Immortal Martial: Pushing Through Two Realms from Reality

He'd only been promoting it for two days, and his own restaurant's accounts were already brimming with who knew how much actual gold and silver.

Zhou Yang felt that if Jiang Shu hadn't taken up martial arts but instead gone into business, Perhaps all the money in Pingling County would have ended up in his pocket!

"Brother Jiang, it's truly a shame you're practicing martial arts."

Unable to help himself, Zhou Yang sighed again, poured Jiang Shu some tea, and said, "Brother Jiang, why don't you come to our restaurant instead? We're already swamped. With your help, the Zhou Family Restaurant's business will boom several times over!"

"With Elder Qiu backing us, if we join forces, we'll definitely be comparable to a typical wealthy family in the county!"

Zhou Yang looked at Jiang Shu with fervent eyes.

Practicing martial arts, what of it?

Without reaching the Bone Forging Realm, those in the ordinary Skin Grinding Realm were merely hired enforcers for wealthy families.

And how difficult was the Bone Forging Realm to achieve?

Throughout the entire county, there were countless apprentices taken on as formal disciples by martial arts school masters.

They could indeed all reach the Skin Grinding Realm and become true martial artists.

But how many of them actually reached the Bone Forging Realm?

Without the Bone Forging Realm, within Pingling County's inner city, in front of the great families, they were nothing more than slightly larger ants.

In his opinion, instead of practicing martial arts, Jiang Shu should follow Elder Qiu and build a good relationship with him.

With Elder Qiu around, the Zhou Family Restaurant's business would remain prosperous.

"Zhou Yang, you're too focused on the superficial."

"Martial Arts are the foundation."

"Do you know that if a martial artist doesn't enter the Viscera Refining Realm, their Blood Essence will begin to decline after forty? How do you think Elder Qiu's current state compares to a true late-stage Bone Forging Realm martial artist in their thirties or forties?"

Jiang Shu shook his head and said, "The Zhou Family and Elder Qiu can still rely on his residual influence to support them. But what if Elder Qiu is no longer here? If a child carries gold through a busy market, how will the wealthy families react?"

"If you want to support the Zhou Family, to support them for a lifetime, you can only practice martial arts yourself and reach the Bone Forging Realm yourself."

"The path of martial arts allows for temporary assistance from others, but one cannot rely on others indefinitely."

It was as if a basin of cold water had been thrown directly onto Zhou Yang.

Zhou Yang suddenly sobered up.

The immense amount of gold and silver had overwhelmed him, making him lose his senses.

He had even neglected martial arts, the very foundation of his livelihood.

Seeing that Zhou Yang was still willing to take advice, Jiang Shu nodded and said, "You mentioned last time that the Yao Family would be holding a birthday banquet in over half a month. The birthday gifts there will definitely include Blood Nourishing Medicinal Cuisine from the Luo Family Pharmacy. How is your investigation into this matter coming along?"

First, the important stuff: Because the book title wasn't attracting enough readers, the original title has been changed to "Two Worlds: Forging a Celestial Martial Overlord from Low-Level Martial Arts" in hopes that the subsequent data will be slightly better.

Now, for the less important stuff:

Regarding performance: Among books released at the same time, the growth in collections has been very slow. To give you a data point, the conversion rate from recommendations to readership for the average book in the same period is 0.9%, while my book title only brings in 0.5%, less than half of the average.

However! However! This book's retention rate is still very, very good (the author believes)!

For every two thousand favorites, there are four hundred and thirty active readers.

What does this mean?

For every five favorites, there is one paying reader actively following the story!

For this reason alone, The author is bowing down to all of you, thanking you for your support.

Regarding the plot: There were indeed some areas in the early stages where the settings weren't ideal. For example, a reader pointed out that the purity of modern silver is too high. The author didn't think of this at the time, but since it doesn't affect the overall reading experience, it won't be changed.

Also, the school segment of the plot has been heavily criticized. I agonized over it for several days and considered whether to change it. In the end, it was scrapped.

The main reason is that the entire segment serves as a bridge, connecting the previous and subsequent plot points. If it were rashly changed, the later plot would become disjointed.

Some readers are calling this part "watered down." In fact, you can look at it from another perspective. As a book with a system panel as a cheat, how many times has the panel appeared in the story so far, with over 100,000 words written? Sometimes, the protagonist's breakthroughs are just briefly mentioned by the author, without padding the text with one or two hundred words about the panel.

If I really wanted to pad the story, I wouldn't do it within the plot, would I?

I would do it in a scene that's potentially about showing off or facing down an opponent, creating a moment of satisfaction, right?

This particular plot segment is poorly executed (though I don't know if any readers found it good), and a large part of that is due to my insufficient writing skills. While I could establish the atmosphere well in the early stages, the force behind a clenched fist being thrown was lacking. This resulted in a very constipated plot, like a bed scene where the foreplay is good, but the main event only lasts three seconds. This is indeed very frustrating.

I considered one way to fix it: delete two chapters and wrap things up quickly. But if I did that, my later chapters would need to be brought forward, which would also affect the readers' experience.

Between two evils, choose the lesser.

If any readers feel this plot segment is very bad but have still persisted in following the story, The author is here to kowtow to you, thank you for your support.

Because of this plot segment, I actually revised part of the later outline. For example, when writing about the Luo Family Pharmacy, the original setting included a minor character who was the illegitimate son of a wealthy family. But I felt I couldn't handle that part properly at the moment, so I put it aside and adopted a different approach. Since the school segment was filler, I pushed the plot forward within Pingling County, accelerating the pace somewhat.

Now, the entire book has reached 100,000 words.

The protagonist hasn't even reached the first realm, the Skin Grinding Realm, nor has he achieved Clear Force.

From a realm progression perspective, this speed is undoubtedly extremely slow.

But from a plot perspective, I feel my content is quite substantial.

The character development and world-building are progressing steadily.

From the very beginning, I intended to write this book as long as possible, detailing the distinctions between each realm. While faster progression is more exhilarating, it also leads to more plot holes. Readers should understand this principle.

I had originally planned to say these things in the "On Shelving" announcement.

But since the atmosphere is right today, I'll say them now.

Without realizing it, I've already written a thousand characters.

If any reader can see this far.

Your author bows down.

Please favorite.

Please follow for updates.

"The suggestion to use Blood Nourishing Medicinal Cuisine as a birthday gift came from Yao Wenbai, the illegitimate son of the Yao Family head... Luo Yongcheng has also reached the Full Body Vital Energy Circulation in the past few days, but Elder Qiu hasn't officially accepted him as a disciple..."

Zhou Yang lowered his voice, explaining the entire story, the cause and effect, and everything that had happened at the Luo Family Pharmacy recently.

With a mouthful of tea, Jiang Shu sat by the window, looking out at the inner city scenery and listening quietly.

Breaking ties with Luo Yongcheng didn't mean he no longer needed to care about the matter.

He wanted to establish himself in Pingling County.

To do so, he had to understand the rules of Pingling County.

The Luo Family Pharmacy was a very classic case study.

Understanding it, familiarizing himself with it, and dissecting it.

Would undoubtedly be beneficial.

As it stands, even though the influential families have experts in the Bone Forging Realm, the authority in Pingling County still rests with the County Office.

With the County Office keeping them in check, everything the influential families do remains within the rules. They can have hooligans surround the Luo Family Pharmacy, but they won't directly smash and loot it.

"Even a remote small county town's County Office can firmly control the situation. It seems the Great Jing Dynasty's control is far greater than I imagined."

"The stronger a dynasty's control, the harder it will be for commoners to rise in status. In times of chaos, even a beggar can become an emperor. But in prosperous times, with resources monopolized, heroes can be relegated to obscurity."

"However, where there is disaster, there is also fortune leaning on it. In prosperous times, it also represents stability. Just like Pingling County's County Office maintains the stability of the entire county. For me right now, stability is absolutely paramount."

"I can obtain resources from Xuan Star. At the Hungry Tiger Martial Arts School, I've become an official disciple and have access to martial arts that lead directly to the Bone Forging Realm. Before the Viscera Refining Realm, I only need to improve steadily."

"Once I also become a Bone Forging Realm expert, I will naturally understand the world outside Pingling County."

Jiang Shu refocused his mind and asked, "What about the news of my senior disciples?"

On the day he was accepted as a disciple, Elder Qiu had only briefly introduced him to the twelve senior disciples. At that time, Jiang Shu had been busy accompanying guests at the Hungry Tiger Martial Arts School and hadn't had much time to socialize with them.

Now that he had a little time and financial means, Jiang Shu planned to visit them one by one.

It was also a gesture of courtesy from him as the junior disciple.

Within three days.

With the information provided by Zhou Yang, Jiang Shu prepared gifts based on the preferences of his senior disciples. Through his deliberate efforts to build relationships, his rapport with several of his senior disciples improved significantly.

Especially with his twelfth senior disciple, Qi Yuan.

They were of similar age and had many topics to discuss.

At this moment, in Qi Yuan's courtyard.