In an instant, the corridor, the windows, the view of the Bureau of Investigation outside, and everything else vanished.
Ye Huan found himself standing in a spacious, brightly lit hall.
His body seemed to have shrunk considerably.
All around him were children about eight or nine years old.
...He seemed to have turned into a child as well.
Up ahead on an arena stage, two children were sparring.
Across from the stage stood a long row of chairs occupied by adults—young and old, men and women.
The young girl spotted an opening and swept a roundhouse kick, knocking the boy off the stage.
"Halt!" barked the referee on the stage.
The girl and boy stopped simultaneously, turning to bow toward the row of spectators.
"Xia Luoning wins! Yuan Zhidao loses!" the referee proclaimed loudly.
An elderly man seated in the center spoke up: "Xia Luoning, you don't need to spar anymore. Go down and rest."
The girl bowed, but didn't budge.
"Do you have something else to say?" the elder asked.
"A lot of people suspect my opponents went easy on me," the girl said, puffing out her cheeks in annoyance. "They say I'm only entering the sect because of my family background, that my spot was rigged from the start."
"And what do you intend to do about it?" the elder asked again.
"I want to fight through to the end."
"And what does fighting through mean?"
"A total of forty-eight people are taking the Taiyin Sect test this time," the girl said, resting her hands on her hips. "Apart from my younger sister, I want to fight every single one of them—beat them all flat, so all those gossips will shut their traps."
The elder froze for a second, then burst into hearty laughter.
The others began laughing along with him.
"In-Rank at nine, Shidu at ten, eight acupoints opened at eleven... With that kind of strength, having you fight them would be practically bullying, Luoning," the elder said.
"Bullying?" the girl repeated.
"Indeed. There is no need to care about the remarks of the weak. None of them can beat you anyway, and fighting them would only lower your standard," the elder reasoned coaxingly.
"Fine, then. I don't want to be a bully, after all... Am I in first place?" the girl asked.
"Of course," the elder replied.
"Hehehe, if any of you aren't convinced, come fight me!"
With that, the girl jumped off the stage and stood alone off to the side.
Seeing that he had persuaded her, the elder finally nodded to the referee.
The referee immediately called out: "Next match, begin! Zhang Beisheng, Ye Huan, come up!"
Ye Huan felt a whirlwind of mixed emotions.
The Taiyin Sect...
This was the Taiyin Sect's entrance test.
Many years later, when he joined the Bureau of Investigation and asked her what he should redeem with a Third-Class Merit, what had she said?
"The Taiyin Sect is far too sinister."
That was what she had told him.
And yet!
She herself was a Taiyin Sect disciple!
She had even taken first place upon entering!
A strange feeling welled up in Ye Huan's chest, as if he were bearing witness to her glorious past.
Now, he had to succeed in entering the sect too!
If the test ended and he failed to enter alongside Xia Luoning, this identity challenge would come to an end.
It looked like he would have to give it his all!
Ye Huan leaped onto the stage and bowed alongside his opponent.
"Zhang Beisheng. Please instruct me," the boy opposite him said.
"Ye Huan. Please instruct me," Ye Huan replied.
"Begin!" the referee shouted.
Ye Huan dropped into a boxing stance.
With a sharp shout, Zhang Beisheng lunged forward, swinging his fists and unleashing three rapid punches in an instant.
Such speed!
Such exquisite fist technique!
Only because Ye Huan had cultivated fist techniques for years within the virtual space and clashed against the likes of Night Owl was he able to react.
The moment they traded blows, he knew his opponent's martial forms surpassed his own.
—Yet it was merely a matter of form.
Ye Huan pulled one hand back while thrusting the other forward in a light slap.
Iron Hand Force!
*Smack!*
A single palm pierced through all three punches. Not only did it knock Zhang Beisheng's arms aside, but it also planted firmly against his chest, sending him flying backward.
Overpowering finesse with raw force!
Landing at the edge of the stage, Zhang Beisheng's expression shifted. "Arms hard as steel, entirely unshakeable... So it's an external body-hardening art."
"You flatter me," Ye Huan said.
Zhang Beisheng raised both fists, pinching his fingers into cone-like points, and yelled, "What a pity! My family's Crane-Controlling Hand is made specifically to break hard external arts like yours. Come on!"
"I'd be glad to experience it," Ye Huan said.
Both rushed forward at once, bringing every bit of their skill to bear as they clashed in close quarters.
In a flash, a dense, uninterrupted clatter of metallic strikes rang out.
The onlookers all wore surprised expressions.
"This child's external conditioning is remarkably high. How interesting," a martial artist murmured.
On the stage, Ye Huan was equally impressed.
His opponent's Crane-Controlling Hand was indeed beyond expectations. The force behind each strike converged onto a single point, attempting to penetrate inside his body to strike at his internal organs.
Against an ordinary external martial artist—or even himself back when he only had Iron Hand—this attack would have long since shattered his defenses.
He had never heard of such an advanced martial art.
—Even among Night Owl and his men, he had never seen such refined penetrating force.
However...
His current external conditioning was the Iron Cloth Shirt, which had evolved from Iron Hand.
Ye Huan let the boy's strikes land against his acupoints, brought both hands together in the shape of hammers, and slammed forward into him head-on.
*Thud.*
A dull impact sounded.
Zhang Beisheng was sent flying once more, crashing straight outside the stage.
"Ye Huan wins!" the referee announced.
"Damn it! I still had three secret techniques I haven't used yet! Winning like this is unearned!" Zhang Beisheng shouted from below the stage.
"No matter. You're welcome to fight again," Ye Huan offered.
Suddenly, the elder spoke: "That won't be necessary. Both of you, come here."
The two had no choice but to stop and walk over before the elder.
"Greetings, Elder," Zhang Beisheng greeted with a bow.
"Greetings, Elder," Ye Huan followed suit.
"Zhang Beisheng comes from a distinguished martial lineage; I am already well aware of his martial arts. You may enter the sect," the elder said.
"Yes, Elder."
"Ye Huan—your martial art appears quite similar to Iron Hand, yet there are differences. Why is that?" the elder asked.
"I modified the art," Ye Huan said.
"Modified it? You?" The elder looked astonished.
Without saying more, Ye Huan demonstrated Iron Hand Force, Twin Dragon Hammers, and Super Iron Hand Bars the River with fluid ease.
Those present were all high-ranking martial artists, fully equipped with the discerning eye to recognize his mastery of these moves.
Moreover, these were lost external martial arts they had never seen before.
Watching him, the elder murmured thoughtfully, "These moves are executed with far too much maturity. In my judgment, one couldn't reach such a level without over a decade of cultivation."
His eyes were extraordinarily sharp.
Ye Huan's heart sank.
Could it be that he still wouldn't pass the test like this?
"Have you practiced any other martial arts?" the elder asked.
"No," Ye Huan replied frankly.
"Life is hard for children from humble origins. Very well. Here is a booklet containing a martial technique for our Taiyin Sect's inner disciples."
"If your comprehension and innate talent truly are that exceptional, you will quickly gain something from it. I will give you the time it takes for an incense stick to burn," the elder said.
"Understood." Ye Huan took the booklet and stepped aside.
The other test candidates continued to spar on the stage.
Ye Huan flipped through the martial technique in the booklet and finished reading it in short order.
Truth be told, with his decades of immersion in fist and palm techniques, he understood the text completely.
It was just that this movement technique, called Three Skims of the Flying Swallow, was excessively profound and intricate.
He had never come into contact with such a top-tier martial art before, and no one had ever taught him anything of this caliber.
Without prior exposure, refined guidance, or a solid foundation of inherited knowledge, trying to figure it out on his own would take several days just to reach basic proficiency.
Yet the elder had only granted him the time of a single incense stick.
—The demand was absurdly steep!
In that case, he had better see if this technique could be added to his skill tree.
Ye Huan closed his eyes slightly and began internal introspection.
A speck of light settled lightly atop the Turtle Breathing Art, forming an icon of a fluttering swallow.
It worked!
Three Skims of the Flying Swallow was a movement technique—not only useful in combat, but an invaluable skill when running for his life!
The core principle he had established for his skill tree was "disaster-averting survival," so naturally, a movement technique like this was welcomed with open arms.
That meant there was room to maneuver.
With a thought, a prompt surfaced in his mind:
"You have shifted 1 skill point away from 'Iron Cloth Shirt.'"
"The power of 'Iron Cloth Shirt' has dropped drastically, reverting to 'Iron Hand.'"
"You currently possess 1 (depleted) free skill point."
Indeed!
From the moment the Disaster-Averting Survival Skill Tree was born, it had possessed this rule:
"Skill points are free to allocate, but moving them incurs depletion."
It should still work, he figured.
At worst, he simply wouldn't be able to achieve complete comprehension.
But he didn't need complete mastery anyway; he only needed to showcase his natural talent and comprehension!
Ye Huan invested the skill point into the Three Skims of the Flying Swallow icon.
In an instant, he seemed to enter a martial world where everyone cultivated movement arts.
Within that world, as he practiced Three Skims of the Flying Swallow, he sought out renowned masters everywhere.
With ample time and guidance from countless martial artists, Ye Huan made rapid strides each passing day.
Soon, in just a few short days, he mastered the first and second forms of Three Skims of the Flying Swallow.
Just as he prepared to devote all his efforts to mastering the third form—
The entire virtual illusion suddenly vanished.
Opening his eyes, he found himself still standing at the Taiyin Sect's test grounds.
Another match on the stage had concluded.
The elder shook his head, saying, "Your aptitudes are limited; you need not enter the sect."
The two children bowed dejectedly and stepped down.
Quite a bit of time seemed to have passed.
After all, it hadn't been a full, undepleted skill point; its effectiveness wasn't enough for full comprehension, and it took longer to assimilate.
"Child, now that you've read the booklet, what do you think?" the elder suddenly asked.
"I wasn't able to learn it all," Ye Huan answered truthfully.
"Learn it all..." The elder chuckled. "If you could learn it all in the time of an incense stick, I would have had to report to the sect master and strike the Talent-Gathering Bell."
"Speak, then. How much did you manage to learn?"
Ye Huan bowed, handed the booklet back, and walked to the center of the hall. He broke into a short jog before suddenly bursting forward like lightning, his feet tapping continuously against one of the great stone pillars in the hall.
The stone pillar was slick and smooth, yet he kicked off it with still shoulders, his body rising straight up all the way to the ceiling beams.
"The first form, Ascending Cloud Pavilion!" someone shouted.
Another person cried out in praise.
Ye Huan bounded across the roof beams for several paces, flipped over to hang inverted beneath a beam, and continuously ran his feet along it without falling down.
Suddenly, he lunged forward. Riding the momentum, he glided along the beam to the opposite end of the hall. Twisting his body like a swimming fish, he dropped lightly back to the ground.
The entire sequence was executed with graceful, effortless composure, carrying an indescribable flair.
"The second form, Rippling Cloud Shadow!" someone else yelled, their voice thick with disbelief.
Ye Huan touched down, walked slowly back over, clasped his fists, and said with an apologetic expression, "It was too difficult. In the time of an incense stick, I couldn't finish learning the third form."
Everyone stared at him in stunned silence.
A single stick of incense.
Out of three forms, he had mastered two.
This was a foundational movement technique that inner disciples spent three to five months learning.
"Children of humble origins truly produce rare talents," the elder sighed, offering no further critique as he nodded. "In this test, you may be called the first."
Chapter 25