Young Eagle Takes Flight Formula

The Immortal Sect was unlike any cultivation sect currently known. It was exceptionally unique.

Inherited from the previous age of civilization, it placed enormous importance on ordinary people and did not regard them as a swarm of ants whose sole purpose was to produce cultivators with spiritual roots.

The <Eagle Hatchling Takes Flight Sword Art, Sixty-Eighth Set> was a product of this philosophy. The project had been established on the very first day cultivators were discovered, over ten thousand years ago. After generations of Immortal Sect sages had poured out their hearts and blood to improve it, with no shortage of Spirit Transformation patriarchs and countless Nascent Soul Cultivators participating, it had now undergone sixty-eight iterations.

Even now, one of the Central Array-Spirit Computer's core main processes was still deducing the sixty-ninth generation of the Young Eagle Takes Flight Formula.

If a breakthrough were made, even the current Spirit Transformation patriarch might join in to accelerate its development.

This was an absolutely groundbreaking breakthrough in the cultivation world.

Those sects and holy lands, large and small, might possess such capabilities—or perhaps they might not—but they would absolutely never pour vast resources and high-level cultivators into something like this.

Those high-level cultivators with four spiritual roots who had flashed across history like ephemera had all obtained heaven-defying opportunities. There was simply no possibility of replication.

The Young Eagle Takes Flight Formula, Sixty-Eighth Set was Blueglow Star's universal teaching material. It included sword arts, saber arts, fist arts, staff arts, and everything else. Whatever one wanted, one could find it within.

What Jiang Ding cultivated was precisely the <Eagle Hatchling Takes Flight Sword Art, Sixty-Eighth Set>!

Unfortunately, a technique's difficulty often matched its effectiveness!

He had begun learning martial arts at seven years old. Nine years had passed, yet he was still merely proficient, far too distant from minor mastery!

How could he temper his bones and marrow to produce inner qi like this?

Jiang Ding's aptitude might have ranked at the very bottom on Blueglow Star.

But he was, after all, at the bottom among Blueglow Star martial artists' aptitudes!

With the assistance of the Banyan City Array-Spirit Computer, he would have been a genius among geniuses in any minor world possessing only martial arts inheritances—a dimensionality-crushing existence. It would not have been strange for him to have reached the peak of the inner qi realm by now.

And that was indeed the case. If he had cultivated any martial arts technique other than the Young Eagle Takes Flight Formula, he might well have had hopes of reaching the Innate realm by now.

The sole drawback was that his road to cultivation would be cut off.

Most mortal martial arts had been created by mortals and low-level cultivators. With their abilities and knowledge, they simply could not create arts that could connect to cultivation.

The process of cultivating mortal martial arts was one of forcibly destroying countless minute meridians that martial artists could not observe, causing already abysmal aptitude to fall beneath the floor.

Even if one forcibly switched to a cultivation technique at the Innate realm, risking nine deaths and one life, even success would lead at most to the first or second level of Qi Refinement, while drastically reducing one's lifespan.

"Today, I'll continue cultivating the <Eagle Hatchling Takes Flight Sword Art, Sixty-Eighth Set>." Jiang Ding took a blue steel sword from the weapon rack.

It was styled after an eight-faced Han sword, 1.3 meters long and sharpened. It had been forged from N2702 Spell-Breaking Steel, which naturally possessed a faint spell-breaking effect that could be strengthened somewhat with the infusion of inner force.

This material was also commonly used in bullet production. At supersonic speeds and while spinning, it could block a certain degree of cultivators' divine-sense interference, ensuring that a bullet would not deviate from its original trajectory from the slightest brush of divine sense.

He placed his hand on the hilt.

In an instant,

the little figure beneath the light screen moved.

It stretched its limbs, and its body gradually enlarged until it matched Jiang Ding exactly in height, shoulder width, arm length, and every other dimension. Its body was composed solely of pale blue light, yet every muscle, every bone, and every tiny meridian was clearly visible, marked with small labels.

"Preparatory Form."

At the mechanical voice, the blue figure moved. Its right foot stepped forward, its knee bent slightly, its left hand rested on the scabbard, and its right hand passed across its waist to settle on the hilt.

The surrounding air seemed to stagnate.

It was clearly only a humanoid figure formed from pale blue lines, without even skin, yet a heavy aura spread from it, like an ancient pine standing firm.

Jiang Ding knew this was no simple matter of gripping a sword.

From his viewpoint, he could clearly see the figure's meridians and muscles undergo dozens, perhaps hundreds, of complex changes in less than half a second. Like springs of varying sizes within the body compressing, they gathered every kind of force and accumulated power for a heaven-shattering eruption in the next instant.

That sense of pressure was no illusion either. The human brain had detected danger and issued a warning in this manner, urging the body to move as far from the source of danger as possible.

Jiang Ding gripped the hilt. His stance was identical to the blue figure's as he closed his eyes and felt the power accumulating within his muscles and meridians.

Of his 639 muscles, 52 could not store power perfectly. They were mainly smooth muscles in the digestive system and bladder, as well as cardiac muscle in the heart. Though he had long completed the Flesh-Tempering realm, he still could not perfectly train the muscles in these areas.

A tiny discrepancy could lead to a difference of a thousand miles.

The result was that he accumulated at least three times less power than the figure before him, even though it had been formed entirely by calling upon the data of his own muscles, meridians, and bones. Their foundations were exactly the same.

"Sword Unfurling Form."

The pale blue figure was like a spring compressed to its absolute limit. In a flash, it shifted from utter stillness to blinding speed, using its sword tip as a brush to draw a perfect circle around itself.

Hundreds of muscular lines went from tension to release, following some mysterious pattern, graceful as a piano master performing, full of rhythmic beauty.

Jiang Ding copied it, but the circle he drew always possessed the slightest discordance and deviation. He could not release one hundred percent of the accumulated power.

"Arm Sword Form."

"Step Sword Form."

"Organ Sword Form."

"Turning Sword Form."

"Harmonizing Sword Form."

"Dashing Sword Form."

Jiang Ding followed the figure and danced with his sword. One moment he stepped forward and thrust rapidly; the next, he turned right and hacked down; then he circled a point in a chain of stabbing attacks. The sword blade hissed as it tore through the air, and his figure filled every corner of the hundred-square-meter practice room.

"Hidden Sword Form."

The blade slid silently into its sheath. Jiang Ding's body trembled slightly as he struggled to calm his heavy panting, slowly exhaling stale air. Great streams of sweat flowed from his pores, soaking his clothes in an instant and pressing them against his skin.

Including the Preparatory Form, the Young Eagle Takes Flight Sword Art had only nine forms. It emphasized extreme speed and explosive force, combining practice and combat into one. It was an exquisite sword art that exhausted the study of meridians, muscles, and bones. If one achieved minor mastery and wielded a sharp weapon, killing an ordinary inner qi realm martial artist would be as easy as lifting a hand—a casual stroke of the sword.

Jiang Ding felt pain everywhere in his body, while his stomach burned like fire.

He crossed three steps in two, picked up the milky-white Essence-Consolidating Bone-Strengthening Soup, and drained it in one gulp. Its temperature was still perfect; it had not cooled despite sitting there for so long.

Warmth flowed down his throat into his stomach, then spread throughout his body. The intense pain immediately eased.

The Young Eagle Takes Flight Sword Art excavated the human body too deeply, and therefore placed an enormous burden upon it. If not for the Essence-Consolidating Bone-Strengthening Soup provided by the school, it would be fine for a short while, but without long-term nourishment, it would be easy to train oneself into ruin.

Ding!

Jiang Ding's heart leapt with joy, and he hurriedly looked up at the figure before him.

The first vertebra of the body made from pale blue lines flashed once, changing from 62% to 66%.

"Four percent!"

Jiang Ding was invigorated. "Ten more times, and I'll temper the first vertebra completely. Give me another thirty days—will I be able to break through to the inner qi realm?"

Without bothering to rest, he immediately took advantage of the time to practice another set of sword forms.

Unfortunately, perhaps because he was too impatient, his movements were not precise enough. Let alone four percent, this time his progress did not even improve by one percent.

"So it really was an illusion."

Jiang Ding was somewhat dejected, but this instead calmed him down. He slowly considered which of his movements had fallen short, and how the rhythm and sequence of his muscles and meridians differed from the figure's.

Proceeding this way, he practiced more than ten times in a row before finally gaining something.

His proficiency in the Young Eagle Takes Flight Sword Art increased by one point, reaching Proficient 33%. He had taken another small step toward minor mastery.

Several of his other vertebrae had also gained a few points of progress.

Ding ding ding...

Before he knew it, class had ended. The pale blue figure slowly vanished, the bright practice room lights shut off in sequence, and the door gradually opened.

Jiang Ding spent a few minutes washing up, changed into a blue-and-white school uniform, and walked out of the practice room.

"I heard those cultivation geniuses can improve their techniques by five or six percent every time they train, and temper their bones by over ten percent. After accumulating day after day, what realm have they reached by now?"

"Major inner qi mastery? Inner qi completion?"

Jiang Ding pondered silently.

Though First High School was Banyan City's best high school and sent more students into university Schools of Dao Cultivation than any other school in Banyan City, its martial arts faculty was not the strongest. Therefore, it had failed to attract those top martial arts geniuses, most of whom had gathered at No. 7 Middle School.

Most of the students along the way were returning from their practice rooms to their classrooms. Some had slumped shoulders and unsteady steps, clearly having trained themselves too harshly.

Students gradually returned to the classroom. Jiang Ding found his seat and closed his eyes to rest.

Very soon, a thick stench of sweat drifted beneath his nose.

"How's your progress?" He did not even lift his eyelids.

"Not bad." Li Junhao said in a deep voice, "In a few more months, I should have a chance of breaking through Skin Tempering and entering the Flesh-Tempering realm."

"Keep it up."

Several minutes later, the noisy sounds gradually stopped, and Jiang Ding opened his eyes.

At some point, class monitor Hua Bing had stepped onto the podium.

"Starting from the first row, everyone, collect your backpacks in an orderly manner." She swiped her student card over the display screen on the metal cabinet beside the blackboard. The compartments opened one after another, revealing backpacks of various colors inside.

Every student was accustomed to this and retrieved their own backpack in turn.

Very soon, Jiang Ding received his gray two-strap backpack and the pitch-black sword beside it. He first fastened the sword at his waist, then took a box from his backpack.

He opened the box.

Inside lay a black pistol and a magazine loaded with bullets.

A Type 58 Self-Defense Pistol.

Information about this handgun, which had accompanied him since middle school, instinctively surfaced in Jiang Ding's mind.

Year 10558: Type 58 Self-Defense Pistol, manufactured by Luban Military Technology Company. Six-round magazine, using 7.62-millimeter N2702 Spell-Breaking Steel bullets. Effective range: fifty meters. Within this range, it could break the inner-force protection of a martial artist at minor inner qi mastery. Two consecutive shots striking the same point, or three consecutive hits, could break the inner-force defense of a martial artist at major inner qi mastery.

For over ten thousand years, Blueglow Star had been intersecting with the cultivation world. From time to time, cultivators or martial artists from beyond the world would abruptly teleport into Blueglow Star, inflicting grievous harm on nearby residents.

Though Blueglow Star was barren, it occasionally produced a heavenly treasure that drove cultivators from beyond the world mad—Law-Breaking Immortal Gold. They would spare no effort and risk life and limb for it, especially elderly cultivators nearing the end of their lifespan, who were particularly frenzied.

Thus, long ago, Blueglow Star had fully opened firearm licenses to all citizens. Even middle school students had to begin firearms training.

Of course, it was mainly for self-defense, buying time to escape. That was also why they were issued pistols.

"Disassemble and maintain!" Hua Bing shouted.

Her divine sense spread out. The Type 58 pistol floated in the air and automatically disassembled into over thirty parts, including the barrel, recoil spring, slide, firing pin, and magazine. The bottle of gun oil opened by itself and applied maintenance oil to them.

Naturally, with her sixth level of Qi Refinement cultivation, the Type 58 Self-Defense Pistol was merely symbolic and could offer her no protection whatsoever.

The more than thirty students also began working, and clicking sounds rose one after another.

Jiang Ding's fingers moved like phantoms, disassembling the pistol into components of varying sizes. He then applied maintenance oil to each one before reassembling it.

He was extremely meticulous, checking every component for wear and every bullet for damage—unlike powerful Qi Refinement cultivators, this was something that genuinely concerned his safety.

Although Banyan City remained peaceful and no incident of cultivators from beyond the world invading and slaughtering people had occurred for many years, one still had to prepare for the worst.

By the time he had reassembled it and placed it in the holster at his waist, thirty-two seconds had passed.

Looking around, he saw that everyone had gradually finished as well.

"First, firearms must be kept on safety. Begin!" Hua Bing started the recitation, and everyone took over.

"First, firearms must be kept on safety. Muzzles must not be pointed at people, or it will be treated as drunk driving;"

"Second, on public buses, yield to the elderly and children..."

"...Firearms must not be used for any purpose other than self-defense."

"Class dismissed!"

"Goodbye, Class Monitor!"

Jiang Ding grabbed his backpack and leaped out the window in a single bound.

He was considered normal. Some people upstairs directly used lightness skills and the Wind-Riding Art to leap more than ten meters. Others ran to the treetops and hopped away from branch to branch until they vanished. There were even wealthy students controlling flying sword artifacts, soaring through the sky with effortless elegance and drawing countless envious gazes.

"That's Gongsun Ling from Class Two. She's also at the sixth level of Qi Refinement. I heard she got her flying artifact pilot's license a few days ago." Li Junhao climbed down while clinging to the window, his voice full of envy.

"She's only at mid-stage Qi Refinement. Isn't she afraid she'll run out of spiritual power and fall?" someone beside him said sourly.

"So what if she falls? It's only a dozen meters high. She won't get hurt."

Jiang Ding glanced at the sweet-faced girl in the sky, equally filled with envy.

Someone living among the clouds like her—could he even scratch her with the bullets from his Type 58 Self-Defense Pistol after emptying the entire magazine?

Poor him could only walk on the ground, backpack on his shoulders, leaving one solid footprint after another.

Boom~

Boom~~

As he reached the school gate, the powerful roar of engines came from afar, rising and falling in waves.

Jiang Ding hurriedly moved aside.

"Hurry up!"

"Hey! Those of you driving, slow down! The formation's going to break!"

A medium tank drove through the school gates. Its 100-millimeter cannon barrel was raised slightly, its bright rifling faintly visible. A 12.7-millimeter dual-purpose anti-aircraft and ground machine gun at the rear side pointed diagonally skyward at a forty-five-degree angle. Its armor was smooth and heavy, and its five pairs of wheels turned as students along the route scattered aside.

A dark-skinned student sat cross-legged atop the turret, eyes closed in meditation.

A Type 62 Training Tank!

This thought surfaced in Jiang Ding's mind.

Normally, the driver should have been in the driver's compartment. The frontal armor of the Type 62 tank could withstand attacks from late-stage Qi Refinement cultivators without damage.

But its weak points, such as the tracks and cannon barrel, were another matter.

Therefore, many cultivators disliked staying inside the cabin and instead controlled it with divine sense.

"Formation! Formation!"

Behind the tank were twelve third-year students carrying Type 89 Heavy Machine Guns weighing 125 kilograms each. They stood in nearly two straight lines behind it, following marching formation and strictly aligning themselves with the tank's width—this was meaningless for cultivators, but for those who were still martial artists, whose bodies were frail as paper, it was the only defense they could rely on after enemy cultivators broke through their own cultivators' interception on the battlefield.

More than a dozen Type 62 tanks roared past, kicking up dust across the ground.

"Class Three is back from field training."

Li Junhao complained, "This outdated tactic should've been eliminated long ago. The army's active units have long changed their squad configuration to tanks plus several or a dozen self-propelled artillery vehicles. How much better would it be to wipe out the enemy from beyond the range of low- and mid-level cultivators' divine sense, dozens of kilometers away?"

Jiang Ding shook his head. "It's not that simple. Cultivators from beyond the world are increasingly inclined to cultivate concealment arts, or mobile concealment spells like earth escape and water escape. Our infantry spirit-particle radar can't always find and lock onto them."

While chatting, the two waved goodbye at an intersection.

Jiang Ding stopped beneath the Route 18 bus stop sign and found a less crowded corner to wait for the bus.

It was already past six in the evening, and there were some people here.

A flock of chattering elementary school students contributed the most noise and vitality. Aside from them, there were exhausted-looking office workers, most at the inner qi realm, carrying gun cases on their backs. These were not self-defense pistols like Jiang Ding's, but combat firearms such as submachine guns and shotguns.

As for heavy machine guns, sniper rifles, and even twin-mounted anti-aircraft machine guns, one could generally purchase them for collection, but taking them into public places was exceedingly difficult. Personal firearm licenses for such weapons were rarely issued.

Inner qi realm martial artists filled the streets. Those still in the three Body-Tempering realms were rare; they were either minors, disabled people, or lazy street loafers.

This was not because the students at Banyan City First High School, the school known as Banyan City's best high school, were all useless. There were merely three inner qi realm martial artists in the entire class combined.

Rather, the Young Eagle Takes Flight Formula was actually a cultivation technique. Even with the assistance the Banyan City Array-Spirit Computer provided students, its difficulty was beyond imagination.

After graduating high school, many people—or most vocational high school students—would no longer cultivate the Young Eagle Takes Flight Formula. Instead, they would switch to mortal martial arts, naturally progressing at astonishing speed.

According to online information, the most popular mortal martial arts at present were the Nine Yang Divine Skill and the Nine Yin Divine Skill. The former strengthened the body and nourished vital essence, while the latter nourished yin and beautified the complexion, and its true qi was equally formidable. Either could serve as the sect-defending martial art of any mortal sect, the sort only core direct disciples could access.

The Lesser Yin-Yang Art secret technique was even more wildly popular.

Of course, even so, the Innate realm was still a threshold only a few could cross.

An Innate martial artist would have little trouble making it into the middle class.

The bus brakes shrieked, followed by a fart-like hiss of released air. The elementary school students crowded aboard, chattering nonstop, then came Jiang Ding and the others. After sweeping his gaze over the bus and finding nothing unusual, he picked a spot by the window and steadied himself against the rail.

He leaned back as wind blew in through the window, carrying a thread of coolness.

Jiang Ding silently pondered the routes through which the various meridians and muscles of the human figure in his earlier cultivation class had operated, combining them with the fundamental principles of cultivation techniques mentioned in language and mathematics class.

Why did the meridians circulate this way in the preparatory stance for maximum efficiency?

Could it be altered a little?

Woooo—

Whooo—wooo—

Screech!

The sudden air-raid siren and braking jolted Jiang Ding awake from his thoughts. He gripped his sword hilt tightly and swiftly scanned his surroundings.

"Notice from above: Cultivators have breached the boundary and invaded. The road ahead is closed!"

The driver shouted an explanation, fumbling as he pulled an AK-47 from a cabinet.

"Cultivators breached the boundary and invaded?"

The bus fell silent for a moment before erupting into uproar.

"Don't panic! Get off in an orderly manner. The police are already handling it..." The driver was somewhat flustered as well. He opened the doors and organized the passengers to disembark through the front and rear exits.

Fortunately, although Banyan City had not suffered a Cultivator invasion for many years, news of such incidents still occasionally appeared online from other places. Everyone had not panicked to the point of completely losing control.

Jiang Ding followed the crowd, getting off behind a group of children.

"The air-raid shelters, hurry..."

"Mom, I'm scared..."

Jiang Ding looked around. The highway that had been teeming with traffic moments ago had ground to a halt. Large numbers of citizens were noisily evacuating, while doors had opened in many places that had originally been walls or grass lawns. The red markings for air-raid shelters were especially conspicuous.

Whether at schools or companies, air-raid drills were held every month. Though chaotic, the crowd remained fairly orderly.

Whoosh!

Whoosh! Whoosh!

Sharp sounds tore through the air.

"Missiles!"

Someone in the crowd cried out.

Jiang Ding looked up.

One, two, three... over a hundred trails of white smoke streaked with flame howled across the sky, moving far beyond the speed of sound. They left only fleeting afterimages on the retina before vanishing from sight.

.