Chen Xun

Chen Xiaojun's life was very regular, mainly because he was highly self-disciplined.

A little after five the next morning, Chen Xiaojun got up and began a full day of cultivation and study.

A little after five, he warmed up for half an hour: leg stretches, frog jumps, horse stance, and other physical exercises.

At six, he ran ten laps around the village.

At seven, he went home for breakfast and washed up.

At seven thirty, he began practicing swordsmanship at the Martial Arts Training Ground outside the side of the main courtyard. Sword techniques were mainly divided into four types: striking sword, thrusting sword, blocking sword, and winding sword.

Among them, striking sword mainly included chops, hacks, slashes, wipes, taps, snaps, lifts, hooks, sweeps, pierces, draws, wrist flowers, and so on.

Thrusting sword was divided into level thrusts, downward thrusts, upward thrusts, and reverse thrusts.

Blocking sword was divided into upper blocks, horizontal blocks, and lower blocks. The upper block was a stop, the lower block was an interception, and the horizontal block was a support.

As for winding sword, it was mainly twisting, used to lock down the opponent's weapon attack.

At this time, our adorable Little Fatty Zhu Wuneng would come over to cultivate with him, but he mainly practiced physical boxing techniques, along with the rake techniques from his mother's family. Their family's endurance was excellent, innate even.

Sometimes others came too, such as his older brother Chen Jianzun, his cousin Chen Feng, and Little Fatty's eldest brother, Zhu Wukui.

After finishing the basic sword techniques, he added one extra move to practice: the sword-drawing technique. This was the only sword technique Chen Xiaojun felt he could currently manage and practice.

In his memories from his previous life, there were far too many legends about the sword-drawing technique. It was a basic sword move, yet its power was extraordinary, and its attack was extremely sharp. What it emphasized was defeating the enemy in one strike.

One sword startled the heavens; the sword left its sheath, and the man died. The sword-drawing technique's attack was so sharp and so swift that an entire set of movements had already been completed in the instant before the enemy could even see the sword being drawn.

Even Demon Lord Qi Ye's Heaven Severing Sword Drawing Technique in A Chinese Ghost Story was already a peerless sword art, dazzling and colorful, immensely powerful, and terrifying to hear of.

One only had to look at the endless brilliance it had left behind in all kinds of novels.

The sword-drawing technique lay in the word "draw," and "draw" in turn emphasized the word "hide."

First, one focused the mind and calmed the breath, requiring essence, energy, and spirit to be highly concentrated. Like a venomous snake waiting for its chance, or a hidden killer, it was fine not to strike—but once one struck, it had to be a sure kill, as fast as thunder.

Mm. Every day, he had to use the sword-drawing technique to cut down a large wooden stake. He had his father install not only chopping stakes, but also plum blossom stakes beside them.

After that, he practiced the family's inherited footwork—Sword Step.

Here, it should be said that movement techniques and footwork were different.

A movement technique referred to a person's natural skill that blended flexibility and force, adjusting one's body through cultivation into an optimal state.

Martial artists always said, "Practice a fist three thousand times, and the movement technique appears naturally." What this meant was that through martial arts, one adjusted one's body into an optimal state, and that state was the movement technique.

Footwork was a type of kung fu and skill, while Sword Step emphasized being unstoppable, standing firm between heaven and earth, forging bravely ahead, and being seasoned and practiced.

Through the plum blossom stakes, he trained his body's flexibility, agility, coordination, and lower-body stability, balancing dodging, turning, leaping, and shifting with fierce advances, improving them side by side.

While practicing footwork, he added basic sword techniques and used the family's inherited Sword Palm Capturing Hand together with them.

By the time he finished practicing all this, it was almost eleven, and then the two of them began sparring to increase real-combat experience.

Little Fatty did not know whether it was because he was honest and simple, because the Young Master had ordered them to fight for real, or because of peasant-style cunning—but he really did fight.

They were young, so they usually sparred for half an hour. After the two of them went at it with a flurry of smacks and cracks, ending up with bruised faces and swollen noses, and patches of blue and purple all over their bodies, was common.

Overall, Chen Xiaojun fared a bit better. His movement technique and Sword Step played a certain role in that, being much better than Little Fatty's footwork.

In the afternoon, it was usually Grandma Xin or his mother who taught him and a number of other children under six, such as the brothers and sisters in the clan, as well as families of generational followers like Little Fatty's. They taught literacy and reading, natural arithmetic, common life knowledge, and told stories of heroes, myths, and legends. In truth, it was the clan's kindergarten.

Of course, perhaps because of the Heaven and Earth Rules and the abundant Spirit Qi, the children here grew faster than the children of Blue Star in his previous life, and their intellectual development was also twenty to thirty percent faster than Blue Star children's. So the range of knowledge they taught was much richer than what Blue Star children learned.

After four o'clock, it was the rest time he arranged for himself.

What was special was that other people liked taking walks after meals, but he was the opposite—he liked walking before meals. Shaolin Lake was behind the village, and he loved sitting or lying on the small steep slope and looking at the lake's surface. When he saw the lake water shimmering, his mood brightened along with it.

Lush lotuses grew by the lake. At a glance, the lotuses bloomed in rivalry with one another, while dew played hide-and-seek on the lotus leaves. Sometimes, flying birds came to hunt and play, "the setting clouds and the lone wild duck fly together; autumn waters share one color with the endless sky." Such serenity and calm sent a kind of comfort straight into his heart, making him feel inner peace and tranquility.

After nightfall, Chen Xiaojun either soaked in Medicinal Baths or read books. There was actually more than one kind of Medicinal Bath; he had seen several kinds, including ones that strengthened the origin and fortified the body, ones that accelerated recovery, ones that cleared the mind and focused the spirit, and so on. They were used in rotation.

Chen Xiaojun liked reading very much. His family had quite a few books, though very few of them were specifically for soul masters. They were mainly concentrated on introducing soul master knowledge of the continent, famous mountains and ancient sites, local customs, astronomy and geography, historical collections, personal biographies, and the like.

Chen Xiaojun liked these very much. There were two large rooms full of them. Ever since he learned to read at the age of four, he had read for two years and still had not gone through even a quarter of them. One could see just how rich the collection was.

He heard that there were even more books in the clan's Ancestral Hall, and once he awakened his martial soul at six, he could go there. That place had even more books related to soul masters.

Occasionally, he danced with his sword under the moon to train his ability for night battles. This too was a fine thing; the night always carried a hazy beauty.

Chen Xiaojun, this child only a few years old, had as his best trait not hard work, not obedience and good behavior, nor cleverness and wit, but self-discipline. His life was extremely regular, and he did not find it dull.

A self-disciplined child's future achievements and life were never poor. This was a quality with a high ceiling and no low floor.

Three days later, June 17th.

"Father, Xiu Xin, Jian Jun, Xiaojun, I'm back."

A resonant voice came in from outside the main courtyard gate. It was none other than the protagonist's father, the leader of the backbone generation of the Chen Clan, Chen Xun.

He was forty-seven years old this year and was already a powerful level 78 Soul Sage, with hopes of breaking through to Titled Douluo in his sixties.

He had a square, dignified face, thick brows and large eyes, a high nose and broad mouth, and flowing hair. He carried the look of wind and frost. Nearly 1.9 meters tall, he was big and mighty, with distinct lines. One look was enough to know he was a resolute man, and as his gaze swept around, he exuded great authority.

He wore sky-blue fitted clothes, with a white cloak attached behind him. Though he looked somewhat travel-worn, it could not conceal his powerful presence. Behind him followed a middle-aged, round-faced man who was slightly shorter than Chen Xun but appeared even sturdier. It was the Chen Clan's butler, Little Fatty's old man, Zhu Tianhao.

Hearing the voices, Ye Xiuxin and Chen Xiaojun came out to greet them.

"Dad, you and Tianhao Uncle are back."

"How did things go over the past half year? Smoothly?" Ye Xiuxin asked with concern.

"First Master, Mistress, Second Young Master, please talk among yourselves. I'll head back first," Tianhao Uncle said, taking his leave.

"All right, Old Zhu. You've had a hard journey too. Hurry on home—your wife and children are waiting," Chen Xun replied, and Ye Xiuxin also nodded to Tianhao Uncle.

"Xiuxin, everything went smoothly for the most part. There were a few small hiccups, but overall it was fairly ideal," Chen Xun answered, then went on, "Xiaojun, your old man rushed all the way back this time and managed to arrive a few days early. Your awakening day is in three days, right? Haha, we used up the Awakening Stones last time, but your old man wouldn't forget. Look..."

As he spoke, Chen Xun opened his bundle on the table beside him and took out six pitch-black round stones.

Awakening Stones were artificial creations. Their main material was Soul Guidance Stone, which was fairly common across the continent, and the technical principles behind them were not complicated. It could be said that anyone with a bit of strength knew about them.

It was just that the production process was somewhat complex, so generally only medium and large factions made and sold them—especially Spirit Hall, which produced and sold them itself. They were available for purchase in Spirit Hall branches in cities at the prefecture level and above, so long as the relevant proof was provided. Of course, Chen Xun had not gone through Spirit Hall's channel.

"Mm, where are Father and Jian Jun?" Chen Xun suddenly came back to his senses. "Did they go to Uncle Hong's house?"

Chen Xun had long since grown used to the two old men's years-long "bad habit" of squaring off like fighting roosters. Old children, old children... people were like that; when a relationship was too close, reason went out the window.

"That's not it. Jian Jun broke through to level 30, so Father took him to Shaolin Mountain to hunt a Thousand-Year Spirit Beast for his third soul ring," Ye Xiuxin explained gently.

Chen Xun broke into a grin. "Haha, that fast? Two levels in half a year. As expected of my seed."

"Did they say when they'd be back?"

"Father said they'd return in a couple of days. They'll be back before Xiaojun's awakening on June 20th."

Speaking of which, why did they attach such importance to Chen Xiaojun's awakening?

First, this was the greatest event in the life of the people of Douluo Continent, bar none. Whose parents would not take their own son's or grandson's awakening seriously? It could be said that the moment one saw the martial soul, one's entire life was decided. This determined one's fate even more than the college entrance exam on Chen Xiaojun's previous-life Blue Star.

Second, Chen Xiaojun's physical constitution was extremely good. Although his build did not make him look especially strong, his flesh was dense and his strength was considerable; his arms were long, and his explosive power was outstanding. Moreover, his life force was very active, and he absorbed the ancestral secret Medicinal Bath method to a remarkable degree. Compared with tall, powerful men like Chen Xun and Chen Jianjun, or an elegant man like his Grandfather Chen Yu, he was even more suited to practicing the sword.

Third, Chen Xiaojun's comprehension was extremely high. In all their lives, his Grandfather Chen Yu and his father Chen Xun had never seen its like. He learned sword techniques as soon as he was taught them; his ability to grasp sword principles could be called frightening. Sometimes, in the middle of discussion, he could even make the two of them draw connections by analogy and benefit greatly. For a swordsmanship clan like the Chen Clan, what this meant went without saying.

Not to mention that half a year ago, Chen Xiaojun's one "self-created" move, the Sword Drawing Technique, had amazed two top soul masters. When feeding him moves, Chen Xun had not taken it seriously for a moment and had nearly failed to dodge. Of course, even if he had not dodged, nothing would have happened, but from a small glimpse, one could see the whole picture.

These second and third points together meant that his talent for the way of the sword was formidable. Such a child, gifted with extraordinary talent, diligent and disciplined, intelligent and precocious, was naturally the object of his entire family's deepest expectations.

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