A Golden Elixir Swallowed into My Belly—My Fate Is Mine, Not Heaven's!

A Golden Elixir Swallowed into My Belly—My Fate Is Mine, Not Heaven's!

The more Jiang Ning understood the extraordinariness of novice martial artists, the less confidence he had.

At the completion of skin tempering, it was as though one wore bronze armor. Against martial artists below the rank, the difference in defense alone was like that between an adult and a child.

Not to mention the gap in strength and vital blood. Between the two lay a qualitative transformation.

Thus, going from the completion of vital blood to entering the martial ranks was no simple road.

It required time to polish oneself, secret methods, and resources.

Yet right now, he neither knew any skin-tempering secret methods nor knew what external resources were required.

Information concerning martial arts inheritances was not something he could learn at his current level.

For any faction, secret methods concerning the foundations of the human body would not be casually spread, even if it was merely a skin-tempering method of the ninth martial rank.

Thus, he had little confidence at the moment.

Of course, if one had money, it would naturally not be difficult to buy such information and secret methods.

Nor was this some closely guarded secret.

But Jiang Ning also knew that he could obtain a skin-tempering secret method without doing that.

So long as he met Wang Jin's assessment requirements as Xiao Peng had—achieving mastery in any one form of the Five Animals Fist within six months of joining the martial hall—he could become Wang Jin's direct disciple.

Direct disciples were the martial hall's true disciples, the only ones truly qualified to call Wang Jin their master.

By then, he would naturally be able to access Wang Jin's inheritance and obtain a skin-tempering secret method.

As he was now, he could at most be considered an outer disciple, or perhaps a nominal disciple.

If he failed to meet the standard within six months and could not pass Wang Jin's test, he could only roll up his bedding and leave.

At that moment.

Seeing Jiang Ning accept the banknotes he had offered, Cheng Ran smiled and patted Jiang Ning on the shoulder.

"Now that's more like it, Junior Brother Jiang!!"

Then.

"Cough, cough—" His hearty laughter tugged at his internal organs, and he could not help coughing repeatedly, threads of blood spilling from his mouth.

"Senior Brother Cheng, are you all right?" Seeing this, Jiang Ning hurriedly supported his swaying body.

Several breaths later, Cheng Ran suppressed the urge to cough and waved a hand. "Junior Brother Jiang, help me go rest for a while. I need to catch my breath!"

Elsewhere.

Watching Cheng Ran being helped away by Jiang Ning, Xiao Peng could not help shaking his head slightly.

What a pity!

That brat had saved him halfway through. Otherwise, if Cheng Ran had crashed into the wall from my charge, with injured sinews and bones and displaced internal organs, it would not have delayed him by merely a day or two.

That way, Cheng Ran, the one who posed the greatest threat to me, would have become far less threatening.

What a pity, truly a pity!!

Xiao Peng slowly withdrew his gaze.

At that moment, amid the flattery of the people around him, the corners of his mouth rose slightly. He could not suppress the delight in his heart.

Jiang Ning's courtyard.

Cheng Ran slowly sat down on a small wooden stool.

"Pah—" He spat out the bloody froth in his mouth. "That damned Xiao Peng really hit hard."

Jiang Ning sat beside him as well. "How are you feeling now, Senior Brother Cheng?"

"Much better!" Cheng Ran nodded. "Fortunately, I've achieved some initial success in skin tempering. Right now, my internal organs have merely been jolted, and the injury isn't too serious. At most, I'll need two or three days of rest. If I had some good medicine for injuries, it would be even faster!"

After saying that, Cheng Ran looked at Jiang Ning again. "Junior Brother Jiang, your strength has already exceeded two hundred jin, hasn't it?"

"Senior Brother's probing was impossible to guard against." Jiang Ning smiled.

"Junior Brother Jiang, please don't take offense! I was simply too shocked to believe it, so I tested you." Cheng Ran showed an apologetic expression.

"It's nothing! But I hope Senior Brother Cheng won't spread it around." Jiang Ning said.

Cheng Ran nodded. "Naturally! With that Xiao Peng's habit of playing dirty, if he learns that Junior Brother Jiang has reached this stage in such a short time, he might secretly resort to some petty tricks."

"Just mentioning that brat Xiao Peng makes me unwilling to accept this!" Anger appeared on Cheng Ran's face.

"Senior Brother merely lacks actual combat experience! In terms of true strength, Senior Brother is above Xiao Peng."

Cheng Ran nodded in agreement. "I truly do lack actual combat experience! I'll have to improve in that regard from now on. If I don't reclaim the face I lost today, the anger in my heart will never settle!"

Then he looked at Jiang Ning again. "Junior Brother Jiang, if you have time in the future, how about we spar regularly and build up combat experience?"

Jiang Ning considered it briefly, then nodded. "That would work. I've never fought anyone before, so I happen to lack practical combat experience as well!"

"Exactly!" Cheng Ran nodded repeatedly. "Master Wang once said that martial arts are techniques for killing enemies. Training alone can never bring one to the pinnacle. We may not be able to kill enemies, but sparring can also increase our combat experience. If we ever get the chance to join the Inspection Office, combat experience will be even more important."

Hearing this, Jiang Ning nodded in agreement. "Then once Senior Brother Cheng has recovered, we'll spar again!"

"It's a deal!" Cheng Ran extended his right palm.

Understanding his meaning, Jiang Ning extended his right palm and high-fived him.

Afterward, Cheng Ran rested for several hours until his breathing had calmed.

Only then did Jiang Ning escort him out through the martial hall's gates.

"Junior Brother Jiang, don't worry! I'll definitely do my best over the next couple of days to investigate the matter you entrusted to me!" Cheng Ran said.

"Then I'll leave everything to Senior Brother Cheng!" Jiang Ning clasped his hands in farewell.

Then his gaze swept across the few stalls by the martial hall entrance, but he discovered nothing.

The next day.

Early morning.

Sitting cross-legged in the small courtyard and feeling the breeze blowing against his face, Jiang Ning quietly waited for the rising sun in the distance.

[Skill]: Inner Elixir Life-Nourishing Technique (Not Yet Initiated 91/100)

His Inner Elixir Life-Nourishing Technique still needed nine experience points before he could begin.

Jiang Ning was filled with anticipation for its initiation.

The mere fact that it required one hundred experience points just to begin showed that the Inner Elixir Life-Nourishing Technique was no ordinary art.

As far as he knew, martial arts techniques were divided into low-grade, mid-grade, and high-grade.

Above high-grade techniques, there were techniques of even greater rank.

Based on the changes in experience requirements, Jiang Ning had two guesses. One was that the Inner Elixir Life-Nourishing Technique was a mid-grade technique beyond low-grade techniques.

After all, his Five Animals Fist was a low-grade technique, requiring only ten experience points to begin.

Thus, it was perfectly normal for a mid-grade technique, one rank above a low-grade technique, to have vastly higher experience requirements for initiation.

As for the second possibility, the Inner Elixir Life-Nourishing Technique was a mysterious technique that stood above even high-grade techniques.

Only a qualitative gap could cause the experience required for breakthroughs in a technique to undergo such a qualitative change.

This guess was not merely because the Inner Elixir Life-Nourishing Technique required one hundred experience points simply to begin—ten times the experience required for the Five Animals Fist.

The greater reason lay in both the method and the underlying intent of the Inner Elixir Life-Nourishing Technique.

The Inner Elixir Life-Nourishing Technique was a method of strengthening the body from within.

Strengthening the five viscera and six bowels internally was an inner-refinement path that martial artists only took at the fifth martial rank.

Such a method of inner refinement was bound to be exceedingly scarce, and its rank was most likely not low.

Moreover, the underlying intent of the Inner Elixir Life-Nourishing Technique left Jiang Ning in awe. It did not resemble martial arts, but rather the immortal path from the myths he had known in his previous life.

One absorbed and exhaled the essence of the great sun to strengthen the five viscera and six bowels. When the technique reached completion, one was to draw the great sun's fire at noon into the body, turning the body into a blazing furnace and refining a golden elixir within.

A golden elixir swallowed into my belly—my fate is mine, not Heaven's.

Such an intent deserved to stand above high-grade martial arts techniques.

Of course, this was merely his speculation.

Beyond these factors that filled Jiang Ning with anticipation, there was another important reason why he was so eager.

The fragmentary page he had obtained only recorded the initiation method for the Inner Elixir Life-Nourishing Technique; it contained no subsequent methods.

As for the method of completion, it only mentioned a few details.

In other words, under normal circumstances, relying on that fragmentary page, he could at most initiate the Inner Elixir Life-Nourishing Technique. It would be impossible for him to reach the state of completion recorded in the technique.

He could not attain the complete realm of a golden elixir swallowed into my belly—my fate is mine, not Heaven's.

What Jiang Ning anticipated was that, through the panel's wondrous power, even with only a fragmentary page, he could still painstakingly grind out experience point by point and raise the Inner Elixir Life-Nourishing Technique to the realm of completion.

To achieve a golden elixir swallowed into my belly—my fate is mine, not Heaven's.