Since the beginning of the year, all the former third-years had heard about Cao Yun, but none of them had seen him either train or fight. Since he had been hurt, he did not even participate in the challenges that happened every other month. With time, rumors spread that those stories had been exaggerated. Maybe he was very good, but most likely, in his fight with Long Jian, the Mortal Warrior had probably gone very easy on him. That was why many had been impressed because they couldn't see through this simple fact.
More and more fourth-years were beginning to question the true strength of Cao Yun. Unfortunately his ranking did not allow them to challenge him. Unless he challenged them, they could not prove that the tales around him were false. Among those fourth-years, the most adamant about that was Yun Ping, a member of the Northern Purple Cloud Faction. He had been the one with the most achievements in the Ancient Ruins and had become a 9th-grade Mortal. Yun Ping was even certain of soon being able to break through the Mortal Warrior realm. And yet, every time someone brought up his name, there was always a moron to also bring up Cao Yun and compare them.
Yun Ping was not very talented and, although he was a noble, he came from the Subei Province and was rather poor. As such, he had had no access to fancy resources or powerful artifacts. Everything he had right now, he had had to fight for with all of his might. Chief Elder Baishen also liked the boy because he was the most hard-working disciple in the entire Wubei Sect. Unlike Cao Yun who had kinda tried to evade her training sessions in the first year, Yun Ping had always come for more.
No matter how hard the training was, he took notice of any tiny bit of progress he made and kept on going forward. During his third year, in the Ancient Ruins, he had broken through two whole grades. Usually, he didn't mind about recognition but he had to admit that he was expecting a lot of praises after his return. Obviously, he got some, but each time, they had to bring up Cao Yun... In the end, even he could not stay stoic through this. Either Cao Yun was the real deal and he wanted to confront his strength with his, or he was a fake and he needed to show it to the world.
-
Cao Yun spent a few days with the new members of the Heavenly Swallow Faction. Apart from Cao Yun and his friends, there were eight members in the faction. It was still rather small but its name was huge thanks to the fact that four members were direct disciples of chief elders. Ren Chao was the direct disciple of Chief Elder Tingyu from the blacksmith pavilion, Sun Liao had Chief Elder Suxian, Mei Hua had Spirit Master Xiao Xuefeng and Cao Yun had also a master in the person of Chief Elder Baishen. Even without talking about what they had done in the Wubei Sect, this mere fact was enough to evoke a deep admiration for their small faction.
During those few days, Cao Yun trained a lot with them and saw that half of them were pretty decent. The other half was less talented but they really wanted to impress him. In the end, he got a good impression of all of them. In his mind, what was really important was not talent but disciple. After working on his mind cultivation for so long, he really understood what a disciplined mind could do. Even a great genius could lose his way or even develop an inner demon. The most important thing for a cultivator was indeed the Dao Heart. That was a saying from Saint Xun Ke he had heard Xiao Xuefeng use. It could seem banal but it was more true than all the young cultivators could comprehend.
Thankfully, Cao Yun had nothing to take care of in terms of administration or paperwork. Sun Liao had taken care of everything. Even more than the array formations, he seemed to excel in managing a small organization. His family was indeed in the business of array formations. So he had also learned how to take care of the administrative and managerial parts of business as well.
Satisfied that he had fully recovered and no hidden trauma could suddenly take him down, Cao Yun went to Chief Elder Baishen. As she was his master, he needed her permission to finally resume his physical and martial training.
-
The moment he entered the martial art pavilion, everyone turned toward him. There were a few fourth-years here and they did not recognize him. However, seeing the attitude of the other disciples, they could guess who he was. This boy did not look that impressive to them. His eyes were very determined though. However, his body was not that great. To be fair, Cao Yun had not trained his body for over a month, maybe two. And just before that, he had been severely injured, almost twice in a row. Although his body was still way superior to that of a mere mortal, it didn't look impressive for the fourth-years.
Cao Yun saluted some people he had recognized and walked to the stairs. The guards obviously knew him as the direct disciple of the chief elder of this pavilion. They let him walk up the stairs. And very soon, Cao Yun reached the door of Chief Elder Baishen's office. After knocking on the door, it opened almost immediately. As soon as he had gotten close to it, Chief Elder Baishen who was working on some paperwork had felt his presence.
"Disciple Chen Guo!"
The old woman seemed overjoyed. And for once, it wasn't just because she had an excuse to skip her administrative duty. Although Chief Elder Luoming had reduced that part of her work thanks to his reorganization, she was always slacking off and nothing was getting done in time.
Chief Elder Baishen used her spiritual senses to see through Cao Yun's body. She wasn't a physician but she knew a lot about this occupation. As the chief elder of the martial art pavilion, she needed to be able to differentiate between a minor and a major injury. Despite the nearby physician pavilion, she couldn't just send everyone to them all the time. And thanks to what the physicians had already told her, she was convinced that Cao Yun had fully recovered.
"This disciple greets Master Baishen."
"Stand up. Stand up straight."
The master of martial arts took Cao Yun's cupped hands and helped him up. Then, she stood in front of him with her right arm extended and her right palm facing him.
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"Let's test you out. Start with a punch. Put all your physical strength in it, nothing more."
Cao Yun did not hesitate and punched her. The moment he hit her palm, he felt as though he had punched the hardest material in existence. If Chief Elder Baishen had not intentionally bent her elbow, Cao Yun's fist would have shattered.
"Good. Good! Your strength should be in the upper range of the 8th-grade Mortal stage. Use your spear then. Once more, pour everything you have in a single attack."
Once more, Cao Yun did not hesitate. He grabbed his spear with his two hands and assumed his stance. It had been a long time since he had used his spear at full strength. Even when training with the new members of his faction, he had to hold back a lot. Faced with a late Spirit Warrior, that wasn't a problem at all. In his sea of consciousness, he almost heard the screech of joy of a dragon. Cao Yun used all of his strength but did not activate neither his Drop of Wrath's intent, his Qi nor the techniques of the Heart Star.
The power behind his blow was enough to annihilate a mere mortal in an instant. To Chief Elder Baishen though, this was nothing. The tip of his spear hit her palm and to reduce the impact in Cao Yun's arms, she bent her elbow again.
"Impressive... But that's not all you can manage, right?"
This time, Cao Yun activated the intent of his Drop of Wrath and focused his mind. The blood in his veins and his muscles became a bit hotter as the Drop of Wrath was exacerbating their strength. The strike from his spear became over half more powerful. Compared to before, Cao Yun felt that the difference between the strike with and without the Drop of Wrath had decreased. This showed that he was becoming increasingly closer to the limit of his physical strength. Usually, a cultivator reached this limit after breaking through to Mortal Warrior. Then, Qi became way more important to one's strength compared with the body.
This didn't mean that the body couldn't be improved, but the efforts to increase one's physical strength became more and more strenuous for exponentially lower results. Even with Qi, there was a limit to what mere flesh and bones could endure.
"You've exceeded the boundaries of the 8th-grade Mortal stage by a very small margin with this strike. But this is still not all you can do. Now, try to use your martial arts. You should have mastered the Heart Star by now, right?"
"Master, the truth is that I only mastered its first move, 'Dragon's Heart'. But I'm still not confident in my 'The Son of Heaven's Cavalry'."
"Then use your 'Dragon's Heart'. Let's not risk it with a technique you're not sure about."
Indeed, Cao Yun had been able to use 'The Son of Heaven's Cavalry' once. But it had been a situation of intense stress and danger. Moreover, it had resulted in serious injuries. However, he was now fully confident in his 'Dragon's Heart'. As of now, he was able to use it at full power without any problem, but he was still limited in time. With this technique, he could increase his physical strength eightfold. This was the limit of that technique. The only thing he could improve now was the time limit. For now, he was able to stay in this state for less than ten breaths. It was enough for a small burst during a fight, but he could probably increase this duration through training.
The strike in itself was not different from before. In fact, all of Cao Yun's attacks seemed unimpressive since Chief Elder Baishen could stop them all with her palm without any effort on her part. Instead, she had to be careful when Cao Yun hit her so that he wasn't injured himself. But this strike was a bit different. Cao Yun's spear was so fast and powerful that it blew the air around the two cultivators. Thankfully the room was resistant. If it had been made of normal materials, the walls would probably have been blown away.
"Great! You're even a bit stronger than an average 1st-grade Mortal Warrior."
A cultivator who had just become a Mortal Warrior had a strength that was of at least 20,000 dan, twice more than a 9th-grade Mortal. Before Cao Yun could think about this, he heard his master scream in despair. Suddenly, he looked all around him in alarm. Then, he saw the reason of her scream. With his last attack, Cao Yun had inadvertently scattered all the paperwork that was on Chief Elder Baishen's desk.
"No! No! I have to sort all of them..."
The old woman was so traumatized by her paperwork that she lost her interest in Cao Yun. That was a rare sight for sure. Usually, she was so crazy about young cultivators' talent and progress that she forgot everything else. However, this was different. She needed to hand over this paperwork in less than a week as the upcoming challenges were soon. As the chief elder of the martial art pavilion, she was responsible for those duels and every administrative duties around them.
Cao Yun decided to let her clean up the mess. He knew nothing about administration and he didn't want to get in her way. In fact, she was so down that she did not even notice his departure.
Contrary to his expectations, his departure wasn't so simple after all. When he went back to the first floor, he met a young man with dark skin and light hair. There even was a bit of red in his skin. As soon as he saw this man, Cao Yun had a flash of Axiu Qian. Obviously, the man in front of him was just an ordinary human, but he still had a very strange complexion that was rarely seen in the Hongchen Kingdom. That boy was Yun Ping. As he came from the Subei Province, he did have an unusual appearance, dark skin and light hair. Even his eyes were red. Moreover, he was intimidating due to his physique. Still, he wasn't as muscular or as tall as Ren Chao who spent all his days hitting unbreakable metals with a hammer. However, with Cao Yun's martial experience, Yun Ping's physique had clearly been forged to fight and kill.
"Are you that Chen Guo I hear about all the time?"
Yun Ping had put himself right in front of Cao Yun, very close to his face. However, Cao Yun sensed no ill intent on his part. After his time spent with Ren Chao, Cao Yun had grown used to this kind of behavior. Some people just didn't know about boundaries... Despite the rudeness of this intimidating young man, Cao Yun stayed polite and composed. He had no reason to create a conflict if it was not necessary. And he was fairly certain that he could end such a conflict with little effort anyway, if need be.
"Senior Brother, I am indeed Chen Guo. And you are?"
Yun Ping was a little thrown off by the way Cao Yun answered. Initially, he had been convinced that Cao Yun would flaunt his reputation and act all mighty. The young man had been mocked so much by arrogant cultivators that he had become used to it. Although he was a noble as well, he came from a very remote and poor province. Furthermore, his physical traits clearly showed it. In fact, as he got mocked over and over, he had even started to take the initiative to be arrogant first.
"Oh?! You haven't heard of me?!" Yun Ping stayed in character and acted as though Cao Yun should have heard of him. Since he was the only man with such an appearance in the Wubei Sect, he was pretty famous. Of course, he had stayed in the Ancient Ruins all the previous year so Cao Yun had no reason to have heard of him. Still, Yun Ping thought he was taunting him. "Yun Ping, from the Northern Purple Cloud Faction. I am also ranked 63th on the fighting scroll. Fight me in the upcoming duels!"