One point for 1% meant Zhao Cheng needed only 69 Simulation Points to complete the conversion of his swordsmanship.
Practicing twice a day, Zhao Cheng could increase the conversion by about 2%.
With diligent study and hard training, it would take him only thirty-five days.
Zhao Cheng did the math. If he spent all his Simulation Points on proficiency from here on, then combined that with his own training, it would take about eleven days to complete the conversion.
Of course, his swordsmanship would surely improve during that time. In ten days, he might even grind it up to lv9. Although that would lower the conversion percentage, he could still guarantee that his swordsmanship reached lv8 in reality within eleven days.
That speed was simply astonishing.
But if he saved all his Simulation Points, then at the very least, he could save up the 300 Simulation Points needed for the Coward's Savior in just seventy-four days.
That was without any new gains; if he got any, it could be even faster.
However, even though spending all his points on conversion would bring greater benefits in the short term, in the long run, the sooner he exchanged them for the Coward's Savior, the greater the returns.
At the moment, he trained twice a day, and his conversion rate was only 2%. But once his body was reforged, that rate would skyrocket.
Just like his Hyper-Dimensional Body in the simulation. Thanks to his extraordinary talent, it had gone from lv4 to lv7 in a mere moment. There was no such thing as conversion at all.
That was the benefit of talent.
Should he take the gains at hand, or the long-term benefits? The thought crossed Zhao Cheng's mind, and he immediately chose the latter.
He had no great vendetta to avenge, no six-month appointment, and certainly no mysterious organization hunting him down. He lived in a peaceful society, with no external danger pressing him.
He lacked everything except time.
As for unlikely accidents, if he went out later and got crushed by a meteorite or hit by a car, if he was truly unlucky enough for that to happen, he'd accept it.
Finally, there were Evolution Points. They were used to raise one's realm, but since Zhao Cheng's realm was currently undergoing conversion, he could only use them to increase his conversion rate.
Consume one Evolution Point to increase conversion by 20%?
The effect of an Evolution Point seemed rather powerful. But considering that this so-called conversion only required a 6% increase, it made sense.
Zhao Cheng thought it over and decided the cost-effectiveness wasn't great either.
In this world, cultivation ultimately relied on swordsmanship to establish oneself, and on swordsmanship to raise one's realm. That was the proper path. Raising one's realm directly without improving one's swordsmanship would only get half the result for twice the effort. On the other hand, once one's swordsmanship improved, whether it was raising one's five-dimensional attributes or one's realm, both would be easy.
So in the end, Zhao Cheng concluded that of the three kinds of points, Skill Points were the most cost-effective. And the best way to use them wasn't to add points to his real body, but to directly upgrade the skills of his Hyper-Dimensional Body.
After looking over the three kinds of points, Zhao Cheng didn't spend any of them. Instead, he planned to save them for later, so he could compare their effects once his attributes improved.
When their cost-effectiveness eventually increased, he'd use them where needed.
Then, taking advantage of how refreshed he felt after waking up, Zhao Cheng opened the Heavenly Phoenix Soaring Fist (Blue) (Middle Section) in the item bar of his Panel.
In the instance, he had only skimmed through it once and hadn't studied it carefully.
And the crystallization of an entire world's civilization and extraordinary power was no simple thing, even if it was only a fragment.
Zhao Cheng had no talent for fist techniques. Even though this manual was so useful and its annotations so detailed that it was practically like having a master teach him step by step, he was still utterly baffled as he read through it.
Fist techniques were no simple matter, especially when they involved the extraordinary.
Since he couldn't quite understand it, Zhao Cheng even let his mind wander. As he looked at the techniques, he thought of the grunts at the Heavenly Phoenix Pavilion, then of the mini-bosses at Moyun University.
"If I train in the fist techniques from that world, will I turn into a muscle giant too?"
"But that makes sense. The bigger the body, the more power it can contain. Especially when there's no such thing as highly concentrated energy—the bigger, the stronger!"
"The power system there clearly focuses on the body. It pushes the body's potential to the extreme and increases its strength. That's unlike swordsmanship in reality, which also refines the body, but focuses on a spiritual transformation, eventually turning the Primordial Spirit into a sword that can kill enemies a thousand paces away."
"Still, even though it focuses on the spirit, the bodies of those sword experts are frighteningly strong. Every powerful swordsman is built like a tank; they're just not over three meters tall."
Zhao Cheng's thoughts raced.
"But now that I think about it, becoming like that would be pretty cool!"
"Once I've trained the qi from the instance and pushed my body to the extreme, I can combine the ultimate spirit developed through real-world swordsmanship with the ultimate physique developed through the instance's fist techniques. At over three meters tall, wielding a giant sword three meters long, who under heaven could block a single strike from me?!"
"Confucius could lift a city gate with one hand. I'll lift two!"
Zhao Cheng's thoughts wandered farther and farther off course.
As for his lack of talent for fist techniques, he already had a vague idea of how to deal with it.
The solution had existed in reality for a long time: use sword techniques as fist techniques.
If sword techniques could be footwork, movement techniques, or cultivation methods, why couldn't they be fist techniques?!
As long as he stacked up enough talent in the simulation, nothing would be a problem.
What's more, he had a huge advantage in the simulation: he wasn't afraid of dying and could experiment as much as he wanted. He could train however he liked. Even if he died suddenly, he'd just start over.
His thoughts wandered for who knew how long before Zhao Cheng finally came back to himself.
After that, he looked at the fist techniques on the Panel with even more enthusiasm.
If he couldn't learn them, there was no need to rush. He could treat them as light reading and familiarize himself with them bit by bit. He had plenty of time for now, and learning and reading more could never be a bad thing.
Before he knew it, the afternoon had passed. Zhao Cheng had spent less than a fifth as much time actually studying the manual as he had letting his imagination run wild.
He imagined wielding a three-meter-long giant sword, killing gods if they stood in his way and Buddhas if they blocked him; lifting a city gate with one hand and doing squats with it; and saying, "You can block this strike? It took me only thirty punches' worth of time to swing it..."
In short, his thoughts left him so fired up that his emotions settled faster than when he was just spacing out aimlessly.
"Old Zhao, what are you thinking about? Why are you so happy?"
After school that afternoon, Zhou Yu nudged Zhao Cheng.
Hearing him, Zhao Cheng didn't even come to his senses before replying on instinct, "I was wondering if a three-foot sword is too feeble. A real man should use a giant sword. Your sword is three feet long; mine is three zhang. You've already lost on sheer presence."
Zhou Yu fell into thought. A few seconds later, he said, "In theory, that's true. But are you sure yours is a sword and not a Ship-Slaying Blade?"
"Where are you going to find a Gundam to pilot in real life?!"
Before you continue