More than half a year later.
"Slap! Slap! Slap!"
The sound of wooden swords clashing echoed intermittently in the spacious training room.
A dark figure moved swiftly through the training room, while another stood casually in the center.
Li Daoyi hand, the tip of the sword lightly touching the ground.
He yawned, his large Daoist robe draped over his body, making him look like an old pine tree, and even his eyes seemed to carry a hint of afternoon weariness.
"Whoosh--"
The wind howled in.
The wooden sword transformed into a black shadow and lashed out directly.
Li Daoyi stood still, seemingly unaware, but just as the wooden knife was about to strike, he turned half a step to the side.
The blade grazed the Daoist robe, and the attack missed!
Without hesitation, Li Daoyi moved the wooden knife he was loosely holding.
It wasn't a parry, but rather like a living whip; the blade trembled, and the tip of the whip struck the inside of the shadowy figure's wrist, which had been raised as he charged forward with all his might.
"Smack!"
The shadowy figure felt a numbness in his right arm, and the force he had gathered instantly dissipated, causing the wooden sword to fall downwards with a thud.
In a normal battle, this would have been the end, but the shadowy figure did not give up. With his free left hand, he reached forward and caught the falling wooden sword.
The blade flashed again.
Chop, slash, parry, thrust...
The moves were varied and numerous, masking a hint of raw inexperience.
Li Daoyi his sword to meet the attack, his movements interspersed with subtle dodges and parries, maintaining the same composure as before.
But no one noticed a faint hint of amazement flashing in his half-closed eyes.
"This kid's a bit outrageous; his progress is only slightly slower than when I was making rapid strides..."
After another hard-hitting block, the two retreated simultaneously, creating distance between them.
Li Daoyi then put down his long sword, smoothed the dust-free cuffs of his Daoist robe, and nodded, saying:
"I'll be much more proficient than before, and after a while, I should be able to master everything!"
Shen Heng raised his sword and held it horizontally in front of him, his Origin Power flowing through his body, soothing his body, which was still numb from the shockwave during the battle.
"Does being proficient in everything count as mastering it?" Shen Heng asked.
"You little punk, what are you dreaming of? Skilled is skillful, but true mastery is true mastery!" Li Daoyi laughed and scolded.
"Then isn't that even further from simplifying things?" Shen Heng said.
"Of course, you've only been practicing for a few months. Do you think you can reach that level? I've been practicing for decades and I've only reached the point of mastering it!" Li Daoyi retorted.
After saying that, he added,
"Of course, that's because I, this old Daoist, don't specialize in swordsmanship!"
Shen Heng nodded, silently looking at the long sword in his hand.
The suggestion to further refine his swordsmanship was made by Li Daoyi few months ago when he had nothing else to do.
According to him, skills generally go through five stages.
You can't do anything, but you can use it; you become an expert; you can integrate the strengths of many schools of thought and simplify the complex.
Most people's lives generally fall into one of the first, second, or Third Tier.
Before Shen Heng, he was probably in the Third Tier.
Next, cultivation is also very simple.
Swordsmanship!
A great deal of swordsmanship!
By learning a large number of sword techniques and understanding their characteristics, one can eventually achieve mastery and integration, which is the Fourth Tier.
Therefore, Shen Heng practiced dozens of sword techniques over the past few months.
This includes the sword techniques from the Martial World Easy Exchange, as well as the sword techniques that Li Daoyi's Clear Wind Temple can directly teach.
On average, each sword technique was probably only practiced for one or two days.
Therefore, he was not surprised that he was not yet proficient in many sword techniques.
However, it takes this long to become proficient; to truly master it will likely take even longer, not to mention the simplification that follows.
"Is this the only way to slowly grind it out?" Shen Heng asked, raising his eyes.
"More or less!" Li Daoyi narrowed his eyes slightly, opened the thermos he had just brought, and took a sip.
"About the same?" Shen Heng asked.
"Hmm," Li Daoyi, taking down the thermos cup, "Do you remember what the book ' Mysterious Gate Visualization Method ' I gave you before talked about regarding spiritual realms?"
" The Clear and Pure Spirit Platform, the Smoke Rising from the Purple Palace, and the Perfectly Harmonious Spirit Illumination." Shen Heng replied without hesitation. As one of his daily cultivation practices, this was quite familiar to him.
Nodding, Li Daoyi continued, "If you can reach the 'Smoke Rising from the Purple Palace ' realm, there will be a period of rapid progress. At that stage, techniques like this can be mastered quickly as long as you're willing to spend the time."
After saying that, he paused for a moment, then continued:
"However, progressing to the next level is not something that can be achieved simply by spending time."
"Smoke Rising from the Purple Palace?"... Shen Heng slowly nodded.
"Alright, that's enough for today's cultivation. You can go now!" Li Daoyi.
Shen Heng nodded slightly and turned to leave. Halfway there, he heard Li Daoyi's voice coming from behind him.
"By the way, get ready, something big might happen!"
"Big changes?" Shen Heng turned around and asked.
"You'll find out later, it should be after the next beast tide!" Li Daoyi his sleeve.
Are there any major changes?
After leaving the training room, Shen Heng walked along the road at the base.
Life became monotonous after we returned from that operation to sabotage the Anchor Point.
Cultivation, resisting the beast tide, cultivation, resisting the beast tide...
At first, everyone thought this situation would end soon, since it had been like this before.
But unexpectedly, this counterattack lasted much longer than anticipated.
The Calamity Beast no longer cease their attacks as they once did, once they realized their efforts were futile.
Instead, every few days, a massive horde of beasts would surge in.
The Calamity Beast continued to increase in number as time went on.
It was at this moment that everyone realized that the Eye of Earth Marrow might be even more important to the Calamity Beast than they had imagined!
So important that the Calamity Beast were willing to change their methods of dealing with them!
Yes, this is the latest way the Calamity Beast is dealing with the situation!!
Initially, the Calamity Beast attacked the base less and less because they realized that unless the table was overturned, they had no way to deal with the base.
Therefore, under these circumstances, it's better to simply ignore it than to waste a large number of Calamity Beast on it.
However, the subsequent destruction of the Anchor Point and the Eye of Earth Marrow forced them to resort to this method.
Without either side overturning the table, they trapped them here through intermittent attacks by large numbers of Calamity Beast, preventing them from continuing to escape and cause destruction!
This is indeed very useful, because they are really trapped here!
The vast difference in the foundations of the two worlds meant that even if they realized why the Calamity Beast was doing this, they had no way to stop it!