Chapter Ninety-Five: A Warning, Nothing More

But the flaw in this move was that it was easy to evade; after all, the windup was far too long.

I tilted my body slightly and slipped out of the way, but Great-Uncle Two was faster than I was. Seeing that his first strike had missed, he answered at once with another punch.

I had only just steadied myself when I saw a straight punch come at me again. There was no dodging it now. I had no choice but to raise my arm and block.

The force behind that punch was tremendous, and it sent me skidding backward for a long distance before I could stop.

I shifted into an offensive stance and moved toward Great-Uncle Two with the Six-Star Step.

After landing a hit on me, Great-Uncle Two showed neither arrogance nor delight. He simply kept attacking.

He had once told me that when fighting with the Eight Trigrams Fist, one must not attack all the time. Defense could win, too.

Seeing that his assault remained fierce, I did not try to trade blows with him. Instead, I changed back into a defensive stance.

His fists rained down on my guarding arms like a meteor shower, and while I took the punishment, I searched for a way to counterattack.

Fortunately, he was not hitting especially hard, so I could still hold out for the moment.

I slipped past his pointed strike, then gathered strength in my left hand and drove it fast, precise, and ruthless into his arm.

Great-Uncle Two’s reflexes were astonishingly quick. Though he stepped back at once, he still could not avoid being hit.

Thus the third round ended, and once again I had been at a disadvantage.

“Boy, give it everything you’ve got!”

I nodded, then smiled faintly. It seemed Great-Uncle Two meant to end it with this third round, so I would stop holding back as well.

We faced each other, circling the courtyard. In truth, we were each searching for the other’s weakness, waiting for a single decisive strike.

My eyes fell on a stone nearby, and an idea came to me.

I deliberately walked toward it, though my gaze never left Great-Uncle Two’s fists.

As I drew near the stone, I borrowed its force and sprang upward more than ten feet.

In midair, I shot toward Great-Uncle Two like a dragon.

This was also a technique Great-Uncle Two had taught me, called Dragon Rain Leap. Its destructive power was formidable, though it was somewhat limited by the situation.

But Great-Uncle Two already knew what I intended. He had anticipated my anticipation and quickly retreated several steps.

My strike landed on empty air, and I nearly fell. Great-Uncle Two seized the chance to shove me, sending me stumbling forward.

Yet I did not give up. Instead, my fighting spirit burned hotter still.

Then, with a carp leap, I sprang back to my feet. The moment I steadied myself, Great-Uncle Two’s fist came at me again.

I could only retreat while blocking, and I seized the chance to counter with a few punches of my own.

This time, Great-Uncle Two was truly using his full strength. Every punch made my arms ache from the shock.

I caught the right moment and used a Sky-Pointing Kick to strike his shoulder. He hurried back a few steps and even smiled.

I did not wait for him to close in. Taking the initiative, I landed a Flood-Dragon-From-the-Sea blow straight to his chest.

But I felt I had used a little too much force and quickly withdrew my hand.

Yet Great-Uncle Two was not harmed at all. Instead, he took the opportunity to hit me with an entire sequence, leaving me unable to defend against it.

“I told you before—never give your opponent a chance. Have you forgotten?”

Since Great-Uncle Two had said so, I had no further reservations. Even the hand that had been defending came forward to meet him.

Now both of us were using our full strength, trading blows back and forth in a fierce, unbroken struggle.

But in this way, given enough time, we would both grow tired. Great-Uncle Two and I were no different.

Once tired, our speed would slow, and we would expose some flaws.

My eyes were sharp. I caught the opening as Great-Uncle Two drew back his fist and was about to land a one-inch punch.

At the same time, Great-Uncle Two saw my opening as well, and he too was preparing to defeat me with a one-inch punch.

Our speeds were nearly identical. I could almost feel his punch reaching my face, and then we both checked our movements at the same instant.

The tip of his fist struck my cheek, blowing my hair back.

We both lowered our hands and smiled at each other. This was a true expert’s exchange, a contest stopped at the point of contact.

“Not bad. You can hold your own against me now.”

Great-Uncle Two patted my shoulder and said with a smile.

“Not at all. You were going easy on me the whole time, weren’t you? Heh.”

In truth, Great-Uncle Two had indeed been holding back. Otherwise, with his strength, defeating me would have been effortless.

Nangong Xi, watching from the side, was extremely envious—not of the fist technique, but of our strength.

He had remarkable talent in the sword path, and in the future his attainments in swordsmanship would surely surpass mine by a great deal.

After Great-Uncle Two finished sparring with me, he went back to sitting down and reading. I, too, sat cross-legged on the ground and began to cultivate.

Ever since I had lost my spiritual energy, I had not practiced it at all. This session brought back a long-lost feeling.

Perhaps because I had gone so long without training, it took me an especially long time to settle in. I ran it through my body more than ten times before I could barely enter the state.

Little by little, spiritual energy began flowing from my fingertips into my body.

I was like a starving tiger, greedily devouring an endless stream of spiritual energy.

Great-Uncle Two had once told me that when spiritual energy enters the body, it must circulate once through the meridians before it can be refined and truly become your own. In simpler terms, it has to be processed once.

But the cultivation method I practiced was different. It allowed me to use the restless spiritual energy directly without refining it.

In the end, the method was simply too powerful. I could feel that clearly too.

I was now at the fourth grade of Spirit Blossom, and when my spiritual energy recovered before, I had already been close to saturation. After cultivating like this today, I could feel signs of a breakthrough even more strongly.

But absorbing too much spiritual energy too quickly was not a good thing either. The energy inside me began to swell, yet I still could not stop.

Fortunately, the White Flow Flower in my body came into play, helping me suppress the spiritual energy, and only then could I pull out of the cultivation state.

I stared wide-eyed, panting heavily, while Great-Uncle Two warned me from the side.

“You have just recovered your meridians, so it is natural that you would crave spiritual energy. But absorbing too much leads to this result. If it weren’t for the White Flow Flower in your body just now, you would already have exploded from within.”

I gave a wry smile and felt the boundless spiritual energy surging through me again.

At that moment, the Snow Blade in my ring began to stir as well.

After I took it out, its agitation only grew stronger. I had no idea what it wanted, so I could only look helplessly at Great-Uncle Two.

But Great-Uncle Two did not know much about spiritual weapons like this either, and he did not know what to do.

“What are you trying to do? Do you want me to summon you out?”

As soon as I asked, the Snow Blade twitched violently a few times. Clearly, it did not want to come out.

“Then what? Do you want spiritual energy?”

No sooner had I said it than the Snow Blade began to tremble wildly, almost wrenching itself free of my hand.

I hurriedly sent spiritual energy into it, and the blade’s body flashed into view once more.

I noticed that every time I sent a stream of spiritual energy into it, the Snow Blade would flash once, as if thanking me.

It was surprisingly humanlike, not an endless void. After reaching a certain point, it would no longer absorb any more.

And after I put it away again, I still could not understand what the point of feeding it so much spiritual energy had been.

Still unwilling to give up, I summoned it once more. But the sight before me stunned me.

The Snow Blade blazed with light, and the temperature around us dropped to well below freezing.