Eve of the Genius Summit

A Yellow-Tier Low-Grade Longsword!

Li Ye drew in a soft breath. When he had come out this time, he had only intended to pick out a fairly good Fine-Grade Weapon longsword. He had never expected to encounter a Yellow-Tier Low-Grade weapon!

"Shopkeeper, how much is this sword?"

Suppressing his surprise and excitement, Li Ye appeared relatively calm on the surface, revealing none of his burning desire.

"Twenty-two thousand gold coins!"

Twenty-two thousand?! Li Ye immediately shook his head to himself. Sure enough, compared with Mortal Weapons and Fine-Grade Weapons, the price of tiered weapons is simply beyond what ordinary people can afford.

On the Cloud Soaring Continent, one hundred gold coins were enough for a family of three to live comfortably for a year. Even ten thousand gold coins were not something many smaller Lineages could readily produce! At a price of twenty-two thousand gold coins, even in Wuzhou City, there were definitely not many people who could pay without batting an eyelid!

Seeing Li Ye fall silent, the shopkeeper smiled slightly. "Of course, if Young Master truly likes it, the price can be lowered a little. Twenty thousand gold coins!"

Twenty thousand gold coins? Li Ye gave a bitter smile and shook his head. Forget twenty thousand—even two thousand was more than he could produce.

As one of the Three Great Families of Wuzhou City, the Li Family naturally treated its Inner Disciples well. Especially since he had fought his way into the top ten Inner Disciples, the family issued him one thousand gold coins in living expenses every month.

However, martial cultivators had considerable daily expenses, and he had only entered the ranks of Inner Disciples this month. He had not received any money yet.

After silently calculating the gold coins he had on hand, Li Ye discovered that he had less than a thousand. This was still the one-time reward the family had granted after he entered the Inner Disciples.

"Looks like this Clearwind Sword and I are fated to miss each other."

He stopped looking at it and turned toward the other weapons. There was more than one longsword in this small room; quite a few weapons hung from the walls.

Among them, Li Ye spotted a set of throwing knives. His eyes immediately lit up as he walked over.

Looking closely, it was a set of six throwing knives. Every one was small and exquisite, glinting with threads of cold light.

At first glance, Li Ye took a liking to them. "I may not be able to afford a Flying Sword, but using the Sword Control Technique to control these throwing knives and kill enemies by surprise would be even more powerful!"

The shopkeeper was somewhat surprised to see Li Ye move elsewhere, but his expression did not change as he continued his introduction.

"Young Master truly has unique taste. This set of throwing knives was likewise forged by Master Tie. Though they have not entered a tier, they are the finest among Fine-Grade Weapons! They even contain some Century Cold Iron. There is no need to doubt their sharpness—against ordinary Mortal Weapons, they cut through iron like mud. Even common Fine-Grade Weapons would be easily snapped upon meeting them!"

Having said that, the shopkeeper took out an ordinary weapon from the side. Then he removed one throwing knife and gave it a light chop. There was no resistance at all—it instantly cut the weapon in two!

"So sharp!"

Li Ye could not help being moved!

On the Cloud Soaring Continent, ordinary Mortal Weapons and Fine-Grade Weapons differed only in the craftsmanship of their makers; there was not much essential difference. Only tiered weapons could achieve such iron-slicing sharpness.

"Though these throwing knives have not entered a tier, their sharpness is no less than that of ordinary Yellow-Tier Low-Grade weapons!"

For Li Ye, who wanted to use the Sword Control Technique to control weapons and kill enemies, the ability to cut through iron like mud was precisely what he valued most!

Before Li Ye could ask the price, the shopkeeper had already begun speaking in a torrent. "Although this set of throwing knives is not a tiered weapon, it is not much inferior to one. And because Century Cold Iron was added, the price is fifteen thousand gold coins per set!"

Fifteen thousand gold coins! Li Ye truly did not know whether to praise his sharp eye or curse his terrible luck.

He had taken a liking to two weapons in a row, yet both were so expensive that they were completely beyond his means.

Shaking his head, Li Ye helplessly shifted his gaze away. He then swept his eyes over the room and immediately understood that finding a weapon here which he could afford would be very difficult.

"The weapons here are at least excellent Fine-Grade Weapons. It seems that with my current wealth, it will be difficult to buy one."

Yet Li Ye could not be bothered with ordinary weapons. Common Mortal Weapons, even Fine-Grade Weapons, could not bring out the power of the Sword Control Technique and might even hinder it.

The shopkeeper had sharp eyes indeed, and he immediately saw that this extraordinary-looking youth was short on money.

Under normal circumstances, he would surely have shown disdain, perhaps even mocked him aloud. But today was different. For some reason, the youth before him seemed unusual. Nor was he foolish—although Li Ye wore nothing but ordinary clothes, his bearing was something no ordinary person could possess.

"Judging by his bearing, he seems to be the child of a great Lineage."

Of course, even the children of great Lineages could not afford weapons above Fine-Grade Weapons unless they were among the very topmost kind.

In the end, Li Ye chose an ordinary Fine-Grade Weapon longsword. It was likewise forged from Hundred-Forged Steel, and he was fairly satisfied with it. After paying three hundred gold coins, Li Ye returned to the Li Family.

"Looks like I had been thinking too simply before. No wonder those martial cultivators all seem poor as beggars. Spending money truly is easy."

Unfortunately, with his current status as the seventh-ranked Inner Disciple, he could receive only one thousand gold coins from the family each month. He had to bear all other expenses himself.

Of course, he could also go out like those mercenaries and adventurers to accept missions and earn money, but Li Ye immediately shook his head and dismissed the idea.

For ordinary missions, those that could be handled alone and easily usually offered little reward. Those with high rewards usually required many people to form teams and might even result in casualties. They also took a long time, making it completely impossible for him to finish before the Genius Summit.

Over the next day, Li Ye began familiarizing himself with using the Sword Control Technique to control a longsword. It did not go smoothly at first. Though he could move objects through the air, he could never achieve the results he had envisioned.

However, it was not long before Li Ye could use his spiritual power to control the longsword in his hand, making it fly back and forth with agility.

"My current limit is ten meters. Beyond that distance, the consumption of spiritual power doubles, while control precision also declines and the power becomes insufficient."

After many experiments, Li Ye discovered that with his current strength, controlling a Flying Sword within ten meters produced the greatest power!

Whoosh! A streak of cold light flashed past, and a hard block of granite seven or eight meters away was pierced clean through!

"With this kind of power, even a Martial Dao Master-level expert could be killed if caught unprepared! At the very least, they would be heavily injured!"

Li Ye was greatly satisfied with the result. His own strength was already not much weaker than a Martial Dao Master's. Adding Blood Eyes' spiritual illusion attack and the Sword Control Technique now in his hands, ordinary Martial Dao Masters had no way to deal with him at all!

"However, threatening Martial Dao Grandmaster-level experts will still be somewhat difficult!"

He knew very clearly that several of Wuzhou City's most talented youths were monsters who had definitely stepped into the ranks of Martial Dao Grandmasters, as could be seen from Li Mo! With his current strength, even if he went all out and risked everything, against a Spirit Martial Tier Nine expert like a Martial Dao Grandmaster, his chance of victory was less than fifty percent!

"What a pity. If I had that set of throwing knives or that Clearwind Sword, then even against a Martial Dao Grandmaster, I would have at least a forty to fifty percent chance of killing them with the Sword Control Technique!"

Shaking his head, Li Ye temporarily stopped thinking about it.

"Right now, Phantom Step still has great room for improvement. I have Frost Fist for my fists and Gale Legs for my legs. That Cloud-Turning Palm manual, though, needs some careful study."

If anyone learned that Li Ye had studied so many Combat Techniques by himself, they would certainly laugh at him. Martial cultivators had limited energy; rather than spread themselves too thin, it was better to specialize in one!

Even geniuses within the family like Li Xuan only devoted themselves to one High-Grade Yellow-Tier Combat Technique, at most also learning several ordinary mid-grade Yellow-tier battle techniques.

Someone like Li Ye, who had learned three High-Grade Yellow-Tier Combat Techniques and one High-Grade Yellow-Tier Movement Technique in one breath, along with a Sword Control Technique of unknown rank, was either an arrogant madman or a peerless genius!

Whether Li Ye was a madman or a genius was still difficult to say, but under the Blood-Pupil Eye, even High-Grade Yellow-Tier Combat Techniques came naturally to him after a single look!

"Cloud-Turning Palm!"

Boom! A row of wave-like palm force blasted out. A tree in the distance, so thick that it took one person to encircle it, cracked loudly and shattered into pieces!

"Its power is stronger than Frost Fist and Gale Legs!"

Li Ye analyzed it in secret. Of the three Combat Techniques he had learned, Gale Legs was the most elusive, with the fastest speed and widest range but insufficient power. Frost Fist was balanced, with moderate power, but its dense chill interfered with an opponent's movements. Cloud-Turning Palm, however, possessed the greatest power. With one palm strike, waves upon waves of palm force erupted, focusing on attack power.

In two days, Li Ye directly cultivated all three Combat Techniques to the Minor Success stage. Combat Techniques and Movement Techniques were generally divided into Beginner, Minor Success, Major Success, Mastery, and Perfection. The Minor Success stage allowed a martial cultivator to unleash around thirty to forty percent of a Combat Technique's inherent power, and normally required months or even years of cultivation to reach.

For someone like Li Ye to enter the Beginner stage after one look and reach Minor Success in two days was nothing short of monstrous! Unfortunately, Li Ye did not know this and believed it to be perfectly normal.

Whoosh, whoosh, whoosh!

Only continuous sounds of air being torn apart could be heard, while seven or eight afterimages filled the entire courtyard.

"Phantom Step truly deserves to be a fragmentary Earth-Tier Movement Technique. Though it is incomplete, it completely surpasses ordinary High-Grade Yellow-Tier Movement Techniques by far!"

For some reason, Li Ye cultivated Phantom Step with extraordinary ease. In less than a day, he reached the Minor Success stage, then directly crossed into the Major Success stage!

Now, when Li Ye unleashed it with all his strength, he could instantly split into more than ten duplicates. Every one was more lifelike and more bewildering than the ones Li Wei had displayed back then.

Over the past few days, Li Yating and Xiao Qing had already left after saying their farewells.

At the same time, the day of the Genius Summit drew closer and closer. The great Lineages of Wuzhou City, along with some Rogue Cultivators, all rubbed their hands together, eager to show their prowess at the Genius Summit!

Yet on the day before the Genius Summit, some unexpected changes occurred!