Chapter 2: Earth-Shattering Howling Wolf
The most fundamental aspects of swordsmanship training are the coordination of strength and battle qi with the use of a heavy sword.
When the Black Crystal Heavy Sword was first forged, Linley, in Hess City, had used it to attack the violet-robed special executor, but he hadn’t even reached the level of properly applying strength and battle qi.
Using a heavy sword isn’t about rigidly swinging it with brute force.
Instead, it’s about conserving every bit of strength to increase the sword’s speed, while perfectly coordinating strength and battle qi with the sword’s movements.
After spending over a year, Linley finally reached the point where he could wield the Black Crystal Heavy Sword as naturally as an extension of his arm, without wasting any strength or energy. By using limited strength and battle qi, he maximized the sword’s power.
But this was only the foundation.
Beyond this first level, the second level was a realm of its own. Linley had only recently grasped it a few days ago while watching the cascading water in a mountain stream.
“Wielding a heavy weight as if it were light” sounds simple.
In essence, it’s about perfect control over battle qi and strength, much like how floodwaters are constantly dammed and accumulated. When the dam bursts, the unleashed power is terrifying.
The “Thunderclap” technique is based on this principle.
It sounds simple, but executing it requires a very solid foundation. Without perfect control over battle qi and strength, even if you understand the concept, you can’t perform this move.
“That powerful? Boss, is this the ultimate technique for using a heavy sword?” Bebe asked in surprise.
Linley smiled and shook his head. “Not even close. According to my family’s records, using heavy weapons is simply divided into three levels. The first is achieving a perfect foundation, the second is ‘wielding a heavy weight as if it were light,’ and the third is ‘momentum.’”
“Momentum?” Bebe looked confused. “What’s that?”
“I don’t know either,” Linley said, shaking his head. “After all, aside from the content of the ‘Dragonblood Codex,’ my family’s secret manual only introduces some family history and the deeds of a few ancestors. The ancestor who used the heavy hammer was described in just a few lines about his strength. The book only says the third level is ‘momentum,’ but it doesn’t explain what ‘momentum’ is in detail. So I don’t know.”
Linley didn’t understand.
Momentum—could it be aura?
But even if you have aura while holding the Black Crystal Heavy Sword, how much more power can it add to an attack?
“If you haven’t comprehended it, you just can’t understand it,” Linley said, shaking his head.
Linley was well aware that he hadn’t even perfected the “wielding a heavy weight as if it were light” level. The most important part of the “Thunderclap” technique was the burst of attack power in the final instant.
How could he maximize that burst?
For now, Linley was simply releasing his strength and battle qi all at once in a crude manner, but he knew this was the clumsiest approach.
“There are no shortcuts on the path of cultivation.” Linley smiled and stopped overthinking.
******
As deep autumn arrived, even the leaves of the ancient trees in the Mountain Range of Magical Beasts had mostly turned yellow.
It was now the deep autumn of the year 10001 of the Yulan Calendar. Linley had been in the Mountain Range of Magical Beasts for over a year and a half, yet he had only traveled about five to six thousand miles.
He focused mainly on training each day, covering only about ten miles in a day’s journey.
Late at night, in the dead silence, Linley sat cross-legged in meditation under a massive tree in the core area of the Mountain Range of Magical Beasts—a tree so large it would take four or five people to encircle it.
Gradually…
Dawn broke, and Linley opened his eyes, a smile spreading across his face.
A gentle morning breeze blew, and a few withered leaves spun slowly through the air before drifting down. Linley watched them fall in silence.
“Boss?” Bebe opened his bleary eyes and asked in confusion, “You’re awake. Why didn’t you call me?”
In truth, Bebe naturally woke up whenever Linley did. But Bebe always waited for Linley to call him before opening his eyes. Today, however, Linley hadn’t called him.
“Bebe, I think I’ve broken through,” Linley suddenly said via soul transmission.
“Broken through?” Bebe immediately scrambled to his feet and asked excitedly, “What did you break through?”
Linley smiled. “My spiritual energy has finally reached the level of an eighth-rank magus.”
“Eighth-rank magus?” Bebe exclaimed in surprise.
In fact, during the winter when he was sixteen, Linley had carved the stone sculpture “Awakening.” The ten-day, ten-night rapid growth had increased his spiritual energy tenfold, reaching the level of a mid-to-late seventh-rank magus.
That winter at sixteen, he was already at mid-to-late seventh-rank.
Now, nearly three years had passed.
During his time in Fenlai City, Linley’s spiritual energy had grown at a moderate pace. At that rate, it would have taken him five or six years to reach the eighth-rank magus level. But during his year and a half in the Mountain Range of Magical Beasts, his soul had fully merged with nature. Every carving was so perfectly attuned to the natural world.
The increase in spiritual energy was very noticeable.
Now…
Linley’s spiritual energy had finally reached the eighth-rank magus level.
“Boss, how powerful is an eighth-rank magus?” Bebe asked curiously.
“Why don’t you find out for yourself?” Linley said with a playful smile. Bebe widened his eyes and then said confidently, “Bring it on! I, Bebe, don’t even care about eighth-rank magical beasts, so why would I be afraid of an eighth-rank spell?”
Linley immediately began chanting a magical incantation.
After a moment, a large amount of earth-element energy rapidly gathered around Linley. The earth-element magical power within his body surged as well.
“Whoosh~~” A wind suddenly rose in front of Linley, sweeping up the withered leaves. Then, with a roar, a three-meter-tall, earth-yellow wolf appeared before Linley. This giant wolf stood three meters tall and was nearly ten meters long, its muscles like iron lumps, its limbs thick and powerful.
Eighth-rank earth spell—Earth Puppet: Earth-Shattering Howling Wolf!
“Roar!”
The Earth-Shattering Howling Wolf let out a furious roar and charged at Bebe. Bebe, however, stood his ground confidently, waiting for the wolf to come.
“Swoosh—” Suddenly, Bebe
erupted with a burst of earth-spike arrays.
“Whoa!” Bebe yelped and leaped into the air.
But the earth-spike arrays didn’t harm Bebe at all. By then, the Earth-Shattering Howling Wolf was upon him. Bebe let out a sharp screech and his body began to expand.
“Roar~~”
The Earth-Shattering Howling Wolf opened its massive maw and bit at Bebe. Bebe, equally enraged, bit back at the wolf. With a “crack,” Bebe cleanly bit through the wolf’s throat.
But the Earth-Shattering Howling Wolf seemed unfazed. Its sharp claws swiped directly at Bebe.
“Smack!”
Bebe was sent flying, crashing heavily into the ground and cracking the earth beneath him. He quickly scrambled to his feet, glaring angrily at the Earth-Shattering Howling Wolf. The wolf’s claws had been quite powerful.
“Bebe, this Earth-Shattering Howling Wolf isn’t a real magical beast. It’s an earth-element puppet, entirely made of magical power and elements. It has no vital points,” Linley said teasingly.
Bebe instantly understood.
For a puppet made entirely of magical power and elements, biting its throat was no different from biting its tail in terms of damage.
“Yow!”
Bebe finally got angry. He turned into a black shadow and shot toward the Earth-Shattering Howling Wolf. The wolf also opened its mouth to bite him. But Bebe dodged, and his small claws frantically slashed at the wolf. In the blink of an eye, he had clawed it nearly a hundred times, pushing its body to the brink of collapse.
“Boom!” The Earth-Shattering Howling Wolf’s body flickered with intense light and then exploded violently.
Bebe was sent flying by the blast, crashing heavily into a nearby tree and snapping it in half before landing on the ground.
“Bebe, are you okay?” Linley knew Bebe’s strength well—this level of attack couldn’t hurt him.
Bebe quickly ran back, grumbling, “Boss, that Earth-Shattering Howling Wolf’s attack power is no less than an average eighth-rank magical beast. And it has no vital points. That’s just insane. And it self-destructs when it’s about to die.”
When a puppet made of magical power and elements collapses, it naturally explodes.
As an eighth-rank dual-element magus, even in human form, Linley was a true powerhouse. Eighth-rank spells were incredibly powerful.
For example, the wind-element “Violent Tornado.” A single Violent Tornado could easily wipe out an army of thousands. Even the “Earth-Shattering Howling Wolf” alone could destroy a small military force. The wolf’s defenses were astonishing, and only a freak like Bebe could break through them so easily.
The Earth-Shattering Howling Wolf was fast, had incredible defenses, and had almost no vital points.
If placed in an army, the damage it could cause was unimaginable.
“An eighth-rank magus is more important to a nation than a ten-thousand-man army,” Linley understood this well. A ninth-rank magus was more important than a hundred-thousand-man army. As for a Saint-level archmage, they were more important than a million-strong army.
A single forbidden spell, “Storm of Destruction,” could nearly annihilate a million soldiers.
******
Linley’s elemental affinity was super-grade, so refining magical power took very little time. Combined with the “Flat Blade School” carving method, Linley didn’t need to spend much time on magical training.
Since he could dragonize, he naturally had to put extra effort into warrior training.
…
Holding the Black Crystal Heavy Sword, Linley walked across a large mountain. He casually swung the sword in all directions—chopping, slapping, smashing—each movement effortless and graceful.
But whenever the Black Crystal Heavy Sword touched a massive rock, the rock would instantly shatter.
Sometimes it broke into dozens of pieces, sometimes it exploded outright, sometimes it turned into dust…
Linley kept experimenting to see how to make the “Thunderclap” technique more powerful. He wanted to achieve greater power while using the same amount of battle qi.
“Whew.” Sensing that his Dragonblood battle qi was mostly depleted, Linley put away the Black Crystal Heavy Sword.
With a flick of his hand, the Violet Blood Soft Sword appeared.
Linley immediately leaped into the air, and the Violet Blood Soft Sword in his hand began to move gracefully. The sword’s strengths were speed and unpredictable changes.
“Pfft!”
The Violet Blood Soft Sword slashed at a small tree in the distance, but mid-swing, the entire blade trembled like a snake. With a flicker, it wrapped around the tree. A flash of violet light, and the tree was cut in two.
The Violet Blood Soft Sword vibrated and suddenly became straight.
“Whoosh.” The Violet Blood Godsword thrust forward, the sharp tip glowing with a faint black-green light. The tip easily pierced the stone wall beside it.
“Hmm?”
Linley frowned, pulled out the Violet Blood Soft Sword, and stared at it in confusion. “What’s inside this Violet Blood Soft Sword?” As he had channeled his spiritual energy into the sword to control its changes, he had suddenly sensed a chilling aura.
“Could it be?” Linley’s heart skipped a beat.
Back when he was in danger in the Radiant Temple, the Coiling Dragon Ring had released a terrifying power. This Violet Blood Soft Sword was also a divine artifact, but its power wasn’t as astonishing as Linley had imagined. He had always suspected there was some secret hidden within it.
Linley immediately focused his spiritual energy into the Violet Blood Soft Sword and carefully probed it.
In the past, before reaching the eighth-rank magus level, he had tried to probe it but found nothing. Now that he had reached the eighth-rank level…
“Huh?” Linley’s spiritual energy finally touched a faint edge.
A wild, frenzied, and violent aura directly contacted Linley’s spiritual energy. It was as if Linley saw endless blood, countless corpses, and boundless bones…
That frenzied, violent aura directly invaded Linley’s spiritual energy and then, like lightning, reversed course and seeped into Linley’s soul…
(Two chapters finished!)
Taking a Day Off
Today, I’m meeting up with some old high school classmates I haven’t seen in nearly two years. We need to catch up properly… I really can’t help it… I’ll make up for the missed chapters tomorrow and the day after.