"Hong Fu started blowing the virtues of the Tiger Form again."
Lu Chenzhou had gotten used to it, finding Hong Fu quite endearing—like an old child who would never grow up, with an innocent’s heart for Martial Arts and serious dedication to it.
After two hours of strenuous practice, he had still not achieved a beginner’s understanding.
But Hong Fu wasn’t disappointed.
This was a first-class Martial Arts technique. For someone of Lu Chenzhou’s age, to master it in two hours? That would only happen to a thousand-year-old monster reincarnated from a novel!
In the evening’s Heavenly Pile Class.
Lu Chenzhou learned the Pile Skill for the twelfth acupoint, known as the "Spirit Acupoint." It was another important spot, which could calm the mind and aid in concentration. Yu Zheng said that for improving the spiritual power and willpower of those practicing Martial Arts, this "spirit" aspect played a significant role. It even had a certain restraining effect against the erosion of one’s mental will by Void Things.
"Dragon and Tiger Heavenly Pile: Twelfth Acupoint (1%)."
"I’ll aim to unlock the acupoints within forty days."
Having set this plan, Lu Chenzhou immersed himself heart and soul in the Heavenly Pile Cultivation, which others found monotonous and tedious—even Grandmaster Wang complained about how bitter and tiring it was.
Shi Ruyu’s match had also concluded, ending in the top 16. Even so, the foundation award for the youth category was quite generous; she received three vials of Bright God №1 Medicine.
In the Martial Arts Room.
Hong Fu’s punches hit the iron pile with a solid force, each strike faintly accompanied by the sound of a tiger’s roar, as if a fierce tiger had possessed him, achieving a fusion between human and tiger!
He finished his set and stood firm, exhaling a long breath.
The iron pile bore the marks of claws and punches, scarred all over.
"See that? That’s ’Inviting Tiger to Possess.’ It involves borrowing the mysterious power from the acupoint and controlling it with one’s own essence, breath, and spirit—this is... the new era of invoking the divine!"
Hong Fu’s gaze was fierce, staring at Lu Chenzhou like a tiger.
"New era of invoking the divine..."
Lu Chenzhou pondered over the term Hong Fu had concocted.
It did make some sense.
After three days of Cultivation and through their joint efforts, he had finally grasped some tricks. He concentrated, used his breath to control his saliva, and directed his attention downward from his mouth, using this momentum to successfully sense the acupoints.
Feeling a faint awakening of some power within him, Lu Chenzhou began his stance and started practicing the first move of the fist form, "Sleeping Tiger Awakening." He began striking the iron pile. With his current level of Cultivation, his punches were moderate enough not to injure his hands, which meant he could progress from wooden piles to iron piles. His body was no longer fragile from long-term Cross Training.
The dull sound of metal being struck echoed as Lu Chenzhou executed the second move, "Leading Tiger Down the Mountain," the third, "Inviting Tiger to Possess,"...up to the tenth, "Tiger God Descending," the eleventh, "Tiger God Demonic," and the twelfth, "Tiger God Returns!"
After a complete set, Lu Chenzhou finished and stood firm. That invisible force seemed to retreat back into the acupoint, lying dormant like a sleeping tiger.
"So this is what ’invoking the divine’ truly means!"
He recalled the ancient saying: "There are thirty-six thousand gods in the human body."
Why do humans need to believe in gods that are elusive and insubstantial? There are deities within the human body; Martial Arts is the process of uncovering the body’s potential and allowing the inner deities to shine brightly.
Seeing that Lu Chenzhou seemed to have realized something, Hong Fu smiled and said,
"The mystery of the acupoints is something you’ve only just begun to glimpse."
Lu Chenzhou glanced at the Martial Arts Tree and nodded,
"Teacher, I think I’ve reached the beginner level."
Hong Fu suddenly said with a touch of melancholy,
"That’s good, a beginner in three days; faster than I was. I’m ashamed to admit, but your comprehension of Martial Arts is superior to mine, your future achievements may even surpass mine."
Heaven have mercy, he had taken half a month back then.
He was of intermediate root bone quality, and his comprehension was not bad either; if he were in today’s high second-level class, he would be at the level of the four main officers... It just goes to show that the new waves of the Yangtze River push the old ones forward.
"Teacher, I’m heading back now."
Lu Chenzhou’s voice pulled him back from his thoughts.
Hong Fu said earnestly,
"Give it your all, and let the teacher see where your limit is! See where the limit of the Tiger Form is. When you get to the university, you must suppress all the other hundred forms!"
Lu Chenzhou looked back and declared,
"Tiger Form, invincible!"
This was not flattery for Hong Fu.
It was a bold and confident assertion from his heart.
The Tiger Form must possess the spirit of invincibility!
The night was clear, the stars sparse, at nine o’clock.
The students gradually returned to their dormitories, either practicing martial arts or playing on their phones, while Lu Chenzhou completed another set of punches on the training ground, looking somewhat stiff and unfamiliar.
[Tiger Spirit Divine Fist: Beginner (2%)→Beginner (3%)]
"If it were a second-class martial art, with my current training intensity, I could improve the proficiency by at least 10% per day. The Tiger Spirit Divine Fist is only at 3%, which means it would only become proficient in a month."
If he knew the pace of progression Wang Caiying and Wang He had with first-class martial arts, he would not lament about his slow progress. Even for a Martial Artist, mastering a first-class martial art from beginner to perfection is not an overnight feat. Follow current novels on noveⅼfire.net
On the beautiful shores of Stone Lake, the original sign of Stone Lake University had been taken down. After nearly a year of construction and renovation, a new university was inaugurated.
Dragon City Martial Arts University, Su City branch.
As a top Martial Arts School, in addition to the affiliated high schools in more than ten major cities across Da Xia, Dragon City Martial Arts University also has five main campuses located in Dragon City headquarters, Changping branch, Central Plains branch, Qinggang branch, and Stone City branch, spreading across the mountains and rivers of four provinces.
Of course, it now has six campuses.
During this time, Martial Artists with powerful auras came and went from Dragon City Martial Arts University, and even the news mentioned that four mysterious grandmasters had come to Su City.
The other four branches each had only one grandmaster. With four grandmasters, the status of the Su City branch went without saying. Just like the branch of Daoist Science and Technology, the Su City branch would become an important front for Dragon City Martial Arts University to expand and develop in the south. If successful, it might even be able to compete with Galaxy Martial University, the leading of the Tianxia’s top nine universities, in the future.
Another major piece of news came through. The Breakthrough Fifth Constraint, a Great Grandmaster from Jin territory who was a permanent fixture there, [Three Extremes Saint Hand·Wang Changming] met with the president of Pingjiang Martial Arts University, [Cold Mountain Elder·Zhang Jizhi], at the Su City Martial Arts Association to discuss and plan together.
Su City enjoys an advantageous geographical location and has been an economic hub since ancient times. Unfortunately, even though it ranks among the top ten cities in terms of economic strength, its martial arts have always been second-class, with Zhang Jizhi being the only native Breakthrough Fifth Constraint.
The Taihu Virtual Calamity posed both a crisis and an opportunity for Su City. Based on the strategy of transferring martial strength from the North Martial to the South, the Da Xia government was determined to build Su City into a new Martial Arts metropolis.
The publicly available information conveyed through their conversation, released by the Martial Arts Association, caused a chain reaction that shook Su City.
As usual, the most astute were the real estate speculators.
They felt that the opportunity for Su City’s housing prices to rise had come. The houses around Stone Lake were particularly expected to see a significant price increase, with many seeking friends and agents to introduce them to property listings.
These days, the residents of Stone Lake Garden felt like it was the New Year – they knew that Lu Guoping’s house had always been vacant, and many people called the old couple to inquire whether they wanted to sell their modest old house, with the highest offer going up to thirty thousand per square meter.
Last year, the price here once fell below twenty thousand.
An 80-square-meter property rights area in the house, that’s 2.4 million yuan.
The old couple called Lu Chenzhou.
"Son, do you want to sell?"
Lu Chenzhou’s tone was very firm.
As a student about to enter Dragon City Martial Arts University, he had recently heard some rumors in high school. Driven by Dragon City Martial Arts University, the Su City government was likely to implement a unified plan for several residential areas around Stone Lake, in tandem with attracting enterprise funds to cooperate with the government to renovate old and dilapidated buildings, creating a Martial Arts University industrial area around Stone Lake.
The goal of the Su City government was simple: to follow the Fangshan model, attract more top Martial Universities to open branches here, and rapidly strengthen Su City’s martial arts prowess.
In a word, his family’s home might be slated for demolition.