sinovels Chapter 3 The Empress's Comprehension
Chapter 3 The Empress's Comprehension
The next morning, Lin Fan woke up at five o'clock.
I wasn't woken up by the alarm clock, but by the scalding heat from the still slightly boiling blood and qi in my body.
He lay on the bed and felt it; the muscle soreness from yesterday's boxing practice had completely disappeared, replaced by an indescribable sense of fullness.
It's as if every muscle and every bone is filled with inexhaustible strength.
This is the effect of cultivating to the Body Refinement Realm.
The fist technique mobilizes qi and blood, which in turn tempers the body, and the body, in turn, nourishes strength.
A perfect positive cycle.
Lin Fan got out of bed, quickly washed up, grabbed his schoolbag, and went out the door.
Zhou Lan poked her head out from the kitchen: "Aren't you going to eat breakfast?"
"We'll eat when we get back!"
Lin Fan's voice was already in the hallway.
Zhou Lan stood there, holding her fried egg, stunned. She turned to Lin Jianguo, who was reading a newspaper, and asked, "What's wrong with your son these past two days? He didn't come home until midnight last night, and he ran off without even eating breakfast this morning?"
Lin Jianguo turned a page of the newspaper and said in a nonchalant tone, "It's a good thing that young people have some drive."
"What good news? I think he is..."
Before Zhou Lan could finish speaking, Lin Fan had already disappeared.
……
Jiangcheng No.1 Middle School, 5:30 a.m.
The campus was deserted, except for a few physical education students running on the playground.
Lin Fan didn't go to the teaching building, but went directly into the martial arts training hall.
At the far end of the first floor of the training hall is a force measurement room, which contains the school's only force measuring instrument that was retired from the military.
Normally, these things are monopolized by the top students in martial arts; students like Lin Fan, who are at the bottom of the class, don't even get a turn in line.
But at this time, the force testing room is empty.
Lin Fan pushed the door open and went in, then closed it behind him.
The force gauge is a metal device about half the height of a person, with a thick force plate on the front and a display screen on top.
The items retired from the military are sturdy and durable, and are said to be able to withstand impacts of up to 5,000 jin (2,500 kg).
Lin Fan stood in front of the force measuring instrument and took a deep breath.
He estimated that he gained about 50 kilograms last night.
But an estimate is still an estimate.
Data is the only true measure.
He lowered his waist and sat on his hips, clenching his right fist.
Without using any specific technique, just the most basic punch, mobilizing the power of the whole body, twisting the waist, extending the shoulder, and throwing the punch—
boom!
The fist slammed into the load-bearing plate, and the metal plate emitted a dull thud.
The numbers on the display screen flickered.
330 pounds.
Lin Fan's eyelids twitched.
He remembered clearly that during the last martial arts assessment, he scored exactly 300 jin on this force measuring instrument.
Now, a normal punch can deliver 330 pounds of force.
I gained 30 pounds.
His estimate last night was that he had gained about 50 kilograms.
In other words...
"Returning Mountain Fist".
Lin Fan muttered a sentence under his breath, his eyes sharpening.
He took a half step back, lowered his center of gravity, and clenched his right fist at his waist.
The first level of Returning Mountain Fist, starting stance.
The energy rises from the Yongquan acupoint on the sole of the foot, travels up the spine, passes the shoulder blade, reaches the arm, and ends at the fist.
The path of qi and blood circulation clearly appeared in his mind, like a lit river, with each node radiating heat.
Then--
He threw a punch.
boom!
The load-bearing plate trembled violently, emitting an even deeper sound than before.
The numbers on the display screen jumped rapidly before finally freezing.
355 pounds.
Lin Fan stared at the number, his breathing becoming slightly rapid.
The first level of the Returning Mountain Fist technique can deliver a punch that weighs 355 jin (approximately 177 catties).
It increased by 25 jin compared to a normal punch.
Keep in mind that this was a boxing technique he had only learned last night, and after just an hour and a half of practice, he was already able to amplify its power to this extent.
"Again."
He didn't stop and continued throwing punches.
The second punch.
357 pounds.
The third punch.
366 pounds.
The fourth punch.
363 pounds.
The fifth punch—
Lin Fan pushed his internal energy and blood to the limit. The energy flow of the Returning Mountain Fist was so familiar to him that it was like a well-trodden path he had walked countless times.
His blood and qi surged like a river bursting its banks, and his fist pierced the air with a sharp whistling sound.
boom!
The load-bearing plate trembled violently, and a dull metallic vibration echoed throughout the entire force measurement chamber.
The numbers on the display jumped several times before finally stopping.
370 pounds.
Lin Fan withdrew his fist and stood up straight.
370 pounds.
Before last night, his maximum strength was 300 jin (150 catties).
In one night, I gained 70 pounds.
And this was only the result of him practicing the Returning Mountain Fist for less than two hours.
If you can master the second level of the Returning Mountain Fist, your fist technique will increase even more, and your strength will grow even faster.
500 pounds?
Lin Fan looked at the numbers on the force gauge, and the corners of his mouth slowly curled up.
500 jin is no longer a suitable target.
His goal is—
1000 pounds.
No, even higher.
Lin Fan turned off the force measuring instrument, pushed open the door, and walked out of the force measuring room.
The sky outside was already beginning to lighten, and more and more people were doing their morning exercises on the playground.
He glanced back at the force gauge, memorizing the data from this morning.
370 pounds.
Just a start.
……
7:30 a.m., in the classroom.
Lin Fan sat in his seat, opened his liberal arts textbook, but his mind was filled with the content of the second level of the Returning Mountain Fist.
He finished reading the whole book last night and has mastered the first level, but he hasn't had a chance to try the second level yet.
According to the book, the second level of Huishanquan emphasizes "the fist posture is like a mountain," which is no longer simply about accumulating strength, but about integrating one's own qi and blood into the fist technique.
With a single punch, the opponent feels as if they are being crushed by a mountain.
This requires a higher level of control over Qi and blood.
With his current Body Refinement Realm cultivation, he would probably need to hone his skills for a few more days to master the second level.
But it's okay.
There is still one month left.
enough.
Good morning.
A crisp sound rang out from the side.
Lin Fan turned his head, and Zhao Xiaoyue walked in with her schoolbag on her back and sat down next to him.
She was wearing her school uniform today, and her hair was still tied in a high ponytail, revealing her smooth forehead and slender neck.
"Good morning," Lin Fan replied.
Zhao Xiaoyue looked him over carefully, then suddenly smiled: "You look great today, much more energetic than yesterday."
At the banquet at her house yesterday, Lin Fan didn't seem to mind on the surface, but she could sense that the other person was in low spirits.
But today is different.
The Lin Fan in front of her had a light in his eyes that she had never seen before.
It wasn't the kind of hyped-up excitement, but rather a calm, unwavering confidence.
"Maybe I slept well last night," Lin Fan casually offered an excuse.
However, he knew in his heart that he was able to change so much thanks to Zhao Xiaoyue.
To be precise, it was thanks to the Bodhi seed on Zhao Xiaoyue's wrist.
If it weren't for that Bodhi seed that opened his martial soul's eyes, he would still be a useless person who couldn't even understand the first page of the Returning Mountain Fist.
Thinking of this, Lin Fan's gaze involuntarily fell on Zhao Xiaoyue's wrist.
The silver bracelet is still there.
The bodhi seeds glowed with a faint golden light in the morning light, the patterns on their surface still layered upon each other, but the gold seemed to have faded a little compared to yesterday.
The change was so subtle that he wouldn't have noticed it at all if his perception hadn't been greatly enhanced.
"Um..." Lin Fan hesitated for a moment before speaking, "May I take another look at your bracelet?"
Zhao Xiaoyue blinked and generously extended her arm: "Here you go."
Lin Fan reached out his hand, his fingertips touching the Bodhi seed once again.
A cool touch.
There was nothing else.
There was no mind-blowing sensation like yesterday, no tremor as my martial soul opened its eyes, and no changes in my body.
The Bodhi seed lay quietly on his fingertip, like an ordinary bead.
Lin Fan withdrew his hand and sighed inwardly.
really.
When he first touched the Bodhi seed yesterday, he clearly saw a faint golden light on the Bodhi seed enter his body.
If I'm not mistaken, it must be some kind of energy contained within the Bodhi seed.
That energy awakened his martial spirit.
But this was a one-time thing.
It's been completely drained.
"What's wrong?" Zhao Xiaoyue noticed his strange expression.
"It's nothing," Lin Fan shook his head. "I just think this bead is quite pretty."
Zhao Xiaoyue withdrew her hand, looked down at the bodhi seed, and muttered, "Why does it seem a little lighter in color than yesterday..."
Lin Fan's heart skipped a beat.
Did Zhao Xiaoyue notice it too?
That means it wasn't his imagination.
The power of the Bodhi seed was indeed absorbed by his martial spirit.
What grade is his martial spirit that it can absorb the energy from the Bodhi seed?
Moreover, after absorbing it, he only opened his eyes briefly before closing them again.
It's like a giant who has been starving for three years and has only eaten one grain of rice.
Far from enough.
Lin Fan pulled himself out of his thoughts and suppressed the question in his heart.
His cultivation level is too low and his knowledge too limited, so he has no way of figuring out the secrets of his martial spirit.
We can only take it one step at a time.
If given the chance, try finding some similar treasures to see if you can change your martial spirit again.
……
The school bell rang.
The first two periods are humanities classes: Chinese and history.
Lin Fan listened with ease.
He already had a solid foundation in humanities, and now that his martial spirit has awakened, he feels that his memory and comprehension have also improved considerably.
He can remember 70-80% of what the teacher says after listening to it once, and he can master it completely after a little review.
However, liberal arts was only a backup option for him.
What's truly important is military science.
The third lesson was on martial arts theory.
The martial arts instructor was named Zhang Heng, in his forties, a level-one martial artist. He had served in the military in his youth and had a scar on his face that ran diagonally from his brow bone to his jaw.
It is said to have been torn apart by the claws of a third-tier demonic beast.
When Zhang Heng walked into the classroom, the previously noisy classroom instantly fell silent.
He stood on the podium, his gaze sweeping across the class, lingering on Lin Fan for a moment before looking away.
"Today we'll discuss the third level of the Returning Mountain Fist."
Upon hearing this, a collective gasp filled the classroom.
The third level of the Returning Mountain Fist.
The mountain winds back nine times.
With a single punch, nine layers of force were superimposed, making its power comparable to a Xuan-level martial art.
No one in the entire senior year of Jiangcheng No.1 High School could master it.
Let alone mastering it, very few people can even understand it.
Ignoring the students' reactions, Zhang Heng picked up a piece of chalk and drew a complex diagram of the human body's meridians on the blackboard, marking more than a dozen key nodes in the circulation of Qi and blood.
"The core of the third level of the Returning Mountain Fist lies in the word 'overlap'."
The first layer is the superposition of three layers of force; the second layer is the superposition of fist techniques and the power of qi and blood; the third layer is the complete fusion of nine layers of force and fist techniques.
"To achieve this, your control over your Qi and blood must reach a level of subtlety."
"What is microscopic perception? It means that you can clearly perceive the speed, flow rate, and direction of Qi and blood in every meridian in your body, and you can precisely control them."
"If you can't do that, don't even think about the third level."
Zhang Heng's voice wasn't loud, but every word struck the students' hearts like a heavy hammer.
Zhao Xiaoyue frowned deeply.
Her martial soul is the Ice Phoenix Feather, a high-grade Xuan-level weapon. Her talent ranks among the top three in her class, and she has already reached the threshold of the second level of the Returning Mountain Fist.
But she still found it very difficult to understand the third part of Zhang Heng's explanation.
The relationships between Qi and blood at those meridian nodes, the control of the time difference in the superposition of force, the techniques for integrating fist techniques with Qi and blood... each of these is like looking through a layer of fog, vague and indistinct, only vaguely understood.
She secretly glanced at Sun Hao sitting in front of her.
Sun Hao's expression wasn't much better.
His brows were furrowed, his lips were pressed into a thin line, and he scribbled a few strokes on his notebook before stopping, clearly also confused.
In fact, apart from Zhang Heng's voice, the entire classroom was so quiet you could hear a pin drop.
No one dared to say they understood.
Except for one person.
Lin Fan.
He sat up straight, his gaze fixed on the meridian diagram on the blackboard, his ears listening to Zhang Heng's explanation, while his mind raced.
"The key to the superposition of nine layers of power lies not in the magnitude of the force, but in the rhythm."
"The interval between each force must be precise to the millisecond level. If it's too fast, the forces will cancel each other out; if it's too slow, it's just nine ordinary punches."
"And what controls this rhythm is the change in the flow rate of Qi and blood in the meridians."
"At the moment of throwing a punch, you should let your Qi and blood flow through your meridians in the form of waves, with each wave corresponding to a layer of force..."
Lin Fan heard every single word Zhang Heng said clearly.
It wasn't the kind of clarity that you could barely keep up with, but rather a kind of... sudden enlightenment and clarity.
It's as if Zhang Heng isn't introducing new knowledge, but rather helping him organize something he already knows.
All the key points, difficulties, and techniques of the third level of the Returning Mountain Fist were automatically disassembled, reassembled, and integrated in his mind.
He could even find that some parts of Zhang Heng's explanation... seemed inaccurate.
For example, Zhang Heng said that the intervals between the nine levels of force should be completely consistent.
But Lin Fan intuitively felt that the ninth layer of force, as the final explosive point, should have a slightly longer interval so that all the potential energy accumulated from the previous eight layers of force could be released.
The moment this thought popped into Lin Fan's head, he was startled.
Is he questioning the explanation given by a martial artist at the Earth level?
But that intuition was too strong.
It was so intense that he couldn't ignore it.
Lin Fan took a deep breath, suppressed the shock in his heart, and continued listening to the lecture.
Zhang Heng lectured for an entire period of time.
From the route of Qi and blood circulation to the rhythm of force accumulation, from the method of condensing the fist posture to the application skills in actual combat, the third level of Huishanquan is broken down in great detail.
When the bell rang, Zhang Heng put down the chalk and dusted off his hands.
"I know most of you don't understand."
His tone was calm, without any sarcasm; he was simply stating a fact.
"The third level of the Returning Mountain Fist wasn't originally meant for you to practice right now. It's something that only those at the peak of the Body Refinement Realm or even the Qi Condensation Realm can access."
"But why should I still speak?"
Zhang Heng's gaze swept across the entire class.
"Because I want you to know how wide and deep the path of martial arts is. What you see and learn now is just the tip of the iceberg."
"Understand as much as you can, but it's okay if you don't. Keep today's confusion in mind, and you will naturally understand when you reach a higher level."
After saying that, he picked up his lesson plan and left the classroom.
The classroom was quiet for a few seconds, then as if a spell had been lifted, it erupted into chaos.
"My goodness, is Teacher Zhang teaching some kind of cryptic script today?"
"Nine layers of power combined, I haven't even mastered three layers yet."
"Let alone the third level, I haven't even fully understood the second level yet."
"Zhao Xiaoyue, did you understand?" someone asked Zhao Xiaoyue.
Zhao Xiaoyue shook her head with a wry smile: "I understood part of it, but most of it is still confusing."
"If even you can't understand, then we have no chance at all."
"Sun Hao, what about you?"
Sun Hao leaned back in his chair, his face looking rather pale.
He didn't really understand much.
He has already mastered the second level of the Returning Mountain Fist, making him a unique figure in the class.
But he probably only understood about 30% of the third part of Zhang Heng's talk today.
This made him somewhat irritable.
But then I thought about it again, and even Zhao Xiaoyue didn't understand, let alone the others.
He subconsciously turned his head to glance in Lin Fan's direction.
Then he frowned.
Lin Fan was sitting in his seat, his expression calm, with even a faint smile on his lips.
What is this kid laughing at?
Sun Hao sneered.
Pretend.
How can a useless person who can't even master the first level of the Returning Mountain Fist laugh while listening to the content of the third level?
I guess they couldn't understand it at all, so they just let their minds wander.
Sun Hao withdrew his gaze, too lazy to look at him again.
Lin Fan was indeed smiling.
It wasn't because he couldn't understand the explanation, but because he understood it all.
Not only did he understand it, he even felt that Zhang Heng's explanation was... a bit too simple.
The idea struck him as absurd.
But he couldn't fool himself.
He truly understood everything in the third level of the Returning Mountain Fist.
The difficulties that made Zhao Xiaoyue, Sun Hao, and others frown were as clear and obvious to him as 1+1=2.
This is no longer a difference in talent.
This is... a crushing defeat on the level of comprehension.
Lin Fan lowered his head and looked at his palm.
After his martial spirit awakened, he changed not only his strength, but also his understanding of martial arts.
Or rather—
Comprehension.
He could now be certain that his comprehension far surpassed that of the geniuses in his class.