The Mortal Martial Chasm

In the deepest darkness before dawn, snow fell silently.

Cui Hao stepped out of the warm courtyard, treading on the freshly fallen snow that came up to his ankles.

Beneath his feet were cowhide boots, sewn stitch by stitch by Su Yun after several sleepless nights. Lined with thick cotton, they allowed him to tread silently on the snow while keeping him warm.

On his body was a thick, dark blue cotton coat, also made by her. The stitches were fine, the duck down packed evenly, warding off the biting wind.

In his bundle were multigrain cakes, still warm, with pork cracklings and pickled vegetables, which she had started making before dawn.

He arrived again at the familiar stream at the foot of Yuanmeng Mountain.

The stream, which usually babbled, was now frozen solid by the severe cold, forming a crystal-clear ice band about four meters wide.

On the ice, a man and a woman were already busy.

The man was laboriously chipping away at the ice with a crude iron chisel to create an ice hole, while the woman, holding a wooden stick, vigilantly scanned the misty woods around them.

Their movements were synchronized, and their silence conveyed the hardships of their lives and the resilience of their mutual support.

They were clearly a poor couple who made a living by venturing into the mountains.

Cui Hao did not approach to disturb them, nor did he give up his plan to cross the stream for the time being. He walked upstream along the frozen bank.

Less than a mile away, a rustling noise came from the bare branches ahead.

Two grayish-brown Squirrels were chasing each other among the branches, their bushy tails drawing agile arcs in the snowy light. Their chirping sounded carefree.

Cui Hao instinctively raised his bow and nocked an arrow.

As he aimed, seeing them nestled affectionately together, the image of Su Yun sewing for him by lamplight and making him cakes at dawn flashed through his mind. His heart softened, and he slowly lowered his bow.

He walked on for a while longer. Luckily, near a sheltered bush, he found two white Grouse pecking for roots in the snow.

This time, he did not hesitate. The bowstring vibrated lightly, and two wooden arrows shot out in succession.

"Swish! Swish!"

A perfect hit! Both Grouse died almost simultaneously.

The second arrow seemed to trigger some mysterious sensation. The moment it left the bowstring, its power, speed, and rotation reached a perfect balance—the 'Critical Hit' indicated on his status panel had taken effect!

The arrow not only pierced the Grouse but also created a wound nearly twice as large as a normal arrow wound, tearing apart nearly half of the bird's body.

He looked at his status panel.

[Archery: Minor Accomplishment (112/600)]
[Effects: Soreness -10, Arm Strength +10, Accuracy +10, Critical Hit +1]

Hunting two Grouse only increased his progress by a negligible 1 point.

As expected, at the Minor Accomplishment stage, ordinary small prey provided very little progress.

Instead... the 'other cultivation' at home yielded more stable and considerable gains.

The thought made Cui Hao's lips twitch slightly. He was too wicked~~~

Picking up his prey, he hadn't gone far when he keenly spotted a grayish figure at the edge of a patch of dead grass about thirty meters away.

--A wild rabbit!

It was rapidly digging through the snow with its front paws, gnawing on the grass roots beneath. Every few digs, it would alertly twitch its long ears, its ruby-like eyes scanning its surroundings vigilantly.

An opportunity! Cui Hao drew his bow again.

After breaking through Mortal Martial, he was still adapting to his control over his strength. This arrow was shot with all his might, wanting to ensure a kill.

"Swoosh--crack!"

The sound of the arrow breaking through the air and the crisp snap of the bowstring breaking sounded almost simultaneously!

The wooden arrow, imbued with far more force than usual, shot out like a black lightning bolt, precisely piercing the rabbit's neck! It tumbled several times before landing in the snow.

And in Cui Hao's hand, the mulberry wood Compound Bow, left by his father and a companion for many years, had its limbs snapped in the middle by the sudden burst of immense force!

Cui Hao froze for a moment, looking at the old bow broken in half in his hand, a complex sense of regret welling up in his heart.

This bow carried the original owner's vague memories of his father and was an important companion for his survival in the early days after his transmigration.

After a moment of sadness, he felt at ease. Out with the old, in with the new.

"Fortunately, I have a spare at home," he muttered to himself. Cui Hao put away the broken bow and went to pick up the rabbit.

Today's harvest was quite good, and with the bow damaged, Cui Hao decided to head back.

As usual, he would chop some firewood, wrap the meat in it, and carry it home.

Climbing over a bare mountain covered in thick snow, halfway up the mountainside, Cui Hao encountered a small, thin figure.

A boy of about eight or nine, wrapped in a tattered, patched-up single layer of clothing that was almost unrecognizable in color and full of holes.

On his feet were a pair of worn-out cloth shoes, clearly too large for him, with the toes already frayed. He trudged laboriously through the knee-deep snow, one step after another.

Behind him, he dragged an object wrapped simply in a rough straw mat, its human-like shape vaguely discernible, by a coarse grass rope.

The snow was too deep, the resistance too great. Every few steps, he had to stop and catch his breath, his exhaled white mist condensing into icy fog before his frozen, purplish face.

Cui Hao stopped, looking at the heartbreaking scene, and asked, "Kid, where are you going?"

The boy's thin shoulders hunched, and he didn't dare look up at Cui Hao. Head bowed, his voice, as faint as a mosquito's hum and trembling, replied, "To... Second Mountain."

"What for?"

"My father... died," the boy's voice grew lower, choked with suppressed sobs. "No place to bury him, so I'm taking him for the wild beasts in the mountains to eat."

Cui Hao fell silent.

The unclaimed wilderness of the First Mountain had long ago been carved up by the city's magnates and various families under all sorts of pretexts.

Not to mention the privately owned farmlands below the mountain.

For the poor, finding a place to bury their dead was incredibly difficult.

Seeing the boy shivering in the cold wind, almost at his last gasp, Cui Hao couldn't bear it. He took the stiff, frozen straw rope from the boy's hands. "I'll drag it for a bit. You follow behind and watch the path carefully."

The boy looked up blankly. On his dirty little face, his eyes were large and vacant, as if he hadn't yet recovered from the grief of losing his father and the torment of the bitter cold.

He didn't say thank you, nor did he refuse. He simply nodded silently and followed Cui Hao, his steps faltering in the snow.

Dragging the corpse, walking through the accumulated snow, they had just climbed back to the mountaintop when hurried shouts and footsteps echoed from behind.

"Stop! You there, stop!"

Cui Hao and the boy halted and turned to look.

Three or four burly men, dressed in thick cotton clothes and waterproof boots, were chasing after them, panting.

The leader was a middle-aged man in his forties with a fair complexion. He was currently bent over, hands on his knees, gasping for breath.

"You little brat!" the middle-aged man cursed, pointing at the boy once he caught his breath. "Who told you to drag the body to Second Mountain? The village head already passed the word, bodies are not to be thrown into Second Mountain!"

"If the fierce beasts inside get a taste for human flesh and become addicted, and then come down to harm the village later, can you bear that responsibility?!"

The boy's small body flinched, but he stubbornly retorted in a low voice, "Then... where should I bury my father?"

"I don't care where you bury him! Just don't throw him into Second Mountain! That's the rule!"

The boy lowered his head, no longer speaking, but biting his lower lip tightly. Tears welled in his eyes, but he held them back.

The situation stalemated. The men blocked the path, clearly not letting them pass.

Cui Hao looked at the helpless boy, then at the aggressive newcomers, and spoke, "Sir... it's freezing cold, and he's just a child... Could you be a bit flexible, or... could the village provide some firewood so he can cremate his father's body?"

"Cremate?"

The man sized up Cui Hao, who was dressed in a simple cotton jacket and carried a broken bow and firewood on his back, and sneered. "You're quite kind-hearted! Doesn't firewood cost money? I'm just a messenger, not his father. Why should I give him firewood? If you're so compassionate, why don't you give him money to buy firewood himself!"

Cui Hao said no more. He counted out ten copper coins from his pocket and pulled the boy's frozen, cracked, dirty little hand, gently placing the coins into his palm. "Take this and find the village woodcutter to buy some dry firewood."

The boy stared blankly at the ten copper coins in his palm, still warm from his body. He looked up at Cui Hao again, his lips trembling. In the end, he couldn't say anything. Tears finally began to fall in large drops, mixing with the dirt on his face.

"Idiot, throwing money away." The man no longer blocked them and turned to lead his men back down the mountain.

Cui Hao helped the boy drag the body back to the vicinity of the village entrance at the foot of the mountain. He saw the task through to the end, cremating the body before leaving.

By the time he hurried back to his home in Willow Tree Village, it was already the afternoon hour of Shen.

Entering the courtyard, he saw some writing on the snowy ground.

The handwriting was crooked, the characters uneven, and some strokes overlapped. To be honest... it was quite ugly.

"Laugh if you want to," Su Yun, a woman with a delicate heart, saw her husband struggling to hold back his amusement.

"Sister Yun..." Cui Hao tried to maintain his composure. "I don't usually laugh, unless I can't hold it in anymore."

"Brother Hao..." Su Yun voiced her thoughts. "I want to learn to write. Will you teach me?"

"Why?"

"You're going to be a man who becomes a scholar. If your wife can't read, won't people laugh at you?"

Sensing Su Yun's desire to improve, Cui Hao nodded. "Starting today, I'll teach you to recognize characters every day from now on."

Su Yun smiled.

"Go burn some hot water," Cui Hao said, putting down the firewood and broken bow. "I was moving a body just now."

Su Yun's heart leaped. "Why?"

Cui Hao briefly recounted what had happened on his way back.

Hearing that her husband had helped the boy and given him ten copper coins, Su Yun merely sighed softly, a flicker of sympathy in her eyes, but she didn't say much more.

She knew Brother Hao had a kind heart. But when her gaze fell on the broken mulberry wood bow, her face instantly turned pale.

"The bow... how did the bow break?" Su Yun's voice trembled. This bow was, in her mind, almost a symbol of her husband's safety and their family's livelihood.

"It's nothing," Cui Hao quickly explained. "I just used too much strength and pulled it apart. Don't we still have a spare at home? When I have time, I'll find someone to make a better one."

Remembering they had another bow at home, Su Yun's suspended heart finally settled a little, as if the sky that had seemed to be collapsing was propped back up.

Without further questions, she turned and went to the kitchen to start a fire and boil water.

..

"Brother Hao..."

The next morning, on the way to the martial arts school, Lin Da walked beside Cui Hao. The snow crunched underfoot, but he barely felt the cold. Instead, his palms were sweating from nervousness.

"I... I'm a little scared. The two-month deadline is getting closer, and I'm afraid... I'm afraid I won't be able to break through to Mortal Martial."

Cui Hao walked in silence. Nearly two months at the martial arts school had changed him from a naive newcomer. He had witnessed firsthand what it meant for the martial arts school to be "iron-clad, but the disciples flow like water."

Every day, new faces filled with dreams stepped in excitedly, and every day, old faces left dejectedly.

Those who survived the two months and were lucky enough to break through to Mortal Martial would soon be filtered out by the even crueler threshold of Clear Force.

And those who failed to break through would be like shells left on the beach by the tide, quickly forgotten.

He also deeply understood the meaning of "talent is dignity." The senior disciples in the Mortal Martial Realm, especially those in the Clear Force stage, would barely glance at disciples who hadn't entered Mortal Martial, beyond completing the mandatory tasks assigned by the master to guide newcomers.

Their circles, their conversations, their resources – there was a clear, visible barrier between them and the ordinary disciples.

He finally understood why Senior Sister Liu Yan had reminded him, "Don't bother others." It was a reminder not to humiliate himself.

Upon arriving at the martial arts school, Cui Hao changed into his coarse cloth training uniform as usual and quietly walked to a corner of the courtyard.

In the faint morning light, he stretched his muscles and bones, then leaped lightly, landing steadily on the cold plum blossom stakes. He began his daily stake-standing practice.

Wang Qing, Guo Yong, Wang Nian, and a few others from the same intake, who had arrived even earlier, were also silently enduring on their respective stakes.

Their eyes met, and they gave the slightest nod, a silent greeting. A tacit, heavy sense of urgency filled the air.

As dawn broke, the master slowly walked out from the inner courtyard.

He first went directly to Xiao Li, offering detailed guidance on his cultivation with gentle explanations and gestures.

Xiao Li listened respectfully, occasionally asking questions, the atmosphere between master and disciple harmonious.

Then, Xu Dian went to Li He's side, also patiently explaining the knack for moving qi and blood.

From this, it was clear that although Li He hadn't broken through, he was clearly highly valued.

Next, Xu Dian had a brief conversation with several Clear Force disciples who were sparring, seemingly inquiring about their progress or assigning tasks.

Afterward, he turned and returned directly to the inner courtyard.

From beginning to end, the master's gaze did not linger on the "ordinary disciple" area where Cui Hao was, nor did he approach to inquire or instruct as he had with Xiao Li and Li He.

Cui Hao stood on the stake, watching Xu Dian disappear behind the moon gate. The thought he had planned to share today, to report his breakthrough to Mortal Martial, quietly died within him.

Besides, even if he broke through, if he couldn't continuously display enough dazzling talent and value, wouldn't he soon be lost in the crowd?

As time passed, the atmosphere in the courtyard became increasingly subtle and tense.

Disciples with slightly more financial backing had shifting eyes, contemplating whether to risk obtaining a 'Qi and Blood Powder' to try their luck.

Those who were truly impoverished and couldn't even afford Qi and Blood Powder wore expressions of confusion, beginning to ponder their future if they failed to break through.

--Would they go home to farm? Or find a strenuous labor job in the city?

As for Cui Hao himself, with only one day left until the two-month "deadline," the gazes of his fellow disciples, with whom he usually trained his strength, stood on stakes, and complained about the hardship, began to change subtly.