Did I choose wrong?
Back in the monks' quarters, Li Su scratched his head. Tianming's gaze had seemed very strange.
Never mind. The Arhat Gong was something he very much needed to acquire.
It wasn't just that his meditation practice showed little progress and wouldn't give anything away. More importantly, it was an advanced version of the Arhat Fist, so the two were bound to complement each other.
He went about his routine: getting up, attending morning prayers, cleaning, and practicing.
Three days passed.
Li Su went to the Arhat Hall alone.
Tianming was there.
"You're here?"
"Sit down."
The old monk's expression was calm. There was none of the strange look he'd given Li Su three days earlier as he said, "The Arhat Gong is an advanced method of the Arhat Fist. It was originally researched exclusively by the Arhat Hall, but it's so difficult that almost no one has been able to practice it in recent years. Though it's ranked among the Shaolin Seventy-Two Arts, and in the top ten at that, I honestly don't recommend learning it. You could go decades without making the slightest progress. Even so, do you still want to learn it?"
Li Su thought for a moment, then took out his charcoal pencil and wrote, "Do you mean I have to join the Arhat Hall before I can learn the Arhat Gong?"
"That's not necessary."
Tianming shook his head. "The Arhat Gong is simply too difficult to practice. Almost no one has ever succeeded, though anyone who studies it does need to register first."
Li Su considered this, then nodded and wrote: I'll learn it.
Whether he could master it or not didn't matter. His Arhat Fist was progressing nicely. At worst, he could wait another twenty or thirty years, until he had enough seniority, and then switch to something else.
"Good."
Tianming nodded. "The Arhat Gong has no written words, no books, and no sermons. It seeks only enlightenment. Though it's a meditation art, it is, in truth, a method of refinement: cultivating the myriad forms of the Arhats."
Tianming sat cross-legged and joined his hands, silently chanting a sutra aloud.
His voice was like a Buddhist chant, like a song, carrying a strange rhythm that tugged at the mind.
As Li Su wondered what was happening, the scene before him suddenly changed. Tianming was gone. In his place sat an Arhat, chanting softly. A golden light seemed to spread through the air and envelop him.
Strange and mysterious, beyond words.
The light shimmered in five colors, while the chant emptied the mind and stilled the soul.
Drawn along by them, the world seemed to change. Everything came into sharp focus, and the space around him appeared to expand a thousandfold, even a hundredfold more. Countless worlds emerged within it, each containing a seated Arhat. Their radiance grew ever brighter, as though reaching the Other Shore, while his spirit took up residence between those twin trees.
It seemed to last but an instant, and yet it felt like countless ages.
Overcome by an indescribable exhaustion and drowsiness, Li Su blinked, and he was back in the room. Tianming sat before him once more.
Eyes wide with shock and confusion, Li Su stared at the old monk.
Just now—
Wait. Wasn't he in a martial-arts world? Why had he seen an Arhat? Could inner power really do that?
Tianming smiled. "What did you see?"
Li Su picked up his pencil and wrote, "I saw an Arhat!"
"Mm, that's right. The Arhat Gong has no specific method or fixed forms. It isn't recorded in books, and it can't be explained in words. I can only let you see it this way. Afterward, you'll have to practice based on what you saw—to search for it and realize it on your own."
Li Su's eyes shifted. He wrote, "Master, does that mean I practice through visualization?"
"Visualization?" Tianming paused, then smiled. "That's an excellent word. Yes, the Arhat Gong can be called visualization—the method of visualization."
"I understand. Thank you for passing on the method, Master."
"Mm. Go on."
Li Su bowed and wrote, "Yes. Your disciple takes his leave."
As Li Su reached the threshold, Tianming suddenly called, "Xuankong."
Li Su stopped.
"You... Never mind. Go on."
After Li Su's footsteps faded away, Tianming shook his head and softly recited, "Amitabha Buddha."
He had become attached to appearances...
He had meant to ask Li Su what he'd seen.
The Arhat Gong was a visualization method and could only be passed down this way. The person receiving it would get one chance to see an "Arhat."
The Arhat each person saw varied.
According to the records, there were three levels: one Arhat, eighteen Arhats, and five hundred Arhats.
One Arhat was the most basic level. Tianming himself was at that level. After practicing the Arhat Divine Art for thirty years, he was still only lingering at the threshold.
The eighteen Arhats were already an impressive achievement. The eminent monks in Shaolin Temple's history who had mastered the Arhat Divine Art had almost all reached that level.
As for the highest level, five hundred Arhats, the only one recorded to have witnessed such a sight was Bodhidharma.
The five hundred did not mean that the person saw exactly five hundred figures. It stood for a great many.
The Arhats seen were too numerous to describe, so five hundred was used to represent them.
Li Su had said he saw an Arhat. That probably meant he'd seen just one. Otherwise, he would have said he'd seen many Arhats.
His senior brother's words had made it clear that Tianming wasn't as at ease as he had seemed. The fate of the Quanzhou Shaolin Zen Temple had sounded a huge warning bell. For decades now, Putian Shaolin had continually sent disciples down the mountain to keep others in check.
He would wait and see.
"Xuancheng is doing well. If he keeps it up, recommend that he be sent over there."
Tianming paused. As for Xuankong, even if he truly had exceptional talent, mastering the Arhat Divine Art would take years. There was little chance of success for now. Better to keep him as a piece in reserve.
Still rather dazed, Li Su returned to the place where he usually practiced and sat on the steps, his expression strange.
This was a martial-arts novel, right?
This was Jin Da's world, right?
An Arhat had appeared.
Remembering the scene deep in his mind, Li Su couldn't help twitching the corner of his mouth. Was the Arhat Gong a martial art that could turn someone into an actual Arhat once fully mastered?
After resting for a while, Li Su waited for his strength to return, picked up a broom, and began sweeping.
Before long, Xuanci and the others came over too.
They helped him clean up. As soon as they finished, the group eagerly began practicing the new martial arts they'd just learned.
The Vajra Palm and the Demon Subduing Staff.
Xuanci led the way. Xuancheng, Xuanku, and Xuannan had all chosen palm techniques.
The other three had chosen staff techniques.
Apparently, no one had picked a leg technique.
That wasn't surprising.
In fact, very few people chose the Chain Kick.
After more than two years at Shaolin Temple, most people knew that Shaolin had the most techniques for the hands. It did have leg techniques, but they fell far short of the techniques performed with both hands.
Now that they had new techniques to practice, Xuanci and the others were brimming with enthusiasm, never mind Xuancheng. They were as earnest as they'd been when they first started practicing the Arhat Fist.
Watching the seven of them practice, Li Su smiled, set down the broom, and sat cross-legged in a corner.
He planned to try the Arhat Gong. Whether he could master it was secondary; the main thing was to pass the time. At this rate, especially with Xuancheng, the others wouldn't stop until nightfall.
A visualization method, huh?
Li Su was curious. He was familiar with the term from novels, but not martial-arts novels—xianxia novels.
He wondered how visualization in a martial-arts world differed.
With a thought, Li Su began recalling the scene he'd witnessed.
As the memory stirred, the image of the Arhat appeared at once. But unlike when Tianming had passed the art on to him, it was hazy. It seemed to be chanting a sutra, but Li Su couldn't hear it.
He tried to see it more clearly, only to find that the harder he tried, the blurrier it became. Worse, his thoughts grew increasingly jumbled, and he couldn't concentrate.
After a while, Li Su couldn't help opening his eyes and drawing a breath.
He found that after trying to visualize the scene, he hadn't entered a meditative state at all. His breathing had grown ragged too.
Was this as much as he could see for now? For some reason, the thought surfaced in Li Su's mind.
He closed his eyes and rested. Once his energy had fully returned, he began visualizing again.
This time, he didn't try to see the image more clearly. After the Arhat appeared, Li Su simply watched in silence and took in what he felt.
Sure enough, his agitation faded as he did so. Gradually, his body and mind seemed to grow clear and calm.
He sat for several hours.
Night quickly fell. Xuanci and the others stopped practicing. They glanced at Li Su, sitting in meditation with his eyes closed, but didn't disturb him and left.
After more than two years together, they had grown quite familiar with one another.
Xuankong was a little aloof, though that was probably because he couldn't speak. More importantly, whenever anyone needed help, he'd take care of their task without waiting to be asked.
Whoosh!
Night fell completely. Li Su let out a long breath, bringing his session of Arhat Gong to an end.
When he opened his eyes, a strange expression crossed his face.
Hadn't the old monk said the Arhat Gong was hard to practice? It didn't seem all that difficult to him.
And after practicing once, Li Su understood something else: this was why the old monk had called the Arhat Gong a method of refinement.
After all that practice, his inner power hadn't increased at all. Instead, it had shrunk.
Li Su wasn't alarmed. He could feel that his inner power hadn't diminished; it had become more concentrated.
Was the Arhat Fist meant to nourish, while the Arhat Gong was meant to refine?
Feeling the changes in his body, Li Su was astonished. There was no doubt that Buddhist martial arts and Daoist methods followed entirely different paths.
No wonder Shaolin's methods had to be practiced alongside Buddhist teachings.
Meditation arts were actually a way to refine qi? No wonder the slightest mistake could lead to qi deviation, and there was almost no way to save someone once it happened. The only remedy was to dispel all their martial arts.
The Arhat Fist was already extremely fierce. The Arhat Gong refined that already fierce energy until it became even more concentrated.
Li Su let out a long breath, stood, and began practicing the Arhat Fist.
He was eager to find out what would happen if he practiced the Arhat Fist together with the Arhat Gong year after year. Could it eventually rival the Nine Yang Divine Skill and those other supreme arts?