" What is going Senior Brother, you look like you are seeing a ghost .
The senior brother in front of me was staring at me wide-eyed and once again had an astonished expression on his face, his face was pale, so pale that i began to feel that it was drained from blood .
" Senior Li, Senior Brother Fu is acting weird, he is... .
Just as I turned to look at Guardian Li wanting him to step in and help Senior Brother, i saw that the man was reacting in a similar fashion to my senior brother, but instead of getting pale, the Blood Qi of his began to become agitated, forcing me be under a huge amount of pressure, due to the pressure his activation of Blood Qi being exerting on me and my Senior Brother .
But due to the huge difference in strength between me and him, i was pretty much under a lot more pressure than him, i was forced to grit my teeth just to be barely able to still standing, fortunately this sudden pressure seemed to awake my senior brother and he directly gritted his teeth as well and was able to muster saying a few words, he said :
Uncle Li, this..... .
The man was also awakened at the sudden call and realizing what was going on, he began to recall back his Blood Qi back inside his body .
I swept the drops of sweat that began to accumulate on my forehead due to what just happened and sighed in relief that it was now over, i tried to rise up, but as i tried to do so, my body parts began to make all kinds of noises, squeaking, crackling, all kinds of sounds, yet my body hadn't still moved an inch, i was dumbstruck at what was going on .
I suddenly felt a hand patting me in the shoulder, i then felt some kind of energy began to swirl inside my body, warming every part of it, i then began to hear Senior Brother Fu saying :
Don't be nervous, it's a normal reaction of your body went hibernation, after sensing a life-threatening danger, if you had a control over your Blood Qi, even a little bit of control, you would have been able to expel that state yourself, I'm currently helping you in that .
You should really be thankful to that state, without it you might have fallen on your knees and that might make you look bad and mske Uncle Lu who is having high hopes for you look bad as well .
He whispered the last part, but i doubt that it had escaped Guardian Li's ears, the man was still looking at me with an astonished expression on his face, i was wondering what triggered all that happened when suddenly my Senior Brother continued to say in an inquiringly tone :
Junior brother, what you said before about taking 4 or 5 minutes to store the booklet content in your mind, was it really true ? .
I looked at the Guardian behind me, I'm now able to freely move my body once more, i saw that he was looking in anticipation to my answer as well, i nodded my head and that was indeed the time i felt it took me to store the booklet content completely in my mind .
I can also recall every detail of it and even the postures inscribed inside it were all printed on my mind, seeing me nodded,he didn't say anything, the one who spoke was Guardian Li, he said :
Then let's us test whether you are telling the truth, what after the section talking about circling your blood .
" Rhythm Your Breathing With The Heaven, Earth, Your Self, Blood .
Then what is after the section talking about consolidating your posture ? .
" Rhythm Your Body With The Lines On Earth, Keep Them In Your Heart, Keep Them In Mind .
What about the the section talking about Gaining Blood Qi ?
As if not satisfied or something, he kept asking me one question after another, i recalled the answers from the booklet and even though i didn't understand much of that was mentioned, i still replied word by word .
You really have memorized the whole booklet and in a 4 to 5 minutes, a genius, our Dojo had gained a super genius, senior brother will be happy to hear about this, mentioned that later to him Nephew Fu, no, i will tell them the good news later myself .
Don't act so surprised Junior Brother Tian, our reaction in finding you having that high level of comprehension is completely normal, if you ask any Martial Artist what is the second most important thing to have in Martial Arts practice after Blood Qi, he will without a doubt tell you that it's comprehension and yours seem to be indeed at the level of geniuses .
" Is it really that high .
Just so that you can understand i will tell that on my first time trying to comprehend that exact same book as yours, it took me the entire incense stick of time and even then i still didn't dare to lie to the master and say that i fully comprehended the information on the booklet .
It's not an exaggeration to call you the fastest one to memorize the whole booklet in 4 to 5 minutes like that, the person closet to your timing will be junior brother Lu Chiang .
He took a little bit more than half an incense stick of time before declaring that ge had indeed memorized the booklet completely, that was the reason to why master accept him as a Close disciple in the first place, today's might be a lucky day, junior brother, your comprehension is unmatched inside the Dojo, congratulations, congratulations .
Seeing them both acting like that, i couldn't help but wonder if what i just did was really that big of a deal, even though i only just followed the book instructions to the letter, i didn't quite get what the Senior Brother implying with him congratulating me like that, but he gave me not much time to think about it as he continued to say :
Well, if you trust me enough to choose for you, i will pick two Martial Skills that should be the best in the Yellow Mid-grade for you, they also may take a lot of time for you to memorize them, you won't have enough time to browse any of the other books, are you willing to put up with my suggestion ? .
I was troubled due to start having doubts about whether i will be able to memorize those two Martial Skills, but seeing that even if i decided against it, i wouldn't still have enough time to memorize most of the books here, so in the end, i decided to accept the senior brother kindness one more tome and have him choose for me .
You made the right decision, i already have a two Martial Skills that if you were able to comprehend, they will be of a great help to you after you breakthrough to the 1st layer of The Flesh Tempering Realm .
He said that and in a swift movement, he picked up two books and threw them at me, i picked the two books in front of me and read the title on the two of them, one was called Crouching Tiger and the other was Thunderclap Fist, those are supposedly the best two books in the Mid-grade category according to the Senior Brother words .
My heart couldn't help but become excited at the thought of finally getting a chance to learn Martial Skills and two at that, i came here today to only get a Technique, but i might be actually able to leave here today with an actual Two Martial Skills, even getting one of them will be something awesome .
I first thanked my senior brother for helping, he just shock his head and brushed it off, he then began to introduce me to the two books in hand, he said :
Thunderclap Fist :
This an offensive Martial Skill that allow you to punch faster than your opponent even when you barely got started with it, after you reach great success, your strike might be so fast that it began producing the sound of thunder clapping, confusing and shocking your opponent, making them more vulnerable to your attacks,
But currently you might not be able to punch more than one time before you get completely exhausted with you still not even a Martial Apprentice yet, but that will change after you enter the Martial Way, if you tried to force it, then your skin might get cuts and your hand bones might fracture, so be careful with this skill .
Crouching Tiger :
This skill is a unique existence among all the other Martial Skills in here, this Skill was a movement skill, but could also be used as an offensive one as well, it work on stringing your back and lower limbs, giving you a sudden outburst of speed similar to the movement of a crouching Tiger, but its ability to maneuver when you just getting started with it is a bit poor, but that will improve with your increase mastery over it .
What made this skill so unique was the fact that it had a tempering effect on the lower body, your legs, thighs, all the way to the waist, but you will need to become a Martial Apprentice first before unlocking that effect .
Crouching Tiger skill for now even if you were able to memorize it, i don't advise you to practice it rashly, especially if you intend to use the Tempering effect it had on the legs, unless you gained a bit of control on your Blood Qi and have herbal ointments to spare, i advise you not to overdo it at least until you reach the 3rd layer of The Flesh Tempering Realm .
I really hope that unlike before with the technique, you do listen to my advice this time, for your sake not mine .
I absorbed all the information he was giving me like a sponge with sparkling eyes, just hearing the names and effects those Martial Skills have already made me unable to control myself, but the last words of Senior Brother and the words instructor Lu mentioned earlier together with the incident that happened with Lu Jiu, all were like being suddenly thrown into a basin of cold water .
Forcing me to calm down my excitement in an instant, i didn't want to end up like Lu Jiu, not just yet, remembering the incident with that guy and how the skill book in my hand name looked quite similar to the Charging Tiger Martial Art, it was a grade higher than the book in my hand, but still, i couldn't help but ask the Senior Brother in front of me about, i said :
" Did senior brother ever heard about a Marital Art called the Charging Tiger Martial Art ? .
Huh, junior brother surely is knowledgeable, in fact i did and even tried to train that Secret Martial Skill myself for some period of time before master gifted it to the Lu Family, how did you get to know of this, junior brother .
" Well, i almost died in the hands of someone who seemed to have practice that Martial Skill, Secret Martial Skill, he wasn't a Martial Art Apprentice so it took no more than a minute or so, before all his Life Force were sucked dry as he died .
I told them about my encounter with Lu Jiu and mentioned some of the words the guards mentioned, I couldn't help but wonder inwardly why they called it a Martial Art while senior brother called it a secret Martial Skills, as i finished telling them all the details, again both of them seemed to be shocked at me, they both began to size me up and down with their eyes, Guardian Lu was the first to say :
You are lucky to stay alive, the servant you mentioned really dug his own grave with practicing that Secret Martial Skill and even used that secret technique in it, how dumb can a person be .
But said nothing more, instead the one who took upon himself to explain what was going was none other than Senior Brother Fu, he said :
That Secret Martial Skill was called as such because it contain a secret technique inside of it that could potentially allow someone to fight a person 3 layers above him in the same Martial Realm, a person in the first layer in the Flesh Tempering Realm can fight a person in the 4th layer of the same realm for a period of time using that secret technique .
But using that technique in itself was suicidal, that secret technique worked on burning the Blood Qi and the Blood Vitality to gain a huge boost in strength and agility for a short period of time, but after that period of time, the body of the person who used that technique will be crippled for life, burning Blood Qi was something, but burning Blood Vitality was an entire different thing .
That secret technique was why it was called a Secret Marital Skill, that secret technique was only used as a reference by Master, the Charging Tiger Martial Skill without that secret technique was quite the formidable skill in itself so there was no problem with it being learned after removing the said secret technique of course, Master said that even with removing the secret technique, the skill was still close to be a Black Low-grade Martial Skill .
It was given to the Lu Family as a gift, but that secret technique was removed from it, i really wonder how it fell in the hands of that servant you mentioned and from the looks of it, he was given only the secret technique to use, so that was very weird .
" Could someone have released that secret technique to public ? .
That will be even more weird, the information about these kind of secret techniques and skills was known to a few amount of people, at least to my knowledge, the book itself wasn't rare, if you happened to know where to look for it, you can pay enough money to acquire it .
But that secret technique together with others secret techniques were all labeled as forbidden information by all the families, this was done to keep the knowledge of these techniques limited to only them, so him acquiring it can only be attributed to someone from those who have knowledge of it in the Lu family disclosing it to him, who did you offend junior brother to be targeted like that .
" I wonder about that myself senior brother, but i can't seem to recall getting in the way of someone from this caliber .
He kept staring at me intently and just shook his head at me and said :
No matter then, but you better keep your guard up while you are at this family, if you want, i can lend you enough money to buy your freedom from that family, you stay here at the Dojo for the next 3 months, just say the word .
I was deeply grateful to that Senior Brother of mine and even though his suggestion was quite tempting to me, i still shook my head at him, thinking that staying at the Lu Family was better for me currently and i also felt a bit of guilt about asking him to do anything more than he already did and about lying to him earlier and now, i still bowed down and thanked him for his guidance .
And just as i sat down and was about to open the two books i got, i was suddenly interrupted by the strong voice of Guardian Li, saying :
Why were you asking about that Secret Martial Skill ? .
For some reason, i felt that even though he was asking, he seemed to be already knowing the answer, so without beating around the bush, i said :
" Well, it's just, i noticed that Crouching Tiger seemed similar to the Charging Tiger in name, so i couldn't help but wonder if they have a connection .
They indeed have a .... .
Stop it, he already learned enough of information for today, let him finish reading, then you guys can gossip with one another after that as you liked, hurry up and go away, kid .