The Counterpart in the Wuxia Great Ming World

With the boasting over, it was time to fight with real swords and spears.

Mo Wenjian waved a hand, and the three hundred and sixty-five Star Seals within his body immediately appeared in the Mahavira Hall.

"Shaolin Temple has no cultivation method for reaching the Shatter the Void and See the Indestructible Spirit realm. Cultivating to the Gang Force realm is as far as one can go. I crossed the long river of time to communicate with Ye Fan in the future and obtained the Ziwei Star Seal he cultivated. I spent a little time using the three hundred and sixty-five Zhoutian acupoints in the human body as a foundation to condense three hundred and sixty-five Star Seals. Try sensing the Star Seals and see which ones you have an affinity with!" When Mo Wenjian finished, he gestured for the eminent monks to proceed.

"Thank you for your blessing, Buddha's son!" The eminent monks closed their eyes as one and began trying to communicate with the Star Seals.

Different stars' power held different profound mysteries.

For example, the power of the Ziwei Star represented the Dragon Qi of a nation's fortune and was essentially exclusive to emperors.

The three ominous stars Tanlang, Pojun, and Qisha, for example, represented the slaughter and Sha Qi of armies and were essentially exclusive to generals on the battlefield.

Although quite a few eminent monks were present, they sensed only two Star Seals.

Mo Wenjian speculated that the stellar power represented by these two Star Seals might be related to Mahayana and Hinayana Buddhism.

As for the truth, Mo Wenjian did not know.

Mo Wenjian used his sun-and-moon eyes to suppress the Zhoutian Star Grand Formation, then used the two kinds of stellar power to forcibly activate the corresponding acupoints of the eminent monks.

In the blink of an eye, the eminent monks had taken their first steps in cultivating Star Seals.

"First, use your acupoints to draw in the corresponding stellar power, refining your bodies and improving your aptitude. Once your acupoints are full, you can think about condensing Star Seals. This isn't something that can be done in a day or two, so there's no need to rush. It's late now, so I'm going back to rest!" Mo Wenjian put away the three hundred and sixty-five Star Seals, then strode out of the Mahavira Hall.

Mo Wenjian returned to his meditation room and fell asleep as soon as his head touched the pillow.

When he woke again, the sun was already high in the sky.

The eminent monks of Shaolin Temple jointly announced that the temple would seal its mountain for a hundred years.

This was not the first time Shaolin Temple had sealed its mountain for a hundred years, but the third.

With precedents to follow, the hundred-year mountain sealing proceeded very smoothly.

Only some people whose interests had suffered had quite a few complaints about it.

Those who complained, however, were mostly secular disciples with low martial skills.

As far as Shaolin Temple as a whole was concerned, such complaints could be ignored entirely.

As usual, Mo Wenjian refined pills at a quarter past noon and returned to his room to rest at three quarters past midnight.

Boom!

Mo Wenjian punched through the void. His main soul remained in his original body, while his secondary soul entered the tunnel through space and time.

Mo Wenjian's main soul fell asleep, and his consciousness transferred to his secondary soul.

The secondary soul was, in essence, an inner demon assimilated by the primary personality.

To the secondary soul's senses, the tunnel through space and time seemed to be made of mirror fragments.

Each mirror fragment held a blurry reflection.

A glimmer of understanding arose unbidden in Mo Wenjian's heart.

For the countless worlds, there were countless counterparts.

And the reflections in the mirrors were the coordinates of those counterparts.

With a thought from Mo Wenjian, his secondary soul rushed toward one of the mirror fragments.

The secondary soul had been transformed from an inner demon and retained its talent for assimilating personalities.

In less than three seconds, the secondary soul had assimilated the counterpart's primary personality.

Mo Wenjian discovered to his surprise that the compatibility between his secondary soul and the counterpart was as high as one hundred percent.

There was not the slightest barrier between soul and body.

Mo Wenjian guessed that the countless counterparts shared the same origin.

It was just that, at his current realm, Mo Wenjian could not yet sense the existence of that origin.

His counterpart was also named Mo Wenjian, but their life experiences were completely different.

In the year 1400 of Wuxia Great Ming, the counterpart was born in a remote village.

In the year 1415 of Wuxia Great Ming, the counterpart, admiring the mighty reputation of the Taiji grandmaster Zhang Sanfeng, traveled ten thousand li to Mount Wudang to seek a master and learn martial arts. He passed the entrance examination, became a menial disciple, and learned the basic martial art Wudang Cotton Palm.

Mo Wenjian briefly searched through his counterpart's memories, and only those two dates were worth noting.

Mo Wenjian could not be bothered to study his counterpart's memories in detail and opened the All-Heavens Dao Fruit Simulator directly.

[Age 16: According to Mount Wudang's rules, menial disciples must work for five years and temper their State of Mind until they remain unmoved by favor or disgrace. Only then can they become outer disciples and learn higher-level Wudang martial arts. You know that for the next few years, you will inevitably focus on Wudang Cotton Palm, so you practice it diligently day and night and ponder its martial mysteries!]

[Age 18: Wudang Cotton Palm emphasizes cultivating the mind and temperament. It is intended to temper the dispositions of beginner disciples, not to fight enemies in battle, and its power leaves much to be desired. Dissatisfied with Wudang Cotton Palm, you incorporate the supreme Yang and hardness of Heavenly Gang Thirty-Six Fists and the endless variations of the An Jin realm, bringing Wudang Cotton Palm to a realm where hardness and softness complement each other!]

[Age 20: After five years of tempering, you have proven your loyalty to Mount Wudang. You become a Wudang outer disciple and learn the three-piece set of the Wudang outer sect-the Pine and Crane Heart Sutra, Eight Steps to Catch the Cicada, and Wudang Long Fist!]

[Age 22: After long study, you discover that the eight extraordinary meridians of the National Martial Arts world are open from birth. Medical texts in the National Martial Arts world clearly state that where there is free flow, there is no pain, and where there is pain, there is no free flow. In Wuxia Great Ming, however, the eight extraordinary meridians are naturally closed, and they seem to seal the human body's potential. Each time a meridian is opened, the body undergoes a transformation, and one's strength rises by a level!]

[Age 24: You finally open the first of the eight extraordinary meridians. According to Mount Wudang's rules, you may choose a low-grade martial art from the Scripture Repository. After careful consideration, you ultimately choose Golden Bell Shield!]

[Age 28: Pine and Crane Heart Sutra is an internal art, while Golden Bell Shield is an external art. Cultivating both internally and externally, you finally open the second of the eight extraordinary meridians!]

[Age 30: Pine and Crane Heart Sutra takes its name from the longevity of pines and cranes. It is a cultivation method geared toward preserving health, with the advantage of the righteous path's balanced, harmonious methods, but also the weakness of their gradual, step-by-step progress. You are very dissatisfied with this cultivation efficiency. You think of Spiral True Qi, which often appears in webnovels, and try to make the True Qi in your meridians spin, using the principle of a drill bit to increase its penetrating force. Your speed at opening meridians improves noticeably!]

[Age 33: You open the third of the eight extraordinary meridians!]

[Age 36: Your condition begins to decline, and your True Qi begins to grow less active. Opening meridians grows more difficult by the day, and you know that your golden age for cultivation has passed!]

[Age 40: You feel utterly helpless about your aptitude. You know you can never become an unrivaled expert in this lifetime, so you turn your attention to studying the principles of martial arts!]

[Age 45: You discover that the essence of Golden Bell Shield is to squeeze out the body's potential to increase its strength. The vast majority of jianghu practitioners cannot reach the third stage even after exhausting all their potential. Only those with certain exceedingly rare special physiques have a chance of reaching the ninth stage, the highest realm. Using the health-preserving effects of Pine and Crane Heart Sutra, you improve Golden Bell Shield so that each time it breaks through a stage, it can restore half of the body's potential!]