At five in the afternoon, classes ended at Qingshan No. 1 High School.
The sun sank in the west, its soft afterglow illuminating the clouds in warm hues.
Ning Chuan walked out of the school gates along the stone-paved sidewalk, using his phone to find the location of the Limit Martial Arts Hall.
Just then, a bright red sports car drove out of the gates and smoothly pulled up beside him.
Lu Mengyue rolled down the window, revealing a fair, oval face. With a faint smile, she said, "If you don't have anything else to do, I can give you a ride. It'll be quicker that way."
Ning Chuan's gaze lingered on the car's emblem for two seconds, and his eyebrows rose slightly.
The Blood Reflection sports car was famous online. Many people joked that you either had one when you were born, or you'd have to wait until your next life, or the one after that...
Now it seemed the three thousand yuan an hour she was paying him most likely amounted to no more than her usual spending money.
"Thanks, Lu Mengyue."
Putting those thoughts aside, Ning Chuan smiled and accepted without ceremony. He walked around to the passenger seat, opened the door, and got in. He wasn't surprised that Lu Mengyue was wealthy.
Her family ran the Extreme Path Martial Arts Hall, the number one martial arts hall in Qingshan City. Its ability to rake in money was terrifying.
In a way, that was actually good news for him. Three thousand an hour might not be the upper limit.
Of course, that depended on whether he could successfully guide Lu Mengyue in practicing Flash Thunder Slash.
Vroom!
Lu Mengyue pressed the accelerator, and the car joined the traffic amid the roar of its engine.
"We're going to the Extreme Path Martial Arts Hall. It has all the space and facilities we need, so it'll be convenient to practice Flash Thunder Slash there." Lu Mengyue watched the road ahead and glanced at Ning Chuan out of the corner of her eye. Hoping he would give her earnest guidance, she said, "After we're done, I'll have the driver take you home."
"Sorry for the trouble."
Ning Chuan nodded lightly. He said little for the rest of the journey, racking his brains over how to guide Lu Mengyue in practicing Flash Thunder Slash.
Or rather, how to make Lu Mengyue feel that she was receiving guidance.
A job paying three thousand an hour was something one could only come across by chance, not seek out, and Ning Chuan very much wanted to land it.
If it lasted until the college entrance exam, he would earn enough to multiply his strength several times over. Galaxy University was hard to say, but he could definitely get into one of the other top ten universities.
But Lu Mengyue's family ran a martial arts hall. If he didn't actually help her, he certainly wouldn't get the job.
I'll take it one step at a time!
Ning Chuan let out a soft breath and stopped dwelling on it.
His Flash Thunder Slash cultivated itself automatically, but the insights it produced were, at least to him, real and substantial. He could truly master them.
Ten minutes later.
The red sports car drifted to a steady stop in front of the Extreme Path Martial Arts Hall.
It was an enormous building. It wasn't tall, standing only three stories high, but it covered a vast area, comparable to the outdoor training ground at Qingshan No. 1 High School.
"Miss!"
A man in black strode over and greeted her respectfully.
"Prepare a private training room. I need to use it."
Lu Mengyue got out of the car and casually tossed the keys to the man in black. Her dashing manner made Ning Chuan raise his eyebrows.
Lu Mengyue led the way into the Extreme Path Martial Arts Hall, with Ning Chuan following.
After passing through the entrance, Ning Chuan heard a great clamor.
In the brightly lit first-floor hall, more than a thousand students in the martial arts hall's training uniforms were practicing diligently.
Among them were children of seven or eight, as well as teenagers around Ning Chuan's age.
The martial arts instruction provided by schools was not comprehensive.
After all, teachers had to teach many students at once and had limited energy. They couldn't attend to every aspect of each student's training.
Any family that was reasonably well-off would send their children to a martial arts hall for more attentive instruction.
Before long, the two entered an elevator and went to a training room on the second floor. It was very quiet inside, and unlike the hall, there were no other students present.
"Lu Mengyue, how do you want me to guide you?"
Ning Chuan asked the question that concerned him most.
After some thought, he added, "I haven't practiced Flash Thunder Slash for very long myself. I only advanced to the Minute Subtlety Realm thanks to a chance moment of enlightenment."
First, he would lay the groundwork in case he didn't know how to guide her.
If Lu Mengyue was dissatisfied, he would have a reason to explain himself.
"There's no need to be so formal. Just call me by my name."
Lu Mengyue stretched lightly and smiled. "Don't be nervous. With your Flash Thunder Slash at the Minute Subtlety Realm, guiding me won't be difficult."
"I'll use Flash Thunder Slash, and you can just stand by and point out where I'm falling short."
Hearing that, Ning Chuan heaved a long sigh of relief inwardly.
This was far simpler than he had imagined.
He had thought he would have to tell Lu Mengyue how to break through her bottleneck, and he had been at a loss about that.
In fact, the misunderstanding arose from Ning Chuan's insufficient knowledge of martial arts.
Bottlenecks between realms were profoundly mysterious and could not be fully explained in words. To break through, practitioners had to comprehend them for themselves.
The job paying three thousand an hour is mine!
The corners of Ning Chuan's mouth lifted, and he couldn't contain his delight.
His cultivation speed was about to soar, and the outlines of the Federation's top ten universities seemed to come clearly into view.
"Oh, right."
While Ning Chuan was thinking about which prestigious university to apply to, Lu Mengyue walked over to the weapon rack by the wall. She picked up a long, narrow, unsharpened saber and pointed it straight at him. "There's something else I almost forgot to mention. You'll also be my sparring partner. We'll fight using Flash Thunder Slash!"
Lu Mengyue pointed out that this kind of actual combat could deepen her understanding of Flash Thunder Slash.
"A fight?!"
Ning Chuan's mouth twitched. With no thought of putting on a brave front before a beauty, he said bluntly, "I'm only at Awakening Stage Four."
It wasn't that he was a coward.
Against someone at Peak Awakening Stage Nine, there was simply no fighting back.
Even if his Flash Thunder Slash had reached the Perfect Realm, it would be useless.
The gap was too great to make up for!
Lu Mengyue could simply crush all techniques with brute force. There was no stopping her.
"My fault for not making it clear. I'll suppress my strength. I'll keep my speed and physical strength at about the same level as yours." Seeing his reaction, Lu Mengyue pressed her red lips together and smiled sheepishly. After a moment's thought, she asked, "What breathing technique do you practice?"
"D-grade Savage Bull Force."
Ning Chuan shrugged and answered truthfully.
He knew why Lu Mengyue had asked about his breathing technique.
Besides their different areas of emphasis, different breathing techniques also tempered the body to different degrees.
Simply put, the higher a breathing technique's grade, the stronger its body-tempering effects.
Strength, speed, stamina, and even the five senses would all differ to some degree.
But a powerful breathing technique was also a double-edged sword: it consumed more energy in the process.
Without enough resources to support it, it was actually worse than a more ordinary breathing technique.
That was why Ning Chuan hadn't chosen a B-grade breathing technique when selecting his martial arts earlier.
There was little point.
Right now, the food he ate couldn't keep up with his needs. Practicing a high-level breathing technique would do more harm than good and delay the growth of his strength.
"Then let's start now!"
Lu Mengyue took a deep breath and calmed her mind, her pretty face growing solemn.
She raised her saber and swung it, a rumble of thunder erupting from her body at the same time.
So that Ning Chuan could clearly follow her movements, Lu Mengyue used only a small portion of her strength.
"The angle of your wrist is wrong. It's tilted upward too much. That way of applying force does increase the saber's power somewhat, but Flash Thunder Slash is a saber technique focused purely on speed. Speed is what matters."
Ning Chuan pondered briefly and identified Lu Mengyue's mistake.
"I'll try again!"
Lu Mengyue swung her saber again.
"That's not right. The movement is too deliberate. Flash Thunder Slash has no fixed moves. The key is to exert force simultaneously with muscles throughout your body!"
"What about this?"
Under Ning Chuan's guidance, Lu Mengyue practiced continuously.
Before they knew it, an hour had passed.
"Let's stop the instruction here for now."
Lu Mengyue took a towel handed to her by an attendant nearby and wiped the fine sweat from her forehead. "Next, let's spar using Flash Thunder Slash."
"All right!"
After that crisp reply, Ning Chuan put down his Silver Blood saber, walked straight to the weapon rack, and drew an unsharpened training saber.
Perhaps because he had killed Thunder Sparrows that morning, his mindset had changed, and he wasn't afraid to fight another person.
The two went to the center of the room and faced each other.
"Begin!"
Lu Mengyue gave a low shout, lifted her foot, and stamped down hard, pressing a deep depression into the thick leather mat. In two or three steps, she closed in on Ning Chuan.
Boom!
Thunder erupted from Lu Mengyue's body as she slashed with her saber. The blade sliced cleanly through the air, producing a piercing whistle.
Ning Chuan's gaze sharpened. Gripping his saber tightly, he also used Flash Thunder Slash.
Swish!
His saber swiftly cut through the air, chopping downward at Lu Mengyue's horizontally swinging blade.
His Flash Thunder Slash was three realms above Lu Mengyue's. In a head-on clash, with her controlling her strength, he could gain the advantage!
Clang!
The two sabers clashed, sending sparks flying and producing a deafening ring of metal on metal.
To Ning Chuan's surprise, however, the right hand gripping his saber felt none of the powerful rebound from a head-on collision.
That's a feint!
Ning Chuan's heart tightened.
With a turn of Lu Mengyue's wrist, her saber tilted inward, deflecting the force of Ning Chuan's downward chop while cutting toward his throat!
The smooth, mirrorlike blade swept through the air, clearly reflecting Ning Chuan's two black eyes.
There was a trace of panic in them, but he hadn't lost his composure.
"Flash Thunder Slash!"
Ning Chuan used the martial art again, raising his saber to meet the attack. With his Minute Subtlety Realm mastery, his speed was astonishing. His blade trailed a silver afterimage through the air and swiftly struck Lu Mengyue's slash.
Clang!
Sparks flew. Ning Chuan's body shook, and the impact sent him staggering backward.
Lu Mengyue stopped and didn't press her advantage.
The purpose of their spar was to hone Flash Thunder Slash, not to decide a winner.
After quite a while, Ning Chuan stamped down hard, planted his foot firmly on the soft mat, and steadied himself.
He looked Lu Mengyue up and down, a faint puzzlement rising in his heart.
They were both using Flash Thunder Slash, and he held a considerable advantage in realm, yet he had felt all along as though his fists were striking cotton.
After pondering for a moment, Ning Chuan's eyes flashed with understanding.
Lu Mengyue's fighting style, or rather, her level of actual combat skill, was superior to his.
After all, neither he nor the body's original owner was very familiar with martial combat. They had only encountered it at school, and at most had just begun to grasp a few of its principles.
His earlier killing of Thunder Sparrows had mostly been a matter of simply overpowering them.
Compared with someone like Lu Mengyue, who had been through a hundred battles, he wasn't in the same league. The difference was as great as that between clouds and mud.
Still, that wasn't a problem.
Compared with learning and cultivating martial arts, the difficulty of actual combat isn't worth mentioning. The former can be considered advanced mathematics or even a problem of the century, while the latter is more like memorizing an entire Chinese textbook. As long as I work hard, I'll see results!
Especially for me, there's no need to spend money to learn it!
Ning Chuan spoke to himself inwardly, and a faint, unusual glint appeared deep in his eyes as he looked at Lu Mengyue.
Lu Mengyue was using him as a sparring partner to improve her Flash Thunder Slash.
In turn, he could improve himself and prepare for the college entrance exam. The difference was that he didn't have to pay his sparring partner.
A one-sided win-win!
Clang, clang, clang...
The two exchanged blows at high speed, their sabers clashing incessantly. The ringing impacts mingled with the thunder each of them unleashed, exploding one after another like firecrackers at a festival.
Nearly half an hour later, the fighting stopped.
Ning Chuan was the one who called a halt.
It wasn't that he didn't want to keep fighting. He was paid by the hour, and he would have loved to fight a while longer.
But his strength wouldn't allow it.
The high-intensity spar had drained his stamina so severely that he couldn't keep going. Even standing there now, both his legs ached.
"This kind of sparring works very well. I can already feel my bottleneck loosening. From now on, let's spar once every day until I break through to the Proficiency Realm." Lu Mengyue smiled with satisfaction. "If you're agreeable, we have a deal."
Lu Mengyue was at Peak Awakening Stage Nine, so this kind of sparring was naturally no trouble for her.
Ning Chuan braced his hands on his hips and barely managed to remain standing. Too tired to speak, he simply nodded his agreement.
Lu Mengyue glanced at the clock on the wall. "It's been nearly two hours, but you're even better than I imagined, so we'll count it as two hours."
"Thanks!" Ning Chuan considered for a moment, then asked, "Can I be paid daily?"
The money he had on hand was barely enough to support his daily cultivation.
"No need to be polite. I was planning to settle up every day anyway, since there's no telling when I'll break through."
Lu Mengyue smiled, turned her pretty face halfway to the side, and looked at the middle-aged man waiting nearby. "Uncle Yang, sorry to trouble you, but please bring six thousand in cash."
"Certainly, miss!"
The middle-aged man hurried away.