Beastmaster of the Ages

”I can’t give up. It’ll make me a laughingstock. No matter how much I don’t understand, I still have to pretend that I do. Maybe I’ll actually get it one day.” Tianming listened to the explanations again and again. While some of the terms used were rather obscure, the structure of what they were saying wasn’t actually that complicated. The really hard part was actually putting it into practice.

The two sword strikes were incredibly unconventional. Tianming attempted them tens of times and noticed that, while his strikes superficially resembled them, they were lacking some kind of core. His Delayed Capture didn’t have the aspect of time, while his Unistrike Singularity lacked the aspect of space. The two peak-level sword arts were worthless in his hands.

”Am I a fool after all? It’s far too hard! Thankfully no one saw me, or I’d be completely humiliated. I bet Lin Jianjia can do it far better than I can.” Fortunately, he wasn’t one to give up. He knew that he hadn’t even begun to take the first step to learn those moves, but he kept trying them over the following ten days in his cultivation room like a clown.

”I can’t believe I’m trying this, but let’s use my totems.” He figured he should just try the moves using his Grandvoid Universum and Infinitum Spatium totem swords.

”I think I’m feeling it a little.” He came to understand that acting out the moves themselves without any understanding of spacetime was pointless. However, he got a feel for it using his totem swords. Even so, the totems were far too large and unwieldy for him to execute the finer movements well.

”Not to mention, the core of sword arts lies with the main body. Even if my totems can execute them, it’ll still be pointless if I can’t.” More crucially, only two of his ten decapath era godswords could execute the moves to an extent. In other words, Tianming’s sword strikes had a ’body’, but lacked a ’soul’.

”How do I go about this?” Hitting a bottleneck was always the most frustrating thing for him, part of which was due to the high standard he set for himself. Many inheritors of legacies took for granted that they would take an incredibly long time to understand those legacies, even though they had started preparing to understand them before obtaining the legacies themselves. Some even spent an entire lifetime training for them.

Tianming paced around the hall nonstop.

”Why the long face, old man?” a sweet voice called out from the entrance.

He didn’t even need to look to know that it was his darling. ”I’m still fresh meat, alright? You’re the old one!” As long as Feiling was around, all his worries seemed to melt away. It felt like he hadn’t seen her for years, even though it had just been days. He instantly leaped to her side and his fingers crept toward her sensitive spots.

She nervously moaned before giving him a hard shake. ”There’s someone else here!”

”Huh?” Tianming turned around, only to see Moran and Xiaoxiao. He had moved so fast that he’d almost stripped her in front of them.

”Ah!” The other two blushed and hurriedly ran off.

”It’s all your fault.... How can I face them now?” Feiling said, tearing up as she struggled to break free.

”This won’t do. I already removed the pleasure ball from the packaging. If I don’t use it now, it’ll go to waste!” Since the others had already been scared off, he went on to do what he was about to do anyway. The doors to the hall completely shut, leaving the two of them in the dark.

......

A day later, Feiling remained seated as she watched Tianming pace around the hall, powerlessly performing the moves.

”I asked you to stop but you didn’t listen. You’re void of any energy now, eh?” Even though she said that, she also couldn’t really stand up after all their activity. It was as if she had fought three hundred battles one after another.

”What would you know? This ancestor is called the Grandvoid Swordfiend. To understand the mystique of his sword art, I have to enter a void state like you said! I’m truly a genius, aren’t I? I bet nobody else can figure this out,” Tianming said.

Feiling clenched her fists tight, wondering if Tianming was already beyond all help. She continued watching him practice the moves. ”Oh? Are those spatial and temporal sword arts?”

”That’s right. Oh, can you watch me and tell me why I’m not getting it?”

”Sure!” She attempted to stand up by propping herself up against the wall, only to weakly slump back down. Shooting him a frustrated glare, she said, ”What was up with you yesterday, anyway? It was like you’d been left high and dry for ages or something!”

”What? No. I was just sacrificing myself for the sake of my swordsmanship, and you, you little old thing, just happened to enjoy the benefits.”

”You really backed me into a corner here... yet even the wall corner can’t help me up.”

Tianming couldn’t figure out the sword arts himself, so he placed his hopes in Feiling. She watched him demonstrate them once more and said, ”Big Brother, one of the moves’ key points is to accelerate time, and the other’s is to compress space. No matter how those aspects are infused into the sword art, their key properties won’t change. The reason you’re completely unable to feel the compression of space or acceleration of time is your lack of exploration in those areas. How about this? I’ll activate Perpetia and provide two environments for you to train in.”

”Alright, let’s try it. I’ve been craving the knowledge for far too long.”

”Take this seriously, will you?” She rolled her eyes and deployed Perpetia, which had many different states. Back when it was still merely a crypt for an ancient deity, it was a black city that seemed to contain dungeons within. But in Feiling’s hands, it was a transparent city of spacetime, a physical representation of her domains. Within it, she had dared to face off against the Blood Abyss Wargod despite having been only a twelfth-level solarian at the time.

Tianming stepped into it right away.

”First try to feel the different rates of flowing time,” Feiling said.

”Let’s do spatial compression at the same time. They’re supposed to be different, so I should be able to tell them apart,” Tianming said.

”Alright, but it’ll be difficult. Both temporal acceleration and spatial compression will have effects on your body.”

”I can take it.” Right after he said that with much bravado, his brows furrowed. ”Gosh, this doesn’t feel too good....” It was an incredibly out-of-place sensation. The speeding up and slowing down of time made it hard for him to tell how fast he was actually moving. Sometimes, one moment flew past just like that, but other times, a moment lingered much longer than it should. As for spatial compression, it was like an invisible pressure applied on all parts of his body as if the world itself was trying to press down on him. While he did indeed feel uncomfortable, the sensations had given him the spark of inspiration he’d needed.

”So that’s what changes in space and time feel like.” It had been far too hard for him to comprehend warping spacetime while he was in normal spacetime. Perpetia’s simulated environment had turned out to be ideal for his swordsmanship training.

”Don’t worry, I understand the finer concepts of those sword arts, while you understand the rough execution. Even if you’re a hopeless idiot, I promise to guide you until you get them right,” she confidently said.

”Are you that certain?” If she was, that made him feel confident about himself too. She was right in that he’d already had the basic structure down. All he needed to infuse into them was the space or time aspect, and he had felt those all too well within the twisted spacetime.

”The only thing about the flow of time is whether it speeds up or slows down, yet that alone is able to make your sword strikes take on countless forms. As for spatial compression, what you’re trying to do is to use your sword to apply pressure for that compression against your target, pushing it into your sword strike to achieve magnificent destruction.” It sounded like Feiling really did know what she was talking about. Not only was she well versed in spacetime, she also had a great grasp on divine celestial formations... well, not the one Tianming usually studied with his ’Grand-Orient Sword’, but a different kind.

Dongshen Yue had guided her to hone her abilities in that regard, making her a top-level formation guru that could even dabble in divine tomes. Apart from fighting, Feiling’s talents spanned many other fields.

She guided Tianming through every slight movement of the sword arts, opening the doors of understanding to him and allowing him to directly feel the effects of fluctuating spacetime, rapidly honing his grasp.

”You’re really good at this, darling.” Feiling didn’t hesitate to play the role of an accomplished master in the arts of spacetime. Back when they were still in the Vermillion Bird Kingdom, she had already been using Temporal Field and Spatial Wall. The only thing she lacked back then was raw power and an ability to channel it. In fact, she didn’t think the aspects in those sword arts were individually that powerful. Only by integrating them would they be truly incredible.

”It’s no biggie,” Tianming said.

Feiling warmly smiled at him with the cutest expression, but her face immediately stiffened right after. ”Now, my child, work hard and don’t slack off!”

”Okay, granny.” Tianming kept on practicing and made actual progress with Feiling’s constant guidance. He had a feeling that the day he would grasp those two moves was not far off.

Half a month later....

”I made it!”

The two of them excitedly hugged each other within Perpetia.

”Oh no! Something urgent just occurred to me!” Tianming said, distraught.

”What’s wrong?” She clutched his hand with a panicked look.

Tianming nervously took something out of his spatial ring. ”This can’t be! My... my pleasure ball is about to expire.... Ling’er, quick! Save this poor child!”

She just stood there, face frozen stiff.

......

After a hearty ’feast’, Tianming returned to the Swordsoul Purgatory once more. He wanted to try raising his disciple grade and gaining access to the sixth level of Caeli Vault, as witnessing the order of cosmic cartographers was really important for him. Additionally, he wanted to put his new moves to actual practice to further hone them and the nova wildbeasts made for perfect sparring partners. Just in case, he also brought Feiling with him.