Breakthrough

No one was surprised to see Wang Qingyuan eagerly trying to take Qin Yuan as his disciple.

Qian Feng and Liu Yuan were unwilling to give up so easily. Even though they knew they were outmatched, they were still ready to fight to the bitter end.

They, too, stepped forward and said they wanted to take Qin Yuan as their disciple.

Wang Qingyuan glanced at the two of them disdainfully, but said nothing. He merely smiled at the bewildered Qin Yuan, not in the least worried that anyone might steal this precious disciple from him.

No one could steal a disciple from him, Wang Qingyuan, the Chess Saint!

"I already have a teacher."

After his initial surprise, Qin Yuan said.

The smile on Wang Qingyuan's face froze. Qian Feng and Liu Yuan also stared at him in surprise.

Indeed, how could someone who had reached the sixth rank of the Chess Path at only ten years old possibly have no teacher...? Wang Qingyuan and the other two thought to themselves.

Hmm? Ten years old... half a year...

Wang Qingyuan and the others found those two points in time strangely familiar, as if they had heard them somewhere before.

Just as they were about to remember, Qin Yuan's voice reached their ears.

"My Chess Path teacher is Zhang Kaiming."

Boom—!!!

Those words rang out like thunder on a clear day, exploding beside Wang Qingyuan and the others' ears and leaving their heads buzzing.

They stood frozen like statues, stunned on the spot. It was as if they had been pulled out of the world; their ears rang, and they couldn't hear a thing.

Only after a long while did their hearing gradually return. Then, like cats whose tails had been stepped on, they shrieked:

"Who? Your teacher is Zhang Kaiming?!"

Qin Yuan didn't know why they were reacting so strongly. He paused, then nodded.

"That's right."

With his confirmation, Wang Qingyuan and the others gave up any remaining hope.

"You're Qin Yuan?" Wang Qingyuan looked at him with an expression of utter complexity.

Qian Feng and Liu Yuan beside him looked the same.

Their hearts were full of guilt and envy. They felt guilty for having misunderstood Zhang Kaiming; it turned out he hadn't been buttering anyone up.

And they were envious because Zhang Kaiming was actually Qin Yuan's Chess Path teacher!

That bastard, keeping all the good things to himself! No wonder he hadn't come to meet up with them once in half a year. So he'd deliberately kept it from them!

"You know me?" Qin Yuan raised an eyebrow.

Behind him, Li Fu's calm, old eyes instantly sharpened. His aura locked onto Wang Qingyuan, like a beast poised to pounce, ready to strike at any moment.

Qin Yuan held a lofty status. In the entire Heavenly Dou Empire, only a handful of nobles ranked marquis or above knew of it. Wang Qingyuan certainly wasn't one of them.

Wang Qingyuan suddenly felt a deadly threat coming from the old man behind Qin Yuan.

He abruptly remembered Qin Yuan's lofty status and hurried to explain:

"I heard it from Zhang Kaiming!"

He spoke extremely quickly, afraid that if he delayed even a second, he'd lose his life.

The feeling of deadly threat vanished.

Li Fu returned to his usual calm.

Wang Qingyuan secretly breathed a sigh of relief, lamenting inwardly, Alas! It seems I'm fated to miss out on a peerless talent like him. What a pity!

Qian Feng and Liu Yuan felt the same regret.

"Chess Saint Wang, could I ask you a question?" Qin Yuan suddenly said.

"Please, go ahead," Wang Qingyuan replied at once, not daring to be negligent.

"What is Chess Heart?"

Three days later, on a cool night, Qin Yuan was alone, pondering the Chess Path when he opened his eyes. A line of information appeared before him.

[Congratulations, you have comprehended Chess Heart! Your Chess Path has advanced to the seventh rank. Reward: seven evolution points.]

Qin Yuan stared blankly at the line of information before him. A hint of delight flashed in his eyes.

He let out a long breath and sighed:

"That wasn't easy. I was stuck for nearly half a month, but I finally broke through!"

With a thought, he called up the panel.

[Name: Qin Yuan]

[Age: 10]

[Martial Soul: Golden Flood Dragon]

[Soul Power: Level 6 (+)]

[Skill: Chess Path, Rank 7 (1854/10000)]

[Evolution Points: 17]

He glanced at the Martial Soul entry, slightly disappointed to find no plus sign after it. As expected, the evolution points required for a third Martial Soul Evolution would far exceed the amount needed for the second.

His gaze fell on the Skill entry. Looking at the 1854 experience points, a trace of surprise and confusion crossed his eyes.

He'd only just broken through. How could there be...

He soon understood.

The 1854 points must have accumulated during the nearly half a month he'd been stuck. They simply hadn't appeared before because he hadn't comprehended Chess Heart and advanced to the seventh rank of the Chess Path.

He dismissed the panel and returned to his room, smiling, to rest.

Time flew by, and another half year passed.

Qin Yuan was eleven now.

Over the past half year, Qin Yuan had often visited the Chess Saint Pavilion to play against the Chess Saint and other Chess Path masters. His Chess Path experience had soared.

It had taken him two and a half months to advance from the seventh to the eighth rank, and three and a half months to advance from the eighth to the ninth.

This terrifying rate of progress left Wang Qingyuan and the others dumbfounded. They looked at Qin Yuan as if he were some kind of monster!

Alongside his shock, Zhang Kaiming felt even more pride and satisfaction. He practically showed off in front of Wang Qingyuan and the others every day, making them grit their teeth with resentment, yet powerless to do anything about it.

There was nothing they could do. After all, Zhang Kaiming had such a monstrous disciple.

Advancing by two ranks in half a year had earned Qin Yuan a total of seventeen evolution points. Added to the seventeen he'd already had, that brought him to thirty-four in all.

But, as expected, he still couldn't trigger a third Martial Soul Evolution. Qin Yuan wasn't disappointed, though. He eagerly stockpiled evolution points, waiting for that third evolution.

He believed that his next Martial Soul Evolution would surely grant him an extraordinarily powerful Super Martial Soul—one that would satisfy him completely!

From first encountering the Chess Path to reaching its ninth rank and standing at its very peak, Qin Yuan had taken only a year. No one before him had ever done it, and no one after him would match it.

However, once he reached the ninth rank, advancing to the tenth would take far too much experience and time. It simply wasn't worth it.

So, after advancing to the ninth rank of the Chess Path, Qin Yuan stopped focusing on it and decided to learn a new skill.

As it happened, Qin Yuan knew that Qian Renxue had mastered a skill and reached the level of a grandmaster. So, the day after reaching the ninth rank of the Chess Path, he immediately went to see her.

He made it into the East Palace without a hitch.

Everyone in the Heavenly Dou Imperial Palace knew that Qin Yuan had been raised by Crown Prince Xue Qinghe, and that they were very close. The guards at the East Palace didn't dare stop him and let him in directly.

Qin Yuan walked into the East Palace and headed straight for Qian Renxue's room. He pushed the door open and entered.

A faint, pleasant fragrance wafted into his nose.

The room was elegantly furnished, clean, and orderly. As Qin Yuan entered, his gaze was drawn to a jade stand carved from stone.

The stand stood right beside the soft couch, directly facing it. It was within arm's reach of anyone lying on the couch.

There were no books on it. The stand had ten tiers, each filled with jade carvings.

At the very bottom was a baby lying in a cradle, its features delicate and charming, utterly adorable.

The second tier from the bottom held a one-year-old child who had just learned to walk but was still unsteady. Some carvings showed the child toddling about, others showed it crawling on the ground, and still others showed it reaching out to be held. Its big eyes looked so lifelike they seemed real.

The higher the carvings went, the older the child became. Its chubby cheeks grew into a handsome little face, like a work of art carefully sculpted by nature.

The carvings on the top tier had been made recently. Even without looking closely, it was easy to see that the face on each one was exactly like Qin Yuan's.

All ten tiers of carvings had been sculpted by Qian Renxue herself, recording Qin Yuan's appearance from infancy to the handsome young man he was now.

As Qin Yuan gazed at the jade carvings sculpted in his likeness, his eyes softened.