Chapter 3: Divine Abilities
The pharmacist had his own idea and said, "Give him spirit blood, lots of it, force it down his throat! Every dose of spirit blood can improve his physique a little. If he drinks enough, even if it doesn't awaken a spirit body, his physical constitution will definitely surpass any spirit body!"
"One punch to kill a dragon."
The village chief laughed. "That'll surely scare the bastards outside the Great Wasteland."
The two exchanged smiles. The pharmacist left the room and closed the door behind him.
The next day, the villagers brought in a few more Ironbone Tigers, Azure Serpents, Thunderbirds, and Golden Turtles. These old men and women had a goal and were full of energy, but they provoked the pharmacist's anger: "Making him drink too much spirit blood at once will burst him!"
The mute blacksmith, dragging two Thunderbirds, grinned with a hoarse laugh, his mouth empty of a tongue.
"Little Mu can handle it!" Grandma Si was full of confidence in Qin Mu.
The pharmacist shot them a glare, said nothing more, and took out insect eggs to continue refining blood, but trouble still arose. This batch of Four Spirit Blood was a bit too much. After Qin Mu drank it, his body swelled up like it was being inflated, making the old folks tense with worry, afraid he might explode with a bang.
The pharmacist took out several hollow silver needles and inserted them into Qin Mu's back and crown of his head. Streams of red, blue, and purple gas hissed out from the needle holes.
After a while, the needles stopped venting gas. The pharmacist removed them and glared at the old folks again. "Step by step, one thing at a time. You want to fatten him up in one go and burst him instead! He's still bloated now, so you all have work to do. Butcher, practice knives with him later. Horse Ye, practice fists with him. Cripple, you practice legs with him. Help him digest it."
"Little Mu, time to practice knives!"
The Butcher supported himself on his hands, leaped up, and landed on a single wooden stake. He had no lower body; his upper half stood upright on the stake, about the same height as Qin Mu.
The Butcher gripped two butcher knives, different from ordinary ones. Ordinary butcher knives were less than a foot long, with round wooden handles and crescent-shaped blades, like a moon with three-quarters cut away.
But the Butcher's knives looked similar but were much larger—three feet two inches long, thick-backed, thin-bladed, polished to a gleaming shine. The two knives together formed an arched door, terrifyingly huge.
Qin Mu's butcher knife was the same size, but he only had one, weighing about twenty pounds. Normally, the youth could only lift one knife, but since taking the Four Spirit Blood, his strength had greatly increased, and he could lift the butcher knife with one hand without feeling its weight.
"Grandpa Butcher, watch out!"
Qin Mu charged at the Butcher on the stake, holding the knife with one hand. The Butcher laughed heartily, his half-body still exuding boldness.
Night Battle Across the City in Wind and Rain!
Qin Mu's single knife flipped up and down as he moved, slashing at the Butcher. The blade light grew faster, the wind howling, merging into a continuous blur.
"Slow, slow, you're too slow!"
The Butcher shouted wildly, his twin knives flipping like rain, clanging impacts like a storm beating on pear blossoms. "Faster! Faster! Your butcher knife can go even faster! The move Night Battle Across the City in Wind and Rain is all about speed—the knife must be as fast as wind and rain in the dark night, sweeping across the entire city! Give me more speed!"
The blade light quickened, like three silver dragons weaving around the wooden stake, the wind growing louder. Sharp knife qi mixed with the wind, and when it hit the ground, deep marks suddenly appeared everywhere.
Those were knife scars.
"Good, that's the speed! The faster your knife, the stronger your knife qi. But you're not fast enough yet. You need to be so fast that your knife intent burns like fire, blazing and blazing!"
The Butcher went wild, his hands dancing with the knives, dazzling Qin Mu. "Burn! Burn! Let your knife burn, let your qi burn, let your spirit burn! After burning comes divine ability!"
Whoosh—
His knife sliced through the air, friction igniting it with a roar. The two knives became like fire dragons weaving back and forth, their momentum growing more and more astonishing.
The fire dragons lunged straight at Qin Mu, who had no way to block them. Suddenly, the two fire dragons shot into the sky, tearing through the darkness above the Crippled Elder Village, an awe-inspiring sight.
Qin Mu was stunned. The Butcher's knives were terrifying.
Above the village, darkness surged in, swallowing the fire dragons, blade light, and knife qi.
The darkness seemed alive, angered by the Butcher's knife cutting toward it. An oppressive blackness pressed down on the village, as if to devour it.
But the light from the stone statues at the four corners of the village brightened slightly, forcing the darkness back.
"Damn sky!"
The Butcher stood on the stake, holding his knives, shouting up at the sky, half-mad: "One day, I'll split this darkness and fight my way back! They cut off my waist and took my legs, but not my head! I'll kill—"
"Grandpa Butcher is crazy again. But his knife is so fast—he's turned his blade technique into a divine ability. When will I be able to practice as fast as him?"
Qin Mu looked at the mad Butcher with admiration, put down his butcher knife, and went to find One-Armed Horse Ye.
"The Butcher's knife must cut out flames to become a divine ability, while my fist must strike with thunder to become one!"
Horse Ye looked serious, his one arm clenched into a fist, bones crackling. Calmly, he said, "Little Mu, when you can hold lightning in your hand, your fist will have achieved something. The Butcher's knife is fast, but my fist breaks the limits of sound and air, unleashing unparalleled power! One hand can also practice boxing; one hand is a thousand hands. One hand can also produce thunder and lightning!"
Boom—
A muffled thunderclap came from Horse Ye's punch, like a thunderbolt exploding.
Boom, boom, boom!
A series of thunderclaps followed. Qin Mu could barely track Horse Ye's punching speed with his eyes. The afterimages made it seem like One-Armed Horse Ye had grown a thousand arms instead of one.
Horse Ye's fists grew faster, and those thousand arms held lightning in their palms, crackling with electric light. Each strike boomed with thunder, sparks flying everywhere!
"This is the Thousand-Handed Buddha among the Eight Thunder Sound Forms! As long as your fist is faster than sound, you can control thunder. Every punch and palm can destroy your opponent's soul and body, sending them into endless calamity, never to be reborn!"
Horse Ye withdrew his fist and said solemnly, "Attack me with the Eight Thunder Sound Forms I taught you. Produce thunder, hold lightning, control thunder!"
Qin Mu steadied himself. Today, the skills Horse Ye and Grandpa Butcher taught him were different from before. They had always taught him knife and fist techniques, but this time, they both mentioned a word.
Divine ability!
The term was unfamiliar; he was hearing it for the first time.
Qin Mu executed the Eight Thunder Sound Forms and attacked Horse Ye. Despite having only one arm, Horse Ye effortlessly blocked every move Qin Mu made, without any strain.
Unlike the Butcher, who seemed mad but always controlled his strikes with Qin Mu, never hurting him, Horse Ye showed no mercy. Whenever Qin Mu's moves had a flaw, Horse Ye would punch him. Though the punches weren't heavy, Qin Mu was soon bruised and swollen.
Only when Qin Mu couldn't continue did Horse Ye let him rest.
"Legs are the wind, the earth, the root of strength."
The Cripple leaned on his crutch. He had only one leg, but he was the one teaching Qin Mu leg techniques. Previously, Qin Mu thought the most normal person in the village was Grandpa Cripple, always smiling honestly, giving a very reliable feeling.
But ever since the Cripple, smiling honestly by the river, stabbed the woman who crawled out of the cowhide to death, Qin Mu wasn't so sure anymore.
The Cripple's smile was a smile hiding a knife. No one knew if it was real or fake.
He smiled at Qin Mu and said, "Little Mu, the Butcher boasts about his knife, Horse Ye boasts about his fist, but the true divine ability is in the legs. Can't cut down the enemy, can't beat them? What do you do? Run, of course! Life is the most important thing! Life isn't just about poetry and distant places; there's also survival! So living is victory! As long as you run fast enough, you can sprint on walls, on water, even in the sky! Run fast enough, and everything becomes flat ground—flames and air are flat ground! When you run so fast that sound can't catch up from behind your ears, then you've initially mastered the divine ability of leg techniques. Little Mu, come, step onto the iron ingot."