Douluo Continent: Martial Soul - Agave, Self-created Earth God Position

A year has passed in the flow of sweat.

The four seasons of Wuhun City have cycled once.

Seasons change, but the only constant is that figure always running on the road.

A new semester has begun.

At four in the morning, before dawn, Sabo quickly washed up.

Bend over and secure the weights to your legs.

After a year of running, Saab was no longer satisfied with the simple way of running.

He started trying new methods, and now he has a 10-pound sandbag tied to each of his calves.

He also had a 10-pound weighted wrist strapped to his wrist.

The total weight was forty pounds.

For a seven-year-old child, forty pounds is equivalent to the weight of a child of the same age.

Starting today, he will carry this weight and run ten laps every day.

He started jogging.

Starting from the main gate of the college, follow the bluestone brick path at the base of the wall all the way north.

He ran this road for a whole year. 365 days a year, rain or shine.

Run when it snows, run when it rains, run when it's windy.

He knew this road as well as the lines on his palm.

There are potholes, bumps, and water accumulation on the road surface after rain.

He can speak even with his eyes closed.

First lap, warm-up.

With light steps and even breathing, his body felt like a machine that had just started up.

Each component gradually comes into operation during the movement.

On the second lap, my body started to heat up, and sweat began to seep from my forehead.

It slid down her cheek.

His breathing began to deepen, inhaling through his nose and exhaling through his mouth, the rhythm steady like a metronome.

The third lap, the fourth lap, the fifth lap... when I got to the sixth lap...

My body is only just beginning to get into the zone.

The muscle soreness disappeared, replaced by a strange sense of lightness.

It was as if the 40-pound weight had disappeared.

His steps became smoother, each step landing with a springy rhythm, like a cheetah running across the grassland.

This is one of his biggest takeaways of the year—how to run efficiently.

It's not the kind of casual running where you just start taking a step.

It is a technique that coordinates breathing, steps, center of gravity, and arm swing into a unified whole.

Sabo knew when to accelerate and when to decelerate.

When to adjust your breathing, and when to relax a particular muscle group.

As I finished the tenth lap, the sun rose in the east.

He didn't rush back to his dormitory; the strenuous exercise couldn't be stopped immediately.

This is the experience he gained through blood and sweat.

After walking slowly for about ten minutes, climbing the stairs, and returning to the dormitory, my heartbeat gradually calmed down.

I grabbed a clean set of clothes and took a shower.

After taking a shower, put on clean clothes.

I checked the time for a while; it was still early, and class wasn't until half an hour later.

Then he pulled out a chair and took out a notebook and a pen from his storage ring.

That was his diary.

Sabo turns to a new page.

"Autumn, September 11th, Douluo Calendar 2623".

"I completed 10 laps of weighted morning run, which was about half a cup of tea faster than yesterday."

"I'm in good physical condition. I'll try to increase my pace a bit more tomorrow."

"I've gained new insights about breathing techniques today."

After writing these few lines, he paused, his gaze falling on the ceiling.

My thoughts drifted back to a day four months ago.

He wasn't in good shape that day. The mimicry training he had done the previous night had drained too much of his mental energy.

I feel weak when I wake up in the morning, and I breathe much more heavily than usual when I go for a morning run.

He tried to adjust his breathing, but it didn't help much.

Then I made an attempt.

He shifted his focus from "breathing" itself to "the flow of breath within the body".

It's not simply about breathing in and out; instead, when you inhale, imagine a cool energy entering through your nasal cavity.

It enters the lungs and then disperses from the lungs into the bloodstream throughout the body.

As you exhale, imagine the waste gas in your body being expelled, while at the same time a warm feeling gathers from every corner of your body into your lungs.

This wasn't some profound skill; it was just an imaginary game he played when he was bored while running.

But that day, he suddenly discovered something that made his heart race—when he breathed in this way, his fatigue lessened.

It's not a psychological effect.

He could clearly feel that, at the same pace and over the same distance...

Using this "conscious" breathing method, his heart rate dropped by about five to ten beats per minute compared to usual.

This means his body is doing the same amount of exercise at a lower cost.

From that day on, he began to systematically study this breathing method.

It started with simple experimentation: different breathing rhythms, different depths, and different breathing ratios.

He tried a new breathing pattern every day, like conducting an experiment, and then recorded his body's response—heart rate, breathing rate, fatigue level, and recovery speed.

He filled his diary with charts and numbers, densely packed, like a record of scientific experiments.

A month later, he found a preliminary "optimal solution": a continuous, cyclical breathing rhythm.

This breathing technique improved his running efficiency by about 20%. At the same pace, he could run one or two more laps before feeling the same fatigue.

This was just the beginning; the real qualitative change occurred two months ago.

What is the essence of breathing? It is oxygen entering the blood from the lungs, and the blood then transporting the oxygen to every cell in the body.

Cells use oxygen to convert nutrients into energy—a process called aerobic metabolism.

Without oxygen, cells cannot produce energy, muscles will quickly become fatigued, and the brain will suffer from oxygen deprivation and coma.

So, what if he could influence this process by controlling his breathing?

This is not simply about "inhaling more oxygen," but rather about whether it's possible to control the body to produce more energy through a specific breathing rhythm and method.

Once the thought takes hold, it's impossible to shake it off.

Then he began a new round of experiments.

He designed a special breathing method and gave it a name: Ripple Breathing.

It's not because this breathing method has anything to do with water waves.

Rather, it's because when he breathes in this way, he can feel a ripple-like energy spreading within his body.

Starting from the lungs, it spreads outwards in circles throughout the body, like a pebble thrown into a calm lake, with ripples spreading outwards until it reaches the farthest fingertips and toes.

When Sabo first successfully used the Ripple Breathing technique, he was startled by himself.

His body began to heat up. Not the kind of heat that comes after exercise.

Rather, it is a gentle warmth that comes from within, like the warmth of winter sunshine.

The warm current started from his lungs, spread outwards along his chest cavity, flowed along his blood vessels to his limbs, to his fingertips, to his toes, and to every corner of his body.

He opened his eyes and found that his hands were glowing faintly.

Coming to my senses...

Recalling the teacher's explanation in class, soul power is the energy generated by a soul master through absorbing the spiritual energy of heaven and earth through their martial soul.

Sabo is now wondering if these two (soul power) can be considered the same type of energy.

The following is Saab's conjecture:

First, the soul power is stored in the dantian (suspected), and the meridians are blocked (suspected), making cultivation difficult.

Second, soul power (energy) should be present throughout the whole body, not just stored in the dantian? The body's cells should also have it, that is, the dantian occupies three layers, and the rest of the body outside the dantian occupies seven layers.