“If you attempt to go against anything I stated, you’ll die immediately. There are no second chances. The terms are subjective to my point of view, interpret as you will but remember it’s your life that you are gambling with if you try anything stupid.” Ryu said solemnly and a pair of angel-like wings appeared on his back. With a flap, Ryu started flying away. The quagmire trapping Fang-Da was undone and an invisible net grabbed him, dragging him behind Ryu.

Another day passed and they finally arrived at the outside of the forest. Ryu dropped Fang-Da off and took his storage ring before disappearing. He only left him a basic storage sack with one thousand gold coins inside. Fang-Da stood there alone dumbfounded. He tried to gather Qi beneath his feet to speed up his walking speed when all the sudden he coughed up blood uncontrollably. An invisible force threatens to pop his Qi reservoir like a bubble and if that happens, its sudden death.

Fang-Da has done many wicked deeds in his life in order to get to where he is in life. Regret swelled up in his heart. If he only went all out in his ambush against Ryu then maybe his fate wouldn’t have turned out like this. Even if Ryu left him his storage rings, he can’t even open them as it requires Qi.

Ryu flew south. Originally he was planning to fly back towards his town but he couldn’t leave Fang-Da stranded in the forest after sealing his Qi so he had to carry him the closest exit.

Before Ryu left the inner sanctum of the forest, he had made a specialization with his primary Qi reservoir and advanced to the Grandmaster Domain. His second reservoir had yet to establish a specialization so he stopped its advancement into the Grandmaster Domain by a hair’s width.

In the previous fight the Gold Keeper was backed by the Qi from his second reservoir while the Qi blades were from the first reservoir. If Ryu only had his primary reservoir, it would have been much harder for him to beat Fang-Da who was at peak Grandmaster Domain while Ryu is at the first level of Grandmaster Domain. However keep in mind Ryu’s second reservoir takes an astronomical amount of cultivation to level up, if Ryu only focused on his original reservoir he would’ve no doubt achieved higher cultivation than Fang-Da.

“Looks like he was an important figure in his sect.” Ryu spoke to himself as he scanned his rings. A total of fifty thousand gold was inside along with various items and manuals. Ryu skimmed through the manuals, the only ones that caught his eye was the Terra Golem and Unearthing Tremor skills.

Since Alexis’s had no affinity with any elements except the death Qi so he used spells instead. Spells are different since it is composed of layers and layers of formulas used to produce “magic”. So no advanced elemental Qi manuals were in his possession. Speaking of magic, it’s the only thing Ryu had gained unequivocally no insights into. Since Alexis was accomplished in that area, he only kept formulas for high level spells. Without an instructor, Ryu couldn’t begin to understand the basics of magic.

For Fang-Da to utilize the Terra Golem technique, he had to use his “specialization” to increase his control of earth Qi to the max. To Ryu who’s loved by Qi and can manipulate them at will, he doesn’t need to do such thing.

“I can probably produce a couple of golems for a large scale attack.” Ryu mused as he moved on to the Unearthing Tremor skill. By creating pulses through the earth, his detection can cover a few kilometers around him. This excludes objects in the air though.

Ryu suddenly remembered the scroll that the incredibly strong monkey beast gave him. As he touched the scroll, the Infinity Tome flipped wide open and all its contents were scribbled in immediately. The information was instantly accessible to Ryu’s mind.

“This is a whole collection of a martial art style!” Ryu exclaimed. In Alexis’s collection, most manuals were part of a set but Alexis only had one or two of them. They were from random sects and gained through dishonest means. Other than Ryu who can discern the concepts of the cultivation and skills from various sects due to the Infinity Tome, most people would train faster if they had a set path from one sect.

The only complete collections Alexis had were of dark arts that Ryu didn’t want to learn at first. However, unexpectedly the Infinity Tome refused to erase the dark arts from its pages and flipped them open to Ryu on many occasions as if begging Ryu to learn it.

In the end Ryu did learn it and he can even produce death Qi but unless extraordinary circumstances occurs, he won’t use it. Getting past some gruesome aspect of the dark arts, Ryu found the dark arts to be just as profound as any other arts. They also had some features superior to that of the orthodox sects’ skills such as traveling undetected in the shadows.

“This divine art is made by the invincible awesome me. If you can learn even half of it then you can be considered cool. If you can learn it all then I might even consider you awesome…” Ryu murmured the first few lines. The person who wrote this was extremely childish unlike the other manuals he read which had an air of wisdom.

“This set of moves have no moves. If you have no set moves then how will your enemies counter? If you are awesome like me than you’ll use no moves…” Ryu read on. There was a set of profound stick arts, one extremely powerful punch and kick skills, and a berserk technique. This style of fighting was made to overpower your opponent by countering any technique with superior explosive power.

“Don’t rigidly memorize but grasp the essence instead. This way you can perform endless variations of my awesome moves which in the end is no moves at all. Predict the weaknesses of your opponent and dominate those weak points….” Ryu got more and more fascinated as he read on. His concepts are similar to the Fairy Lady’s advice. I wonder what rank this set of art is.

“… The names of my awesome moves are Invincible Stick, Mega-Punch, Mega-Kick, and Superman-Mode. The end.” Ryu read the last bits of the scroll and started laughing. His naming convention was comical, he used the word awesome repeatedly to describe himself and he kept mentioning using no “moves” but calling his own skill “moves”. This was probably due to his lack of vocabulary. However one thing Ryu understood was that this style was extraordinary.

Although the stick is preferred in the Invincible Stick style, once you master it then a sword, a branch, a piece of paper or even your bare hands can all be your weapon. The Mega-Punch and Mega-Kick is a unique and simple way of launching devastating blows to an opponent. The special aspect of the two skills is how to unleash unusually high condensed Qi at the tip, magnifying the attack. The Superman-Mode is a way to use all of your Qi reservoir at once. Usually the output of your Qi is limited by the seventeen Qi channels in the body but this method is able to ignore it. Your level will rise by ten, a whole domain, for a few minutes depending on your cultivation. The amazing thing is that there is no backlash besides complete fatigue.

“Sigh, I wonder who this great senior is? He didn’t leave his name.” Ryu asked out loud.

During the next few days Ryu learned the Mega-Punch and Mega-Kick easily. The Superman-Mode was mastered instantly by Ryu since it’s just a cunning way of unleashing your Qi which Ryu just needed to know the method. The Invincible Stick style took a while and will be a learning process for Ryu. It has no moves or patterns and actually relies on superior instincts, speed and power to dominate your opponents. The Infinity Tome increases Ryu’s mental capacity many folds so processing information, finding the weakness and unleashing a devastating move all at once is actually not too hard for him. It was as if these set of moves was made for someone like Ryu.

A town finally started to emerge on the horizon and Ryu decided to take flight on a flying beast instead. This town was called Azure-Mist and was fairly similar to his very own Blazing Tempest town. Ryu decided to disguise himself a bit and went to a local salon.

“Sir, would you like a haircut?” An elderly woman with a warm smile asked. Ryu purposely chose this family owned shop because he could see that this elderly woman had a very clean Qi which reminded him of his own grandpa. Ryu’s own hair had grown just a bit past his tailbone over the three years.

“I am actually here to dye it.” Ryu responded politely. The barber complied and made small talk. She mentioned about the Talent Examination that’s happening in two days. She also mentioned how her son just gave birth to a baby boy. As she talked, Ryu noticed how feeble her hands were. She must have worked so hard to provide.

“Grandma, you seem like a nice person and you remind me of my grandpa. He would give up everything for me and in the end he got sick. You have to take care of yourself so you can see your grandson grow up.” Ryu spoke as he put his hands over hers, a small stream of warm Qi was transferred to her. This Qi went around her body, strengthening it and healing it.

Before the elderly barber can respond, Ryu had disappeared like a ghost and a small pile around fifty gold coins was beside her. This was a huge sum for commoners.

Ryu purchased a flying beast from the Maxwell Flight Service and headed towards Frost-Fire City. He was going to pay the Wang family a visit and go see his grandpa right after.

Two days later Ryu finally approached Frost-Fire City. The guide didn’t speak much during the flight since Ryu seemed to be in deep thought but he did want to explain a bizarre scene to Ryu.

“As you can see on the right. There is a huge crater and a trail of destruction leading from the Forbidden Forest. A master from the Wudang Sect did battle with some powerful monster here three years ago! Rumor has it that the battle lasted three days and three nights. In the end, the expert from Wudang managed to repel it back to the forest but was poisoned from the fight.” The guide explained and Ryu opened his eyes to see. Indeed there was an aftermath of a spectacular fight a few kilometers away from the city.

Today was the day of the Talent Examination registration. Tomorrow the actual tournament will start. Ryu tipped the guide and walked straight towards the residency part of the city. He wasn’t worried about anyone figuring out his identity due to his transformation over the past three years. He was nearing six feet tall, his body is that of a well chiseled statue, his face was prettier than that of a model’s, his voice had matured and he even dyed his hair blonde! He was getting a lot of attention from the females and a lot of jealousy from the males. Ryu made a mental note to disguise himself better next time, one with less skin showing.

“Oh my god! So handsome, is he a foreigner?” A group of teenage girls giggled as they gawked at him. Foreigners were uncommon but Britannica is on good terms with the Heaven Continent so occasionally a foreigner can be seen.

Ryu inquired the blushing girls and quickly found the Wang mansion. There were guards outside but how could they catch someone of Ryu’s caliber? Although Ryu didn’t want to admit it but utilizing the dark arts to sneak in was really useful.

“As long as I don’t use the dark art to hurt innocent people then there really isn’t any difference between good or dark arts.” Ryu spoke to himself as he wandered around the mansion unnoticed.

He found Kwong’s room and obviously it was empty during the day time. Using the newly acquired skill, Unearthing Tremor, Ryu found a secret compartment behind a bookshelf. Behind the bookshelf lies a door reinforced with some type of sturdy rock. However with Ryu’s strength, how could he not open it?

Ryu didn’t want to create too much sound, he didn’t want the servants in the mansion to be involved. He put his hand on the door and slowly melted the door with magma. This was created by his fusion of fire and earth. A hole big enough for a grown man was made in minutes. After searching around inside, Ryu found all sorts of ill-gotten gains from the Wang family. Ryu pocketed a few things into the Infinity Tome.

Ryu left the secret room and decided to hide in the shadows. Night quickly came and Kwong came in. Instantly Kwong saw the exposed room and dashed forward. However after two steps he felt a chilling object beside his neck.

“If you agree to everything I say then I’ll let you live, if not I’ll kill you right here and now.” Ryu spoke in a soft but dangerous voice. Kwong could feel Ryu’s Qi that was purposely let out and knew his opponent was also a grandmaster.

“Name your terms.” Kwong said carefully, if he acted rashly than he might not be able to keep his head.

“You may not reveal anything about me and you’ll do anything I say.” Ryu said simply.

“Okay okay, I agree!” Kwong replied and a sharp blow came from behind. Kwong fainted instantly.

By the time Kwong woke up, the sun was already rising.

“What the hell happened?” He spoke to himself as he rubbed his neck. However, the melted door to the secret compartment was right in front of him. He stared in shock, it wasn’t a dream!

He couldn’t investigate this further because today was the tournament, he had to show up as the patriarch of the Wang family, one of the three most powerful families in the city. He quickly stored all the items in the secret compartment into a storage ring and ran out.

Ryu stood outside beneath a tree and looked intently.

“He acted just like I thought he would.” Ryu said expectedly.