Ten Inverse Beast Fist

Zhou Leng got up, prepared breakfast and lunch, then, after eating, headed to Xiaoru Village with a lunchbox.

Zhou Leng entered the Mysterious Forest and spotted Big Yellow lying beneath the Frost Giant Tree from afar.

Beside Big Yellow, two Divine Script Golden Pages stood beneath the tree.

Zhou Leng walked over and picked up the two pages.

A subtle expression appeared on Zhou Leng's face.

The first page was entirely covered in Divine Script.

Most of the second page was readable Chinese, with only the final line's ten characters written in Divine Script.

Zhou Leng looked up at Big Yellow.

Big Yellow grinned happily, raised its two front legs onto Zhou Leng's legs, pressed down its waist and back to stretch its body, then circled around Zhou Leng.

"You dug these up too?" Zhou Leng asked.

Big Yellow nodded vigorously.

"Big Yellow, you're amazing!" Zhou Leng said, taking out the duck breast he had prepared for it.

Big Yellow lowered its head and began eating.

"This junior, Zhou Leng, greets Tree Senior." Zhou Leng still bowed politely, then sat on the ground with his back against the Frost Giant Tree and read the contents of the second page.

After reading it once, Zhou Leng pondered for a moment before reading it a second time.

This Golden Page recorded foundational Martial Dao knowledge, including some Martial Dao knowledge Blue Star did not possess.

The text listed many types of Martial Dao cultivation: pure body cultivation, pure qi cultivation, a combination of qi and body cultivation, as well as bloodlines, Source Energy, and various other methods.

Blue Star's Martial Dao was a multifaceted path that combined qi and the body.

The text explained that no cultivation method was absolutely stronger or weaker than another; it only depended on whether it was better suited to the current environment.

The text began with broad generalities before focusing on the two core cultivation methods of inner training and outer training.

Inner training was divided into qi training and intent training.

Qi training cultivated internal arts, while intent training cultivated Divine Diagrams.

Internal arts were true qi, while Divine Diagrams were scrolls that gathered the aura of the Great Dao. They could either form naturally or be painted by experts, imprinting tremendous power.

"Divine Diagrams..."

Zhou Leng opened his Demonic Wristwatch.

The Demonic Wristwatch had an enormous storage space. He had downloaded a Martial Dao knowledge database, allowing him to browse it offline even without a network connection.

With a simple search, Zhou Leng roughly understood.

The Ten Realms also had Divine Diagrams, but there was very little information about them.

All that was known was that this was an extremely advanced cultivation method. Blue Star's humans had yet to fully comprehend it and were still researching it.

Only a tiny handful of Grandmasters or Martial Saints were qualified to study Divine Diagrams.

At present, all Divine Diagrams were incomplete. If ordinary people practiced them recklessly, they would inevitably suffer qi deviation.

Unfortunately, the Golden Page did not provide a detailed explanation of how to cultivate Divine Diagrams.

Besides inner training, there was also outer training.

Outer training was divided into combat methods and training methods.

All kinds of martial arts moves—fists, palms, legs, and kicks—belonged to combat methods, whose core purpose was offense and defense.

Training methods were not for offense or defense, but for strengthening the body so it could better exert internal arts, techniques, and every other kind of power.

Different cultivation paths required different training methods.

The training methods of qi cultivators and body cultivators were vastly different.

Blue Star civilization followed the most solid orthodox path of Martial Dao cultivation, cultivating qi, body, and intent together, so the training methods it required were more complex.

Blue Star had already developed a barely complete system of training methods.

However, current training methods placed extremely high demands on the body. The slightest carelessness could injure it, so the state stipulated that one could only cultivate training methods upon reaching the Body-Refining Stage.

But if one had an Innate expert nearby to guide them, they could secretly use training methods from childhood and strengthen their bodies faster than their peers.

Zhou Leng guessed that one reason Zhang Xinglie had ultimately ranked eleventh in the Martial Examination was that those ahead of him had received Innate guidance from childhood and cultivated training methods.

Even though Blue Star's training methods were relatively complete, they still had all kinds of problems.

Training methods needed to be paired with suitable internal arts to produce results.

Most internal arts could only be paired with universal training methods, resulting in less substantial improvement.

At the end, the Golden Page introduced a powerful training method that strengthened qi within and the body without, called the "Ten Inverse Beast Fist."

The "Ten Inverse Beast Fist" drew upon the strength of insects and beasts without completely following their power, combining it with the human body to cultivate both the body and qi at once. It was the training method most suited to Blue Star's Martial Dao.

This simple introduction alone stirred intense interest in Zhou Leng.

The "Ten Inverse Beast Fist" had ten levels of training methods. At the end of this Golden Page was the translated Chinese training method for the first level, called the "Standing Elephant Chapter."

Zhou Leng read it carefully.

The "Standing Elephant Chapter" took the form of an elephant standing on two legs and was divided into twelve forms.

Every time one completed the "Standing Elephant Chapter," the body would undergo a tempering, and one's strength would increase by a degree.

Holding the Golden Page, Zhou Leng carefully pondered the "Standing Elephant Chapter," yet could not grasp its essence.

"This training method will be difficult to learn with words alone. In theory, there should also be illustrations..."

Zhou Leng looked at the ten Divine Script characters at the bottom of the Golden Page.

The first character in that line happened to be the first character of the Divine Script on the first page.

Zhou Leng compared them one by one. The ten Divine Script characters on the second page were the first ten characters on the first page.

Zhou Leng looked at the final character. That character should contain the contents of the "Standing Elephant Chapter."

Divine Script had to be learned one character at a time. His memory of the first Divine Script character was already exceptionally clear, so he could not give up halfway.

Divine Script rotated and could not be written directly. Zhou Leng could only use Mind Training to reproduce the first character within his mind.

This time, the Divine Script was clearer than ever before, with only a very few blurry areas.

Zhou Leng struck while the iron was hot, memorizing and studying without pause. Before long, he drifted off to sleep in a daze.

When he woke, Zhou Leng felt refreshed. Closing his eyes, he saw the cubic Divine Script rotating clearly in his mind. Though it still churned his brain, it no longer seemed unbearable.

"Looks like I've remembered it completely."

Zhou Leng looked at the final Divine Script character that might be the "Standing Elephant Chapter," memorizing every stroke and line, then the six characters on its six faces, and finally the process of the characters' rotation.

Half an hour later, Zhou Leng finally managed to memorize the blurry character. An image emerged in his mind.

A faceless figure dressed in a black training uniform stood with slightly bent legs, its upper body bent forward, head raised, back arched, and hands held one above and one below. It looked exactly like a three-legged elephant raising its trunk.

At the same time, a blue true qi circulation route emerged within the faceless figure's body.

The image looked ordinary, yet it was like a mountain soaring ten thousand zhang high before him.

That person seemed to become a colossal elephant deity, possessed of boundless strength and standing amid the starry sky.

The first form of the "Standing Elephant Chapter."

Zhou Leng memorized it with all his strength. Before long, his brain was overloaded and he was utterly exhausted. He collapsed and fell asleep.

After waking, Zhou Leng studied the "Standing Elephant Chapter" Divine Script again. The first Standing Elephant form appeared before his eyes once more, and he memorized it with all his strength.

Fortunately, the image that appeared was far easier to remember than the Divine Script.

Zhou Leng continued like this—studying until he slept, then studying after he woke. He slept three times in all before he thoroughly memorized the first Standing Elephant form.

After warming up a little, Zhou Leng stood before the Frost Giant Tree and assumed the first Standing Elephant form.

This posture was simple for any martial artist.

Zhou Leng adjusted it repeatedly. After finally confirming the optimal position, he began circulating his true qi.

After one circulation cycle, Zhou Leng felt both his legs grow ten times heavier.

After two circulation cycles, his waist and back seemed to grow ten times heavier.

After three cycles, both arms grew ten times heavier.

After four cycles, Zhou Leng's entire body ached, but he gritted his teeth and remained utterly motionless.

After five cycles, beads of sweat the size of soybeans appeared on Zhou Leng's forehead.

After six cycles, Zhou Leng felt ants covering his entire body, lightly gnawing at him.

Seven cycles... eight cycles...

Big Yellow stood nearby, tilted its head to look, then copied Zhou Leng and assumed the exact same posture.

Effortlessly.

Big Yellow looked at Zhou Leng's faintly trembling body and sweat-soaked clothes, its face full of confusion.

When his true qi reached the eighteenth cycle, Zhou Leng's vision went black. He knew he had reached his limit.

Zhou Leng drew his qi into his dantian and slowly rose. Supporting himself by the waist, he slumped onto the ground, his chest heaving violently as he gasped for breath.

Zhou Leng stared expressionlessly ahead, his eyes hollow.

The entire cultivation process had been like being thrown into a juicer, his body completely wrung dry.

The "Standing Elephant Chapter" truly lived up to its name. It really was like an elephant standing on top of him.

Gradually, Zhou Leng recovered.

Gurgle, gurgle...

His stomach was hungry again.

"Big Yellow, bring the backpack over."

"Woof." Big Yellow bit the backpack and dragged it before Zhou Leng.

Zhou Leng raised an arm and let out a soft hiss.

An intense tearing sensation ran through the entire arm, like continuous cramps.

Trembling, Zhou Leng slowly dug out a bottle, poured out a Marching Pill, swallowed it, and drank some water.

He slowly circulated his qi, quickly digesting the Marching Pill.

Before long, his stomach rumbled again.

Zhou Leng swallowed two more pills in succession, and the hunger finally vanished.

"One Marching Pill costs three hundred yuan. One cultivation session takes nine hundred. I might as well buy a solar heating stove and heat up my food here."

Zhou Leng slowly stood, enduring the soreness throughout his body as he began stretching to ease the pain.

After stretching, Zhou Leng determined that he could not practice external arts today. He took out the Demonic Wristwatch, projected a large screen, and browsed the Divine Script section of the Martial Dao knowledge database.

As Zhou Leng read slowly, he discovered that humanity had always been researching Divine Script.

"Every six-faced cubic Divine Script character consists of six different 'Surface Characters.'"

"Each Surface Character can face in the four directions of up, down, left, and right, with each orientation representing a different meaning."

"The six Surface Characters can be distributed across different faces and positions of the hexahedron, representing different grammar."

"The rotations of a cube are divided into counterclockwise rotation, clockwise rotation, top-down rotation, bottom-up rotation, as well as ordinary rotation, vertical rotation, and diagonal rotation..."

Zhou Leng continued reading. He had thought that learning such complex writing as a beginner would leave him utterly lost and make his head swell, but as he studied, he found it easy to understand.

This was because the Divine Script in his mind continuously flickered, as though confirming each other and constantly deepening his understanding of it.

Divine Script seemed to possess an unusual magic.

A strange thought arose in Zhou Leng's heart: he should regard Divine Script as something between matter and life.

Divine Script was more like flowers and grass than stone.

Zhou Leng continued browsing the information.

To this day, the Ten Realms had not discovered a single "complete, moving" Divine Script character. They could only infer these things from ancient relics such as records, stone carvings, and murals.

The Divine Script on all kinds of relics was flat and motionless.

However, there were rumors that some Demigods possessed scattered complete Divine Script characters in their collections and studied them in secret.

Zhou Leng looked at the two Golden Pages. The characters on them were all complete.

Zhou Leng lightly moved his body. The tearing sensation remained, so he simply crawled into his sleeping bag and went to sleep.

When he woke, Zhou Leng checked the time and found that he had already stayed here for two days.

He put on his backpack, brought Big Yellow along, and slowly walked outward.

The faint tearing sensation remained, but it was already bearable.

Zhou Leng had not expected a single Standing Elephant form to have such powerful effects. It seemed that if he wanted to cultivate the "Ten Inverse Beast Fist" in the future, he would need to pair it with Meat Medicinal Diets. Otherwise, his body would be unable to recover quickly, and injuries would instead accumulate.

"Meat Medicinal Diets cost a thousand per meal..."

The supply of scraps was unstable, so he could only buy them at the Martial Dao mall.