Chapter 654: Time Passes, a Fairy Under the Moon

Inside the Training Room.

Yang Jing suddenly rose from his cattail mat, the airflow around him stirring slightly from the abrupt movement.

The confusion and restlessness in his eyes were long gone, replaced by a rock-like determination.

The loss in the contest for the number one prospect was just a small bump on the long road of the Martial Dao, not the end.

He firmly believed that as long as he resolutely moved forward in his chosen direction and cast aside all distracting thoughts, he would be the one to have the last laugh.

Yang Jing calculated inwardly. Even without the boost from the Exotic Beast Musk in the Grade A Training Room, his cultivation speed would slow.

But relying on the resources of the Grade B Training Room and his own arduous training, he was certain he could polish his Mountain-Breaking Seal to the Peak of the Qi Eating Realm within a month. Then, he could make a concerted push to break through to the Qi Absorption Realm.

And as long as the Mountain-Breaking Seal broke through first, with that higher-level foundation, the training efficiency for his Indestructible True Skill and River-Crossing would be extremely high. Their subsequent breakthroughs would just be a matter of time.

Once all Three True Skills entered the Qi Absorption Realm, he was confident that even if he couldn’t win against the prodigies at the level of the various Veins’ Senior Brothers and Senior Sisters, he would at least be able to put up a fight. He would no longer be a junior whose potential was for others to judge.

Yang Jing took a deep breath. The churning Inner Qi in his chest gradually calmed. His expression solemn and resolute, he walked to the center of the Training Room.

He spread his feet shoulder-width apart and sank his qi into his Dantian. The three streams of Inner Qi slowly began to move. With a thought, the Heart Method for the Mountain-Breaking Seal was already circulating.

“Hah!”

A low shout erupted from his throat. His right fist, wrapped in an incomparably fierce Qi Force, whistled forward. The edge of his fist cut through the air, creating a dull, tearing sound.

His movements were a blend of hard and soft. When hard, they were like splitting mountains and cracking stone; the force of his fists was heavy and ferocious, and even the bluestone slabs on the floor seemed to tremble slightly.

When soft, they were like a river flowing back on itself. The transitions between his moves were smooth and seamless, and the Inner Qi flowed freely through his meridians without the slightest stagnation.

Each punch he threw was imbued with his profound understanding of the Mountain-Breaking Seal. His fist intent was condensed and refined, no longer a mere imitation of the moves, but an integration of his own comprehension of the Martial Dao.

Within the ferocity was agility, and hidden within the weight were variations. As he performed the entire set of fist techniques, Qi Force crisscrossed the air, its power several degrees stronger than before.

…

In the following days, Yang Jing completely returned to the state of arduous training he had maintained back at the Sun’s Martial Arts Hall in Yuhe County.

He cast all outside disturbances and discussions to the back of his mind. Every day, aside from cultivation, he had no other distracting thoughts.

As dawn broke and the eastern sky turned the color of a fish’s belly, he would already be stepping into the Training Room. Once the stone door closed, it shut out all the clamor of the outside world.

At noon, he would only eat the meal delivered from the kitchens. After hastily finishing, he would immediately return to the Training Room, unwilling to waste even a moment.

The stone door of the Training Room would only open slowly when night fell and moonlight bathed Lingxi Peak. Yang Jing would drag his exhausted yet fulfilled body back to Qing No. 4 Courtyard, briefly regulate his breathing, and then fall into a deep sleep, storing up energy for the next day of arduous training.

Lin Ziheng, Fang He, Yan Chenglong, and the others often came looking for Yang Jing, but they usually found him gone.

They would arrive at the Training Room area and gaze at the one with the tightly sealed stone door, their hearts filled with a mix of admiration, sighs, and of course, pity.

In their eyes, Yang Jing’s desperate, arduous training was ultimately an exercise in futility.

On a Martial Artist’s path of cultivation, the importance of resources was self-evident. Even with similar talent, a vast disparity in resources would cause the gap in strength to grow ever wider.

Yang Jing’s innate constitution was already inferior to Chu Yunhai’s, and now he had lost the support of the top-tier resources that came with being the number one prospect. Meanwhile, not only was Chu Yunhai exceptionally talented, but he was also not a lazy person himself.

Coupled with the tilted resources like the cultivation efficiency of the Grade A Training Room and exclusive Elixirs, the gap between the two would likely only grow larger. Yang Jing’s efforts were, perhaps, all in vain.

…

The Xuanzhen Sect had been incredibly lively recently.

The various peaks had successively begun construction on Grade A Training Rooms. Compared to the Grade B rooms, these were not only more spacious, allowing for the practice of more complex martial arts, but more importantly, the concentration of the Exotic Beast Musk Aroma within them was more than double that of the Grade B rooms.

The dense musk aroma could greatly promote the circulation of Inner Qi, accelerate the widening of meridians, and provided an immeasurable benefit to a Martial Artist’s cultivation.

The sect built one Grade A Training Room on the Main Peak and one on each of the Seven Veins, but some of these rooms were temporarily vacant.

According to sect regulations, only the top four experts on the Profound Truth List, as well as the number one prospect, Chu Yunhai, were qualified to use these exclusive Grade A Training Rooms.

As for the Training Rooms themselves, the stone chambers had nothing special about them.

Their true core value lay entirely in the Exotic Beast Musk Aroma they contained. Without this scarce resource, they were just ordinary stone rooms, completely useless for promoting cultivation.

In the past few days, besides the construction of the Grade A Training Rooms, another matter had caused quite a stir in the Xuanzhen Sect.

The Senior Sister of Lingxi Peak, Si Jiawen, had taken the initiative to challenge Zhang Hongmeng, the Senior Brother of Celestial Derivation Peak, who was ranked fourth on the Profound Truth List.

The match took place in the Main Peak Plaza, drawing the attention of all the sect’s disciples.

Both were top-tier experts at the Peak of the Qi Absorption Realm. Zhang Hongmeng had occupied the fourth spot on the Profound Truth List for many years, his strength unfathomable.

Si Jiawen, on the other hand, was the leading figure of Lingxi Peak, with outstanding talent.

After a fierce battle, Si Jiawen relied on her exquisite Swordsmanship to narrowly defeat Zhang Hongmeng. She successfully broke into the top four of the Profound Truth List and, as a matter of course, obtained the qualification to use a Grade A Training Room.

The top five rankings of the Profound Truth List had not changed for a long time. Now, with the sect offering the Grade A Training Rooms as an incentive, the rankings had finally begun to shift for the first time.