin became exhausted, he would require 10-minutes of rest to replenish his energy. However, with much endurance and persistence, his rest time became shorter and shorter as the body’s restoration speed improved.
Now, he only required 9 minutes of rest time before he could continue training. The more he trained, the better he got. The duration of the pose gradually increased; 1 minute 30 seconds, 1 minute 40 seconds, 1 minute 50 seconds.
Finally, at dusk, he had managed 1 minute 58 seconds.
Sensing that he was near his goal, Wang Lin stood up and gave a good stretch. Noticing a scab forming over his wound, he applied some more herbs on it.
After that, he pushed open the room door and took a deep breath. While admiring the setting sun, he let out a smile. The feeling that he was improving with time pleased him because he felt like he had more control over his own fate.
On a stone table in the courtyard, there were two plates of food and a set of new clothes. The food sent by Chun Lan was meant for lunch and dinner. After throwing the food away, Wang Lin took the clothes, returned to his room and continued training.
As he trained more, he realised that his senses had become sharper. He could sense Chun Lan clearly every time she sent him food.
Simultaneously, the ache and numbness became less the more he trained.
The next few days, Wang Lin was completely absorbed in training all day and night. Finally on the fourth day, he had a breakthrough. He managed to extend the pose duration to ten minutes with a rest time of five.
At the tenth minute of the pose, Wang Lin felt his brain tremble. His whole body, including every inch of his skin, muscles, bones, blood vessels and nerves experienced gushes of warmth. These gushes flowed through his entire body, as though it was crawling with ants.
Droplets of black liquid perspired from Wang Lin’s pores, drenching his clothes.
As the sensation slowly wore off, Wang Lin breathed out a dark cloud of air and opened his eyes. At this point, his eyes became as clear as moonlight.
“There’s finally a small breakthrough for the first illustration of Spiritual Enhancement Technique!” Wang Lin mumbled to himself. He was amazed to find that his whole body felt sticky. As he sniffed himself, his nose was greeted by an overwhelmingly foul smell.
Wang Lin immediately stood up, stripped and went to the bathroom to thoroughly clean his body. He was extremely delighted as the intense energy emanating from inside his body gave him an extra level of confidence!
“A small accomplishment after four days of training on the first illustration of Spiritual Enhancement Technique. That’s quite slow. The initial plan was to accomplish this in three days. It seems that I still need to work harder in order to be able to hold the pose for one hour. That way, I can proceed to the second illustration.” Wang Lin thought while cleaning his body.
Based on the record for the Spiritual Enhancement Technique, the fastest record for achieving a small accomplishment on the first illustration was three days. However, little did Wang Lin know that the record holder had regularly submerged in precious herb water from a young age, leading to no impurities in the body. Thus, it’s natural that the time needed to train was a lot shorter.
Aside from that person, others who had been training in the Spiritual Enhancement Technique would require months to achieve a small accomplishment on the first illustration.
Coming from Jian Yu Island, Wang Lin had been very careful. He knew that any mistake would mean his end. Living in a world of survival of the fittest, he constantly reminded himself to be cautious.
Putting this aside, there was something else that concerned Wang Lin; Grade D spells were high level spells so the time required to train in them was longer than Grade E spells.
Wang Lin knew that what he was lacking right now, was time. Taking all of this into consideration, he decided to train with Grade E spells so that he could reach Level 3 soul power as quickly as possible. Future plans would be made after attaining the ability to defend himself.
Spiritual Enhancement Technique was a commonly seen spell in the Empress Mainland. It had one function, strengthening the body. Rumours were that practising this spell for an extended period of time could prolong one’s life.
This spell had no chants. One just needed to follow the poses shown in the illustrations, and as described in the texts. Because of its utmost simplicity, it became the favourite for people in the Empress Mainland.
Wang Lin began practising by following the illustrations in the book.
The pose for the first illustration was weird.. The arms were twisted to the back while both legs formed corkscrew motions. After a lot of effort, Wang Lin barely managed to make a pose similar to it.
No more than ten seconds later, he immediately felt burning aches all over his body as his breathing became laboured.
According to the requirements for the Spiritual Enhancement Technique, it’s considered a small progress to be able to hold a pose for more than ten minutes. If one was able to hold the pose for more than an hour, it would be considered a success and one could proceed to the next illustration.
After loosening up a bit, Wang Lin reattempted the pose from the first illustration with great determination. Ten seconds later, he could feel every inch of his muscles burning in pain, but he persevered with a strong will. He knew that there was no room to slack off as his time was precious.
After twenty seconds, the pain subsided. But before Wang Lin could even sigh in relief, a sharp pain radiated from his chest. He retched and vomited dark purple blood, before collapsing and falling unconscious.
After some time, Wang Lin slowly regained his consciousness. Upon waking up, he carefully observed his surroundings and gave a sigh of relief when he realised that everything still looked the same.
With the sky already turning dark, it appeared he was unconscious for quite some time. Wang Lin recalled his previous training and felt confused. The pose would explain the numbness and aching. But to think that he would have a sudden onset of chest pain and blood vomiting?
Unable to figure out the root of the problem, Wang Lin once again tried the pose. Ten seconds later, he felt the same aches.
With great focus, he maintained his posture. After twenty seconds, he could clearly feel pain all over the left side of his chest, as though something were tearing and biting through him. Before the pain got any worse, he stopped.
At this point, his face became pale. With every breath, traces of rosy redness returned to his face. It took a while for his facial colour to return to normal.
“Something is wrong!” Wang Lin’s eyes was full of apprehension. He opened his shirt, revealing his chest. He bent his head towards the left side of his chest to take a look while slowly palpating it.
He relaxed his body and shut his eyes. Slowly, his breathing became calmer. His surroundings were silent and he could feel his heart beating, “Lub dub, lub dub……”
Hold on, that’s not right. Wang Lin abruptly opened his eyes. He could feel that with every heartbeat, there was something moving within the left side of his chest.
With a finger, Wang Lin touched the location where he felt the sensation and gave it a good poke. That thing actually moved. It shifted away slightly from Wang Lin’s finger.
“This….. This thing is actually alive!” Wang Lin was horrified.
It must have been this thing that disrupted his training, but how did it enter his body? There were only two possible answers. One, was that it had been inside him ever since Jian Yu Island. The second explanation, would be because of the poison given to him by San Xiao Jie.
Between the two answers, he was more inclined towards the latter.
Wang Lin seemed to be in deep thoughts. He picked up the broken piece of clay from his bedside and put it under his foot. He knew very well that if he was not able to solve this problem, he would be unable to continue his training. Clenching his teeth, he took a deep breath and repeated the pose shown in the illustration again. Twenty seconds later, there was an extreme sensation of pain as expected. Wang Lin grabbed the piece of clay and unhesitantly stabbed into the location of the moving thing.
He disregarded the pain and the fresh blood flowing from his chest. With one quick movement, he explored the wound with his right hand. After a sharp shriek from inside the wound, Wang Lin sat weakly on the floor. In between his two fingers was a black, half bean-sized body of a worm.
“What a cunning worm.” Still shivering, Wang Lin brought out one of the herbs he bought. After munching on it, he applied it to his chest.
He felt drowsy and drained of energy.
“Lucky for me, one of these herbs is an excellent blood coagulant.” After a long time, Wang Lin’s pain slightly subsided. He then bandaged the wound with his shirt.
This slight movement caused the wound to start bleeding again. Wang Lin leaned on the side of his bed with both eyes closed. His face was unusually pale.
The worm was still alive and was hiding deeply inside Wang Lin’s body. Wang Lin tried searching for it, but was unable to detect the worm anymore. It must have realised Wang Lin’s brutality, thus it did not want to show itself anymore.
After resting for a bit, Wang Lin ignored the pain and once again made the pose. Twenty seconds later, even though there was still numbness and weakness all over his body, the pain caused by the worm did not recur.
This time, Wang Lin managed to hold the pose. The night slowly passed by.
That night Wang Lin’s wound reopened a few times, making him use up half of the blood coagulating herb. With unwavering persistence, he managed to extend the pose duration to 1 minute and 20 seconds before dawn.
Even though he hadn’t slept, Wang Lin realised that, apart from the pain coming from the wound, he did not feel tired at all. In fact, he was full of energy and his body felt quite well. This undoubtedly increased his confidence about the efficacy of the Spiritual Enhancement Technique.
In the morning, Chun Lan sent him some breakfast, but Wang Lin did not touch the food. After Chun Lan left, he took out one of the herbs he bought. It was a herb which could increase blood production and with spiritual energy restoration properties. He put a large chunk of it into his mouth and swallowed it to fill his stomach.
He had decided not to consume any food that was prepared in the mansion. If he was hungry, he would take some of the herbs he bought. Otherwise, he would walk to the street and buy some food himself. This was to deny San Xiao Jie any opportunity to poison him.
Initially he thought of asking Chun Lan to not bring him any food in the future. However, after thinking about it, he decided to not tell her. He would instead secretly dispose of the rice and dishes after Chun Lan left.
Sitting in bed cross-legged, Wang Lin was not willing to waste any more time. He continued to do the pose from the first illustration. This time, he set a target for himself. His goal was to hold this pose for more than two minutes today.
Previously, after Wang Lin became exhausted, he would require 10-minutes of rest to replenish his energy. However, with much endurance and persistence, his rest time became shorter and shorter as the body’s restoration speed improved.
Now, he only required 9 minutes of rest time before he could continue training. The more he trained, the better he got. The duration of the pose gradually increased; 1 minute 30 seconds, 1 minute 40 seconds, 1 minute 50 seconds.
Finally, at dusk, he had managed 1 minute 58 seconds.
Sensing that he was near his goal, Wang Lin stood up and gave a good stretch. Noticing a scab forming over his wound, he applied some more herbs on it.
After that, he pushed open the room door and took a deep breath. While admiring the setting sun, he let out a smile. The feeling that he was improving with time pleased him because he felt like he had more control over his own fate.
On a stone table in the courtyard, there were two plates of food and a set of new clothes. The food sent by Chun Lan was meant for lunch and dinner. After throwing the food away, Wang Lin took the clothes, returned to his room and continued training.
As he trained more, he realised that his senses had become sharper. He could sense Chun Lan clearly every time she sent him food.
Simultaneously, the ache and numbness became less the more he trained.
The next few days, Wang Lin was completely absorbed in training all day and night. Finally on the fourth day, he had a breakthrough. He managed to extend the pose duration to ten minutes with a rest time of five.
At the tenth minute of the pose, Wang Lin felt his brain tremble. His whole body, including every inch of his skin, muscles, bones, blood vessels and nerves experienced gushes of warmth. These gushes flowed through his entire body, as though it was crawling with ants.
Droplets of black liquid perspired from Wang Lin’s pores, drenching his clothes.
As the sensation slowly wore off, Wang Lin breathed out a dark cloud of air and opened his eyes. At this point, his eyes became as clear as moonlight.
“There’s finally a small breakthrough for the first illustration of Spiritual Enhancement Technique!” Wang Lin mumbled to himself. He was amazed to find that his whole body felt sticky. As he sniffed himself, his nose was greeted by an overwhelmingly foul smell.
Wang Lin immediately stood up, stripped and went to the bathroom to thoroughly clean his body. He was extremely delighted as the intense energy emanating from inside his body gave him an extra level of confidence!
“A small accomplishment after four days of training on the first illustration of Spiritual Enhancement Technique. That’s quite slow. The initial plan was to accomplish this in three days. It seems that I still need to work harder in order to be able to hold the pose for one hour. That way, I can proceed to the second illustration.” Wang Lin thought while cleaning his body.
Based on the record for the Spiritual Enhancement Technique, the fastest record for achieving a small accomplishment on the first illustration was three days. However, little did Wang Lin know that the record holder had regularly submerged in precious herb water from a young age, leading to no impurities in the body. Thus, it’s natural that the time needed to train was a lot shorter.
Aside from that person, others who had been training in the Spiritual Enhancement Technique would require months to achieve a small accomplishment on the first illustration.
Re: Against Heaven - A great chines novel in English
The Emergence of Soul Power
After washing up, Wang Lin once again sat down on his bed to train.
A few days had passed since the minor accomplishment. Today, he was about to break the sixty minute mark. Sweat dripped from his forehead like rain drops. His body had actually reached its limit three days ago.
For the next three days, the time needed to rest was shortened down to ten seconds. He never stopped finding ways to maximize his body potential. Without extreme perseverance, one definitely would not be able to have such progress.
Armed with an iron will, Wang Lin managed to keep himself going. This high intensity training was very taxing on his body. In just three days time, he had become so much thinner.
Wang Lin, who was originally not very fleshy, looked even skinnier now.
Real kung fu belonged to resolute people. In the evening on the next day, he managed to hold the pose for one hour as he hoped.
The feeling of ants crawling throughout his body, like the ones from his minor accomplishment resurfaced. But this time, the feeling was much more intense. After holding the pose for three gritting hours, the energy emanating from all of his organs, bones and muscles combined together, forming a faint but tenacious soul power.
At this point, he achieved major accomplishment for the first illustration of Spiritual Enhancement Technique.
According to the records of the spell, once major accomplishment for the first illustration was achieved, soul power would be produced. The production of soul power meant that one’s ability had reached Level 1.
Achieving the first level of soul power in just thirteen days would put one among the rare geniuses residing in the Empress Mainland. However, Wang Lin was not the fastest. The fastest one to achieve Level 1, did it in just five days!
After washing up, Wang Lin changed into some clean clothes and walked out of the room.
The stars in the sky were shining brightly. The autumn wind brought along with it the night’s chill. Wang Lin was not in a rush to learn the second illustration; but was instead, silently savouring the soul power within his body.
Just by thinking about it, the soul power flowed into his right hand. Wang Lin gently hit the corner of the stone table. He indistinctly felt the table shake and then, suddenly, the corner broke.
Wang Lin raised his eyebrows, secretly admiring the soul power. Although only at Level 1, it did so much damage. However, he could feel that his soul power had dropped by half. At the same time, he was bleeding from a cut on his right hand. Fresh blood slowly dripped from his hand.
“Merely one use took so much soul power……” Wang Lin blinked his eyes, looking at the wound on his right hand. He suddenly gained enlightenment, “No, it is the way I used it. If I did not use so much soul power hitting the stone table, the energy probably wouldn’t have depleted as much.”
Thinking about this, Wang Lin immediately started experimenting. He slowly tried to control the flow of soul power into his right hand in order to find the right balance point. However, getting the precise control of the energy was easier said than done. It would wildly flow into his right hand each time he tried to muster the energy there.
Wang Lin did not give up. He continued his attempts, but it was impossible to control the energy precisely. Unknowingly, a great deal of time had passed. He let out a sigh, realizing that he had been impatient. It would take a long time to practice controlling his soul power.
Somehow he had the feeling that if he could control his energy precisely, he would only need one tenth of his soul power to break the corner of the table rather than just wasting half of it.
“It seems that from now on, other than routinely training Spiritual Enhancement Technique, I also need to use time to practice controlling my soul power. For now, the most important thing is to find a suitable method to use the energy for attacking. To muster it into both hands does not seem advisable for now, so how can I utilize this limited amount of soul power?”
Wang Lin muttered to himself. Suddenly, a light bulb lit in his brain. He recalled how some of his soul power leaked from the wound before reaching the right hand the last time he tried controlling it.
This gave Wang Lin an idea. Maybe, by using this, he could find a suitable offensive strategy!
Without hesitating, he mustered all of his remaining soul power into his left index finger. Then, he aimed it at the stone table and in a swift motion, cut up the end of his fingertip. He restrained his soul power, as to not use too much. A drop of fresh blood, saturated with soul power, shot out fiercely, leaving a small hole on the stone table.
At the same time, the small cut on his index finger slowly healed,stimulated by the soul power.
Wang Lin was excited. This method of attacking was ingenious; it did not require much skill to control but could also achieve the desired effect. At present, it would make for an excellent weapon to defend himself with. Moreover, the destructive potential was satisfactory.
Wang Lin believed that he could further increase the damage inflicted by this method of attack through practice and by adjusting the amount of his soul power output. Perfect timing in restraining the dispensed energy was also of dire importance.
Thus, besides Spiritual Enhancement Technique and precision control of his soul power, Wang Lin added “perfecting the restraint of energy” onto his training list.
“However this is but a cheap trick. My body obviously cannot cope with the conventional attacking method. Seems like the solution is to improve my body strength!” Previously, through the conversation with Chun Lan, Wang Lin found out that the so-called soul power was in fact, a type of energy. In this world, there were two main ways of utilizing the soul power, namely Spiritual and Physical.
Wang Lin did not have much knowledge regarding Spiritual techniques. On the other hand, from the term of Physical Technique itself, he deduced that these techniques utilized a person’s body as the weapon to project one’s soul power.
It was unfortunate that the bookstore did not have any books regarding Physical technique training. But from Wang Lin’s understanding, this type of technique centered around using all kinds of methods to improve the inner strength of one’s body.
Thinking about this, Wang Lin decided to make a trip to the town tomorrow to purchase some equipment to help strengthen his body.
At this point, the sky was becoming bright. Wang Lin returned to his room, took a few pills and continued practicing the pose from the first illustration in bed. Time and tide waits for no man. Just as Wang Lin completed his third round of training, Chun Lan arrived with his breakfast.
After telling Chun Lan about his desire to purchase some equipments to train his body, they both left the mansion together.
Even though that was his second time walking on the streets, Wang Lin still wasn’t used to it. The feeling of being watched by people walking by made him feel uneasy.
After a while, with Chun Lan leading the way, they arrived at the equipment store. There were all sorts of strength building equipment in the store. Wang Lin carefully looked at each and every one of them and finally bought an equipment which was to his liking.
One thing worth mentioning was that because the equipment he bought was huge, the store gave him a storage card as a complimentary gift for his purchase. This piqued Wang Lin’s curiosity.
This was the first time he heard of storage cards. Although it could only be used once, he could not help but feel fascinated. Secretly, he decided to get a reusable storage card which he could permanently use in the future.
Looking at Wang Lin’s expression, Chun Lan covered her mouth and smiled, “This storage card is nothing out of the ordinary. Almost everyone has one. If you wish, I can bring you to buy one later.”
Wang Lin was extremely delighted, nodding his head in agreement.
After paying the bills, both of them left the store. Suddenly, Wang Lin frowned. With lightning speed, he pulled Chun Lan a step backwards.
At the same time, a loud thunder was heard. A three metre long spear surrounded with electricity was dropped from the sky, piercing into the position where Chun Lan was standing moments ago. The ground split, forming a cobweb pattern.
Chun Lan’s face immediately paled, gratefully glancing at Wang Lin.
Wang Lin’s expression turned grim as he looked up to see a Spring Water spacecraft hovering in mid air. On it stood a woman clad in armor. The armor was fitted to her body curves, making her extraordinarily attractive. Her short hair gracefully framing in her face. Although beautiful and charming, it now held a menacing look. Her right hand seemed to be shaking slightly.
“Ice Phoenix, one of the ten Honourables of Heavenly Water City. Is that all you have? I think I might have overestimated you in the past. Heh heh, I can’t believe that you cannot even hold your weapons steadily.” A loud voice echoed.
Wang Lin was stunned as it was actually the voice of a man!
There was a cold look in Ice Phoenix’s eyes. She raised her right hand and the spear immediately flew from the ground, returning to her hand. In a voice full of hatred, she said, “Stone, today is your funeral.”
“Stone! One of the ten most wanted fugitives in Spring Water Empire. Oh my god, how can it be him?”
“Wasn’t he killed by the city governor a few years ago? How could he still be here?” Crowds were already fervently discussing amongst themselves on the ground.
Chun Lang’s face paled. While pulling Wang Lin, she said, “We need to leave at once. Stone is a bloodthirsty barbarian with frightening power. I cannot believe he would appear in Heavenly Water City.”
Wang Lin smirked, secretly thinking that this outside world was not as what he’d seen before. “Who is this Stone guy? He has quite the reputation.”
“Heh heh, young lady. Do you think you are capable of killing me? I am bored of playing this little game with you. Come follow me home so we can make babies.” The loud voice echoed again. A weird-looking figure was suddenly seen rushing out of a house, a trail of blurry shadows behind him, launching a punch at lightning speed.
When this punch traveled towards Ice Phoenix, 108 blocks of ice suddenly formed a round shield, protecting her.
With much uncertainty, Ice Phoenix’s spacecraft immediately retreated.
“That attack was nothing. This is not the time for you to retreat. What you are now is nothing to me.” Stone gave a big laugh and started punching more violently. One by one, the shield formed by the 108 ice blocks broke into pieces.
Ice Phoenix clenched her teeth and with a swift movement, she waved her spear and stabbed it towards Stone’s fist.
Stone laughed wildly as his hand turned into a claw He dodged the spear at unbelievable speed and grabbed it, he then gave it a strong pull. Ice Phoenix’s expression immediately changed. She wanted to release the spear but it was too late. Her body was sent flying towards her opponent. Stone punched her in the abdomen with his other arm, knocking her out before grabbing her and putting her over his shoulder.
He then proceeded to ruthlessly spank Ice Phoenix’s bouncy buttocks while laughing. Looking at the crowd on the ground, he noticed Wang Lin and became momentarily stunned. There was a despicable look in his eyes as he spat towards Wang Lin before saying, “I see that there’s a pet rabbit here. Leaving you here would be an embarrassment for all men. So, let me grant you a quick death!”
After washing up, Wang Lin once again sat down on his bed to train.
A few days had passed since the minor accomplishment. Today, he was about to break the sixty minute mark. Sweat dripped from his forehead like rain drops. His body had actually reached its limit three days ago.
For the next three days, the time needed to rest was shortened down to ten seconds. He never stopped finding ways to maximize his body potential. Without extreme perseverance, one definitely would not be able to have such progress.
Armed with an iron will, Wang Lin managed to keep himself going. This high intensity training was very taxing on his body. In just three days time, he had become so much thinner.
Wang Lin, who was originally not very fleshy, looked even skinnier now.
Real kung fu belonged to resolute people. In the evening on the next day, he managed to hold the pose for one hour as he hoped.
The feeling of ants crawling throughout his body, like the ones from his minor accomplishment resurfaced. But this time, the feeling was much more intense. After holding the pose for three gritting hours, the energy emanating from all of his organs, bones and muscles combined together, forming a faint but tenacious soul power.
At this point, he achieved major accomplishment for the first illustration of Spiritual Enhancement Technique.
According to the records of the spell, once major accomplishment for the first illustration was achieved, soul power would be produced. The production of soul power meant that one’s ability had reached Level 1.
Achieving the first level of soul power in just thirteen days would put one among the rare geniuses residing in the Empress Mainland. However, Wang Lin was not the fastest. The fastest one to achieve Level 1, did it in just five days!
After washing up, Wang Lin changed into some clean clothes and walked out of the room.
The stars in the sky were shining brightly. The autumn wind brought along with it the night’s chill. Wang Lin was not in a rush to learn the second illustration; but was instead, silently savouring the soul power within his body.
Just by thinking about it, the soul power flowed into his right hand. Wang Lin gently hit the corner of the stone table. He indistinctly felt the table shake and then, suddenly, the corner broke.
Wang Lin raised his eyebrows, secretly admiring the soul power. Although only at Level 1, it did so much damage. However, he could feel that his soul power had dropped by half. At the same time, he was bleeding from a cut on his right hand. Fresh blood slowly dripped from his hand.
“Merely one use took so much soul power……” Wang Lin blinked his eyes, looking at the wound on his right hand. He suddenly gained enlightenment, “No, it is the way I used it. If I did not use so much soul power hitting the stone table, the energy probably wouldn’t have depleted as much.”
Thinking about this, Wang Lin immediately started experimenting. He slowly tried to control the flow of soul power into his right hand in order to find the right balance point. However, getting the precise control of the energy was easier said than done. It would wildly flow into his right hand each time he tried to muster the energy there.
Wang Lin did not give up. He continued his attempts, but it was impossible to control the energy precisely. Unknowingly, a great deal of time had passed. He let out a sigh, realizing that he had been impatient. It would take a long time to practice controlling his soul power.
Somehow he had the feeling that if he could control his energy precisely, he would only need one tenth of his soul power to break the corner of the table rather than just wasting half of it.
“It seems that from now on, other than routinely training Spiritual Enhancement Technique, I also need to use time to practice controlling my soul power. For now, the most important thing is to find a suitable method to use the energy for attacking. To muster it into both hands does not seem advisable for now, so how can I utilize this limited amount of soul power?”
Wang Lin muttered to himself. Suddenly, a light bulb lit in his brain. He recalled how some of his soul power leaked from the wound before reaching the right hand the last time he tried controlling it.
This gave Wang Lin an idea. Maybe, by using this, he could find a suitable offensive strategy!
Without hesitating, he mustered all of his remaining soul power into his left index finger. Then, he aimed it at the stone table and in a swift motion, cut up the end of his fingertip. He restrained his soul power, as to not use too much. A drop of fresh blood, saturated with soul power, shot out fiercely, leaving a small hole on the stone table.
At the same time, the small cut on his index finger slowly healed,stimulated by the soul power.
Wang Lin was excited. This method of attacking was ingenious; it did not require much skill to control but could also achieve the desired effect. At present, it would make for an excellent weapon to defend himself with. Moreover, the destructive potential was satisfactory.
Wang Lin believed that he could further increase the damage inflicted by this method of attack through practice and by adjusting the amount of his soul power output. Perfect timing in restraining the dispensed energy was also of dire importance.
Thus, besides Spiritual Enhancement Technique and precision control of his soul power, Wang Lin added “perfecting the restraint of energy” onto his training list.
“However this is but a cheap trick. My body obviously cannot cope with the conventional attacking method. Seems like the solution is to improve my body strength!” Previously, through the conversation with Chun Lan, Wang Lin found out that the so-called soul power was in fact, a type of energy. In this world, there were two main ways of utilizing the soul power, namely Spiritual and Physical.
Wang Lin did not have much knowledge regarding Spiritual techniques. On the other hand, from the term of Physical Technique itself, he deduced that these techniques utilized a person’s body as the weapon to project one’s soul power.
It was unfortunate that the bookstore did not have any books regarding Physical technique training. But from Wang Lin’s understanding, this type of technique centered around using all kinds of methods to improve the inner strength of one’s body.
Thinking about this, Wang Lin decided to make a trip to the town tomorrow to purchase some equipment to help strengthen his body.
At this point, the sky was becoming bright. Wang Lin returned to his room, took a few pills and continued practicing the pose from the first illustration in bed. Time and tide waits for no man. Just as Wang Lin completed his third round of training, Chun Lan arrived with his breakfast.
After telling Chun Lan about his desire to purchase some equipments to train his body, they both left the mansion together.
Even though that was his second time walking on the streets, Wang Lin still wasn’t used to it. The feeling of being watched by people walking by made him feel uneasy.
After a while, with Chun Lan leading the way, they arrived at the equipment store. There were all sorts of strength building equipment in the store. Wang Lin carefully looked at each and every one of them and finally bought an equipment which was to his liking.
One thing worth mentioning was that because the equipment he bought was huge, the store gave him a storage card as a complimentary gift for his purchase. This piqued Wang Lin’s curiosity.
This was the first time he heard of storage cards. Although it could only be used once, he could not help but feel fascinated. Secretly, he decided to get a reusable storage card which he could permanently use in the future.
Looking at Wang Lin’s expression, Chun Lan covered her mouth and smiled, “This storage card is nothing out of the ordinary. Almost everyone has one. If you wish, I can bring you to buy one later.”
Wang Lin was extremely delighted, nodding his head in agreement.
After paying the bills, both of them left the store. Suddenly, Wang Lin frowned. With lightning speed, he pulled Chun Lan a step backwards.
At the same time, a loud thunder was heard. A three metre long spear surrounded with electricity was dropped from the sky, piercing into the position where Chun Lan was standing moments ago. The ground split, forming a cobweb pattern.
Chun Lan’s face immediately paled, gratefully glancing at Wang Lin.
Wang Lin’s expression turned grim as he looked up to see a Spring Water spacecraft hovering in mid air. On it stood a woman clad in armor. The armor was fitted to her body curves, making her extraordinarily attractive. Her short hair gracefully framing in her face. Although beautiful and charming, it now held a menacing look. Her right hand seemed to be shaking slightly.
“Ice Phoenix, one of the ten Honourables of Heavenly Water City. Is that all you have? I think I might have overestimated you in the past. Heh heh, I can’t believe that you cannot even hold your weapons steadily.” A loud voice echoed.
Wang Lin was stunned as it was actually the voice of a man!
There was a cold look in Ice Phoenix’s eyes. She raised her right hand and the spear immediately flew from the ground, returning to her hand. In a voice full of hatred, she said, “Stone, today is your funeral.”
“Stone! One of the ten most wanted fugitives in Spring Water Empire. Oh my god, how can it be him?”
“Wasn’t he killed by the city governor a few years ago? How could he still be here?” Crowds were already fervently discussing amongst themselves on the ground.
Chun Lang’s face paled. While pulling Wang Lin, she said, “We need to leave at once. Stone is a bloodthirsty barbarian with frightening power. I cannot believe he would appear in Heavenly Water City.”
Wang Lin smirked, secretly thinking that this outside world was not as what he’d seen before. “Who is this Stone guy? He has quite the reputation.”
“Heh heh, young lady. Do you think you are capable of killing me? I am bored of playing this little game with you. Come follow me home so we can make babies.” The loud voice echoed again. A weird-looking figure was suddenly seen rushing out of a house, a trail of blurry shadows behind him, launching a punch at lightning speed.
When this punch traveled towards Ice Phoenix, 108 blocks of ice suddenly formed a round shield, protecting her.
With much uncertainty, Ice Phoenix’s spacecraft immediately retreated.
“That attack was nothing. This is not the time for you to retreat. What you are now is nothing to me.” Stone gave a big laugh and started punching more violently. One by one, the shield formed by the 108 ice blocks broke into pieces.
Ice Phoenix clenched her teeth and with a swift movement, she waved her spear and stabbed it towards Stone’s fist.
Stone laughed wildly as his hand turned into a claw He dodged the spear at unbelievable speed and grabbed it, he then gave it a strong pull. Ice Phoenix’s expression immediately changed. She wanted to release the spear but it was too late. Her body was sent flying towards her opponent. Stone punched her in the abdomen with his other arm, knocking her out before grabbing her and putting her over his shoulder.
He then proceeded to ruthlessly spank Ice Phoenix’s bouncy buttocks while laughing. Looking at the crowd on the ground, he noticed Wang Lin and became momentarily stunned. There was a despicable look in his eyes as he spat towards Wang Lin before saying, “I see that there’s a pet rabbit here. Leaving you here would be an embarrassment for all men. So, let me grant you a quick death!”