Six Finger Techniques, Six Stages of Hardening! (Seeking Daily Reads)

In the small courtyard.

Zhao An consumed one Earth Origin Pill and drank a bowl of ten-year-old Red Blood Root decoction, the feeling of physical depletion finally easing.

"That's better..." Zhao An was somewhat surprised.

He had originally assumed that since this was the result of twenty years of cultivation, he would need to supplement a massive amount of energy and nutrients to fully absorb it.

For this reason, fearing his supply of Earth Origin Pills and Red Blood Root would be insufficient, he had specifically sent Li Gou'er to the medical clinic to find Meng Wanyi, purchasing an additional bottle of seven premium Earth Origin Pills along with several jin of ten-year-old Red Blood Root.

Yet, he had not expected the energy requirement for absorbing this cultivation result to be lower than usual.

This was primarily because this particular cultivation result did not bring about many changes or improvements to his physical body.

For the majority of the time, the Soul Slave He Song had been struggling to comprehend the subtleties; like a middle school student trying to self-study and apply university-level knowledge, the progress was naturally very slow.

The tempering of the body and the growth of Internal Breath over these twenty years had been minimal.

Twenty years passed like a single day, and it was only at the very end that he finally grasped a few subtleties and mastered some of the techniques.

Zhao An looked at his hands; if there was one major change to his body, it was undoubtedly his ten fingers, the skin of which had become noticeably tougher.

His already slender finger bones felt like iron rods, impossible to snap.

If he were to use these to jab someone, he feared that even with brute force alone, he could easily inflict injury.

As for the invisible meridians within his fingers, they had also become significantly more resilient, capable of channeling and releasing greater amounts of Internal Breath.

All these changes were in preparation for practicing this finger technique!

He signaled for Li Gou'er to stop boiling the Red Blood Root and ordered him and Zhao Chunzi to attack him.

Upon hearing this, Li Gou'er immediately pulled a bitter face and bowed, begging for mercy.

Previously, whenever Zhao An made a breakthrough in his martial arts but lacked a suitable sparring partner, he would make these two lackeys suffer.

"Be quick about it," Zhao An said.

With no other choice, Li Gou'er had to steel himself and swing his fist toward Zhao An.

Zhao An raised a finger, seemingly tapping lightly on the side of Li Gou'er's arm. Li Gou'er let out a pained cry, his entire side going numb as he collapsed straight to the ground, as if struck by lightning.

On the other side, Zhao Chunzi also swung his fist, only to be tapped by Zhao An in the same manner.

It appeared effortless and unremarkable, but within his body, a strand of Internal Breath followed his meridians to his fingertip, piercing into the opponent's acupoints to cause a series of injuries and various different effects.

This finger technique was called the Pulse-Severing Finger, but in reality, that was only one part of it.

The entire set of finger techniques consisted of six forms.

Pulse-Severing Finger, Acupoint-Sealing Finger, Bone-Piercing Finger, Sword Finger, Qi-Bursting Finger, and Spring-Returning Finger.

Currently, he had initially mastered the Pulse-Severing Finger and the Acupoint-Sealing Finger.

The power and effect of the Acupoint-Sealing Finger were similar to what Zhao An understood as "freezing" someone by striking their acupoints.

What he had just used was the Acupoint-Sealing Finger, striking Li Gou'er and his companion to instantly paralyze them and strip them of their mobility.

If practiced to a profound level, a single finger could render even a Martial Master completely immobile.

The Pulse-Severing Finger, however, targeted the opponent's meridians, disrupting the flow of their Internal Breath. Once mastered, it could even cause the Internal Breath to reverse its flow or allow him to remotely control the opponent's Internal Breath to move according to his will!

For a martial artist, Internal Breath is the foundation of their practice, and its importance is beyond doubt.

Once the Internal Breath is thrown into chaos, the consequences are unimaginable.

This finger technique could be said to target vital points specifically, making it particularly effective against fellow martial artists, far surpassing ordinary martial arts.

He asked himself: if his opponent possessed this technique, Zhao An would have no confidence in being able to neutralize it.

Unless I overwhelm them with a superior level of Internal Breath, or use a hard-body cultivation technique to prevent my Internal Breath from penetrating... Zhao An pondered the potential solutions.

Of course, this finger technique had long been lost to history; today, he was the only one in the world who had learned and mastered it, so the only ones who would find it troublesome in the future would be his opponents.

Since his physical burden was not heavy, Zhao An decided to proceed with absorbing the cultivation results of his other Soul Slaves.

One must know that there were quite a few Soul Slaves whose servitude periods had ended today.

The Eighth-Grade Hard Bone Skill, Mountain Crushing Fist, and Gale Palm had all completed their initial cultivation.

"Let's start with the hard-body cultivation," Zhao An decided, grabbing three Soul Slaves whose servitude had ended and refining them instantly.

Each Soul Slave provided a five-year term to be used for practicing this hard-body skill.

There were no shortcuts for hard-body skills; it was a matter of spending time, bit by bit, to temper the skin, flesh, tendons, bones, and internal organs from the outside in.

Because of this, once Zhao An absorbed the Hard Bone Skill cultivation results from these three Soul Slaves, an unprecedented sense of "hunger" surged through his body.

His body was desperately craving food, nutrients, and energy.

Zhao An was mentally prepared; he calmly swallowed a premium Earth Origin Pill, drank a bowl of Red Blood Root decoction, and then continuously consumed large amounts of meat.

Then came another Earth Origin Pill, more Red Blood Root decoction, repeating the process until the "hunger" in his body vanished.

For this, he had consumed three Earth Origin Pills and three jin of ten-year-old Red Blood Root!

Whether it was an Earth Origin Pill or a single jin of ten-year-old Red Blood Root, each cost ten taels of silver!

In other words, this single round of supplementation had cost him a full sixty taels of silver!

This was no small sum; the money Zhao An had looted from the two major gangs was shrinking rapidly, and he now had only about fifty taels of ready cash left.

Yet, not long ago, he had possessed over two hundred taels!

It had to be said that practicing martial arts was truly a money-burning endeavor, and with his Soul Slaves training on his behalf, it was burning money at a lethal rate.

Fortunately, the returns this brought made Zhao An feel it was worth every penny.

This Grade 8 Hard Bone Skill was divided into six realms: Skin, Flesh, Tendon, Bone, and Viscera; once these five were completed, one would finally forge a Vajra Body!

With this initial training, the combined results of the three Soul Slaves had successfully allowed him to complete the first realm.

His skin had become more refined and taut, possessing an extraordinary natural resilience that feared neither punches and kicks, strikes from clubs, nor even light slashes from small knives; it was difficult to leave even a mark on this layer of skin!

And if his Internal Breath was circulated according to the Hard Bone Skill, with the skin absorbing the energy, he could generate the same kind of rebounding force that Tang Niu had previously displayed!

Beyond that, this set of hard-body techniques also imparted numerous unique deflection skills, which complemented the power of the technique itself, allowing him to keep his physical body intact throughout life-or-death struggles!

Zhao An still had Li Gou'er and the other man test his body-refining results, though this time, he had them take short clubs and strike him repeatedly.

They struck until Li Gou'er was drenched in sweat and his arms were aching unbearably, only then did they stop.

Yet Zhao An stood where he was, completely unscathed!

Li Gou'er rubbed his numb and aching hands, looking at Zhao An's skin, which didn't even have a single bruise, and desperately wanted to say, "You're not human," but he ultimately held his tongue, not daring to be presumptuous in front of Zhao An.

"Brother Zhao, your skin is like stone; the clubs hit you, but it's my and Chunzi's hands that hurt. What kind of logic is this..."

Zhao An merely shook his head and said, "It's not enough."

"Not enough?" Li Gou'er was stunned.

"Clubs can be blocked, but blades and swords are still hard to defend against; it's not powerful enough yet." Zhao An evaluated his "new skin" and spoke.

"..."

"Even cowhide, bear hide, or elephant hide couldn't stop a blade's cut or a sword's thrust. Brother Zhao, is what you're saying really something a human can achieve?" Li Gou'er was dumbfounded.

"It can be done." Zhao An didn't say anything more; as long as he continued to practice this Hard Bone Skill, he would be able to become impervious to blades and spears!

Additionally, his Internal Breath had also seen a corresponding increase, now rising to nearly four hundred and fifty strands.

Once the results of his other martial arts were collected one by one, his Internal Breath would surely rise by another wave.

Of course, today was not the day; he would have to wait a couple more days, otherwise, the martial arts results he collected would inevitably suffer significant losses.