Zhang Qingyuan had been only ten when he first transmigrated.
After his master picked him up and brought him up the mountain, he had been a little dazed for a while.
Later, once he got used to things and thought over his situation, he felt the Tianyang Sect really had no prospects.
The whole vast sect had only ten people.
Three in management, seven employees.
By the thinking of his previous life, this company belonged to a sunset industry, the sort that could go bust at any moment.
He ought to hurry up and sell it before that happened.
His master might have been in the upper three ranks, but he was only third rank!
The third rank realm might have been enough in the Eastern Realm, in Yu Province, in this little patch of turf called Phoenix Cry City, but in other prefectures where martial arts flourished, that only qualified someone to be an elder.
And the Tianyang Sect had an extensive legacy-over eight hundred years of heritage!
Countless cultivation manuals, and plenty of grounds, too.
Most aggravating of all, Phoenix Cry Mountain was not even tall, and the Tianyang Sect was easy to find.
So Zhang Qingyuan had known since childhood that without some overwhelmingly powerful fighter protecting it, the Tianyang Sect would not last. It was a sunset business.
Fortunately, this place really was remote. The Eastern Realm lay by the sea, far out of the way.
And in this era, there was not much of a tourism industry. Few people came to the seaside, and the big shots were unwilling to come.
The local factions were not strong in combat, so his master's fighting ability was enough.
For those first two or three years, Zhang Qingyuan had worked very hard, too.
He was a transmigrator, in a high-martial world, without a system.
Wasn't that the very template of a genius male lead? Shouldn't he master any martial art the moment he picked it up?
But alas.
It was just like fucking lining up for food: whichever queue you joined was the one that slowed down.
He tried countless methods, but his realm simply refused to rise.
Then he started slacking off.
He began building unity with his senior brothers and being filial to his master.
When he had nothing to do, he read books and practiced his punches, dreaming of earning more money someday and marrying a few more wives, enjoying wives, children, and a warm kang bed, and becoming an ordinary, unremarkable disgrace to transmigrators.
But he never, ever expected this!
Thirty years east of the river, thirty years west; fortune took its turns, and this year it had come to his door.
It was not that his system would never come. It was merely late.
His master died, and the system arrived.
Had he known it was a sect-master disciple-recruiting and base-building system, he would have gone down the mountain to make plans long ago.
He could have built his own sect step by step, recruiting disciples and whatnot according to the system's procedures.
Starting with every little detail.
Just look at those system missions and rewards: build a faction, recruit disciples, receive Creation Pills, Minor Rejuvenation Pills, money, manuals...
That alone made it clear the system wanted him to follow the plot of one of those very old-fashioned showing-off-and-face-slapping stories.
He would start building a faction with nothing to his name, someone would come mock him and say he was no good, and he would take a Creation Pill and deliver the face-slapping.
His fledgling faction would have no martial arts and amount to nothing; someone would come mock him, or he would encounter mountain bandits, and then he would receive a martial arts manual, master it just like that, and show off and slap faces.
Wasn't it obvious? It was all designed in advance, every reward arranged for showing off and face-slapping.
Unfortunately, the system had arrived too late.
The moment it arrived, Zhang Qingyuan suddenly understood something.
Fuck taking things step by step!
If he was going to play, he would play big!
And that was how the current Tianyang Martial Dao Academy had come to be: the wuxia version of Lanxiang Technical School.
It was just that, after taking the pills, his realm had indeed risen.
His martial arts still had not improved much. He had read through the sword techniques, movement techniques, and such that he had selected before.
But he truly had no time to practice!
Over these past six months and more, he had been fucking run off his feet.
What didn't he have to worry about himself? He did not even have time to sleep at night.
So for something as physically and mentally draining as practicing martial arts, he relied on the system whenever he could.
But today, seeing the students' pure pursuit of the Martial Dao, that urgent longing...
It truly had rubbed off on him.
The Tianyang Sect was now on track, and the six elders had been trained up, more or less. He had time to cultivate now, too.
Although Old Second was already in the third rank realm, he could not depend on him for everything.
A sect master with no strength, running to an elder whenever trouble arose-it would not sound good if word got out.
There was no helping it. Zhang Qingyuan had been a capital kid in his previous life, too, and capital kids cared about face from childhood. (Just a meme; you can look up the original. Please don't turn this into regional hate.)
Standing in the library pavilion, Zhang Qingyuan looked over the martial arts manuals on the shelves, picking through them.
He wanted to practice every one, but he also knew that biting off too much meant he would not be able to chew it.
Although his talent had now been raised to genius level, even a genius had limited time and effort.
Previously, when he had not planned on cultivating, he had merely picked out a few techniques at random.
Now that he had decided to work hard, he could not be careless. He had to take it seriously.
Still, speaking of which, this genius-level talent really was powerful. The internal cultivation art he practiced was the one the system had given him, the "Yin-Yang Limitless Skill" from the webnovel Starting with the Zhang Sanfeng Template on the Tomato website.
This internal art was extremely difficult to practice, and one look at its formulas and Qi circulation routes told him this was a fucking Daoist martial art.
With his former talent, he probably would not even have understood the manual's first level.
That was why genius talent was so powerful. He had understood it after reading it just once, and his cultivation had progressed without any real snags.
Moreover, despite never having read Daoist scriptures, he could even understand all those Daoist theories.
This art had only three stages in total, and every stage was extremely difficult to cultivate.
Yet Zhang Qingyuan had taken only three months, and that was with merely casual practice, to master the first stage of the Yin-Yang Limitless Skill.
Yin-Yang True Qi flowed endlessly within him. Without deliberate cultivation, his True Qi circulated on its own.
In other words, his True Qi had tremendous staying power!
And the second stage would arrive soon, too. He only needed to consolidate it a little more, find his own path in the Martial Dao, and comprehend his own domain, and he would surely break through to the art's second stage.
Genius talent truly lived up to its name. Such a difficult martial art really did seem so simple now.
There was no hurry with his internal art at present. All he needed now was to study martial techniques.
With his current talent, wouldn't any martial art he picked up be a cinch?
After making a circuit, Zhang Qingyuan ultimately still chose the Tianyang Nine Swords.
There was no other reason; mainly, he was familiar with practicing this sword art.
Returning to his courtyard, Zhang Qingyuan drew his treasured sword.
A light breeze brushed past as he recalled the sword art's moves. He had practiced this sword art countless times.
Back when his talent had been poor, he had struggled to execute some of the moves well.
Now that I'm a genius, and I can even master such a difficult internal art, surely one run through this sword art should bring it to major accomplishment?
After all, he was already familiar with it.
Take the stance, thrust the sword!
Sword Qi flashed swiftly, and sword light whirled.
His movements flowed like drifting clouds and running water, his moves like a gale sweeping away tattered clouds.
Sword Qi sliced through the air, and the sword's ringing cut across the night sky.
The sounds of the air being cleaved drew two people over: Old Eldest and Old Second.
Zhao Guangqi and Zheng Jianxin lived nearby, and hurried over when they heard the noise.
Old Third was down the mountain, asking his father for money.
Old Fourth had left as soon as the meeting ended, in quite a hurry.
Old Fifth and Old Sixth lived a little farther away.
The two brothers arrived at the entrance to the sect master's courtyard, and Old Eldest was rather nervous.
He feared some villain had come to assassinate his junior brother.
Now that his junior brother had developed the Tianyang Sect so well, it was only natural for people to be jealous.
His methods might have departed somewhat from accepted ways, but the results were remarkable.
He was very worried about his junior brother's safety. Even if something happened to Old Fourth, he could not let Old Seventh face danger.
Old Third was, after all, already in the third rank realm. He could hear the difference between fighting and practicing, and had only come to see how his junior brother was doing.
It was just that Old Eldest's arrival, too, surprised him somewhat.
"Second Brother, you're here, too."
Once they met, Old Eldest spoke first. He glanced into the courtyard, and only relaxed when he saw it was merely practice.
"Mm."
Old Second nodded, his gaze turning toward Zhang Qingyuan practicing his sword in the courtyard.
As Old Eldest calmed himself, he said with some surprise, "When did Old Seventh become so hardworking? Practicing his sword in the middle of the night, even. Look, this swordsmanship is so much better than before, isn't it?"
They had all grown up together, especially Zhao Guangqi. As the eldest senior brother, he had arrived earliest, and had practically raised his junior brothers himself. He knew exactly what each of them was like.
Their little junior brother had only been enthusiastic when he first joined. Later, feeling his talent was not very good, he stopped being so enthusiastic about practicing.
For all Zheng Jianxin's showing off, his talent really was exceptional.
His realm was high, too. Watching the fluidity of Zhang Qingyuan's moves, he could tell at a glance. When had this kid become so good?
Had something clicked for him?
His brows furrowed slightly, and he found it a little hard to believe.
Seeing him frown, Old Eldest hurriedly asked, "What's wrong? Is there something off about our junior brother's practice?"
Old Second shook his head. "He's doing very well."
"Then what's with that expression?"
Old Eldest could also tell Zhang Qingyuan was practicing well, but he knew his own aptitude was poor. Seeing Old Second's expression, he feared there was some hidden problem he could not detect.
Yet, to his surprise, he actually said there was no problem!
Old Second said, "I was just wondering how things suddenly clicked for him."
"Huh?"
Old Second added, "His feel for the sword is almost catching up to mine."