Embers of Sword

Chapter 376: Turbid World, Clear People

Refining Qi, building foundation, and controlling Qi.

For a genius, it doesn't take long to reach these three realms.

But for the vast majority of practitioners, even if they practice diligently and arduously, it will take ten or even dozens of years of effort.

Xie Xuanyi originally thought that "Chu Guo" would be a genius.

But he didn't expect it.

"Chu Guo" cannot even compare to the vast majority.

Behind the mountain of Taoyuan, fallen leaves are flying.

The young man held the wooden sword and chopped it hard on the wooden man, making a crisp sound.

Xie Xuanyi pushed the wheelchair and slowly came to Chu Guo's side.

"You're half an hour late... the first wooden man of the night is almost chopped down!"

Chu Guo was sweating profusely, but he stood straight.

"..."

If it were a few nights ago, Xie Xuanyi would probably have said a few words of encouragement.

But tonight, he chose to remain silent.

After thinking about it, Xie Xuanyi did not tell the boy the cruel truth.

If it were someone else, they would have probably chopped down two or three wooden dummies by now.

If compared with myself...

It's a huge difference.

When Zhao Chunyang taught himself to practice sword, he set up a hundred wooden dummies in the Lotus Peak Dojo, and he had to knock them all down within three days. Hitting the wooden dummies is a "homework" that every disciple of the Sword Palace must do. Before officially practicing Qi and slaying demons and monsters, everyone has to face such "wooden dummies".

An ordinary disciple would practice hard for six hours a day and could chop down two wooden stakes in one hour.

More talented.

In one hour, four to five wooden stakes can be chopped down.

This wooden stake may seem "ordinary", but it is actually infused with vitality and has toughness. It cannot be chopped down simply by sheer force.

It certainly didn't take Xie Xuanyi three days to knock down the one hundred wooden stakes when he was young.

He didn't even use it overnight.

He strolled through the dojo at a leisurely pace, and the entire journey took less than an hour, at which point all the wooden stakes exploded.

This news shocked the entire Dashui Sword Palace. No one could believe that a young child who had not yet started practicing vital energy could draw and strike the sword based on his intuition. Every time the sword landed, it could hit the "weak spot" of the wooden stake very accurately and shatter the meager vital energy gathered inside the stake, using the force of the opponent to counter the opponent and achieving twice the result with half the effort!
He is a natural born swordsman.

As for Chu Guo...

I don’t know how many times Xie Xuanyi has sighed in his heart these days.

Is this little guy's "royal blood" fake? Even if he was sealed by the library, he shouldn't be so miserable.

In his previous life, when he was giving lectures, he had seen many young practitioners with extraordinary talents coming to him to ask questions.

The path of spiritual practice is long, and the most taboo is to have high expectations but low skills.

Chu Guo did a very good job in this regard. He chopped stakes with a sword for several days in a row. It was extremely boring, but he didn't complain at all.

As for sword moves, sword momentum, and other things, he never asked a single question.

What does Xie Xuanyi teach?

He does what he wants.

All masters in the world like obedient disciples. Although Chu Guo is a little "stupid", Xie Xuanyi is very patient and accompanies him and keeps instructing him on his movements.

"I'll practice for two more hours tonight! I'm sure I can cut more!"

Chu Guo was full of fighting spirit.

[“Very good. Very energetic.”]

This was probably the answer Xie Xuanyi would give a few days ago.

But tonight.

He still chose to remain silent.

Tonight is different from the past -

Xie Xuanyi asked Deng Baiyi to pick him up in advance.

It wasn't because he had lost his patience.

Instead, he wanted to re-evaluate whether he should teach Chu Guo how to practice sword.

It’s been a long journey.

Xie Xuanyi had already thought over what he wanted to say in his mind many times, but thinking of what Deng Baiyi said before they parted, Xie Xuanyi decided to watch silently for a while.

This time.

No longer from the perspective of "Master".

"What’s wrong with you?"

Chu Guo felt that the atmosphere was not right.

The atmosphere in the back mountain tonight seems a little serious.

Xie Xuanyi pushed the wheelchair and came silently behind Chu Guo: "You continue."

"it is good."

Chu Guo scratched his head and continued chopping the wooden stakes.

Xie Xuanyi watched silently.

Over the years, it has become my habit to strike directly at weak points with my sword.

When Xie Xuanyi looked at people, monsters, living things, and dead things, he would only pay attention to their "weaknesses" and would always think about how to maximize the damage if he was about to draw his sword the next moment. It was precisely because of this habit that his practice of the "Law of Destruction" was extremely smooth.

At this moment, he tried to abandon the habits of these years and re-examine each of Chu Guo's swords.

Gradually, he saw something "different".

Chu Guo is a doctor.

Doctors are the people who know the body's meridians best.

Logically speaking.

Drawing the sword to chop the stake should be done very quickly.

These stakes "fabricated" by Xie Xuanyi basically conform to the physical characteristics of ordinary people. As long as you know the general meridians, you can find the weaknesses of the wooden stakes and knock them down quickly.

Every sword strike from Chu Guo indeed hit the weak point.

But it's not aimed at the "dead spot".

In the past few days, Xie Xuanyi did not teach Chu Guo any specific sword skills, but just let him play freely.

His original intention was to let Chu Guo chop the wooden stakes with all his strength according to his own ideas, so as to first understand what a "sword" is.

But look at it now.

The "kindness" brought by medical skills became Chu Guo's weakness when he used his sword.

"Why didn't you stab Lianquan with this sword?"

Xie Xuanyi looked at it for a moment and finally couldn't help but speak.

Chu Guo was stunned for a moment.

He looked at the spot where the wooden sword landed and asked, "Lian Quan?"

Xie Xuanyi said: "As a doctor, you should know... Chengjiang, Tiantu, Lianquan. Any of these three acupoints can be used to cut the throat with one sword and kill the enemy."

"I don't want to kill 'him'."

Chu Guo thought for a moment and asked slowly, "Just chop it down...why be so cruel?"

"So your sword deliberately deflected and pierced the Zhongfu acupoint."

Xie Xuanyi asked: "If you don't want to kill him, why do you draw your sword?"

"Stab the central palace, knock it down and you can save it again."

Chu Guo hesitated: "If we pierce Lianquan, I'm afraid we can't save him."

Xie Xuanyi was silent for a moment.

He said, "It's just a wooden figure."

Chu Guo gritted his teeth and said, "But I learned sword skills not just to chop down wooden men."

"You are not suitable for sword training."

Xie Xuanyi shook his head and said, "If we encounter the Pingzhi City bandit rebellion again, a sword like yours will kill you."

"I……"

Chu Guo originally wanted to say that if he encountered banditry, he would fight to the death since he had learned swordsmanship.

But this rebuttal is too pale.

If you don't stab the vital points on normal days, how can you hit them at the critical moment?

How could he not know this? He was of course aware that there was only a wooden man in front of him, but every time he was about to draw his sword, he looked at the "meridian acupoints" on the wooden man and always found it difficult to pierce the vital acupoints.

"..."

Chu Guo's silence caused the entire forest behind the mountain to fall into silence.

"If you don't want to kill people, why bother learning sword?"

Xie Xuanyi pushed the wheelchair and looked at the wooden stakes scattered all over the ground. His voice was very calm, without any anger at all.

to him.

Whether Chu Guo can learn swordsmanship is actually not important.

But at this moment.

This question sounded a bit sharp.

"Does learning swordsmanship necessarily mean killing people?"

Chu Guo also looked at the wooden stakes he had knocked down and spoke in confusion.

"of course."

Xie Xuanyi said indifferently.

He picked up a dead branch at random and swung it casually. The dead branch burst out with sword energy, and the Lianquan acupoint of the wooden man's stake cracked. The sword energy was extremely light, like the wind, but it tore open a wooden man's head with ease. After cutting it off, it rolled alone on the ground and finally rolled to Chu Guo's feet.

"I just took a look at the wooden stakes from the past few days..."

"There are seven Yang orifices and two Yin orifices. You haven't pierced any of the nine orifices."

"You don't even pierce the key meridians and important acupoints."

Xie Xuanyi pushed the wheelchair and moved among the wooden men.

It has been a long time since I practiced the most basic swordsmanship.

Over the years, he has been practicing Taoism and comprehending the great Dao!
The realm of sword energy is higher than before—

With just a dry branch, he easily chopped down all the wooden stakes on the mountain in just a few breaths.

Chu Guo looked pale.

He looked at the piles of piles in front of him, not a single one was intact.

Xie Zhen's sword is completely different from his own.

Each sword strikes directly at the vital point.

To be more precise, it only hits the vital points!
"The cultivation world is very cruel."

Xie Xuanyi lowered his eyebrows, handed the dead branch to the young man, and said, "For most practitioners, life is only once, and it cannot be regained if missed. The battle of life and death is not a joke. If you want to learn swordsmanship, you must accept these 'cold and cruel' rules. If you don't want to learn swordsmanship, perhaps being a kind-hearted doctor is also a good choice."

The people Xie Xuanyi chopped down were all wooden men.

This dead branch is not stained with blood.

But Chu Guo's hands, which were holding the dead branch, began to tremble slightly.

A few days ago.

On a sunny morning, he began to learn sword with high spirits. He said the words "I want to practice" very easily, but when he actually took the sword, he found that the wooden sword was so heavy.

Chu Guo's voice was also trembling: "But... I have never killed anyone."

these years.

He saved many people, but never killed anyone.

"You've never killed anyone, but have you never encountered someone who wants to kill you?"

Xie Xuanyi looked into the young man's eyes.

He has seen many people's eyes.

Chu Guo's eyes were very clear, but they were not the eyes that the Great Prince Chu should have.

The previous Emperor Chu had a smile in his eyes, but there was a knife hidden in his smile.

Chu Guo's sister Chu Yin's eyes seemed confused, but in fact they were full of brilliance.

A clear-minded person cannot survive in troubled times.

The reason why Chu Guo lived such a peaceful life was, on the one hand, because he was really lucky, and on the other hand, because of the care of Chen Jingxuan in the library and the supervision of the "Lord of Fire".

Chen Jingxuan did not want to reveal Chu Guo's identity directly.

presumably.

Over the years, he also learned about Chu Guo's life through the "Lord of Fire".

Being able to grow up happily in Pingzhi City is the best case scenario, but living in a turbid world, this clarity will only bring disaster.

The moment Xie Xuanyi proposed to teach swordplay, he made up his mind to break this "window paper".

"I……"

At this moment, Chu Guo suddenly thought of the scene where Pingzhi City was destroyed.

Zheng Fengsheng blocked the knife for himself.

The female sword fairy saw him off.

If it weren't for these people's efforts, would he have been killed?
He suddenly felt guilty and his eyes became evasive.

"If someone wants to kill you."

Xie Xuanyi said: "Then you should take the initiative and kill them first. Learning swordsmanship is the same as curing illness. If you can see the 'cause' of a person's illness, you should pierce the acupoints directly to make him suffer less... Killing people is the same as saving people. Both require speed, accuracy and ruthlessness."

"If you want to learn sword from me, you must accept this."

"If this place is Qianzhou, where peace is common all year round, you can learn a beautiful but useless sword technique, and perhaps go to the streets to perform and dance with swords..."

"It's a pity that this is Yuanzhou."

Xie Xuanyi said calmly: "I might as well tell you that the place you are going to in the future will only be more cruel than Yuanzhou."

A click.

The dead branches fell to the ground.

The back hill is so quiet that you can hear a pin drop.

After a long time, Chu Guo asked in a hoarse voice: "Is it possible for me... to go back to Pingzhi City?"

A young man is still a young man after all.

When the rebellion broke out in Pingzhi City, Chu Guo fled here with Lao Zheng, and a trace of delusion always remained in his heart.

Perhaps when the rebellion is quelled and peace returns to the entire Yuanzhou, he can return to his little nest in Pingzhi City.

Xie Xuanyi did not directly answer the boy's question.

Instead, he asked, "Even if I go back, will it be the same as before?"

Chu Guo understood it immediately.

Some things, just happen.

The moment of leaving Pingzhi City.

He couldn't go back.

At this moment, the delusion in his heart was almost shattered, but the young man couldn't help but continue to ask: "What if I take Lao Zheng to Qianzhou?"

"It's the same wherever you go."

Xie Xuanyi said expressionlessly, "Zheng Fengsheng's broken leg will not grow back. Whether you go to Pingzhi City or Qianzhou, you can't go back to the old days. After we meet this time, countless people will want to kill you. Even if you are a genius in swordsmanship and your progress is rapid, it will be difficult to save your life."

"To be honest, I am 'Xie Zhen' who is wanted by the Yuanzhou Iron Cavalry. Miyun is the future leader of Buddhism that the Fanyin Temple delegation is fully protecting."

"Actually, whether you learn sword or not won't affect anything..."

"The person who kills you in the future will at least be in the Yin God Realm."

“Perhaps, there is also a Yangshen cultivator standing on the top of the mountain.”

Chu Guo stared blankly at the young man sitting in the wheelchair in front of him.

Thank you really?

Even though he was just an ordinary man, he had heard of this name. There was turmoil in Li State, and people in the streets were discussing what had happened recently in Chu State. It was said that Beihai Mausoleum was destroyed and a golden age was coming. Many powerful Taoist geniuses would appear in Chu State and Li State.

And Xie Zhen was the direct disciple of the previous Dasui Sword Immortal.

Less than a year old.

He surpassed all his peers and all the same level and became the top of the list of geniuses!
This is a well-deserved genius!
Chu Guo guessed that the young man in black sitting in the wheelchair must have a very high level of cultivation.

But he didn't expect it to be so high!
"I have said everything that needs to be said..."

Xie Xuanyi spoke slowly, his voice getting slower and slower: "If learning sword means killing people... Think about it carefully, do you still want to learn sword?"

Say it.

He stopped talking and sat quietly in the wheelchair, closing his eyes and no longer looking at the boy, waiting for his response.

After a long time, a strong wind blew from the back mountain.

The dead leaves fluttered and the boy squatted down.

He picked up the dead branch, clenched it tightly, and said in a trembling voice: "I... still want to learn sword."

(End of this chapter)