People had five virtues: warmth, kindness, respect, frugality, and humility; they also had five moral qualities: wisdom, trustworthiness, benevolence, courage, and discipline.
Dynasties, too, had virtues and moral qualities. As dynasties rose and fell in succession, each represented one virtue, cycling endlessly according to the order in which the Five Elements overcame or generated one another.
So this palm strike could be called the signature move of Heaven's Mandate Academy.
The five colors represented the five virtues. They swirled and intertwined like the rise and fall of dynasties, forming a pillar of light that revolved through all five colors and slammed toward Blessing Monk.
Blessing Monk knew this palm strike was no ordinary attack. The Amitabha formed by his Golden Light Dharma Form turned its head, revealing a pitch-black face.
It was Mahakala, the wrathful form the Buddha assumed when subduing demons.
Blessing Monk flipped his hand and formed a Demon Subduing Seal. The six-armed Mahakala gripped a trident in each hand and thrust them toward the palm strike!
Shi Feizhe stood far away, watching the two fight. He saw them clash, then a flash of light BOOMED before his eyes, followed by a gust of air that nearly knocked him off his feet!
Their clash also sent a towering wave surging across the lake, drenching those standing too close.
Then the two clashed again and again, making it nearly impossible to stand by the lakeshore!
So this was what a Qi Sea expert from the Escaping Mundane Realm was like?
It was truly something to yearn for!
Watching the two fight on the lake, Shi Feizhe could barely make out their figures. All he could see was five-colored light colliding with golden radiance, and he couldn't help yearning for such power.
He had no idea when he might reach such a realm!
"Since you two have come from afar, why not do Three Talents Manor a favor?" A deep, powerful voice rang out from Three Talents Manor. A middle-aged man in a green robe flew out from within.
Strangely, as he flew through the air, red flames blazed from one side of his body while blue, icy qi streamed from the other.
"Manor Lord Zhan!"
"It's actually Manor Lord Zhan!"
The onlookers immediately recognized the imposing middle-aged man and called out to him one after another.
"Today, I'll give Manor Lord Zhan some face! Otherwise, in three moves, I'd smash that turtle shell of yours to pieces, you bald donkey! If you have the guts, why not fight me another day?" Seeing Manor Lord Zhan, half ice and half fire, Bu Cunren withdrew his move and landed lightly on the lake.
"Amitabha! It is precisely because Manor Lord Zhan stepped in today that Heaven's Mandate Academy hasn't lost one of its people!" Blessing Monk replied with a barbed smile, then landed on the lake as well.
"Gentlemen!" Manor Lord Zhan came up to the two of them. "You are both outstanding men, and at such a young age, you've already entered the Qi Sea Realm. One day, you are certain to become True Persons! Why let a minor matter sour your relations?"
"As they say, a fight makes friends. Why not join me inside the manor for a chat?"
Though Blessing Monk and Bu Cunren both wanted to kill each other, they knew a fight was out of the question now.
"How difficult it is to reach the True Person Realm! We don't know when we'll ever get there. But Manor Lord Zhan has brought yin and yang into harmony. I imagine you're close to reaching it!" Bu Cunren bowed to Manor Lord Zhan as he spoke.
"In this humble monk's opinion, Manor Lord Zhan is perhaps no more than half a step away from the True Person Realm!" Blessing Monk added.
Manor Lord Zhan had praised them in front of so many people, and neither of them was new to the martial world. They knew how its unspoken rules worked!
As for Manor Lord Zhan's cultivation, they couldn't possibly judge it themselves. But their elders had told them!
"I'm still far from it! Still far!" Manor Lord Zhan said modestly. Walking ahead, he clasped his hands in greeting. "Please, come inside for a chat!"
"Thank you for your kind invitation, Manor Lord!" The two returned the greeting and entered Three Talents Manor with him, leaving behind a fine tale for the martial world.
Shi Feizhe stood amid the crowd like an ant, watching the three of them enter the manor.
The sky was slowly darkening. Shi Feizhe had no time to dwell on what he'd just seen. He had something more important to do: find a place to stay!
He'd arrived in Three Talents Town that morning, and night was falling. He still had nowhere to sleep.
So he hurried into town and asked around about the price of lodging at the inns.
The inns in town were indeed far from cheap. A bed in a shared room cost ten copper coins, while a private room cost a hundred—three times the price of inns along the road!
It was no wonder. This was a tourist attraction, after all. Prices in tourist spots were bound to differ from the usual ones.
Fortunately, the townsfolk were resourceful. They tidied up their spare rooms and rented them out to people of the martial world to earn some extra money. One room cost only one tael of silver a month!
Outside Three Talents Town, one tael of silver could pay for a month at an inn. But what could you do? This was Three Talents Town.
"This room really feels like home!"
After searching for a while, Shi Feizhe found a family willing to rent out a spare room. The room was bare as a beggar's bowl: one bed, one table, two chairs, and nothing else. He lit an oil lamp and, with a wry grin, delivered his verdict.
He took a copy of True Origin Sword Finger Technique from inside his robe.
This wasn't the copy of True Origin Sword Finger Technique he'd had before. Earlier, while looking for a room, he'd passed Orchid Grass Bookstore and gone in to buy yellow paper for his visit to Three Talents Manor the next day. His sharp eyes had spotted the shopkeeper using this book to prop up a table leg, so he'd bought it for five copper coins.
"Sir, you've struck it rich! Even toilet paper doesn't come this cheap!" When the shopkeeper heard Shi Feizhe wanted to buy the book, his eyebrows shot up with delight. He pulled it from under the table leg and shoved it into Shi Feizhe's hands.
He was afraid Shi Feizhe might change his mind!
The first copy of True Origin Sword Finger Technique only showed half the method. It went as far as condensing true qi and unleashing it as sword qi; the rest was impossible to make out. This was the complete True Origin Sword Finger Technique.
By the light of the oil lamp, Shi Feizhe flipped through the second copy of True Origin Sword Finger Technique. He needed to know what the latter half of the manual contained.
But after only a few pages, Shi Feizhe frowned. A few more pages, and his frown deepened!
Unable to help himself, he took out his previous copy of True Origin Sword Finger Technique and compared the two side by side. He soon spotted plenty of differences.
Some parts were simply copied wrong; others made no sense at all, with the beginning and end having nothing to do with each other!
How... could this be?
How could the copy someone else was selling be different from the one he'd found?
Was theirs wrong? Or was his?
Or were they both wrong?
In an instant, countless thoughts flashed through Shi Feizhe's mind. Cold sweat poured down his forehead!
This couldn't be right!
Unwilling to give up, he used the faint oil-lamp light to compare the books character by character. In the first few thousand characters alone, he found dozens of mistakes!
He skimmed the rest of the book too, but it was all a blur, and much of it contradicted the earlier sections!
Damn it!
Shi Feizhe cursed inwardly!
No wonder it had cost only five copper coins. Some bored fool must have copied it. The handwriting was easy enough to read, but the mistakes were outrageous.
It would be a miracle if anyone could cultivate from this!
Pirated books could kill!
After realizing all this, Shi Feizhe wiped the cold sweat from his forehead. He'd just been terrified that he might have practiced True Origin Sword Finger Technique incorrectly and somehow turned into a madman one day.
Sure, practicing martial arts was bound to make you a little crazy, but going mad because of a pirated book? That would be downright stupid!
Actually, it was easy to prove whether the second copy of True Origin Sword Finger Technique was pirated.
He needed a third copy of True Origin Sword Finger Technique!
Shi Feizhe: Pirated books could kill!
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