Qian Feng woke up in his previous room, the one he used in the trip to the Nomad examination. Pain wracked his body and he had to refrain from coughing blood out, knowing if he were to make such violent movements in such a state, he would certainly regret it.

At first, his mind was blank, and he was completely at a loss as to why he was where he was. Then, slowly, memories began to trickle back in, each recollection contorting his face even further.

Suppressing the growing rage inside him at himself(he knew that just yelling at himself while dangling off a cliff would only have adverse effects) Qian Feng drove his Life Qi to course through his body, mending and repairing the flesh, muscles, organs, and bones that were inches away from irreparable damage.

Most people, even at Qian Feng's cultivation level, would take weeks to recover, if not months. Thankfully, because of Qian Feng's powerful Life Qi and the foundations laid from cultivating Legacy of the Immortal, he could hasten the process to a little under a day.

    Unfortunately, the healing process was incredibly painful, especially the resetting of the bones and the shifting of the organs, but Qian Feng already had plentiful experience with agony and wasn't truly bothered by it(he didn't enjoy pain, but he was so used to it that the sensation was... not dulled, but his reaction and perception of it was not as negative). 

  Finally, Qian Feng was fully recovered, and headed outside to seek some answers.

  The carriage space 'outside' his door was empty, so Qian Feng just knocked on his mentor's door, which was quickly opened to reveal the Iron Fox.

  "What happened after I lost consciousness?" Qian Feng asked, still waiting for his reflection on his mistakes until after all the pressing mtters had been taken care of - the boy had never liked remaining unconscious for extended periods of time: the feeling of missing out was blatant and uncomfortable.

  "Sit." The Iron Fox gestured towards a table and two chairs inside the carriage. "After you were knocked unconscious by that black sword, Lu Teng was pronounced the winner and the fight between you and Gong Ren was scheduled to happen in three hours, regardless of your state of recovery. When that time passed, and you had not yet regained consciousness, Gong Ren was declared the winner by default and you were left in third, Gong Ren in second, and Lu Teng in first. Since then, it's been a day. You passed, of course, and I accepted the badge in your stead, as your master. We've been traveling towards your new training location and residence, Reun Arena. You are a Duelist Nomad, after all, and arenas and battlefields are supposed to be your home!"

  Qian Feng sat there for a few seconds in silence, mulling over everything he had just learned. For a few seconds, it irked him that, as the clearly stronger fighter, he had technically lost to Gong Ren, but he was more mature than his body would suggest and got past that quickly. After that, he digested everything else. 

  A day just to regain consciousness meant a day of passive recovery; which, in turn, meant that his injuries were actually far more severe originally than what he had woken up to. This only served to fuel his rage even further - even in spite of the surprise attack, had Lu Teng needed to be so heavy-handed?

  "Thanks. I'll be fully recovering and cultivating until we get there, master, so just tell me when we arrive."

  "Of course, my highly antisocial disciple."

 Qian Feng smirked at that. It seemed that he was growing on his originally brusque teacher; that was good.

  As Qian Feng settled into his cultivation mat, he began to reflect upon the battle.

  One advantage of having a powerful mind(reincarnating did that, apparently) was an equally powerful memory. This memory allowed the warrior to relive his battle with Lu Teng, pointing out his own flaws and the holes in his defense with the power of hindsight. Finally, as he progressed through the battle in his mind, Qian Feng came across the final moment before he was sent flying back, unconscious. It appeared the injury hadn't distorted that memory, a small mercy.

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  Now that he reviewed it, Qian Feng's disappointment in himself only grew. How stupid was his mistake? After all, the reason he was hurt so bad was the same reason he managed to get the drop on Lu Teng, who was clrealy above his weight class: cockiness and last-minute surety.

  Outside of the haze of battle, Qian Feng clearly remembered his muscles slightly loosing, his tense face softening and the arrogance making its way through his veins as he made what he thought was the finishing strike.

  Regardless, little would change just through Qian Feng beating himself up over his mistakes in battle. On the bright side, the boy was sure he had done remarkably well for the first time imcorporating such high-level deception into battle(the skeletons and beasts he had fought had rudimentary intelligence. In other words, they were too stupid to merit such treatment).

  If he had an actual, fair battle, though, Qian Feng was sure that, even if he couldn't win, he at least would not lose so terribly. The only reason he lost at all, in fact, was just because of the other party's overwhelming power. Sure, Lu Teng had skill and was certainly proficient with those shurikens of his, but they were only so fearsome because of the warrior's high advantage in terms of strength and, undoubtedly, cultivation. If that battle was purely a contest of skill, well, skill was Qian Feng's main source of confidence in battle, so it could, naturally, only be fearsome.

  What did that mean? Well, if Qian Feng wanted to reach the full potential of his pure skill in battle, he had to have the power to back it up. And that meant training.

  Qian Feng found the uses of a strong body much greater and more unique than simply a higher cultivation, even if certain breakthroughs could induce a rise in strength that could put body tempering to shame. No, a strong body allowed someone to fight for longer and to fight more effectively, and provided a great edge over one's peers; not to mention the great effect body tempering had on one's cultivation.

  Ah, he had to be honest with himself - Qian Feng only wanted to temper his body as compared to cultivating because of the sheer fun of that training under the waterfall - he may be over 100 years old, but that was no reason not to enjoy himself!

 And so, Qian Feng took to practicing the Overbearing General Tactic.

   He quickly lost any grasp on time whatsoever as the days melded together through his hard work, and with an unknown amount of time passing(Qian Feng was sure it wasn't greater than a week, though) a knock was heard on the door, reaching Qian Feng's ears even through the Ancient Cosmos Pearl.

  This sound broke Qian Feng out of the long-running training trance that he was in, leaving him in a daze for a second before he reacted, standing up and opening the door, analyzing his progress. 

  In that period of time, Qian Feng had trained only the Overbearing General Tactic, and because of his increased cultivation base as well as the ideal environment he trained in, he had progressed much faster, reaching the Initial stage of progress and progressing more than halfway of the way to the Knowledge stage. The difference was huge, to the point that the inscriptions on the wall of the staircase Qian Feng would have to had use significant amounts of Qi to break previously would now be shattered by a simple, Qi-powered punch, without any special techniques or even weapons.

  "Hello, disciple. I hope you have made progress, but I suppose we'll see soon enough, eh? Anyways, we've arrived at the region's most prolific arena, Reun Arena. Oh, the expression on your face will be priceless." The last part was muttered, just barely above a whisper, but Qian Feng managed to pick it up with his sharp senses and as a result, grow slightly excited, and anxious, for what he was about to see.

  The carriage was parked right outside of the arena, which was a good thing, given that Qian Feng's state of mind was far too disturbed by the grand sight in front of him to be going anywhere.

Spoiler: Qian Feng's current progress.

Cultivation: All affinities at 6. Martial Spirits are Empyrean Might Titan for Force, Universal Tortoise for Earth, and Truejade Qilin for Life. Cultivation techniques are Infinite Force for Force(no duh!), Unyielding Bastion for Earth, and Legacy of the Immortals for Life.

Body Tempering: Tian Mountain Technique(Earth) at Initial / Knowledge / Proficiency / Completion / Mastery, Overbearing General Tactic(Force) at Initial / Knowledge / Proficiency / Completion / Mastery.

Progress In the Iron Fox's Training: 1.6/3 years.

Age: 4.6 years.