Wulin : Martial Heroes

Chapter 08: The Effect of Fusing Skill

A week ago, he could not have done such a thing. But now, with his sword, he had killed a few dozen wolves in the span of ten to fifteen seconds.

If this was a week ago, when he landed before, he could not balance himself but right now, he looks like Duan Yu using the Lingbo Step.

Of course, his lightness skill is not Lingbo Step but other lightness technique but he daresay, that there is probably none that have more lightness skill than him.

He invested a lot in lightness skill because in the beginning he believes that the most important thing is always to stay alive.

And he remembers a lot of the rules of Jianghu.

And one of the most important skill that one had to learn if they want to live long in the strife of Jianghu and in Wulin, the one skill they need more than the martial skill is the ability to run and escape.

That is why he invested heavily in lightness skill in the beginning and also because lightness skill is the easiest skill set that generated a lot of points since he usually uses lightness skill even when he is fighting.

His stamina has also improved then a week ago. If not, by now, his stamina would probably be depleted already.

Though comparing him with the him a week ago is quite unfair. At that time, he did not really understand on how to use his meridians and he did not have a lot of skills.

Now, all of his twelve meridian is open. He felt energy coursing through his body like an inexhaustible source of energy is powering his every move.

Li Xin moves backward and forward like a ghost, his sword swing left and right, forward and backward, above and below, the sword is like the extension of his hand.

But he did not only use his sword. Flying daggers cuts through the wind, and reaches its target. Each time the dagger flies, it would shoot straight right to the vital parts of the wolf.

If the sword is like the extension of his hand, then the dagger is like his eyes.

When his hand moves, the sword moves.

Where his eyes could see but his hand could not reach, the dagger would fly like a death sentence and reap a life.

Where his hand pointed, there will be his sword.

The coordination between sword and dagger, the swift attack and the elegant evading, all of it makes Li Xin appears like some kind of ghost going left and right, leaving afterimages and wherever he passes, blood will be splashed onto the ground, the howls of the wolves turns to whimper and death follows.

His ears twitched and his senses caught two wolves that is about to ambush him from the top.

He did not even look to confirm that there are two wolves but his sword is already ready.

The wolves jump down, the sound of the wind alerted him, his wrist jerk and his hand moves, the sword arc slashes upwards, a force exploded and a rain of blood showered down the ground

In that exchange, Li Xin moves were perfect for each movement. There was no flaw and no gaps.

The blood rain is momentary before the sound of the bodies of the wolves fall down. But Li Xin was already a few meters ahead, reaping more wolves to meet Yama

On his white sleeve, there is not even a drop of blood.

Li Xin eyes is still closed. His eyes are closed but his senses are as good as like he is watching. His ears twitched again

He listened and he smirks. Two wolf jumped out from the bush, their claws are ready to charge towards him

Behind him, there are also other wolves that tramples on their dead companion and is rushing toward him, with their mouth wide opens showing its long and sharp fang.

The wind blows and the wolf charges forward.

To solve this, he did not even use his sword. The foot moves, sidestepping to the left. By taking that one step to the left, one of the wolf that lunges toward him, miss.

Almost a second later, he changes his direction and takes a step toward the right and another wolf that lunges towards him also miss its attack

In a span of a second and a half, there were two wolf that was attacking him but with two step, he avoids calamity.

Then he opens his eyes and his energy burst out, his hand pointed toward his right, the sword moves and a sword light shakes the air

The sword moves and the wolf head flew. He changes the direction of the sword to the left and another head flew upwards.

In the span of the head flying up to the air, Li Xin dashes forward, his sword pointed to the wolf that was behind him

But because he had changed his direction, the wolf that was charging him from behind is now in the direction of his front

He dashes forward and passes the two wolves.

And in that matter of second a sword flash passes the two wolves. The wolves did not even know what hit them as their sides were cut opens and their intestine flows out

Another few wolves jumped towards him. He jumped upwards, revolves in the air and then his sword pointed toward the few wolves below his body.

Stabbing toward the wolf head, the sword pierces the wolf brain like soft tofu, exerting some strength, the sword is pull back and exited the wolf head.

Then as the sword exited the wolf head, Li Xin swept the area with his sword and all the heads of the wolf flew upwards

This swift exchange of strikes happens in only the span of one second.

Li Xin landed and then as he saw around six wolf coming toward him he once again jumped. This time he jumps high, the wolf lunges upward, yet their claws could not reach him.

In the air, instead of swinging his sword, a few dagger flies toward the six wolves. Some of the wolves is able to sense it and evade it

But not everyone was lucky that they could evade it.

Two wolves were pierced in the head by the dagger. As for the other four, Li Xin landed, kick the ground and charges forward with his sword.

Half of head of the first wolf was cut clean. The other were either beheaded, cut into two, sliced from above or cut from below.

The movement is very fast and very frightening.

When the wolf’s charges toward him, he moves his sword to cut. When the wolf jump high. He lowers his center of gravity and slide below the wolf and cut from below.

When there is no opening from the front or below, he would jump and rolls in the air, his sword pointed toward the wolf and slices the back of the wolf like he was opening the skin that covers the spine and kills the wolf.

All of these moves combined his lightness skill and his sword skill.

Most of these wolf had not even had the chance to howl in pain before it died of a sword stab or a sword slice

Then Li Xin stopped. For a moment he stopped. He stands there in the middle of a massacre. All around him there is the pungent blood of the wolves.

Some of them bled red. Some of them bleed black.

Li Xin could see that this is the effect of the poisons or drugs that is in the wolf. The reason he stopped is simple.

In that frenzy of him swinging his sword, he had killed almost all of the wolves. There is a trail of dead wolf from the cave to this area of the forest.

His inner energy right now is left only ten years of inner energy. He takes a breath and quickly gathers back his inner energy

It would take some time because the method of his inner energy is just a low level inner skill.

Skill have five ranks. There are the Introductory level martial arts

Then there are the Beginner level martial arts

The Intermediate level martial arts, High level martial arts, Master level martial and then there is the Supreme skill

The Supreme Skill is like the Eighteen Dragon Subduing Palms, Jiuyang Zhenjing (Nine Yang Manual) Nine Yin manual and so on and so forth

Most of these is sold in the System store.

When he broke through to Understanding Oneself he got the ability to Modify skill

Before that, he did not know that there is a difference between martial arts and that there are levels.

But when he got the ability to modify skill he then knew what it meant by the ranks of martial skill technique. An introductory level martial arts did not mean it always have to stay that way

If the foundation is strong, it could even be evolved to supreme martial skill

But some introductory level martial arts could only reach beginner level or intermediate level. There are of course some that could reach supreme level like his One Sword technique which is derived from the Thirteen Path of Sword

Li Xin then modify the skill and it became Six Path of Sword

When he modified the Six Path of Sword, it became Three Sword Slash

From the Three Sword Slash, it became Twin Dragon Soaring Sword, the final crystallization of these skill is the One Sword technique.

>>> 

Author Note

Eighteen Dragon Subduing Palms -  Xianglong Shiba Zhang translated as the Dragon Subduing Palm, this was one of the two supreme techniques of the Beggars’ Clan in Jin Yong’s stories. Hailed as the most physically aggressive technique in Wulin, all eighteen strokes were named after phases from the I’Ching, with all names containing the Chinese character for dragon. Two of Jin Yong’s most famous heroes, Guo Jing and Qiao Feng were renowned for their mastery of this technique

Jiuyang Zhenjing (Nine Yang Manual) - Jiuyang Shengong in the earliest editions of Jin Yong’s stories, Jiuyang Shengong was the twin of Jiuyin Zhenjing (or Jiuyin Shengong), and both were created by the founder of Chinese martial arts, Bodhidharma. Later editions retconned Jiuyang Shengong to be a set of Buddhist neigong techniques. As a “pure” neigong method, mastering Jiuyang Shengong doesn’t make one a powerful fighter. However, the technique is highly useful for healing. It also vastly simplifies the learning of other skills.

Nine Yin manual - Jiuyin Zhenjing is Jin Yong’s most famous martial arts compendium, which appeared in all three parts of his Condor Trilogy. Written by the vengeful Huang Shang, the compendium contained Taoist neigong secrets and several sets of deadly martial arts techniques. Competition for the compendium was a major plotline of The Legend of the Condor Heroes 

Lingbo Step- Lingbo Weibu, literally meaning “tiny steps on water”. Its name comes from the ancient poem “Old to Goddess Luo, which originally described a beautiful woman walking elegantly. Since Duan is the prince of the kingdom of Dali in the novel, his royal identity just matches this aristocratic qinggong, though in most cases he just used it to run for his life.