131: Chapter 131 Elder's Lecture

The mountain path of Moxia Peak was much narrower and darker than that of Zixia Peak.

The trees on both sides were of an unknown species, their branches and leaves exceptionally dense, blocking out the sky and sun, casting fragmented spots of sunlight onto the ground.

Occasionally, one could see black stone steles along the mountain path, engraved with runes Lin Tian could not understand, emitting a faint, lingering chill.

The air was permeated with an indescribable scent; it was neither the bitterness of medicinal herbs nor the fragrance of flowers and plants, but rather resembled the smell emitted by some kind of metal after being soaked in water for a long time—chilly and piercing, drilling straight into the nose.

Lin Tian carried the wooden box and walked up the mountain path. On the way, he met several Disciples of Moxia Peak, all wearing ink-colored Disciple robes, their footsteps silent, drifting across the mountain path like shadows.

They glanced at Lin Tian, their gazes pausing briefly on his purple Disciple robes, then at the wooden box in his hands and the seal on it, before withdrawing their gazes without asking further questions.

The identity of a delivery person was indeed useful. Lin Tian traveled unimpeded all the way, with no one stopping him or questioning him.

When he reached the mountainside, he heard voices coming from ahead. After rounding a stone forest, the view suddenly opened up—on a flattened rocky platform, dozens of Moxia Peak Disciples were gathered.

They sat cross-legged on the ground, facing a protruding boulder, on which an old man stood.

The old man was thin, wearing an ink-colored robe, with graying hair and an expressionless face, but his eyes were piercing, like two nails embedded in his eye sockets.

He was speaking; his voice was not loud, yet it reached the ears of everyone present clearly.

An Elder of Moxia Peak was giving a lecture.

Lin Tian slowed his pace. He quietly walked to the back of the crowd, placed the wooden box at his feet, and stood there to listen.

The old man was speaking about hidden weapons.

"Hidden weapons, as the name implies, are weapons hidden in the dark. Their first characteristic is not power, but concealment. If you raise your hand and the opponent already knows you are about to launch a hidden weapon, then what you are launching is not a hidden weapon, but an overt one.

When a true hidden weapon is launched, the opponent should know nothing. By the time they see the hidden weapon, it should already be at their throat."

"The second characteristic is suddenness. The method of exerting force for hidden weapons differs from that of blades and swords. Blades and swords emphasize building up momentum; force rises from the ground, passes through the waist and hips, transmits to the arms, and finally to the weapon. No matter how fast this process is, it leaves traces.

Hidden weapons are different. The exertion of force for hidden weapons must be short, crisp, and such that people cannot tell when you moved.

Force should be exerted from the wrist, from the fingers, or from any joint in your body that can generate force; the shorter, the better; the more concealed, the better."

"The third characteristic is timing. When should you launch a hidden weapon? When the opponent is attacking with all their might, their attention is entirely on their attack, and their defense against you is at its weakest.

When the opponent's old strength is exhausted and new strength has not yet been generated, they won't even have time to dodge. When the opponent thinks you have no options left, their vigilance is at its lowest. These are all the best times to launch a hidden weapon."

Lin Tian stood behind the crowd, listening intently.

Some of the things the old man said, he had vaguely felt while cultivating the Flying Knife in the Sleeve, but it was blurry and he couldn't articulate it clearly.

For example, the exertion of force must be short and sharp—when he practiced, he did indeed discover that the more crisp his wrist flick, the faster the flying knife. But he had never thought about why it was faster.

Now, hearing the old man explain it, he realized this was because short, sharp force has no warning, and the time from exertion to the knife leaving his hand is extremely short, giving the opponent no time to react.

Take the choice of timing, for instance. He had used flying knives in the canyon before—no, that's not right, he hadn't learned the Flying Knife in the Sleeve back then.

But if he had had flying knives at that time, launching them while those Fourth-Rank Warriors were attacking him with all their might would have indeed been much more effective than a direct head-on clash.

Practicing on one's own is one thing, but listening to an experienced Elder explain it is another.

Although he had the Proficiency System, and could raise the Realm of his martial arts just by cultivating over and over, the System only increased proficiency, muscle memory, and the speed and precision of his attacks.

But what the Elder was talking about was experience, strategy, and the "Dao" of using hidden weapons. The System could not provide these things.

The old man spoke for a while longer, then waved his hand: "Listening without practicing is useless. Go and try it out, and see how much you have comprehended."

The Moxia Peak Disciples stood up one after another and walked towards the wooden posts erected around the platform.

Those wooden posts were as tall as a person, made of ironwood, their surfaces pitted and scarred with the marks left by hidden weapons.

The Disciples launched their attacks.

The types of hidden weapons were varied.

Some threw darts, some flicked out iron lotus seeds, some shot sleeve arrows, and others used a type of blade so thin it was almost transparent; when they attacked, one only saw a faint glimmer flash by, and a deep mark would appear on the wooden post.

The sound of weapons piercing the air rose and fell, and the du-du-du sounds were as dense as raindrops hitting banana leaves.

Lin Tian watched them attack and nodded inwardly. Moxia Peak was indeed worthy of its reputation for specializing in hidden weapons; the techniques of these Disciples each had their own ingenuity.

Some exerted force in an extremely concealed manner, their wrists barely moving before the dart was out. Others attacked extremely quickly; from sleeve to wooden post, the trajectory was almost impossible to see.

His hands were itching too.

He looked left and right; no one was paying attention to him. Lin Tian walked to an unused wooden post nearby and stood still. He made no preparatory movements, didn't even adjust his breathing, just gave his wrist a light flick.

A moyuan flying dagger slid from his sleeve to his fingertips, then vanished.

Almost at the same moment it vanished, a "du" sound came from the wooden post. The flying knife pierced through the front of the wooden post, exited from the back, flew another zhang or more, and nailed itself into the mountain wall behind, splashing up a few stone fragments.

Lin Tian walked over and pulled the flying knife from the mountain wall. The blade was clean, without a single speck of stone dust on it.

He looked again at the penetration mark on the wooden post—the knife hole was neat, the edges smooth, without a single crack. This was a sign of highly concentrated force; all the power was gathered at the point of the knife tip, without spreading to the surroundings.

The power had increased.

Before, when he practiced on Zixia Peak, his flying knife could nail into a tree trunk by three inches, but it couldn't penetrate it.

Today, after listening to the Elder's explanation, he had adjusted his method of exerting force at the moment of the attack, pouring the power more concentratedly onto the knife tip, and sure enough, he pierced through in one strike.

Although ironwood was much harder than old pine, the force he used was more concentrated, so the penetrating power was actually stronger.

Lin Tian tucked the flying knife back into the knife pouch in his sleeve, bent down to pick up the wooden box on the ground, and turned to leave the platform.

He first went to the Moxia Peak Affairs Hall, handed the medicinal herbs to Deacon Sun, and then descended the mountain along the path he had come.

On the way back, he kept ruminating on the several key points the old man had mentioned.

Concealment, suddenness, timing. These three words seemed simple, but countless details were hidden behind each one. Take "concealment" for example; not only must the action of launching be concealed, but the flying knife itself must also be concealed.

The black blade of the moyuan flying dagger was almost invisible in a dim environment; this was a natural concealment advantage. If combined with an unexpected angle of attack, the effect would be even better.

He calculated in his mind, his steps growing faster. He wanted to return, to go back to his small courtyard, and integrate these insights into his cultivation.

The lecture at Moxia Peak continued.

The old man walked from one wooden post to another, observing and commenting as he went.

"The force is scattered; it exploded upon hitting the wooden post. A hidden weapon is not a hammer; you don't need to smash, you need to use a drilling force."

"Your intention to attack is too obvious; your shoulder moved first. Once your shoulder moves, the opponent knows you are about to attack; even if I gave you ten hidden weapons, you wouldn't be able to hit anyone."

"This one is passable; it has concealment, but the speed is insufficient. Launching a hidden weapon requires taking the opponent by surprise; you are so slow and leisurely, the opponent would have enough time to drink a cup of tea and then dodge."

Some Disciples nodded, some lowered their heads, and some wore thoughtful expressions. The old man commented all the way along, then his footsteps suddenly stopped.

He stood before a wooden post, his gaze landing on the penetrating knife hole in the wooden post.

The knife hole was not large, only a finger wide, but it pierced all the way from the front of the wooden post to the back, bright and clear, allowing one to see the mountain wall behind.

The edges of the hole were smooth and neat, indicating that the force of the attack was extremely concentrated, with Internal Energy poured in evenly, without the slightest dispersion from the knife tip to the knife tail.

The old man extended two fingers and traced a circle along the edge of the knife hole. His fingers were steady, but his brows slowly furrowed. It was not dissatisfaction, but surprise.

"Not bad. Not bad."

He said "not bad" twice, his voice a few decibels louder than before: "This hidden weapon technique is quite good. The force is concentrated, the penetrating power is strong, and the angle of attack is tricky."

"Piercing in from the front of the wooden post three parts to the left, and exiting from the back five parts to the right—this uses a rotational force, not a straight, dead force."

The surrounding Disciples gathered around one after another, surrounding the wooden post, stretching their necks to look at the knife hole.

Some squatted down to look from the back, some used their fingers to measure the size of the knife hole, and some clicked their tongues in wonder.

"This knife strike is truly amazing."

"Who did this? Who was standing in this position just now?"

"I don't know, it wasn't me."

"It wasn't me either."

The Disciples looked at each other, all shaking their heads. Although there were many Moxia Peak Disciples, everyone had been cultivating together for years, and they all recognized each other's techniques and hidden weapons.

This kind of flying knife technique that could penetrate ironwood was clean and neat, the force both fierce and accurate; it was not the style of any one of them.

At this moment, a Disciple standing at the very edge suddenly spoke up: "It seems... not someone from our Moxia Peak."

Everyone's gaze turned to him.

The Disciple scratched his head: "I just saw someone standing here; they didn't seem to be wearing Moxia Peak Disciple robes. They were purple."

Purple. Someone from Zixia Peak?

The old man's brows furrowed deeper, but not out of displeasure, rather out of curiosity. A Zixia Peak Disciple ran to Moxia Peak to listen to a hidden weapon lecture and even executed such a beautiful strike?

"What kind of person? What did they come here for?"

The Disciple thought for a moment: "It seems they were here to deliver medicinal herbs. Sent by Baicao Valley."

The old man was silent for a moment, then slowly nodded.

Baicao Valley. Someone sent by Old Man Qian.

He didn't ask any more questions, just took another look at the knife hole on the wooden post, and turned to walk back onto the boulder.

"Continue the lecture."

The sun shifted from mid-sky to the west, then sank behind the mountains from the west. When twilight spread, the day's lecture finally ended.

The old man waved his hand to dismiss the Disciples, gave a reminder to practice diligently after returning, and then turned and walked off the platform.

He did not return to his own residence.

In the twilight, the old man's figure was like an ink-colored cloud, drifting down along the mountain path, passing Moxia Peak's mountain gate, crossing Qixia Sect's main road, and heading in the direction of the back mountain.

Baicao Valley's medicinal herb fields shimmered with a faint green light in the twilight, and the air was filled with the clear fragrance of medicinal herbs.

Elder Qian was squatting at the entrance of the medicine hut, holding a cattail leaf fan in his hand, lazily fanning the medicine pot on the stove. The medicine pot was bubbling and steaming, though it was unclear what was being brewed.

Hearing footsteps, Elder Qian looked up. After seeing clearly who it was, he was taken aback.

"Yo, what wind blew Old Sun from Moxia Peak here?"

The Moxia Peak Elder—Elder Sun, sat down on a stone opposite Elder Qian.

He didn't bother with pleasantries and got straight to the point: "Old Qian, who was the Disciple you sent to my place to deliver medicinal herbs today?"