Virtual Universe.
The study.
Li Dui picked up the tablet he had customized to suit his habits. He logged into the internal system and clicked on the treasure vault.
Eight categories appeared on the screen.
Secret Techniques. Weapons. Rare Treasures. Technological Weapons. Materials. Tools. Lifeforms. Other Special Items.
He clicked on Secret Techniques.
A dense list of secret technique types appeared below: different Universe Origin Law systems, different weapon types, soul techniques, movement techniques, combat techniques, and many more.
Li Dui went straight to the search bar and entered, "Earth Origin Law, Origin Law of Space, blade techniques, attack."
He had always presented himself as using earth and space, so for the time being, he could only use those two.
He clicked search. A huge selection of secret techniques popped up, including some costing tens of millions of points.
Li Dui had to add another filter: "Under 100 points."
He wasn't here to look for his main combat secret techniques, anyway. For now, the strongest secret technique he could display in public was the Giant Axe First Blade, a technique derived from the Giant Axe Chaos Stele.
As for his true strength... he had no secret techniques. He simply infused his attacks with the power of laws and hacked away.
What he was looking for were cheap, unusual techniques that might inspire him as he created his own.
As it happened, being unusual and original was more or less the standard the internal system used to collect these low-level secret techniques.
Ordinary secret techniques created by Immortals normally sold for 10,000 points. Just imagine how weak a technique must be if it could be bought for a few dozen points—or even a few.
Each secret technique came with a holographic recording of it being performed. If you were willing to spend Universe Coins, the Virtual Universe could also create a dummy for you, allowing you to personally experience the technique's power.
As was his habit, Li Dui kept half his attention on the Ring. He watched seven or eight secret techniques in a row. Two or three of them gave him a faint sense of inspiration, enough to let him roughly guess their creators' thought processes or approach.
That was enough. That was exactly what he wanted.
He went to the training room and topped up his account. Then he asked the Virtual Universe System to create dummies for those eight secret techniques and fight him one by one.
This time, six of them gave him a sense of inspiration.
"Then why would I buy them? I can just get them for free."
That was right. In Li Dui's eyes, achieving his goal by spending only a few Universe Coins was the same as getting them for free.
Even if a secret technique cost just 5 points, that was cheap, right?
The problem was, those 5 points could be exchanged for 5 Hunyuan Units. There was just nowhere to exchange them for the time being.
Wait, Li Dui suddenly realized. If he really wanted to exchange them, he could go ask Hong. He was sure Hong would know a way.
He fought the dummies one after another. Once he had found ten secret techniques that inspired him, he stopped and began carefully considering what their creators had been thinking. From time to time, he would also practice them himself.
Half his attention was focused on comprehending the laws through the Ring, while the other half went into studying secret techniques. This was indeed about 30% less efficient than devoting himself to just one task.
But the gains from doing both together were enormous.
Creating a secret technique was really just a matter of releasing the laws you had comprehended in a particular way. The tricky part was deciding what kind of effect you wanted it to have.
You might want your secret technique to make your attacks more penetrating.
You might want to strike over a wide area while preserving as much power as possible.
You might want your attacks to be faster.
You might want a series of attacks to stack together in a certain way. You might want to achieve power beyond what your own Law Comprehension would normally allow, and so on.
Li Dui's mastery of secret techniques was already quite high.
He had completely mastered the Giant Axe Third Blade. In terms of the power of its laws alone, it had already reached the Immortal level.
Of course, that was on the Heavenly Bridge, where his physical attributes were restricted. In reality, its power was still far from the Immortal level.
Looking back at these rudimentary techniques now, Li Dui found them hardly difficult at all. It was just that before, he could only create his own techniques by relying on the three Giant Axe blades and his own experimentation.
Now he could draw inspiration from the flashes of insight of countless predecessors.
The secret techniques he imagined creating would go like this: the first and second would be more or less on par with the first and second blades Giant Axe had left on the Chaos Stele. The third would aim for something greater.
This wasn't a mindless attempt to surpass Giant Axe.
The techniques Giant Axe had left behind were a guiding beacon, crafted from a higher vantage point.
A hint was all that was needed. It wasn't that Giant Axe was only capable of that much. The main reason was that if he made it too advanced, you wouldn't understand it.
Once fully mastered, the third blade on the Chaos Stele could carry someone through the Tenth Layer of the Heavenly Bridge.
The third blade Li Dui truly envisioned should touch on combining laws for the first time. Its power should be enough to pass the Twelfth Layer of the Heavenly Bridge.
That was still a long way off. His own first blade couldn't even get him through the third layer of the Heavenly Bridge yet.
Watching, experiencing, thinking, experimenting, all while comprehending the laws. His days were busy and fulfilling.
Li Dui himself hadn't noticed how different circumstances and a different life had gradually changed him.
The near-inexhaustible energy of a Universe Rank powerhouse allowed him to revel in the thrill of improvement as he trained almost without sleep.
"Whoosh." "Whoosh." "Whoosh."
Blades of light crisscrossed through the air.
Li Dui practiced alone, swinging his long blade. He couldn't get dummies powerful enough to match Universe Rank warriors or anyone above the fourth layer of the Heavenly Bridge. Even money wouldn't help; he didn't have the required permissions.
In just a few days, he had perfected his first blade. It now matched the Giant Axe First Blade, with the Law Comprehension of the first three layers and enough power to pass the fourth.
His second blade, which he had created from scratch, took him less than a year. Though he hadn't actually performed it yet, the blade had already taken shape in his mind.
He was confident it could match the Giant Axe Second Blade and carry him through the Seventh Layer of the Heavenly Bridge.
He had never practiced the Giant Axe Third Blade in the Virtual Universe, let alone unleashed the full power of the Origin Law of Space.
The strongest attacks he had used in the Virtual Universe so far were a few components or incomplete moves from his second blade. They were roughly powerful enough to pass the fifth layer of the Heavenly Bridge. That shouldn't be enough to draw special attention.
Li Dui remembered the system email he had received more than ten days ago. Xiao Le had reminded him about it at the time, but he had been at a critical stage in creating his second blade and had ignored it.
The email was rather long. Its gist was this: You people have been in the secret realm for a full year now. You've been here all this time, and every one of you is holed up indoors. Not a single person has taken on a mission, gone adventuring, or fought over resources.
Do you think you can become strong just by staying inside and training? Do you think you're especially talented?
Our Battle Axe Secret Realm has only 3,000 spots for Universe Rank Core Members, but there are now more than 3,700 of you. In the next Qualification Battle, you'll all be demoted to reserve members.
Are you willing to accept that? If not, get out there and temper yourselves. Fight! Every true supreme powerhouse rose up through countless battles.
Li Dui nearly laughed out loud as he read it. Some of the wording was pretty harsh. It was practically accusing them to their faces: You're all a bunch of useless trash. What the hell do you think you'll achieve by hiding here and training every day?
He had to admit, they had a point. Fighting to the death every day and walking along the edge of a blade might not make you a supreme powerhouse, but every one of those powerhouses had indeed clawed their way up through mountains of corpses and endless slaughter.
He needed to think carefully about how to strike the right balance.
Before you continue