Crack!

Jiang Li felt his arm was grabbed by Hong Heiyu and all the bones in his body were going to break. There was an excruciating pain but he still had a smile on his face and didn’t dare to make a sound. He knew that if he yelled out in pain now, he would get beaten up even worse by his teacher.

Although his life force broke through to 3, he was still far from an equal match against Hong Heiyu. Hong Heiyu checked his entire body and applauded: ”It’s only been two days and you went from 2.7 to 3. You’re really baffling. Most importantly, your spiritual state rose, excavating more potential in your body to govern your whole body. This way, your cells can contain more potential as well!”

The brain was the most mysterious part of the human body. Science still hadn’t been able to completely understand the human brain. Human brains haven’t been excavated enough. The strength of the brain and the excavation of brain potential completely relied on spiritual cultivation. Every time the spiritual cultivation improved a state, the brain would influence every part of the body and make it stronger. Otherwise, no matter how much spiritual medicines and genetic changes the body received, there wouldn’t be a large scale improvement in physical capabilities.

If Jiang Li hadn’t reached greater stasis, the cells in his body would reach a containment limit. No matter how much he cultivated, he still wouldn’t be able to break through to a life force of 3.

On top of that, spiritual state was also very helpful for genetic changes. Normal people had a very low success rate for injecting genetic water. But those with a strong spiritual state could control their own DNA and catalyse the dissolving of the genetic water, and some could even remove some unnecessary DNA, greatly increasing the success rate.

Jiang Li studied spiritual and DNA studies and knew that there were some very peculiar links between DNA and the spirit.

Technology studie at Astral University were the highest secret of human technology. They even needed to learn how to create battleships and mechas as well as their maintenance. As they researched more and more, they would even need to learn some cultivation methods.

Seeing that the teacher was checking Jiang Li’s body, the other squad members didn’t dare to talk. They knew to be quiet when the teacher spoke, or they would get beaten badly.

“Okay, not bad! Strengthened bones and tendons as well as tendon membranes. You will no longer fear the slashes of swords. However, this body has barely met my expectations for you. Your blood is white. When it turns sky blue, then it would be at a great standard.” Hong Heiyu let go of Jiang Li and looked at the other people: “In comparison, the rest of you are much weaker. There will be competitions between squads, so you better not lose my face, especially in front of some of my opponents. If I lose face, there will be severe punishments.”

There was also rivalry amongst the teachers of Astral University. The squad teachers would also have fights. The losing squad’s teacher would lose face. Li Zhen looked at his team with worry. They knew that the heavy training and mission would once again be loaded upon their shoulders, and their short-lived period of relative bliss was over.

“Don’t worry, I said you can have 3 days rest. I won’t go back on my word. However, if you have any questions in cultivation you may ask me.” Hong Heiyu stuck to his words and pointed at Jiang Li: “Especially you, you have just reached greater stasis. Although you found your own Dao, it is not firm. You may have doubt and your spirit may still digress. This is the most dangerous period.”

“Teacher, what is Dao?” Jiang Li hurried to ask.

“I’m cultivating the [Ten Sided Path of Hell]. In order to cultivate this martial art, you must endure countless torture and pain. Eventually you must turn the pain into joy. Pain isn’t pain, joy isn’t joy. Di Zang Wang Buddha said that if hell wasn’t empty, he swore he wouldn’t become a true Buddha. In fact, hell is heaven, for there was originally no hell. My Dao is for all living things to know that hell is heaven. Everything changes with the change of heart. With one change in heart, hell is heaven, and with one change in heart, heaven is also hell.” Hong Heiyu walked forward a few steps: “In this way, mortal people would know true pain. After understanding the essence of pain, people would then be easily rid of pain.”

“ Wise indeed.” Jiang Li praised, this was a new level.

He continued questioning: “Teacher, I’ve seen some people ascend to eternal stasis. Once they ascend, all living things are able to feel the emanated spirit.” Jiang Li remembered Wang Changrong: “But what is forming a holy fetus? How do you convert and collect spirit and energy? What sort of thing is the spirit chi of heavens and earth, and why can it be absorbed by the spirit?”

He saw the golden huge hand of the cultivation civilization and that could even break battleships. That was a pure energy body. Energy is something intangible, how could it intervene with matter?

“I know you are full of questions, sit down.” Hong Heiyu pointed to a shade under the tree, he walked up and sat on the ground. All the squad members came and sat down around Hong Heiyu.

“Energy and spirit is still a topic that humans are researching. In fact, the thing called holy fetus is the synthetical body of spirit and energy. Ancient Taoist call it energy fetus. With the formation of the holy fetus, one can use the godly arts!” Hong Heiyu’s voice was low and mysterious, as if coming from the eternal hell.

“Godly arts?” Jiang Li was dubious.

“Godly arts are the stuff of supernatural beings. It is the synthesis between body and spirit which appears only the material world. For example, this!” Six arms suddenly appeared behind Hong Heiyu’s back, making him look like a spider. He suddenly grabbed Jiang Li into the air.

“This isn’t a spiritual illusion nor congenial chi. It is something solid and real!” Jiang Li was shocked at a loss of words: “This is an arm of energy! This, is the godly arts! Isn’t that showing the spirit in the material realm as well? In my opinion, this is a truly sagely appearance!”

“Big mistake! This is holy fetus and not sagely appearance! You’ve learnt the three realm theory right.” Hong Heiyu reproached. The six arms on his back retracted back into his body: “The spirit can’t appear in the physical realm straight away, it needed a carrying body. The body is also a type of energy. The three realms, spirit, energy, matter. People need to realise things through all sorts of actions. In fact, as long as people found the suitable energy with a strong enough spirit, te spirit and energy can combine, one of such combinations is spirit chi.”

[TL note: Xian Sheng: sagely appearance]

“On the ancient Earth, there were no spirit chi, so no matter how strong one’s spiritual state was, there was no godly arts. But now, humans have walked into the universe and acquired this energy called spirit chi. After people formed a holy fetus, they had access to godly arts. As for the state of Xian Sheng, that is the spirit appearing in the physical realm, without the need of any energy. It is fundamentally different from godly arts. For example, if a car wanted to start, it needs batteries. It would be a mere hunk of waste metal if it didn’t have a battery. The state of Xian Sheng is when you don’t need energy and the spirit can still appear in the physical realm.

Because it didn’t need energy, it was undying. On the other hand, after you form a holy fetus, if you don’t constantly inject it with spirit chi, it would die. The holy fetus needs the nurturing of spirit chi. If it weren’t nurtured constantly, it would be like a car without a battery. This is very different to Xian Sheng.”

“So that’s how it is.” Jiang Li nodded. He understood now. Although the spirit chi on his teacher were strong, it was actually also another type of spirit-mastering energy and synthesizes with energy to create an effect.

“Remember, sagely appearance is not something the holy fetus can compare with. Those types of people could spread their thought across half a planet or even the entire planet! Because they don’t need energy nor the physical body, their thought can travel from one planet to another and survive anywhere. If I wasn’t on Emperor Planet and went back to Earth without the supplement of spirit stones, my holy fetus would wither soon and my life force would regress.”

“Don’t they say that those with life forces of 3 digits still rely on battleships to travel through wormholes?” Jiang Li asked.

“3 digit life force doesn’t equal a sagely appearance. Perhaps they are in the state of sitting in oblivion. This state is also divided into 3 levels, oblivious to self, oblivious to shape and oblivious to realm. This corresponds to what the Buddha says, no me, no people, no everything, no life. Being oblivious to realm means to forget the entire world.” Hong Heiyu explained very patiently: “There was also a huge difference in the masters with 3 digit life forces. Do you think the difference between 100 and 999 is big? Perhaps, there are those with 4 digit life forces in humanity as well!”

“4 digit!” Jiang Li and the others were shocked.

To them, even two-digit life forces were a very distant dream. With a life force of 3, Jiang Li already felt he was superman. Two digit must be god-like; 3 digit was unfathomable. What is four digits?

“With your current greater stasis, your life force can still grow. As long as you absorb enough spirit chi and constantly train. I think your life force can reach 7 under my guidance. But them it would stop growing. You must reach eternal stasis because your brain will get stronger once again and bring about change in your body. Only then can you reach 2 digits.” Hong Heiyu said.

Jiang Li understood that he needed to cultivate step by step. First he needed to get his life force up to 7.. Then he needed to ascend to eternal stasis and increase his potential. Then he needed to gradually cultivate and reach two figures and fully understand fetal respiration. Thus, this allowed him to store large reserves of energy in his body while acquiring godly arts. This way, he could release something like that golden hand which could destroy battleships.

Suddenly, he thought of something: “By the way, teacher, our Astral University base uses only energy to transport things and send us to battle. Is that also the doing of a huge holy fetus?”

The energy in the base was huge and omnipresent. If used, it could blast the asteroids in the sky to pieces, suppress earthquakes, hurricanes and lightning as well as killing enemies. This type of energy seemed much stronger than the golden hand that destroyed the ship.

But, how do you focus energy?

“In the most centre of our base is a huge furnace where we concentrate energy onto to materialize and intervene with matter. This is the most advanced technology of humanity. Before, it was one of the core technologies founded on that alien space ship. Your so-called martial arts master system is also a type of energy utilization. Technology uses mechanical energy, and cultivation used spiritual energy. The two actually end up at the same spot.”

Hong Heiyu explained: “Blood and flesh is a type of energy but it contains impurities. So when people eat it, there will be excretion. The process of cultivation is to gradually remove the impurities in the body; that way, your strength would grow stronger, perhaps indefinitely!”

ED Carolin Cao