Emerging from Seclusion, the World Changes

It was only after beginning the deduction that Lin Xiao realized the consumption was far greater than he had expected.

When fifty Potential Points were invested, his expression remained unchanged.

When one hundred Potential Points were invested, his expression changed.

When the first... one hundred and fifty Potential Points flowed into this bottomless pit, he felt his hands tremble slightly and his vision blur. He felt that even the air conditioning in a rich woman's villa couldn't keep his somewhat weak, trembling legs steady.

When the two hundredth Potential Point disappeared, Lin Xiao felt an urge to halt the deduction.

But in the end, he held back, because he felt that the deduction was about to succeed.

Finally, after consuming a full 225 Potential Points, the vortex that fused all the martial arts took shape. The thousands of phantoms in his mind also merged into one, transforming into a new, unknown martial art ranked Two-Star High-Grade.

"What the hell!"

Lin Xiao was speechless. This deduction had consumed twice as many Potential Points as the Primordial Chaos Divine Art. He had thought it would produce a Two-Star Peerless Grade divine art, but it had only produced a Two-Star High-Grade one. The result didn't match the deduction cost at all.

However, when he carefully experienced the newly deduced martial art, his eyes lit up, and he felt that the expenditure seemed to have been worth it.

That was because, as he had expected, the newly deduced martial art was a Scattered Hand, but its power had also far exceeded his expectations.

Before the deduction, he had used the Eagle Claw Hand and Golden Jade Fist as its core before incorporating other martial arts. After the deduction, it had automatically taken the principles of the Golden Jade Fist as its core. The principle behind this fist technique was to make one's fists as hard as gold and jade through cultivation. Once the Golden Jade Fist reached great attainment, both fists would turn as hard as stone, with the arms taking on a golden-stone hue like those of Golden Eagle Envoy Wang Zhen.

In other words, the Golden Jade Fist was actually an external-style fist technique.

The newly deduced Scattered Hand took the Golden Jade Fist as its core and combined the strengths of various martial arts. Not only were its techniques more exquisite, but its external cultivation method was also far stronger. According to the martial art's description, when he circulated the new technique with all his strength, both arms would become as hard as metal, practically impervious to blades and spears.

This gave Lin Xiao a bold idea. If he used this new martial art as a foundation and integrated more external fist and claw techniques into it, could he continuously strengthen his arms and make them even tougher?

Or perhaps he could continuously merge in other martial arts, such as external hardening techniques, expanding the area that was impervious to blades and spears from his arms to his shoulders, then to his body, until all four limbs were covered?

Wouldn't that allow him to cultivate an Indestructible Vajra Body through another method, just like the Indestructible Vajra Divine Art?

Well, perhaps it was impossible to cultivate an Indestructible Vajra Body in this world. Even the lowest level of an Indestructible Vajra Body—Bronze-Poured Iron-Cast, also known as Copper Skin and Iron Bones—was invincible at the Third Rank. That far surpassed this world's power level. Unless he used Destiny Points to raise his strength and break through the restriction, it would be absolutely impossible to cultivate an Indestructible Vajra Body.

Although he couldn't cultivate an Indestructible Vajra Body, he could still cultivate a pseudo-Indestructible Vajra Body. Being impervious to blades and spears, for example, could also count as a level of body cultivation.

Though it lacked the Indestructible Vajra Body's immunity to all poisons and resistance to water and fire, its defense could already withstand most blades and swords. It would be enough to let him roam this world invincible.

Lin Xiao named the newly deduced martial art Adamantine Hand. This martial art still had tremendous potential to excavate, and it would remain useful even in other worlds.

At this point, the martial arts Lin Xiao currently possessed were:

Two-Star High-Grade Primordial Chaos Divine Art, Two-Star Low-Grade Flying Heaven Steps, Two-Star Mid-Grade Swift Saber, Two-Star High-Grade Adamantine Hand, two hundred and fifty years of inner force, and 215 Potential Points remaining.

"I can go down the mountain now!"

Standing at the cave entrance, he looked back at the stone cave where he had lived for more than half a year. He raised a hand and struck the rock wall beside the entrance with one palm. A series of thunderous crashes rang out as huge chunks of stone shattered and buried the entrance. He turned and leaped down the cliff, vanishing into the mountains.

Eight days later, Lin Xiao appeared on a small hill less than three li from Shanhaiguan Pass. Looking at the more than one hundred cavalrymen and the several thousand prisoners being escorted along the main road in the distance, he furrowed his brows into a deep vertical crease.

He recognized those cavalrymen. They were the foreign army he had seen before. They looked extremely savage, but their appearance here wasn't what made him frown. It was... the thousands of Han civilians they were escorting.

He raised his head and gazed into the distance. The dragon banner of the Great Kang Dynasty had once flown over Shanhaiguan Pass, but it had now been replaced by another foreign eagle banner. Clearly, during the more than half a year he had spent in seclusion, Shanhaiguan Pass had already fallen to the foreign race. All these civilians had been plundered and dragged away.

"Crack!"

A cavalryman in a brown fur coat suddenly lashed out with a leather whip. Two civilians with their hands bound were knocked flat by the blow, two bloody whip marks appearing across their backs. Another rider immediately galloped over and trampled straight across them. Though he was more than two hundred meters away, Lin Xiao still heard the crisp sound of bones breaking.

Behind the cavalrymen, several burly men who were probably foreign leaders each held a Han woman in their arms, groping them as they committed acts too vile to look at. The women's cries only made them laugh even more excitedly.

Looking at his two fellow countrymen struggling as they spat blood and the women crying out, Lin Xiao's eyes turned cold of their own accord. He let out a cold snort, which exploded in the cavalrymen's ears like thunder beneath the hillside, startling countless warhorses into rearing upright.

Once they had steadied their mounts and looked around, they saw Lin Xiao charging down at them. A foreign man who seemed to be their leader drew his curved saber, pointed it at him, and shouted:

"He's a Han! Kill him!"

Twenty or thirty cavalrymen drew their curved sabers, splitting into two groups on the left and right as they charged him.

The hillside wasn't steep, so the warhorses could charge straight up.

Lin Xiao used no particularly exquisite Lightness Skill. He simply charged down in great strides, yet each step carried him more than ten meters. After a few steps, he came into contact with the foreign cavalrymen. At close range, he could even see the ferocity and savagery on their ugly faces.

Without the slightest hesitation, he struck down with one palm. A great ring of shockwaves expanded and surged outward, directly blasting the foreign man and his horse more than twenty meters into the air. When they landed with a muffled thud, the man was already no longer recognizable as human. Every bone in both man and horse had been shattered by Lin Xiao's palm, delivered in fury.

There was no other reason. It was simply anger—the anger of a keyboard warrior's soul from Earth.

Although this was merely an unknown martial-arts world, the foreign race's invasion southward into the Central Plains was so similar to the history of Huaxia on Earth. Before transmigrating, he had always felt sick whenever he saw such history online. Now that he had witnessed it with his own eyes, old and new hatred fused together into that furious palm.

This terrifying palm did not frighten the burly men. Instead, they spurred their horses forward even more fiercely.

Lin Xiao let out a cold snort. He raised both arms, and his sleeves burst apart, revealing solid muscles. The skin on his arms visibly turned the color of ancient bronze, carrying a faint metallic sheen. Rather than retreating, he advanced and slammed straight into a cavalryman.

After the crisp sound of the curved saber being forcibly snapped came the heavy impact of bodies colliding, followed by the successive sounds of men and horses being sent tumbling.

In less than a minute, nearly thirty Haigher Khan cavalrymen had been beaten to death by him with the most violent methods.