This High Martial World is Too Crazy!!!

Chapter 6: Chapter 6: Idealistic Martial Dao, Knowledge is Poisonous

”’As long as my will is firm enough, the entire world will clear a path for me?’” Fang Can listened to Yang Lie, unsure of what to make of it.

Yang Lie nodded seriously. ”That’s right. What we call exceptional talent isn’t just about physical aptitude, but also about the firmness of one’s will.”

”Legend has it that when the founding King of the Great Yan Country was young, he was deceived into believing that something called ’Iron Wire Fist’ was the Moke Great Sun Divine Fist.”

”But he still painstakingly threw ten thousand punches every day. Fifty years later, his fists indeed carried the aura of Lieyang. With a single punch, everything within a ten-li radius was scorched to charcoal.”

”It was by relying on this Moke Great Sun Divine Fist that he carved out the vast territory of the Great Yan Country.”

”Conversely, if your conviction wavers, that spiritual weakness will affect your physical body. An enemy could make your body rupture and dissolve into a pool of blood with a single intimidating glare.”

”Take, for example, the greatest enemy of the first King of Great Yan in the founding legends: the Overlord of Great Chu. His oppressive might was unparalleled. He slaughtered cities and annihilated strongholds wherever he passed, and others would grow faint with terror just hearing his name.”

”But even an Overlord like him was defeated by the Moke Great Sun Divine Fist seven consecutive times when facing the Great Derivation Divine Monarch. He was, in turn, overcome by the Great Yan King’s overwhelming aura, and then...”

Yang Lie trailed off, an odd expression on his face. Fang Can couldn’t help but press, ”And then what?”

”And then...” Yang Lie said, his tone complex.

”After being defeated by the Great Derivation Divine Monarch for the seventh time, the once peerlessly mighty Overlord suffered a cultivation deviation. He awakened the feminine within his heart, and his mind’s will worked in reverse upon his body. Through a profound physical transformation, he changed from male to female and was taken into the Great Derivation Divine Monarch’s harem.”

Fang Can’s brain short-circuited. *Um... what? HISSS! No way!*

By the time Fang Can managed to process what he’d heard, his initial avid curiosity had morphed into pure shock.

Just from hearing this martial world legend, a chill ran down Fang Can’s spine. A thousand snarky comments welled up in his throat, threatening to burst out.

Seeing Fang Can’s astonishment, Yang Lie continued unhurriedly.

”And that is why the most important thing for a martial artist is to have a singular focus—to pick a path and walk it to the very end.”

”If you waver halfway through, at best, you’ll lose all your power and die from your body exploding. At worst, you’ll end up bearing children and being toyed with at another’s whim.”

’That is genuinely terrifying,’ Fang Can thought, nodding in agreement.

He hadn’t expected defeat in this world to lead to an H-game ”game over” scene. ’Though, for some M-types, that might be considered a reward.’

”So, on the path of cultivation, physical aptitude is certainly important, but the execution of your will is paramount. The more focused and unimpeded your thoughts, the more they can nourish your spirit in return.”

Yang Lie said sternly, ”If you want your thoughts to be focused, you must cultivate a mindset of invincibility in everything you do, whether walking, sitting, or lying down.”

”In every fight, you must strive to win. You must eat the best food, wear the best clothes, and use the best of everything. Only then can you subconsciously strengthen your conviction, which will in turn nourish your physical body.”

Seeing Fang Can looking down in contemplation, Yang Lie’s voice grew heavy as he stressed, ”Do you understand?”

”I understand perfectly,” Fang Can said, nodding seriously.

”You mean, to keep my thoughts focused, if anyone dares to defy me, I should wipe out their entire family, leaving no one alive. I shouldn’t even go easy on my own father. If I see something I want, I buy it. If I can’t afford it, I steal it. If I can’t overpower them to steal it, I’ll cheat, swindle, and deceive them. And if I can’t trick them, I’ll resort to poison and assassination. Basically, the goal is to be utterly lawless.”

Hearing Fang Can’s long-winded interpretation, Yang Lie broke into a nervous sweat. He couldn’t even say Fang Can was wrong. After all, if someone actually did all that without getting ganged up on and killed by the rest of the world, becoming the strongest under heaven would be well within reach.

”Well, you don’t have to be quite so extreme,” Yang Lie said placatingly. ”The Martial Dao isn’t just about killing, killing, and more killing. It’s also about finding your own path.”

”You can seek your Dao in everything you do. It could be perseverance, glory, love, eternal life, lust, sloth, greed... As long as you head in one direction and never lose heart, your path in the Martial Dao will be wide open.”

Listening to Yang Lie’s explanation, Fang Can felt something wasn’t right. ’This whole mind-over-matter Martial Dao... sounds like it’s full of complete lunatics.’

’Could anyone who obsesses over a single thing their entire life be considered normal? And if you give a lunatic like that immense destructive power, it would be weirder if the world *wasn’t* in chaos.’

Ignoring Fang Can’s thoughts, Yang Lie continued, ”Next, I’ll teach you to identify acupoints.”

With that, Yang Lie pointed into the distance. ”Look over there.”

Following Yang Lie’s finger, Fang Can saw a six-foot-tall, pitch-black, life-sized iron dummy standing not far away. Dozens of indentations were evenly distributed across its body, each connected by lines.

Yang Lie said, ”See those indentations? Those are the acupoints of the human meridians. There are... eight times eight... eighty-eight of them in total.”

”Isn’t eight times eight sixty-four?” Fang Can blurted out instinctively.

”You see? You’re already starting to doubt me. This proves that your heart for the Martial Dao is not firm enough.”

Yang Lie said sternly, ”So-called cultivation is about letting your own heart replace the principles of heaven and earth. If you’re still bound by the rules of simple arithmetic, it only proves that your heart isn’t firm enough. You don’t believe in yourself enough.”

”No, Instructor Yang, you’re wrong. Eight times eight is sixty-four.”

Fang Can insisted, holding his ground.

”If I let you lead me astray with just a few words, it means my own will and conviction aren’t even on your level, let alone strong enough to challenge the heavens and the earth.”

Fang Can’s response left the instructor stunned for a moment. Then, his face broke into a wide grin.

”Excellent! Excellent! You’re already beginning to understand the Martial Dao. Perhaps your aptitude for martial arts is quite good after all.”

”In any case, these... eight-eight-eighty-eight acupoints are all the acupoints in the human body. You must memorize their positions and depths perfectly.”

”Then, when you practice, you must follow the lines on the dummy and firmly believe that Inner Strength is flowing through those acupoints inside your body.”

”The moment you can truly feel a current of energy circulating between the acupoints and completing a full cycle, you will have officially entered the first Realm of the Martial Dao: Transcendent Body.”

”Remember this: in the Martial Dao, the most important thing is a single word: ’Heart’.”

”The King of Great Yan himself once said that with enough heart, anyone can become a Martial God.”

After speaking, Yang Lie tossed a quaint little booklet into Fang Can’s hands. ”This is the introductory martial art of our Tiger Slaughter Sect, the Thirty-six Tiger Addiction Fist Skill.”

”Follow the movements in this manual and visualize the flow of Inner Strength. If you can generate a sense of that energy within a month, your aptitude is considered excellent. Otherwise, you can get lost and go sleep in the servants’ quarters.”

Fang Can caught the manual. On the cover were five words he didn’t recognize. He flipped through it casually. Every page had meridian charts, so it was clearly designed for even an illiterate person to learn.

Looking up, Fang Can asked, ”Instructor Yang, where can I learn to read? I’m completely illiterate. How am I supposed to understand other martial arts manuals in the future?”

”You want to learn to read?” Yang Lie was taken aback for a moment, then said with conviction, ”I advise against it.”

”That kind of knowledge is a potent poison. It will only interfere with your heart. The more you learn, the weaker your conviction will become.”

He gave an example. ”The seventh Disciple of the Supreme Profound Sect’s Master was once a peerless genius. He generated a sense of energy in just half a day and surpassed the Transcendent Body Realm within a few months. But because he read too many books... guess what happened to him?”

”What happened?”

Yang Lie slowly uttered two words: ”Went mad.”