Covert Force

Time flew like an arrow; the sun and moon sped by like a shuttle.

Duan Xuan felt as though time itself had installed an accelerator on him.

In the blink of an eye, it was already mid-September.

Only a little over three days remained until Zhao Rui, Liu Chunmei, and the others met for the third time to share amusing stories.

His daily life was dull and monotonous, still revolving around three places: home, the Broken Mountain Martial Arts Hall, and Benevolent Harmony Hall's medicinal garden.

Its main content remained practicing the Broken Mountain Fist and consolidating the Azure Wolf Stealth Hunt.

Yes, Duan Xuan had turned the entire Flower Snake Gang mountain stronghold upside down, yet he had not found so much as a scrap of cultivation technique. He had only taken two, three, and four taels of silver from inside, along with one Vitality Pill and four packets of Vitality Powder.

He kept only a small portion of that silver, exchanging the remaining eighty percent at Benevolent Harmony Hall for medicinal pills.

That day, he arrived at the martial arts hall early. The atmosphere there grew more tense by the day; less than a month and a half remained before the martial examination.

The senior brothers and sisters in the hall were also busy beyond measure. Some rose early to train in preparation for the martial examination, while others decisively gave up and went out to take up permanent posts.

The remaining Bright Force martial artists were all racking their brains to break through to Covert Force.

"Junior Brother Duan Xuan, come here!" Zhang Chen held two large steamed buns and stuffed them into his mouth in a few bites.

"What is it, Senior Brother Zhang?"

Pointing at the crowd gathered ahead, Zhang Chen said, "Senior Brother Zhou Ye is explaining how to break through to Covert Force.

"You've been here for nearly five months now. You'll soon face your first chance to cross the threshold, so you need to listen carefully."

Covert Force differed from Bright Force. Bright Force depended on talent, so one had only a single chance to cross its threshold.

If one failed to seize that chance, if one's vitality and blood were insufficient and one could not cross the first threshold, then one would never become a martial artist.

Covert Force, however, offered three chances at a breakthrough. The first came three months after breaking through Bright Force.

By then, one's vitality and blood would have accumulated to a certain degree. Compared to Bright Force, it would have increased severalfold, allowing one to attempt a breakthrough to Covert Force.

The second chance came six months after the first failed attempt at breaking through Covert Force.

The third was also a Bright Force martial artist's final attempt to enter Covert Force.

Once one had condensed the vitality and blood throughout one's body back to its peak, one would make the final breakthrough attempt a year later. Success meant entry; failure meant being forever stranded at Bright Force.

Of course, martial artists with exceptional natural bones like Liu Mingze and Lin Hu absorbed vitality and blood at a rate far beyond ordinary people.

After roughly three or four months of martial training, they could attempt a breakthrough. Besides, both of them had succeeded a month and a half ago.

Their speed was enough to leave others eating dust.

Duan Xuan looked ahead and, as expected, spotted two familiar figures: Senior Brothers Song Dayuan and Wu Hui.

The two had joined the Broken Mountain Martial Arts Hall over two years ago. They had already used up their second chance to break through Covert Force; this was their third.

And the person imparting his experience to the disciples this time was also a rather senior disciple, one who had finally broken through just as his third opportunity ran out!

"To achieve anything in the martial examination, Covert Force is the bare minimum. Forget it if you're only at Bright Force.

"That's why this bunch of disciples is showing such support!" Duan Xuan had no desire to go, but Zhang Chen spoke as he dragged him to the edge of the crowd.

Zhou Ye stood high above them, his hands waving excitedly like the musician Duan Xuan had once seen in his previous life, turning a conductor's baton into a magic wand by sheer force.

His words were even more brimming with excitement and agitation.

"Junior brothers and sisters, breaking through to Covert Force is actually not as difficult as you imagine. In the end, it comes down to one word: train!

"Force your vitality and blood through the breakthrough, constantly raising your personal limit.

"My first two breakthrough attempts, for example, were times when I deliberately chose not to cross that threshold.

"Why did I choose to break through to Covert Force only on the third attempt?

"Because I wanted to train my vitality and blood to the maximum. Once Covert Force is achieved this way, I'll be able to crush experts of the same rank!"

Those disciples who had yet to break through Bright Force were half-convinced, half-doubtful. But Zhou Ye's performance was simply too brilliant, and in the end, they all believed him.

"Huh? Junior Brother Lin Hu is here. Let's ask Junior Brother Lin Hu too. Maybe it really is as Senior Brother Zhou Ye says."

At the sight of Lin Hu, Zhou Ye lowered his head sheepishly, jumped down from the platform, and quickly hid beside Zhang Chen.

Lin Hu gave a disdainful smile, only to be surrounded by the senior brothers and sisters.

"Junior Brother Lin Hu, how did you break through—"

"Get lost. A bunch of worthless trash who can't even break through Covert Force, and you still have the nerve to ask? What a disgrace.

"If I were you, I'd have gone home of my own accord long ago. What are you waiting for, a second chance? A third?

"If it were truly that easy to cross?

"Wouldn't Covert Force martial artists be everywhere?" After Lin Hu spoke, the disciples were instantly overcome with shame. Though angry, his words had truly stabbed them in the heart.

Moreover, Lin Hu was now personally taught by their master. Even if they all attacked him together, they likely would not be his match.

With his arms folded, Lin Hu suddenly noticed the silent Duan Xuan. With interest, he backed up a few steps and said in a mocking tone, "Isn't this my dear Senior Brother Duan Xuan?

"Oh? Such abundant vitality and blood—are you trying to scare me to death?

"I heard you didn't even dare sign up for the martial examination. Go home and hunt rabbits early; in this life, the most you'll ever catch is a rabbit!"

Lin Hu put particular emphasis on the words "Senior Brother."

In the past, he had thought Duan Xuan's natural bones were poor and his vitality and blood low, making him unworthy of being his senior brother.

Now, however, no one in the entire courtyard who ranked above him by seniority was qualified to be his superior.

Zhang Chen could not bear to watch any longer, but before he could speak, Lin Hu beat him to it. "Senior Brother Zhang Chen, do you have something to say?

"As an old-school disciple, it took you more than a whole year to break through to Covert Force. Hmph, how embarrassing!"

"You little—" Zhang Chen charged forward furiously, intending to fight, but Zhou Ye, Song Dayuan, and Wu Hui pulled him back.

Duan Xuan, meanwhile, stared fixedly at Lin Hu's departing back.

From the day he entered the hall, Lin Hu had been this kind of person. Now he looked down on everyone in the courtyard, so arrogant and conceited that sooner or later, he would stumble and fall!

Another half month passed. Since that day, Lin Hu had never appeared again, and Duan Xuan did not deliberately inquire into his whereabouts.

He still stood like an ageless pine at the spot where his stomping had worn out a deep pit, practicing his fists methodically and earnestly.

His fellow disciples left one after another, some going away and some returning to the dormitories. Before long, he was the only one left on the training ground.

"Junior Brother, keep it up—but don't wear yourself out!" Senior Sisters Chen Jingshu and Chen Jingyun bade Duan Xuan farewell as well and boarded the carriage outside the gates.

After a month, Master Chen Feng finally came to the front courtyard. Yet his mind was full of how to help Liu Mingze mend his final injuries and strive for good results in the martial examination.

He merely glanced at Duan Xuan without offering guidance or checking on his cultivation progress over the past few months. He too boarded the carriage, and with the clatter of hooves, left the martial arts hall.

Duan Xuan paid none of this any mind. Zhao Rui and Liu Chunmei's encouragement from days ago flashed through his mind, followed by his aunt's encouragement, his mother's encouragement, and Senior Brother Zhang Chen's patient explanations.

Again and again, he practiced the stake method, raising his vitality and blood.

At the same time, he placed the two packets of Vitality Powder provided by Benevolent Harmony Hall this month at his feet.

Ever since Ren Wanqing returned that day, Ren Yun had attached particular importance to Duan Xuan. Upon seeing him, he had mentioned Benevolent Harmony Hall's willingness to increase its support.

It had gone from the initial fifteen taels of money and fifteen taels of meat to thirty taels, along with two packets of Vitality Powder.

Were it any other faction, there was no way they would hand out two packets at a time of something as precious as Vitality Powder.

But Benevolent Harmony Hall had its own medicinal garden, as well as its own mature supply chain. Two packets were neither here nor there to them.

After countless repetitions, Duan Xuan suddenly felt as though flames were burning within his body.

Yet those flames were strange. They gathered within him, not wildly spreading outward.

This feeling was vastly different from when he had first entered Bright Force.

The flames of Bright Force were flamboyant, seeking to burn through everything they could sense.

But the flames now were restrained, even though they burned more fiercely, steaming through his eight extraordinary meridians, five viscera, and six bowels as searing pain swiftly coursed through his entire body.

Duan Xuan felt as though he had truly fallen into a pit of fire. It was agonizing.

[Human effort is repaid; Heaven's way makes up what is lacking]

[Trap: Perfected (12／2000)]

[Hunting: Major Mastery (265／300)]

[Broken Mountain Stake Method: Minor Mastery (986/1000)]

[Broken Mountain Fist: Minor Mastery (628/1000)]

[Azure Wolf Stealth Hunt: Minor Mastery (31/1000)]

A moment later, the flames within his body and the burning sensation they brought receded like the tide.

Seizing the moment, Duan Xuan grabbed a packet of Vitality Powder and poured it directly into his mouth.

In an instant, his cooled vitality and blood became like an oil pan splashed with water, erupting into violent boiling with a whoosh.

The effect of the Vitality Powder was obvious. The Broken Mountain Stake Method's points immediately increased by two.

Ordinarily, Vitality Powder could at most add one point. But today, by sensing the threshold of Covert Force and using that method to drive his vitality and blood, he had produced one additional point.

Duan Xuan had pondered this method before: spread his vitality and blood throughout his entire body, make it incomparably active, then consume Vitality Powder or Vitality Pills to increase the blaze.

But at the time, Covert Force had been far beyond his reach, and the results had never been ideal.

Now that it had truly succeeded, Duan Xuan was delighted. He quickly assumed his fist stance and practiced the stake method to digest this flame of internal training.

Two hours passed in the blink of an eye, and the Broken Mountain Stake Method had already reached 997.

Duan Xuan took a deep breath, picked up the final packet of Vitality Powder, tore open its thick oily wrapping, tilted back his head, and poured it into his mouth.

The bitterness of the medicine mixed with the taste of blood from his ruptured mouth. With a gurgle down his throat, it all rolled into his stomach.

The vitality and blood that had just begun to subside surged violently again. Duan Xuan's face changed drastically, twisting as though forged from molten iron.

But he merely clenched his teeth hard and once again assumed the Broken Mountain Fist stance.

"Broken Mountain Fist—press forward with indomitable will, never retreat, never give up!

"I will use this fist to split mountains, sever rivers, overturn seas, and rend the earth... I will crush every injustice in this world.

"I will reshape the order of this chaotic age and bring true light back into the world—haah!"

Duan Xuan drove the third move of the Broken Mountain Fist, binding every trace of force firmly within his body.

At the same time, he fused the techniques for erupting force from the first and second moves, throwing an explosively fierce punch.

Yet before that punch could make a sound, its force swiftly died away, and the noise abruptly ceased.

The violent force seemed to flow backward through time, miraculously merging into Duan Xuan's body.

Thus, Duan Xuan completed the retrieval of all force outside his body.

The force that had churned within him for so long also became gentle, like a river in spring.

It no longer churned, no longer boiled, no longer surged!

Covert Force—achieved!