Star-Transferring Blood Art!

Central Park, East Sea City.

The afternoon sun fell lazily across the chessboard, casting the Chu River and Han Border in sharp relief.

Chen Ping held a cannon between his fingers, feinted a few times in the air, then brought it down hard with a crisp clack.

"Check!"

His old chess companion across the board scratched his head with a miserable look. After a long while, he managed to squeeze out, "Old Chen, your style of play is getting more and more overbearing."

Chen Ping hummed a tune smugly, picked up the thermos beside him, and took a sip of hot tea. He felt comfortable all over.

Just then, the voices of several young people on a nearby bench drifted over on the wind.

"Holy crap! Did you see the top story on the Federation Education Network? A god has appeared in our East Sea City!"

"Who? You mean that guy named Chen Fan, right? Jiangnan No. 1 High School recruited him directly! Holy moly, is he even human?"

"Exactly! How long has it been since anyone from East Sea City got into Jiangnan No. 1 High School? Who would've thought a monster would appear this year!"

The name "Chen Fan" pierced Chen Ping's eardrums like an invisible needle.

His hand, holding a chess piece, paused slightly in midair.

East Sea City... Martial Dao elementary school... Chen Fan?

The thought had barely surfaced before he shook his head and laughed at himself.

Absurd.

His grandson was only eight years old, after all. How could he possibly take part in a top-level exam meant for graduating students?

The Federation's population was well over a hundred billion. There were plenty of people with the same name.

The person in the news had to be some outstanding prospect in a graduating class.

At that thought, an indescribable ache and pity welled up in Chen Ping's heart instead.

He could almost imagine how disappointed his somewhat withdrawn grandson would feel if he heard the news and saw another Chen Fan shining so brightly.

No.

Chen Ping resolved that when he got home, he wouldn't mention a single word about this genius Chen Fan.

He had to protect Little Fan's sensitive, fragile heart.

That evening, the lights in the old house were warm and tranquil.

Chen Ping had prepared four dishes and a soup for dinner, placing the Sweet and Sour Pork right in the middle.

"Little Fan, Grandma Wang's cat from next door snuck into our yard to steal dried fish again today. I chased it away with a broom, and that rascal ran faster than a rabbit!"

"Oh, and that orchid you planted looks like it's about to bloom. The buds are nice and plump. They're really pretty."

The old man chatted on and on, never mentioning a word about school or the news, carefully building a safe harbor out of these little everyday matters.

Chen Fan ate quietly, listening to his grandfather.

With an adult's soul, how could he fail to see the old man's deliberate avoidance, or the love and concern he couldn't hide deep in his eyes?

A warm current flowed through his heart.

He chose to remain silent as well.

Explaining what had happened to him—things enough to overturn an ordinary old man's worldview—would do no good except to frighten him and cause him endless worry.

And so, under this curious misunderstanding, grandfather and grandson reached an unspoken understanding: one concealed the truth out of love, while the other silently went along out of consideration.

Night deepened.

Chen Fan returned to his room and shut the door. The calm in his eyes gave way to a sharp glint.

He sat cross-legged and began to take stock of the strength he had gained at a furious pace over the past six months.

Qi and Blood surged through his body like mercury, but that invisible barrier remained as sturdy as divine iron.

He knew he was only one step away from becoming a true martial artist—the last and most crucial step.

The next day, in the principal's office.

Li Guangming sent everyone else away and locked the office door from the inside.

From a special safe requiring three layers of password verification, he took out a palm-sized jade slip made entirely of an unknown metal and engraved with mysterious star patterns.

"Director Wei Tianlong sent someone to deliver this by private plane overnight."

Li Guangming solemnly handed the jade slip to Chen Fan. His voice trembled slightly with excitement, and his face was full of fervor and envy.

"One of Jiangnan No. 1 High School's true treasures, a top-tier Qi and Blood Technique that ranks among the best in the Federation—"

"The Star-Transferring Blood Art!"

"Director Wei said this is Jiangnan No. 1 High School's greatest show of sincerity and investment in a peerless genius like him!"

Li Guangming took a deep breath, his expression turning exceedingly solemn. "Little Fan, the Five Elements Stance is just brick and stone, but this is the pillar that will hold up the heavens for your future Martial Dao edifice! It will determine the quality of your Qi and Blood after your breakthrough, as well as the heights you can reach in the future!"

"With it, you can shatter that damned bottleneck and forge a true supreme Dao foundation!"

Chen Fan reached out his small hand and accepted the weighty metal jade slip.

It was icy to the touch, as though he were holding a piece of ten-thousand-year-old profound ice. Yet from within it came the faint sense of a terrifying torrent of information, vast and boundless, as if it could devour everything.

He knew that his true Martial Dao path had only really begun at this moment.

Without the slightest hesitation, Chen Fan carefully sent a thread of spiritual power into the jade slip.

Hum!

An ocean of information poured into his mind in an instant, like a galaxy bursting through a dam!

Countless mysterious runes, complex diagrams of energy circulating through the body's meridians, and obscure, incomprehensible cultivation formulas streamed rapidly through his sea of consciousness.

But when he saw the first line at the beginning of the art, written in scarlet characters in the ancient Federation language, his normally unruffled pupils abruptly contracted!

"Draw Star Power into the body and temper Qi and Blood. Nine deaths, one life."

"Those without great perseverance, great talent, and great fortune who cultivate it..."

"Will surely die!"

"..."

"Principal, I'll head back to cultivate now."

Chen Fan put away the jade slip and bowed slightly to Li Guangming. The contents of the slip had not frightened him; he still appeared quite calm.

"All right!"

Li Guangming nodded and let Chen Fan leave.

The heavy Alloy Gate slowly closed behind him.

The familiar cold and solitude enveloped Chen Fan once more.

He sat cross-legged and, without the slightest hesitation, once again immersed his spiritual power in the jade slip engraved with star patterns.

This time, he did not merely browse. He etched the meridian circulation route, so complicated it made his scalp tingle, inch by inch into the depths of his mind.

The Star-Transferring Blood Art's circulation route was bizarre in the extreme. It involved not only the twelve primary meridians and eight extraordinary meridians, but also hundreds of minute acupoints hidden deep within the flesh, points unheard of in ordinary martial arts.

"Begin!"

At a thought from Chen Fan, the vast Qi and Blood within him, measuring a full fifty-seven calories, stirred like an awakened primordial beast and began its first tentative circulation under the guidance of the cultivation formula.

Boom!

The moment his Qi and Blood surged into that unfamiliar meridian route, it lost control like a wild horse breaking free of its reins!

An agonizing pain, as though it would tear all his internal organs apart, erupted with a boom!

"Pfft!"

Chen Fan's eyes flew open, and he spat out a mouthful of blood. His face instantly turned as pale as paper.

He forcibly stopped circulating the art and gasped violently, his chest heaving like a worn-out bellows.

The very first attempt had nearly severed his meridians inch by inch!

The warning of nine deaths and one life was no exaggeration!

Chen Fan wiped the blood from the corner of his mouth, and the calm in his eyes gave way to a ruthless glint.

Without resting, he closed his eyes again, mobilized his Qi and Blood, and began his second, third, and tenth attempts to break through!

All afternoon, his stifled grunts and heavy breathing echoed through the special-grade cultivation room.

Every attempt ended with his Qi and Blood running wild and excruciating pain in his meridians.

This cultivation art was like a maze filled with deadly traps. He could not get through even the first complete circulation cycle.

Night fell.

The cultivation room's simulated daylight system slowly switched to its deep-night mode.

Chen Fan lay on his back on the icy floor, drenched in cold sweat. The waves of stabbing pain inside his body made it difficult for him to move even a finger.

He gazed at the cold, simulated starry sky overhead, replaying his failures in his mind again and again.

Suddenly, a brilliant flash of inspiration lit up his weary eyes!

"Draw Star Power..."

"The stars!"

He sat bolt upright, as though he had seized a life-saving straw.

Without the slightest hesitation, he immediately used his highest-level authorization to issue a command to the cultivation room's main control system.

Hum!!!

With a low rumble of machinery, the alloy dome bearing the simulated starry sky slowly slid open to either side.

In an instant, the vast, boundless real sky replaced the cold steel!

The light of billions of stars passed through the city's thin layer of spiritual energy and poured down like strands of cold silver thread, completely enveloping Chen Fan's small figure.

Bathed in that pure, ancient starlight, Chen Fan felt as though he had entered a faint, elusive, and mysterious resonance with the entire vast universe.

He circulated the Star-Transferring Blood Art once more.

This time, rather than simply urging his Qi and Blood onward, he actively visualized himself as a furnace, carefully drawing in an exceedingly faint strand of starlight and channeling it into the crown of his head!

"Hiss!"

The instant the starlight entered his body, an extreme agony erupted, as though even his soul would be frozen and crushed!

The pain was a hundred, a thousand times worse than any of his previous bouts of rampaging Qi and Blood!

Chen Fan's body shuddered violently, and he clenched his teeth hard enough to draw blood!

But with an adult's resilient will, tempered a thousand times over, he held on with all his might!

The instant that strand of icy starlight entered his body, it became the finest, sharpest energy scalpel, subjecting his vast but somewhat impure Qi and Blood to the most fundamental and brutal tempering and refinement!

Traces of impurities were stripped away, and surges of violent energy were smoothed out, compressed, and reorganized!

Chen Fan finally understood. This cultivation art did not have a martial artist break through the barrier on his own at all. It borrowed Star Power to replace his blood!

Meanwhile, thousands of miles away, at Jiangnan No. 1 High School.

In the principal's office, inside an even more classically elegant study.

Admissions Office director Wei Tianlong, his face bright with the pleasure of claiming credit, respectfully handed a freshly drafted list to a white-haired old man who was painting with broad, sweeping strokes.

"Principal, this is the final list of students admitted through this independent recruitment. That monster named Chen Fan—I took the liberty of giving him our highest-level S-grade special recruitment contract!"

The white-haired principal wore a simple long robe of coarse linen. His hair and beard were both white, his face lean, and not the slightest fluctuation of Qi and Blood came from him. He looked like an ordinary old man from next door.

He did not look up, remaining focused on the landscape beneath his brush. He merely asked casually, "An art as overbearing as the Star-Transferring Blood Art can easily cause qi deviation. Which teacher did you send to stand guard over him?"

The smug smile on Wei Tianlong's face froze instantly.

His head buzzed as though an invisible giant hammer had struck it, and his mind went blank!

Stand guard?

He... He'd been so caught up in his excitement and reporting his achievement that he'd forgotten the most crucial, most deadly step!

"Plop."

The brush in the white-haired principal's hand fell onto the expensive xuan paper. A drop of thick ink ruined the nearly finished landscape.

He slowly raised his head. For the first time, a thunderous rage fierce enough to burn the heavens blazed in those cloudy eyes, which had always been as still as an ancient well!

"Wei! Tian! Long!"

That icy voice seemed to send the temperature of the entire study plunging to freezing.

Wei Tianlong's face turned deathly pale, and beads of cold sweat the size of beans rolled down his temples.

He dared not imagine an eight-year-old child cultivating the Star-Transferring Blood Art alone for an entire night, with no one to guide or guard him...

Was he dead or alive now?!