Warrior of the First Rank
Early the next morning, Luo Feng got out of bed at the first hint of dawn. Facing the first rays of sunlight in his family's little courtyard, he did frog jumps with cries of "Hey! Hah! Hey! Hah!" Then he did push-ups, squats, and a series of exercises used by modern soldiers. After working up a heavy sweat, Luo Feng went to wake his younger brother, Luo Fu.
Luo Feng had never expected much from the Qi-Nurturing Stance. He had practiced it since he was three and had now mastered it, but he could clearly feel that it did little to improve his physical condition. Luo Feng did not insist on more; he would just do his best.
"Luo Fu, you lazybones, get up! A great warrior wouldn't lie in bed. Go do your morning training, hurry up! Otherwise, your big brother will leave without waiting for you!" Luo Feng came to his brother's bedside, twisted his ear, and shouted.
"All right, all right, I know! I'll get up right away. As the future strongest Warrior of the Sixth Rank, how could I lie in bed?" Little Luo Fu talked about Warriors of the Sixth Rank all day long. Apparently, the strongest people he knew of were Warriors of the Sixth Rank. Hearing this, Luo Feng could not help smiling.
After taking his brother to the open ground, Luo Feng instructed him, "Luo Fu, as a man, you can't spend your whole life under your big brother's protection. You have to stand on your own. Han Mu bullied you again yesterday, so you need to give him a good beating in return, understand? I can't be at your side protecting you every moment, so you have to get stronger, understand?"
"Yeah, I know, big brother. Don't worry, I definitely will. Who does Han Mu think he is? I'll beat him so badly even his mother won't recognize him." At that moment, little Luo Fu forgot who had come crying to his brother yesterday, asking him to get revenge.
Han Mu glared fiercely at little Luo Fu from nearby, but he did not charge over. After the beating he had taken yesterday, he knew better than to trouble the two brothers before becoming a Warrior of the First Rank. Otherwise, he would be the one to suffer.
Luo Feng said goodbye to his brother and headed straight out of town.
The vast forest stretched to the horizon in lush shades of green, like a boundless ocean. As a person stood within it, a fierce wind stirred. The sea of trees swayed gently, and great green waves hundreds of feet high swept in from the distance, a spectacle that left one speechless.
A figure stood in the forest. On closer inspection, the figure was quite small. It was none other than Luo Feng. This was a world where the strong preyed on the weak, where the fist was always the truth. Without strength, you were nothing. The Qi-Nurturing Stance could not meet Luo Feng's needs at all, so he had spent a long time searching before finally finding this excellent place to train.
He hurried upward along the foot of the mountain. Up ahead was a waterfall, where Luo Feng had been training lately. These days, he rarely went to the open ground to practice horse stance with the other boys, so he had come here to train alone.
The waterfall roared loudly as Luo Feng rushed toward it as fast as he could. The water plunged from a height of more than a hundred meters with tremendous force, but Luo Feng stripped without hesitation, leaving on only a pair of underpants, and jumped into the pool beneath it. Ignoring the bone-chilling cold, he gritted his teeth and made his way directly beneath the waterfall. There was a platform there, and after training here for half a month, he was already familiar with the waterfall.
Several times, Luo Feng climbed onto the platform, only to be swept back into the pool by the water crashing down from above. Even after half a month, he still could not make it onto the platform and stay there in one go. Finally, keeping his body low, he slowly crawled onto it and gritted his teeth as he crouched beneath the curtain of water.
Luo Feng was in an utterly sorry state, but he had finally made it. The delight in his eyes was hard to hide. "I made it up in fifty-eight tries today. That's a bit of progress compared to sixty-two yesterday."
Once his excitement passed, Luo Feng began to train in earnest. There was nothing else to it, really: he held tightly to the rocks on either side to keep the current from sweeping him away. That was Luo Feng's training for now, and it was also an excellent way to strengthen his body. Over the past half month, Luo Feng had felt more and more that he was only one step away from becoming a Warrior of the First Rank.
The rising sun hung in the sky, and the lingering mist dispersed. Intense sunlight streamed down like great swathes of golden feathers drifting into the sea of trees. Beneath the brilliant light, the whole forest seemed clad in golden battle armor, lending a masculine air to a place that had been rather gloomy at night.
A river wound through the forest, its cool pool water flowing slowly.
Suddenly, water splashed up from the pool, and a somewhat indistinct figure rose from it, flickering in and out of view in the dazzling sunlight.
He had wheat-colored skin and long, smooth black hair that hung wet over his shoulders. Judging by his figure, he seemed to be a boy of only nine or ten. His eyes were clear and deep, possessing boundless charm, and his sword-like brows swept upward toward his temples. His cool, handsome face had a resolute look to it.
The child's face was full of delight, breaking the cool expression he had worn when he sprang from the pool. His still-youthful face was full of joy as he stared foolishly at his slightly swollen muscles. "A Warrior of the First Rank? Haha, I've reached the First Rank!" This was the result of half a month of bitter training so he could survive better. Though the pain and injuries of the past were hard to forget, at this moment, he regarded them only with delight.
Although he still could not compare to the children of nobles, like Dixie from the original story, an absolute genius whose mage's spiritual force was sixty-eight times that of an ordinary person when he was probably only around nine, Luo Feng was very satisfied with this. At least he could go further along his path than others, no matter how much effort or sweat it took. Luo Feng was full of anticipation for his future.
After coming out of the pool, Luo Feng still did not let a single opportunity to train pass him by. He ran from the mountaintop to the foot of the mountain and back up again, repeating the trip five times. By then, Luo Feng could feel layers of fine sweat covering his body, and he finally headed home, utterly exhausted.
When he got home and saw little Luo Fu still working hard at his horse stance, Luo Feng could not help smiling. "I'm back." "Ah! Big brother, you're back!" Luo Fu walked over to him, stuck out his little belly, and made an effort to look very serious. "Big brother, do you know? Uncle Jack from the guard said I might be the third person among us to become a Warrior of the First Rank. Apart from you and that big oaf, I'm the strongest."
Seeing how proud his brother looked, Luo Feng laughed. "Then you'd better work hard. Maybe in a few days, I'll break through and become a Warrior of the First Rank. You can watch from behind and envy me."
"Tch, don't worry. I'll definitely become a Warrior of the First Rank soon. I won't be weaker than certain creatures." With that, he ran back to practice his horse stance. Luo Feng shook his head and went inside, saying nothing to his brother about having already broken through to the First Rank, lest the confidence he had just built up wilt again.