Blood Forging

Compared to the commotion over in Wu Village, Xu Village was clearly far livelier. A huge crowd had gathered at the village entrance alone, joy brimming everywhere. By the time they reached the Xu family's courtyard, the place was packed three layers deep inside and three layers deep outside.

Wu Ming and several distant relatives from Wu Village were also welcomed into the Xu family home.

It could be seen that

the entire Xu family courtyard had been renovated, and the central house had even been newly built. The air about the place was plainly utterly different.

After making a round of the Xu family home, Wu Ming had roughly familiarized himself with the Xu family members. They were quite amiable and showed no lofty airs, though Xu Tong's elder brother, Xu Hao, had yet to appear.

When it was time for the midday meal, Xu Hao finally showed himself.

Wu Ming had heard this name many times before. Now, he saw a burly and imposing man stride in from outside. His body was robust and strong; at a glance, he was entirely unlike the sallow, emaciated poor.

"So this is Brother Hao. He's built like a bull. He even seems a little sturdier than our clan head."

"I heard Brother Hao is nearly at Second Blood Forging."

"Wouldn't that put him on par with our clan head?"

"Brother Hao was meant to succeed as the Xu Village clan head anyway. Look at all these people inside and out—they came to curry favor while there's a happy occasion."

The few Wu Village relatives beside Wu Ming all exclaimed in amazement upon seeing Xu Hao.

"Second Blood Forging..."

Wu Ming, too, observed Xu Hao and murmured inwardly.

Nine Transformations of Congealed Blood, Pure Yang undying!

So-called Martial Path cultivation was the process of refining Pure Yang Blood Qi. Each refinement of Blood Qi was like being reborn, shedding one's mortal frame. Wu Qu, the clan head of Wu Village, was an expert who had forged blood twice. That was why he could become the clan head of over a hundred Wu Village households. He even possessed a stretch of farmland and orchards outside the village, yielding an unceasing harvest every year.

By comparison, ordinary people could not avoid taxes because farmland levies were too burdensome. Few possessed land of their own. Most served as tenant farmers for landlords and gentry in the city. After crops were subjected to layer upon layer of exploitation, barely anything remained, leaving them only enough to scrape by.

According to what Wu Ming knew, forging blood twice already made one a capable fighter. Forging blood three times gave one a certain standing even within the city, and such people would generally move into the city to settle down. As for four times and above, he was not yet qualified to know.

Just as he was pondering this,

Xu Hao suddenly walked over.

"Wu Ming?"

Xu Hao called out toward the crowd. The people nearby immediately moved aside, revealing Wu Ming behind them.

Xu Hao looked Wu Ming over from head to toe, nodded slightly, and said, "I heard about what happened to you. Encountering an evil entity before becoming a martial artist and surviving was already quite fortunate. Now that our two families have become kin by marriage, I'll naturally look after you a little. Once you've recovered, learn a trade from Uncle. When the time comes, come find me, and I'll arrange something for you."

Xu Hao had also heard something of the Wu family's circumstances, but he could not be bothered to waste thought on trivial village matters.

His mind was now almost entirely focused on martial arts. He was not far from Second Blood Forging, and compared to the common village folk of these surrounding villages, he was already as far apart as clouds and mud. In the future, he would establish a home and career in Jingye City.

He was only looking after the Wu family in passing because of Xu Tong.

After saying a few simple words, Xu Hao did not speak further with Wu Ming and turned to leave.

As Xu Hao departed, quite a few gazes from inside and outside the courtyard fell upon Wu Ming. Low murmurs soon arose in twos and threes. Before long, Wu Ming's circumstances had spread throughout the Xu family courtyard and beyond. The looks directed at him all carried a hint of peculiarity. Some marveled that he had survived an evil entity, surely protected by his ancestors; others lamented that all his hard work training in martial arts had gone down the drain. Yet this was the normal state of most families.

After all, among the villages and households for ten miles around the city, not everyone could refine Blood Qi and become a martial artist.

Wu Ming's expression remained as usual. Though, with his current senses, he could hear every hushed discussion within the courtyard clearly, his heart did not stir in the least. After all, only one's own family knew its own affairs. He knew well that refining Blood Qi and becoming a martial artist was only a matter of time for him, but naturally, he would not speak of it.

The main purpose of accompanying the wedding procession this time had been to see the Xu family's situation and the place where Wu Yu would live in the future. Having looked around, Wu Ming found nothing unsatisfactory. Even Xu Hao, who was proud at heart and thought highly of himself as a martial artist, treated his younger brother Xu Tong and younger sister-in-law Wu Yu with relative generosity rather than cold indifference.

Seeing this, Wu Ming was relieved.

Village weddings had few cumbersome formalities and were generally kept simple. After eating here and exchanging a few final words with Wu Yu, Wu Ming returned to Wu Village with the others from his village.

The days after Wu Yu's marriage soon returned to calm.

The Wu family.

Within the few old, low houses, other than one person being gone, everything remained as before.

Wu Qi went out to work as usual. Though Wu Yu's marriage had brought back many betrothal gifts—ten jin of dried meat and thirty jin of fine grain—first, this food had to nourish Wu Ming's body; second, once spring arrived, it would be time for the government to collect the Head Tax. Life therefore still had to be lived through toil and frugality, with belts tightened and no room for slackness.

In the blink of an eye,

nearly a month passed.

One morning, after cooking porridge and attending to Liu Shi, Wu Ming came into the courtyard.

After nearly a month, his physique had undergone no small change. The weakness he had once felt had long vanished without a trace, and his formerly somewhat gaunt body had visibly filled out.

"After eating meat, the effect really is obvious."

Sensing the changes in his body and feeling the abundant Blood Qi throughout himself, Wu Ming could not help but sigh inwardly.

In this world, if a poor family did not produce a martial artist, generation after generation would remain mediocre. Yet wealthy great households could endure without decline for several generations. At the root of it all lay an enormous disparity in resources.

Fine grain and meat such as these were everyday fare for the children of great households from a young age. Naturally, refining Blood Qi was incomparably easy for them.

To avoid waste, Wu Ming had weighed matters several times and decided to eat only two liang of the ten jin of dried meat each day. For his body's ability to digest and absorb it, this was the most suitable amount, offering the highest efficiency and the least waste.

With the supplementation of those two liang of meat, his recovery and accumulation had become much faster. As early as two days ago, he had been confident in refining Blood Qi. But since becoming a martial artist was already certain, he was no longer in such a hurry. Instead, he recuperated for another two days, restoring his body completely to its previous peak condition.

"It's time."

Feeling the abundant Blood Qi within him, Wu Ming drew a deep breath.

The Qi and Blood within him had already returned to their former peak. With meat to supplement him, he could even accumulate still more Qi and Blood. Even before this, he would have had a chance to refine Blood Qi. Now, success was assured beyond all doubt.

As Wu Ming's thoughts shifted, all sounds fell silent in an instant. The distracting thoughts in his heart receded at once, leaving behind utter clarity.

"Pure Yang Blood-Drawing."

Facing the rising sun, he slowly assumed the most basic stance of the Martial Path: the Pure Yang Blood-Drawing Stance.

A golden ray of morning sunlight fell across him, illuminating a vigorous youth whose tender face held a trace of handsome charm. One foot was planted on the ground, his body as steady as an old tree. The Qi and Blood within him were drawn forth one by one by his will, like surging blazing flames.

Thump, thump, thump.

As his heart beat powerfully, blood flowed through his entire body in rushing streams. Strands of intangible, formless Blood Qi gathered in from all parts of his body under Wu Ming's guidance. Some rose from his legs through the meridians, while others descended from his head, all converging at the dantian.

His surging Qi and Blood gathered and condensed in the dantian beneath his navel, filling Wu Ming with a fierce burning sensation. It felt as though he had swallowed a sun into his lower abdomen, searing hot.

"Forge blood and gather qi, embrace and condense them into one."

Wu Ming slowly exhaled a breath of turbid air, then suddenly inhaled. A breath of New Life entered his body. At the same time, the surging Qi and Blood brewing in his dantian abruptly condensed once more under his guidance, as though something had finally been pierced through.

At that instant, everything changed completely. The surging Qi and Blood that had originally been forcibly gathered and organized through stance work and mental guidance suddenly began to move on its own. He no longer needed to deliberately guide or control it; it condensed of its own accord beneath his lower dantian.

This pure Blood Qi continued to draw inward and contract, growing hotter and hotter, until it suddenly broke past a certain boundary. In that moment, Wu Ming no longer felt scorching heat, only an utterly supreme and righteous sensation.

Pure Yang Blood Qi!

Refine Blood Qi and transform it into Pure Yang—this was what it meant to become a martial artist!

"It's done."

At this moment, Wu Ming felt neither joy nor sorrow, with no emotion surging within him. He merely quietly observed the changes in himself. He could sense that after being refined, that strand of Pure Yang Blood Qi had peacefully gathered into a cluster, resting within his lower dantian.

Though it had become quiet, that strand of Pure Yang Blood Qi was in fact still trembling in an imperceptible rhythm. Centered on the dantian, this "trembling" seeped through the meridians into his limbs and bones, slowly tempering his body in minute increments.

"Once Blood Qi condenses, it is like an infant, naturally pulsing and nourishing the hundred meridians throughout the body."

Wu Ming's gaze was clear.

Why were true Blood Forging martial artists utterly different from ordinary people? Why could ordinary people train their muscles until they were as brawny as they pleased, yet still fail to match a Blood Forging martial artist's strength? Because once blood was forged, Pure Yang Blood Qi took root in the dantian and seeped through all the body's hundred meridians. Day and night, it would continuously transform the entire body.

At this moment, having only just condensed Blood Qi, he was not greatly different from an ordinary person. But after enduring a period of tempering by Pure Yang Blood Qi and allowing his body to complete its transformation, he would become entirely different.

With a mere lift of his hand or step of his foot, he could easily overturn a millstone weighing two or three hundred jin!

Furthermore,

all manner of demons, evil entities, and ghosts in this world often possessed strange and uncanny methods. Some bewildered the mind, some were shapeless and invisible... only Pure Yang Blood Qi could restrain all of them.

For ghosts and evil entities, an ordinary person could slash at them a thousand or ten thousand times without harming them in the slightest. But once Pure Yang Blood Qi was drawn forth, using blood to break evil, it could immediately inflict damage. The difference between the two was one of essence.

Thus,

refining Blood Qi and becoming a martial artist meant immediate rebirth, like a fish entering the vast sea, no longer trapped within a muddy pond.

Wu Ming slowly withdrew from the stance and exhaled a breath of turbid air. His gaze suddenly turned toward the fence at the edge of the courtyard. A droplet of dew rolled gently down the fence and fell upon a tiny pale-yellow wildflower below, making its petals and leaves quiver softly.

Beyond the fence, the silvery white had faded away.

On the nearby mountains beyond the village, a wash of green quietly emerged.

Spring had arrived.