Book of Troubled Times

Over the past few days on the road, Zhao Changhe had discreetly asked Luo Qi and several Blood God Cult members about the basics of this world. These fundamentals were fairly close to the concepts familiar in his own world. Martial arts likewise divided into internal and external arts: "Within, cultivate a breath of energy; without, train sinews, bones, and skin." Whichever one practiced, reaching a certain level qualified one to attempt to open the mysterious Profound Passes within the human body.

With enough fortunate opportunities, one could certainly cultivate both. Supposedly, doing so made opening the body's Profound Passes easier and gave one greater combat strength. Every renowned master under heaven cultivated both internal and external arts.

External arts were not as abstruse as internal arts, but they still held plenty of intricacies. Even learning something like Iron Sand Palm required knowing what iron sand to use, how to train, which medicines to soak one's palms in, and so forth, along with forms, routines, and techniques for applying force. Ordinary people never even had the opportunity to learn these things. Anyone who had learned a little could just about be called a "hero of the martial world," and such people formed the foundation of that vast world.

In fact, even practitioners of internal arts needed foundational training such as holding a horse stance, which also fell within the scope of external arts.

Internal arts were even harder to find. They were usually closely guarded secrets, the very foundations of a sect. It was not that others did not want wondrous internal energy; they simply had nowhere to seek it. The Luo Family practiced internal arts, with a core cultivation method divided into nine levels. Completing them would probably allow one to break through the Profound Pass ninth level. Yue Hongling's recommendation that Zhao Changhe learn martial arts with the Luo Family had truly been made with his future in mind.

The lousy outer-disciple cultivation method Luo Qi had on hand was naturally of little use. Who knew whether he would ever have a chance to obtain the real thing?

Judging by this framework, this world's martial power seemed rather low. Zhao Changhe kept feeling that something was off...

And the Blood Baleful Art was a particularly typical external art.

It did not cultivate internal breath. One could practice it until death and still never develop the hidden force of internal arts, or transfer internal energy to heal someone... But that did not mean it was a body-hardening art, either. What it cultivated was blood energy.

The Blood God Cult believed that human blood contained tremendous energy and baleful force. Blood coursed through the veins, boiling and surging; drawing that baleful force into the sinews and bones could unleash extremely ferocious strength. At deeper levels, one could also throw an enemy's blood into chaos, making it clash within their body until it burst out and killed them. The death was exceptionally gruesome. It was a textbook demonic art.

Naturally, practicing this art also had certain prerequisites. Since it relied on one's own blood energy, young, powerful men were the best candidates. The stronger and more robust a young man was, the more abundant his blood energy would naturally be.

Compared with this world's common people, who generally suffered from poor nutrition and shortages of food and clothing, Zhao Changhe was well nourished, tall, and powerfully built. He had also been an accomplished athlete at school. His physique was already well suited to practicing external arts.

The Blood Baleful Art suited him very well. It might even have been the art best suited to his current circumstances. It neither required training from childhood nor demanded any profound comprehension, and it could lay a foundation for practicing the Blood God Art later. That was a truly fine art that cultivated both the internal and external...

It very likely had drawbacks, of course. Judging by the usual pattern, it might overdraw the body's potential or something similar... But demonic arts almost always had drawbacks, just as orthodox mystical arts almost always progressed slowly. Want the best of both worlds? That required a genuine divine art that only a protagonist had the privilege of practicing.

Zhao Changhe suddenly thought of Yue Hongling. Was she a protagonist?

He chuckled despite himself and continued turning the pages.

The actual instructions for the Blood Baleful Art stated their purpose right at the outset: first temper the sinews and bones and practice fundamentals such as horse stances and bow stances. There were even illustrated diagrams. These examples differed somewhat from the ordinary horse and bow stances he knew, though. Perhaps those differences were the special key to establishing this art's circulation of blood energy.

It fell a little short of the mysterious methods he had imagined, but Zhao Changhe actually found it more believable this way. Wasn't the Sinew-Transforming Scripture-or was it the Divine Foot Scripture-that You Tanzhi obtained something like this? After a moment's thought, he simply left the table and began holding a horse stance, copying the movements in the diagrams.

Since he had decided, he would do it.

Luo Qi leaned against the headboard, watching him with some surprise.

That decisiveness was interesting... But how long could he keep it up?

In fact, Zhao Changhe could not hold out very long even on this first attempt. Someone who had never practiced horse or bow stances could not truly understand how, after only a few minutes, their legs would ache and weaken until they could not endure another moment. This was not something accomplished in a single leap. Only day after day of accumulated effort could forge a stable lower body, unmoving as a mountain.

Just as Zhao Changhe was about to give out and go to bed, a beam of light suddenly flashed through the pitch-black night. What looked like a page of a book slowly unfolded overhead, covered in dense golden lettering so dazzling that he could not keep his eyes open.

Zhao Changhe looked outside in shock. "What's this? Why can I see something in the sky even from inside the room?"

Luo Qi asked in surprise, "You've never seen it?"

Zhao Changhe's heart lurched, and he hurried to cover for himself. "I always saw it outside before. I've never watched it from indoors."

"Whenever the Chaos Era Ranking changes, the Heavenly Dao bestows a record for all to receive with reverence. You can see it wherever you are." Luo Qi explained casually, but could no longer remain lying down himself. He got up, went outside, and tilted his head toward the sky.

Chaos Era Ranking? What the hell was that?

Zhao Changhe looked up for a while. The dazzling glare faded, and he could finally make out the words: "Late tenth month, Light Snow. Yue Hongling pursued Xue Canghai for a thousand miles and fought him outside Wenshan City. Xue Canghai was bested and fled."

"Change to the Hidden Dragon Ranking."

"Second among the Hidden Dragons: Yue Hongling!"

"A red plume in the setting sun, beyond all restraint."

Zhao Changhe was dumbstruck. What was this? A server-wide game announcement?

I was just wondering whether the low martial power seemed a little off. What kind of bizarre world have I transmigrated into?

Beside him, Luo Qi sighed softly. "Yue Hongling... Defeating the ninth level while at the Profound Pass eighth level. She truly is a favored child of heaven, beyond the reach of ordinary people."

Zhao Changhe asked, "Who's Xue Canghai? Profound Pass ninth level? He's so pathetic that someone at a lower level beat him, and Yue Hongling was the one actively hunting him down?"

Luo Qi gave him a sidelong look. "He's Cult Master Xue of our Blood God Cult."

Zhao Changhe: "!!!"

"Well?" Luo Qi sounded amused. "You went through all that hardship for a chance to join the cult, only to discover that even its master can't defeat Yue Hongling, who brought you into the manor. How does that feel?"

"Nothing much. I already knew the Blood God Cult wasn't all that badass..." Zhao Changhe steadied himself and said quietly, "Actually, I'm more worried about her. She's so dazzling at such a young age. It's all too easy to invite envy."

Luo Qi was even more amused. "You're worried about her? Worried about what?"

"For example, those rankings. I heard she was fifth before, right? Now she's second. The former second place has been pushed down to third. What if they can't accept it? What if they make trouble for her? And Cult Master Xue got beaten by someone below his level, with a public announcement for the whole world to see. That's much worse than an ordinary loss of face, isn't it? I'm afraid he won't stop until one of them is dead."

Luo Qi finally laughed aloud. "You're a lowly bandit who's only just started practicing the Blood Baleful Art, and you're worrying about a woman who can beat your cult master? Because she's pretty?"

Zhao Changhe's expression hardened. "She's my benefactor. If she hadn't intervened, I would have died in Zhao Cuo."

Actually... Could Yue Hongling's thousand-mile pursuit of Xue Canghai have had something to do with Zhao Changhe, too? Perhaps she thought he had died at Luo Family Manor and blamed herself for causing his death. Or perhaps she had already learned about "Zhao Changhe the murderer" and had come knocking to demand an explanation? Zhao Changhe was not so full of himself that he dared assume anything.

Luo Qi thought of that possibility too and stopped teasing him. He said languidly, "Your worries are reasonable, of course... Why else do you think a perfectly ordinary ranking is called the Chaos Era Ranking? The thing itself is a source of turmoil. Who knows how many conflicts have arisen because of it?"

Something stirred in Zhao Changhe's mind. He turned to look at him. "Then the so-called Book of Troubled Times..."

Luo Qi nodded. "This thing is divided into the Heaven, Earth, and Human Rankings, along with the Hidden Dragon Ranking. Put them all together, and you have the Book of Troubled Times."

Zhao Changhe: "..."

No wonder Luo Qi had looked at him as though he were an alien when he had said earlier that he had never seen it.

With these server-wide announcements, how could anyone living in this world possibly have missed it? Though the Heaven, Earth, and Human Rankings did sound a little tacky...

He coughed twice and covered for himself. "So this is the Book of Troubled Times. If you'd said it was this earlier, I would've known. I came from some remote mountain valley. I've never heard the nickname you people gave it."

Luo Qi accepted that explanation; it was what he had assumed in the first place. He did not dwell on it and chuckled. "Since you've seen it, isn't this a divine miracle? What doubt could there be that gods exist?"

Zhao Changhe pondered in silence.

People from the modern world had broad knowledge and experience, so their thinking would not necessarily follow the same paths as the natives'. To him, this was not necessarily the work of a god. The game world he had just considered was one possibility, for instance. Even that was far from certain; there were plenty of other possibilities.

Even if some higher-dimensional being really was operating all of this, that thing did not necessarily deserve to be called a god.

The blind woman's calm face rose in Zhao Changhe's mind, casting a shadow over his heart. If she really was that powerful, how was I supposed to get back...?

Luo Qi asked curiously, "What are you thinking about?"

"Oh." Zhao Changhe came back to himself and casually found an excuse. "I was thinking that Yue Hongling's only at the Profound Pass eighth level, yet she can beat someone at the ninth, and none of you seemed particularly surprised. Is beating someone at a higher level ordinary to you?"

Luo Qi scoffed. "Cultivation levels are nothing more than greater strength, quicker reactions, sharper hearing, and keener eyesight. They certainly provide a substantial advantage in a fight, but they don't guarantee victory. Otherwise, why would people still work so hard on sword and saber techniques and hone their practical fighting skills? Speaking of which, Luo Zhenwu was supposedly at the Profound Pass third level, but didn't he die at your hands anyway? You're the one who crossed the most levels."

"He wasn't impervious to blades and spears. What's so strange about killing him with a dirty trick? Oh, right, couldn't that get me on the ranking? Was it too low-level?"

"The Book of Troubled Times doesn't look at levels. It looks at achievements in battle. Whatever your cultivation, an outstanding victory might be recorded, especially on the Hidden Dragon Ranking, which places even more emphasis on demonstrated potential. But what you did didn't count as a fight at all, so the Book of Troubled Times wouldn't react. If you'd actually hacked Luo Zhenwu to death in combat, I reckon you really could have made the ranking..."

"I see..." Zhao Changhe rubbed his chin. "Then would throwing lime during a fight and killing someone with a dirty trick count?"

"As long as you're in combat, whatever means you use count as part of your combat experience and tactical intelligence. If you can defeat the strong while you're weak, that's your ability. The heroes of the martial world consider that sort of thing despicable, but the Book of Troubled Times recognizes it... As the saying goes, heaven follows its constant course: it does not endure for Yao, nor perish for Jie."

Zhao Changhe: "?"

"What? Why are you making that face?"

"How do you people have Yao and Jie?"

"...What do you mean, 'you people'? Even you've heard of them coming from your mountain valley. Why shouldn't I have?"

"No, that's... Forget it." This world was damned strange. Did the stronghold have any history books? I'd have to find one and look through it sometime.

Luo Qi asked, "What, from the sound of it, are you very interested in making the ranking?"

Zhao Changhe had no desire to compete with anyone over rankings. Naturally, he was only learning about all this to understand how the world worked. But since Luo Qi had asked, he could only play along. "Who doesn't feel the urge to get their name on a ranking? Think how much you could show off..."

Smiling, Luo Qi patted his shoulder. "Ten on the Heaven Ranking, thirty-six on the Earth Ranking, seventy-two on the Human Ranking. Hidden Dragons under twenty-five have no limit on their number. Work hard, Brother Zhao Changhe, who only started practicing his horse stance at nineteen."

Zhao Changhe gave him a sidelong glance, then suddenly smiled. "You're smiling more and more now. Is this the real you?"

Luo Qi's face instantly stiffened. Huffing angrily, he went back inside to sleep.