Foundation Establishment Form

The words "begin cultivation" were like a spell.

As if pumped full of chicken blood, Wu Tie threw back his head, spread his legs, and sprinted forward in great strides. Astonishingly, he reached the place Old Tie had mentioned in just a quarter of an hour.

He rolled and crawled all the way, falling who knew how many times. Mud and moss smeared his entire body, and countless spiderwebs clung to him, leaving him filthy as a mud monkey. Wu Tie set Old Tie on a mound of earth, braced his hands on his knees, and panted heavily as he looked at him.

"You brat... did someone inject you with chicken blood? You ran that fast?" Old Tie gave a dry chuckle. "I don't know which idiot—"

With an awkward laugh, Old Tie's dark red eyes turned. "Who said you couldn't cultivate? You haven't lost an arm or a leg... Besides, even if you had, why wouldn't you be able to cultivate?"

"I, I... Father taught me the Sky-Breaking Fist, but I..." Wu Tie panted as he muttered haltingly, "I... simply can't perform a complete set of punches. My body is too weak..."

Red light flickered in Old Tie's eyes as countless impossibly thin, invisible rays rapidly swept across Wu Tie's body.

"Show me," Old Tie said stiffly.

Wu Tie looked at Old Tie, gritted his teeth, drew a deep breath, and straightened his back. He spread his legs, one fist forward and one fist behind, assuming a solemn, imposing stance.

"Hey, ha!"

"Hey, ha!"

Wu Tie shouted loudly as he performed the Wu Family's secret Foundation Establishment fist art, the Sky-Breaking Fist, move by move.

When Wu Tie threw the first punch, every muscle in his body suddenly convulsed, and Old Tie gave a cold snort.

When Wu Tie threw the second punch, the veins beneath his skin bulged violently, and Old Tie snorted twice in succession.

As the third punch came out, blood-red light blazed in Old Tie's eyes. He spoke in a raised voice, "Enough. I understand now. This so-called Sky-Breaking Fist demands extremely high physical aptitude... Every time you perform it, it's the same as mutilating yourself."

Old Tie gave several crackling laughs. "Which idiot created this fist art? Still..."

The bloody light in his eyes dimmed. Old Tie fell silent for a while, then murmured, "Perhaps this is also the correct choice. But whether it is right or not has nothing to do with me. Strategic analysis was never my specialty."

The bloody light suddenly flared, pouring from Old Tie's eye sockets in a great stream and forming a curtain of light more than ten meters wide beside Wu Tie.

Within the curtain appeared a figure clad in fully enclosed white fitted armor, its surface flowing with brilliant light as though it had been carved from white crystal. Then a gentle, pleasing woman's voice suddenly rang out. "Foundation Establishment Form, first stance, begin!"

The figure slowly spread its legs, extended its hands, turned slightly sideways, and assumed a movement with only a small range of motion.

Wu Tie stared at the curtain of light in shock, at the figure within it.

That gentle female voice gave him an even greater fright.

Only he and Old Tie were here. That woman's voice clearly did not belong to Old Tie.

"What is this?" Wu Tie cried out.

"What are you spacing out for? Follow it." Old Tie snorted impatiently. "Heart and soul, heart and soul... Hurry up and follow it. I'm having a hard time here."

"A hard time?"

Wu Tie looked at Old Tie's ghastly pale skull face, seemingly unchanged since ancient times, and stuck out his tongue. "Foundation Establishment Form? That name isn't imposing at all!"

The bloody light in Old Tie's eyes surged. "I could call this thing the 'God-Slaying, Immortal-Butchering, Heavens-Collapsing Grand Demon Fist,' or the 'Primordial Shattering, Chaos-Crushing Great Divine Ability'... Would that be meaningful?"

"Let me teach you a lesson, brat... Names are not important. What matters is what lies within!"

"Second lesson... You are not allowed to doubt me. If you doubt me, you get beaten!"

With a smack, blue light flashed from one of Old Tie's ghastly pale teeth, and an extremely thin bolt of lightning struck Wu Tie's thigh viciously. The flesh all over his body suddenly jerked as though countless fine needles had pierced him. Wu Tie let out a miserable howl and dropped onto the ground on his backside.

"Foundation Establishment Form, first stance, begin!" Old Tie barked stiffly.

Wu Tie looked at the figure in the light curtain, swayed as he stood, and assumed the exact same posture.

There was none of the pain from performing the Sky-Breaking Fist, where his bones and tendons felt filled with lead and his muscles felt as if they were being torn apart. Nor was there that violent, surging heat that burst uncontrollably from his internal organs.

When Wu Tie secretly practiced by himself in the Wu Family training grounds, that blazing force pouring from his organs had made him cough up blood several times.

Wu Tie assumed the first stance of the Foundation Establishment Form. He heard several crisp crackles as tendons throughout his body stretched apart, felt a few bones shift slightly, and sensed a faint soreness and tingling numbness in several muscles of his arms. It felt remarkably pleasant.

After maintaining that strange posture with the figure for a minute, the figure's lower body remained still while its upper body slowly changed position, both arms opening slightly backward like a bird's wings.

"Foundation Establishment Form, second stance, begin!"

Wu Tie immediately followed the figure's movement. He heard faint sounds from the tendons around his shoulders and neck, and felt several muscles in his back grow itchy, tingly, and slightly warm.

"Foundation Establishment Form, third stance, begin!"

Stance after stance changed, the movements slow and gentle. That soft female voice possessed a mysterious charm. Before he knew it, Wu Tie's movements had become exceptionally natural and harmonious, and even the rhythm of his breathing had unconsciously changed.

With every inhale and exhale, Wu Tie seemed to draw some strange substance from the air and expel useless waste from his body.

Beads of sweat continuously seeped from his pores, carrying a faint fishy stench.

By the eighteenth stance, sweat poured from Wu Tie like rain. His skin flushed red, and streams of white vapor shot from the top of his head. Half-closing his eyes in a daze, his body went limp, and he simply sat down on the ground and fell asleep with a soft snore.

He did not know how long he slept. When he woke, a blind rat more than a foot long lay beside him.

These blind rats had terrible eyesight and were practically blind. They fed on all kinds of mushrooms and moss in the caves, and their flesh was quite plump. After devouring it raw, skin and all, Wu Tie felt strength fill his entire body.

He had never felt so good before. Wu Tie even had the sensation that his whole body had been reborn anew.

"Carry me, watch the direction, and walk forward!" Old Tie shouted. "Listen carefully. Watch your breathing rhythm. One-two-one... one-two-one... one-two-one... March in step!"

Wu Tie picked up Old Tie and strode in the direction he indicated.

After only a few steps, his foot slipped. With a smack, Wu Tie sprawled across the ground and flung Old Tie seven or eight paces away.

Without making a sound, Wu Tie climbed up, ran to Old Tie, picked him up, and continued striding forward.

Forward, forward, forward...

Within this strange realm, the circular basin at the center stretched for more than a thousand li, while vast gravel deserts lay beyond it. The basin resembled a sea bowl, and under Old Tie's direction, Wu Tie continuously advanced toward its center.

The red light ahead gradually brightened, while the temperature around them gradually rose.

The moss on the ground gradually became thicker, and clusters of large mushrooms appeared in greater numbers. Plants with countless branches, which Wu Tie had never seen before, also became more numerous, growing so densely in many places that they formed forests.

"These are ferns!" Wu Tie carried Old Tie onward, practicing the Foundation Establishment Form whenever he rested. Whenever he encountered something he did not recognize while traveling, Old Tie would teach him the names and properties of those plants.

"These ferns are all mutated varieties. They can grow on the little heat and light provided by the lava." A red beam shot from Old Tie's eyes and swept over a fern. "This is an edible fern... Remember its appearance and characteristics. Sometimes, it can save your life!"

Which ferns could be eaten, which were lethally poisonous, which could numb people, and which could actually explode and kill...

Which mushrooms were delicious, which would kill anyone who ate them, which had venomous snakes and poisonous spiders living beneath them, and which mushrooms those little insects loved most...

Which venomous snakes had the fiercest poison, which were the fastest, which possessed the strongest constricting force, and which could spray venom to injure others...

Old Tie was a vast treasury of knowledge, and Wu Tie absorbed all kinds of information from him bit by bit.

"You know more than the teacher." One day, Wu Tie finally broke through the eighteenth stance of the Foundation Establishment Form. After completing all eighteen stances, he did not fall asleep. Instead, he smoothly continued through the twenty-seventh stance before his entire body grew hot and weak, forcing him to sit down.

Though he sat down from exhaustion, his spirits were high, and Wu Tie did not fall asleep.

He looked at Old Tie and praised him from the bottom of his heart.

"Nonsense. I am..." Red light flashed in Old Tie's eyes, and his tone became very low. "A professional."

"A professional at what?" Wu Tie looked at Old Tie curiously.

These days, with Old Tie as his companion as they walked through this vast strange realm, Wu Tie learned much new and curious knowledge from him every day. The dark clouds in his heart had already dispersed considerably.

He buried the hatred over his father and brothers deep in his heart, carving the two blood-drenched words "revenge" upon it. Wu Tie's words and actions had somewhat returned to what a boy his age should have been.

"Professional... at healing the sick and saving the dying." Old Tie's tone became somewhat strange. "I... am Bian Que's ninth-generation medical-care Ancient Divine Weapon!"

Wu Tie stared blankly at Old Tie.

He could not understand a word of what Old Tie had just said.

"Bian Que? You don't know?" Bloody light flickered in Old Tie's eyes.

Wu Tie shook his head.

"Ancient Divine Weapon... Surely you have heard of the mighty name of Ancient Divine Weapons." Old Tie snorted coldly.

"I haven't," Wu Tie said honestly, shaking his head again.

"I like honest children... Come, stand up. Foundation Establishment Form, first stance, begin!" A streak of lightning flashed across Old Tie's rows of large teeth. A thin electric spark struck Wu Tie's belly, making him howl as he sprang to his feet.

"No, not the first stance of the Foundation Establishment Form. Rather... start running, young man!"

"Run with hot blood and a belly full of passion! Let me see the results of your cultivation these past few days!"

"Run! Circle around me! That's right, run... Run happily, young man!"

A thin layer of electric light enveloped Old Tie, while threadlike arcs of lightning lashed fiercely at Wu Tie's body.

Wu Tie howled in pain as he staggered into a mad run around the mound where Old Tie sat. The electric arcs continuously struck his body, making every muscle and internal organ convulse and tremble from the stimulation of the tiny currents.

The current Old Tie emitted carried a strange vitality, and Wu Tie's bodily functions slowly improved.

Bit by bit, thread by thread, the more he ran, the more energized he became; the more he ran, the stronger he felt. Wu Tie panted in great gulps, and a faint fishy stench tainted his breath.

After running wildly for nearly an hour, Wu Tie had never imagined that he could run continuously for so long.

In the end, he was exhausted beyond endurance and suddenly collapsed to the ground.

A venomous snake as thick as a bowl abruptly shot from a cluster of ferns, bared its fangs, and bit down at Wu Tie.

A streak of red light flashed. The snake's head vanished, and its body broke into more than a hundred pieces, which rained down over Wu Tie with a series of clatters.

"Hurry and fill your stomach, then continue onward!" Old Tie gave a stiff laugh. "You have great potential, young man. It seems we can reach our destination several days early. Eat and drink your fill, then continue onward!"

Wu Tie grabbed a piece of snake meat and tore into it in huge bites.

Over the past two days, he had already seen Old Tie's methods. He was not the least bit surprised by the venomous snake's miserable end.

Advance, practice the Foundation Establishment Form, run, scream as electric arcs struck him, eat and drink his fill, then continue onward...

"We're here! Right here, beneath this spot!" More than ten days later, Old Tie suddenly shouted and had Wu Tie put him down.

Wu Tie's clothes had already been completely reduced to rags. Only a few large fern leaves wrapped around his waist barely covered his body. Once as thin and frail as a bean sprout, he had grown much straighter in these short dozen days. A thin layer of muscle could now be seen on his chest, arms, and legs.

"There's nothing here." After setting Old Tie down, Wu Tie looked around.

This place was near the center of the basin, still roughly a hundred li from the exact middle.

Thick, rich soil covered the ground, with a dense layer of moss growing over it. Massive clusters of mushrooms surrounded them, and thickets of ferns grew everywhere. In the shadows of the mushrooms and fern groves, countless glowing green eyes appeared and vanished.

Spiders, venomous snakes, lizards, and other cave-dwelling creatures unique to this place...

"Old Tie, there's nothing here." Wu Tie instinctively moved a little closer to Old Tie.

"Of course there is something here. You simply cannot see it." Old Tie laughed. "Young man, begin working hard. It is right beneath your feet—more precisely, one and a half meters ahead of the tip of your right foot."

"Dig a pit. Dig downward. Work hard, young man!"

"I can let you cultivate... You have already begun practicing the Foundation Establishment Form."

"But the Foundation Establishment Form has a major problem." Old Tie gave a dry laugh.

"What problem?" Wu Tie hurriedly asked.

He wanted revenge. He wanted to find the enemies who had attacked the Wu Family and take revenge. He had to cultivate; only cultivation could bring him strength.

He had once been unable to cultivate. The Foundation Establishment Form was his only hope. There could not be any problem with it!

"The Foundation Establishment Form is too gentle. Gentleness means low efficiency, so progress is very slow."

"You are already eleven. Perhaps it will take you twenty years to complete Foundation Establishment. That is far too slow."

"There is something below that can speed up your cultivation." Red light shot from Old Tie's eyes, drawing a circle two meters in diameter around the spot he had indicated.

Without saying a word, Wu Tie jumped over and began digging into the ground with both hands.

Without saying a word, Old Tie watched Wu Tie dig out clump after clump of soil and stone with his hands, continuously throwing the dirt and rocks far away.