Understanding

Dawn broke the next day.

Faint daylight filtered through the paper-covered lattice window, falling on Yang Ge as he held his stance inside.

His knees were slightly bent, his arms loosely rounded before him. His face was dark red as a ripe jujube, his mind focused and his breathing calm. Wisps of heat curled above his head as though he were an incense burner.

His long, slow breaths were barely audible.

Yet with every exhalation, an invisible force pushed the dust around him outward in all directions.

And with every inhalation, that dust drifted toward him as though someone had switched on a high-powered vacuum cleaner.

Over the course of the night, ring after ring of dust had formed around his feet...

When the first ray of dawn sunlight spilled into the room, Yang Ge's lightly closed eyelids twitched.

He slowly straightened, pressing his palms down to conclude his practice, then opened his mouth and exhaled a three-foot stream of scorching white vapor.

As that hot breath left him, his crimson cheeks rapidly returned to their usual healthy color.

Only after a full quarter of an hour did he finally open his eyes.

"A body like an iron barrel, force like a great mallet..."

Murmuring to himself, he clenched his fists and quietly savored the reassuring strength that answered him. A few breaths later, he suddenly twisted and lashed out with a whipping kick.

Thump.

A deep airburst boomed like a great hide-covered drum. A fierce gust sprang up inside the room, rattling every tightly shut door and window.

"Wind?"

Yang Ge stood dumbfounded for a few breaths with one leg raised. Coming to his senses, he bounded forward and delivered another chopping kick. The powerful wind from his leg actually shoved the square table several feet backward.

"I get it!"

He let out a low cry of realization, rushed to the courtyard door in a few quick strides, pulled it open, and charged outside, leaping into a chopping kick.

Thump.

A muffled airburst erupted, and a fierce wind howled.

As he pulled back from the chopping kick, he followed with a sweeping kick into the wind. The two gusts met at once, sending chaotic winds swirling everywhere.

His descending body actually shot another three feet upward in midair!

Thump, thump, thump...

Yang Ge kicked faster and faster, his legs gradually trailing overlapping afterimages. They whipped up a hurricane that held his body aloft, letting him strike from all manner of impossible angles.

He kicked on instinct alone, each kick faster than the last.

Stranger still, once he gradually lost himself in that feeling of boundless freedom, as though he had become the god of wind, all the kicking techniques and methods of exerting force that he once had to deliberately recall now came to him as effortlessly as conditioned reflexes!

Snapping kicks, chopping kicks, sweeping kicks, and whipping kicks flowed seamlessly together.

Overt and covert force coursed through his body.

Hard and soft force alternated in perfect harmony.

"Wind-Catching Shadow-Seizing!"

Yang Ge cried out softly. The sky full of kicking afterimages instantly vanished. The moment he landed, he lightly tapped the ground and shot upward as a blur, unleashing a sequence of kicks in midair. Each kick's force stacked onto the last, finally forming a leg-shaped afterimage as large as a tabletop that struck into the air.

Boom!

The force exploded with a thunderclap!

Yang Ge landed heavily. His vision darkened, and his right leg went numb. After swaying for two seconds, he still ended up dropping onto his backside.

"Holy shit..."

Panting, he craned his neck and shouted, his voice cracking, "That was fucking awesome!"

He could hardly believe he had delivered that kick himself!

That kick had almost taken on the embryonic form of projecting internal qi outward. Even without landing a solid hit, its force could shatter wood and split stone!

This must be the true power of the Eighteen Routes of Chaotic Wind Kicks!

Once his excitement subsided, Yang Ge gathered his thoughts and reassessed the Wild Wind Leg technique.

By his reckoning, he had been practicing this kicking technique for over three months.

But today marked the first time he had truly unleashed one of its killing moves.

Before this, he had copied the shape without grasping the substance, forcing his way through the first three of its six killing moves.

But back then, he had failed to grasp the essence of "chaotic wind." His killing moves had possessed the form but none of the substance. Comparing their power to that last kick was like comparing a tiny firecracker to a hand grenade-there was simply no comparison!

That was why he had often felt this kicking technique might lean more toward training and building a foundation than actual combat and killing.

It was also why, when they intercepted the Xie Family's merchant ship last time, Yang Ge had asked Fang Ke to get him an axe... Back then, he had felt that if he foolishly swung his two thighs, armed with nothing but martial-world bravado and a chivalrous heart, and charged into a forest of blades and spears, he would surely die in there!

Only now, after mastering Wind-Catching Shadow-Seizing, did he finally understand: in real combat, this kicking technique relied not on physical strength, but on inner force!

The relationship between strength and inner force was like that between fists and weapons.

With a fist, it might take all your strength just to break a few bones.

With a weapon, two or three tenths of that strength could stab someone to death.

And the different methods of exerting force in a kicking technique were like techniques for wielding different kinds of weapons.

The same outward kick...

With some methods, what you kicked out was a sword, with tremendous penetrating power.

With others, what you kicked out was a shield, with tremendous defensive power.

And with still others, what you kicked out was a hammer. Even if the enemy blocked it, the tremendous force could still shake them to death!

Seen that way, mastering this kicking technique might only require fully developed inner force. But to truly unleash its power, I'd need to reach at least the Qi Sea Realm!

Yang Ge mulled it over.

The killing moves of this kicking technique centered on "overwhelming the opponent with force."

But inner force could not leave the body. So unless he could match the power of that last kick, he would still ultimately have to pit his own flesh and blood against another person's blades, spears, swords, and halberds.

And to achieve the power of that kick, he had to forcibly stack his force through special methods of exertion and extraordinary speed!

This fighting method placed an enormous drain on his inner force and an enormous burden on his body!

Yang Ge estimated that, with his current fully developed inner force, he could unleash at most two Wind-Catching Shadow-Seizing moves or one Gale Wind, Sturdy Grass before he could no longer keep going.

With that kind of expenditure, these could clearly only serve as killing moves for a life-or-death struggle, not ordinary basic attacks.

But this was currently the only kicking technique he knew. If he did not use those six combat moves, he had no other means of protecting himself.

What if... I learned a weapon technique too?

After some thought, Yang Ge came up with an initial solution.

But a second later, he rejected it. No. Judging by how complex the Eighteen Routes of Chaotic Wind Kicks are, getting any technique down until I know it inside out definitely won't happen overnight!

As Shen Fa put it, my advantage is that I level up faster than ordinary people, with hardly any bottlenecks.

Abandoning my advantage to grind away at my weakness would be like throwing away a watermelon to pick up a sesame seed.

If I want to make the most of my advantage, I should prioritize raising my martial arts realm and crush people with a level advantage!

Besides, once I open my qi sea and cultivate internal qi, these six killing moves of the Wild Wind Leg alone will let me slaughter inner force martial artists left and right...

He clapped his hands. "That's what I'll do!"

Something came up tonight and delayed me. I'll deliver the second chapter tomorrow morning... Please forgive me, gentlemen~