You must obey me well from now on and cultivate the Sky Breaking Thirteen Slashes.

Seeing Liu Weiran's adorable expression, Lu Lin couldn't help reaching over to ruffle her hair, messing it all up.

Under Liu Weiran's annoyed glare, Lu Lin said, "The Twelve City Martial Arts Hall League is made up of the contracted halls under Jiangzuo City's Monster Slaying Martial Arts Hall across twelve satellite cities. Every year at the end of the year, this internal competition among the twelve halls is held in Jiangzuo City. It's mainly for Martial Artist grade participants, with the Monster Slaying Martial Arts Hall and the twelve Hall Masters serving as judges to determine the champion."

"The Hall Master said that in previous years, our Liu's Martial Arts School's results haven't been great, so this time it's all on me. So, Liu Weiran, from now on you need to listen to me and let me train happily. Otherwise, if I don't perform well and fail to get the championship, I'll blame you, got it?"

"Why should I!"

"If you can't cut it yourself, you're going to pin it on me? That's not fair."

Liu Weiran shook her fist at Lu Lin, but inwardly she took what he said seriously.

She had heard her old man mention the Twelve City Martial Arts Hall League before, but since their results were poor, Liu and Qinglong had brushed it off without giving her the details.

Lu Lin had only just advanced to Martial Artist, but with his talent, he just might have a shot at the championship.

Fine, she'd lower herself for a while. Yeah, it was all for her old man's happiness—nothing to do with Lu Lin.

Riding back to West City Martial Arts School in Liu Weiran's car, Lu Lin grabbed his gear. As he reached the front desk, the receptionist called out to him.

It turned out that when Ren Tian left earlier, he'd prepared another ten thousand in tips for Lu Lin.

But holding that ten thousand, Lu Lin felt it burn in his hands.

He'd trained for less than an hour today, and had to cut it short because of his own issues, yet Ren Tian still gave him ten thousand in tips.

Silently pocketing it, Lu Lin kept Ren Tian's kindness in his heart. He'd find a way to repay him someday.

At noon, Liu Weiran took Lu Lin out for a big meal, and he didn't overthink it.

Back at the hall, Lu Lin checked his info panel.

[Owner: Lu Lin] [Grade: Beginner Martial Artist] [Techniques: Thousand Layered Breathing Technique Layer 3 (2066/10000), Dragon Roar Golden Bell Shield Layer 2 (795/1000), Sky Breaking Thirteen Slashes Layer 1 (0/100), Mad Ox Strength Fist Layer 4 (495/10000), Soaring Cloud Steps (Insufficient Points), Snake Step (Insufficient Points)] [Points: 1005.7]

The Thousand Layered Breathing Technique was steadily improving. This technique, which automatically trained as long as Lu Lin wore weights, would likely reach Layer 4 by today.

Dragon Roar Golden Bell Shield had hit Layer 2, and he estimated that after tomorrow's sparring session with Ren Tian, it would advance to Layer 3.

Mad Ox Strength Fist hadn't progressed much in the last few days, but Lu Lin didn't plan to abandon this basic technique.

Though it wasn't ranked, training Mad Ox Strength Fist to its later stages could greatly enhance a Martial Artist's Physical Strength.

For ordinary Martial Artists, once they reached the Martial Artist stage, they'd focus mainly on Vitality Cultivation Methods and combat skills. Training a basic martial art like Mad Ox Strength Fist felt like neglecting the essentials for the trivial.

But for Lu Lin, training this technique was simple. He could work on it during his spare time—slow and steady wins the race.

As for the Mysterious Grade High Rank Sky Breaking Thirteen Slashes, he'd been too busy these past two days to train it.

After simplification, all Lu Lin had to do was chop at a Wooden Dummy with a wooden blade to easily raise its proficiency. This combat skill was essential for when he'd go out to slay monsters later, so he needed to level it up to a decent stage as soon as possible.

As for the two footwork techniques, Lu Lin had told Liu and Qinglong today that he needed a Monster Core to assist his training, and they'd agreed to prepare a suitable Fifth Order Monster Core for him tomorrow.

Then he could complete the simplification of both footwork techniques.

After organizing his current martial arts, Lu Lin changed into his training gear, grabbed a wooden blade, and headed to the hall's combat skill training area.

Since training combat skills carried some risk, the hall had set aside a separate space where Martial Artists could train without interfering with each other.

As a hall sparring partner, Lu Lin enjoyed the perk of freely using any available training facilities whenever he had time.

After searching through over a dozen training rooms, Lu Lin finally found one with a Wooden Dummy. He immediately started hacking at it with the wooden blade.

[Sky Breaking Thirteen Slashes: 1/100] [Sky Breaking Thirteen Slashes: 2/100] [Sky Breaking Thirteen Slashes: 3/100]

As the proficiency ticked up bit by bit, Lu Lin's understanding of Sky Breaking Thirteen Slashes deepened.

Sky Breaking Thirteen Slashes was a unique combat skill that could continuously stack power, vitality, and attack strength.

The technique had thirteen stages in total. Reaching the first layer allowed the user to unleash 1.5 times their own power. Each subsequent layer increased the attack multiplier by another 1.5 times.

Layer 2: 2.25 times. Layer 3: 3.38 times. Layer 4: 5.06 times... By Layer 13, the boost to a Martial Artist's attack power reached a terrifying level.

194.62 times!

Nearly two hundred times the attack amplification—how horrifying was that?

Yet in the over three hundred years since the Spiritual Energy Resurgence, no one had ever been reported to have trained Sky Breaking Thirteen Slashes to that limit.

Even reaching Layer 8 or above was exceedingly rare.

But none of that mattered to Lu Lin.

As long as he had proficiency, he could grind Sky Breaking Thirteen Slashes' level up eventually. Even the legendary Layer 13, which no one had ever achieved, wasn't out of reach.

As proficiency kept rising, when he broke through the first layer, more training methods and usage techniques for Sky Breaking Thirteen Slashes flooded into Lu Lin's mind.

Sky Breaking Thirteen Slashes had only thirteen moves, but different combinations could unleash different powers, and it had different applications for different scenarios.

A move that looked like an attack might, when executed, turn into a defensive one.

The mysteries within had only been received into Lu Lin's mind; to grasp them fully, even to casually unleash the most fitting moves, would require relentless practice.

With this thought, Lu Lin suddenly stopped.

He realized that while his chaotic hacking and slashing could still raise proficiency, the actual improvement to his own ability was negligible.

When it came time to fight, he would still be fumbling in the dark, becoming a waste of cultivation with no combat power to show for it.

Rather than that, it was better to execute each move with precision. This might slow the growth of proficiency, but it would allow Lu Lin's Blade Technique realm to transform into real combat strength.

After all, when battling demonic beasts later, they wouldn't obediently offer their heads for the taking just because his blade realm was high enough.

"First slash."

"Crack."

The wooden blade struck heavily against the Wooden Dummy. Lu Lin carefully sensed the difference between this strike and the technique in his mind.

But the proficiency that suddenly appeared before him made him pause.

[Sky Breaking Thirteen Slashes: 4/1000]

What was going on?

He had just broken through; shouldn't the blade technique's proficiency be 1/1000? How had it jumped by 4 points?

Lu Lin set aside pondering the mysteries of the moves. He swung the blade again according to the technique.

"Second slash."

"Crack."

[Sky Breaking Thirteen Slashes: 8/1000]

The proficiency had increased by another 4 points.