Martial Arts: Starting with Upgrading the Dilapidated Temple

Chapter 127 Obtaining the Treasure (3K)

The pulse traveled up from the palm of my hand, running along the metallic lines within my bones.

Light. Fast. Sharp.

It's completely different from the Prison Suppression Technique.

The Prison Suppression Technique is a mountain, an earth, a weight that is stomped underfoot and seeps into the bones.

The frequency emanating from the palm is like a knife, like the wind, like a sharp blade that can cut through iron like mud.

Xu Hao withdrew his hand.

"There's something underneath. It's not the same thing as the Dragon-Suppressing Nail."

The old man's white eyebrows were furrowed.

He had been squatting here for thirty-three years, his feet treading on this ground every day, never realizing there was anything else besides the secondary nail.

"You want to dig?"

"Don't dig." Xu Hao pressed his palm against the rock strata and closed his eyes.

The compass needle in his mind spun wildly for a few seconds before suddenly stopping, the position of the light spot precisely located three feet east of the secondary nail.

It wasn't buried under the nail, it was buried next to the nail.

The situation is different from that in Yanzhou.

The main nail of Yanzhou and the inscription of the Prison Suppression Technique are glued together; taking the inheritance is equivalent to breaking the seal.

The layout here is even more ingenious—the secondary nail and the fragment each occupy a separate space, without interfering with each other.

Emperor Wu used different methods of concealment in different locations.

Taking it away will not affect the seal.

But how long would it take to dig through the three-zhang-deep layer of high-purity basalt rock?

Xu Hao moved his palm to a position three feet to the east and pressed it back down.

The bone resonance switching frequency of the Prison Suppression Technique changed from "Body Tempering" mode to "Pulse Probing" mode.

The shockwave flowed from the palm into the earth.

The echo bounced back like a sonar, drawing a diagram of the underground structure in his mind.

The rock strata are not solid.

Three zhang deep, there was a cavity, about the size of a palm, completely encased in a body of black iron ore.

Inside the cavity was something flat in shape, much thinner than a domino.

Shockwaves won't work.

We need to use more precise methods.

Xu Hao stood up and gripped the hilt of the Devouring Sea Blade with his right hand.

"Move aside."

The old man took three steps back.

The Devouring Sea Blade was drawn.

The blade gleamed with a dark blue, cold light under the glow of the red gold stone.

The extreme cold and yin energy flowed along the blade, suppressed by 40% in the interference field of the mineral vein, but the blade's sharpness remained undiminished.

Xu Hao aimed the tip of his knife at the rock face three feet to the east of his feet.

There was no chopping.

He inserted the tip of the knife into a crack in the rock, transmitting the frequency of bone resonance to the blade.

The Devouring Sea Blade emitted a low hum.

The vibration of the blade resonated subtly with the basalt ore in the rock strata—it wasn't a hard break, but a "transformation".

The resonant frequency creates an extremely thin shear force on the contact surface.

The rock peeled off layer by layer along the direction of the vibration, and the fragments, as fine as powder, flowed out from both sides of the crack.

one foot.

Two feet.

For every foot the blade penetrates deeper, the recoil force it experiences doubles.

The hilt of the Devouring Sea Blade was burning hot in his hand, and the web of his hand gripping it was sore and numb from the impact.

When it was two and a half feet long, the tip of the knife touched something.

It doesn't feel like stone.

It is a metal.

But it's smoother and lighter than black iron.

Xu Hao stopped and drew his knife.

At the bottom of the crack, a dark silver light flashed briefly.

It was extremely short, like a fish flipping over in deep water.

Then the light, sharp pulse suddenly intensified.

Within his sea of ​​consciousness, the light from the compass exploded.

Here comes the scene.

The method was the same as when he received the Prison Suppression Technique in the Yanzhou Rift Valley—not by showing it to him, but by implanting it into his brain.

But this time the scene was completely different.

There was no abyss, no ferocious dragon, and no metallic sound.

There is only one person in the picture.

A silhouette from behind.

Not the Martial Ancestor.

She was tall and slender, with narrow shoulders and a thin waist, standing on a boundless white plain.

The ground of the plain is not snow, it's bone.

The earth, paved with broken bones, stretched all the way to the horizon.

This person is holding a knife.

It's not a broadsword, nor a curved sword, but a straight blade that's extremely narrow and thin.

The blade was almost transparent, with only a thin line of dark silver light visible at the tip.

Screen switch.

He saw the man draw his knife.

The first strike, the blade flashing from the left shoulder, slashes diagonally down to the right hip.

The trajectory, when simplified to its extreme, is simply a straight line.

But where this straight line passes, a crack appears in space.

A two-dimensional cross-section has been cut into a three-dimensional space that is visible to the naked eye.

The crack lasted for a moment, then closed.

A ravine three zhang wide and bottomless appeared on the Broken Bone Plain.

The second strike, a horizontal slash, was twice as fast as the first.

The ravines turned into a rift valley.

The third cut.

I didn't see it clearly.

It's not that the video is moving too fast.

The image was cut off the moment the knife was struck.

It's like cutting a film reel that's being played with scissors.

Only one line of ancient seal script remained at the break, which was different from the script of the Prison Suppression Manual—the strokes were sharp, each stroke like it was carved with a knife tip.

"Nine Slashes of Innocent Delusion, Blade of Shattering Realms. Fragment. Three slashes are enough."

The information about the practice method is then infused.

It's not a breathing technique, nor is it the frequency of bone vibrations; it's the trajectory of a knife's movement.

The extremely pure trajectory, from the start to the finish, is divided into three levels, each corresponding to a different way of using power.

First strike: Power is transmitted through bone resonance and released through the blade.

It doesn't utilize internal energy or consume internal force; it's purely physical output that remains consistent regardless of the environment.

The second strike: Using willpower as a guide, the frequency of bone resonance is superimposed on the blade to form a resonant strike.

Its cutting power transcends the realm of physics and can break through defensive qi.

The third cut: not fully recorded in the fragments.

There was only a vague concept—"combining the power of heaven and earth into one strike."

The three-slash structure subtly aligns with the body-tempering levels of the Prison Suppression Technique. The Prison Suppression Technique trains the body, while the Nine Slashes of Innocent Delusion are used for body training.

One attack, one defense; one training, one battle.

It was no coincidence that Emperor Wu placed these two fragments in adjacent locations.

interesting.

The image fades away, and consciousness returns.

Xu Hao opened his eyes and found that he was still holding the Devouring Sea Blade in his right hand, but the blade had changed.

The dark blue, extremely cold energy was still there, but there was an extra layer on the blade—extremely fine dark silver lines spread along the edge of the blade, from the tip to the hilt, like a silver thread embedded in the back of the blade.

It's not that the knife has changed, it's that the way you hold the knife has changed.

The frequency of bone resonance is transmitted through the palm to the handle, and then from the handle to the blade.

The knife became an extension of his bones, and the metallic patterns in his body resonated with the same frequency as the metal blade of the Devouring Sea Blade.

The man and the knife moved in unison.

"You were stunned just now," the old man's voice came from the side.

"how long?"

"Twelve breaths." The old man looked at the Sea-Devouring Blade in his hand, his white eyebrows furrowed so deeply they could trap a fly. "Your blade—is ringing."

"6

Xu Hao raised the Sea-Devouring Blade.

The blade was indeed emitting a very faint hum, the frequency of which was perfectly synchronized with the vibrations in his right arm bones.

He tried twirling the knife.

The buzzing continued, and the trajectory of the blade left a faint, dark silver line in the air.

The first step to mastering the art of slashing.

It wasn't a complete strike yet, but the pathway for power transmission had already been opened.

He sheathed his sword, and the hum ceased.

At the bottom of the crack beneath their feet, the dark silver light also went out.

With the inheritance complete, the contents, like the inscription on the Prison Suppression Technique, merged into the scroll of the blessed land. The fragmentary information of the Nine Slashes of Innocent Delusion had been engraved into his sea of ​​consciousness.

Two messages popped up in the sea of ​​consciousness from the scroll of blessed land.

[The third incomplete chapter of the Martial Ancestor's Nine Divine Skills, "Nine Slashes of Innocence," has been received.]

The second message from the Blessed Land Scroll popped up immediately afterward.

[The host has collected three fragments of the Martial Ancestor's Nine Divine Skills (Heavenly Scroll: Fragment of the Myriad Transformations Heavenly Vault Scripture, Earthly Scroll: Fragment of the Prison-Suppressing Myriad Bones Technique, and Military Scroll: Fragment of the Nine Slashes of Innocent Delusion). The compass's sensing range has expanded. Remaining fragment signals: six locations. Four are blurry, and two are extremely weak.]

Six places.

Including these three, that makes a total of nine.

Back then, the Martial Ancestor shattered the Vast Heaven World into several smaller worlds, and the nine divine skills were scattered in all directions.

However, the signals given by the compass are mostly blurry, indicating that the distance is extremely far or that the signal has been obscured by special means.

Now is not the time to chase after these things.

Xu Hao pulled his mind back from his sea of ​​consciousness.

The crack underfoot was still open, with gravel and powder scattered all over the ground.

He used the sole of his boot to stomp down part of the crack, then filled it with rubble, roughly blocking the entrance.

"You got the item."

The old man wasn't asking.

Xu Hao glanced at him.

This old man had been underground for thirty-three years. Although his perception had been severely suppressed by the mineral vein, he could not hide the changes that were right in front of him.

"Something unrelated to the stakes."

"That's fine then." The old man said decisively, without asking any further questions.

He bent down and dragged the priest's body away from the edge of the pit with nimble movements, unlike someone in their seventies or eighties.

They dragged the body to the wall, rummaged through its clothes, and pulled out three items, placing them on the ground.

A domino.

It's the same piece that the priest showed us before, carved from white bone with barbarian totem patterns.

A cloth bag.

Inside were more than a dozen blood-red crystals of varying quality, the largest of which was the size of a pigeon egg and had a deep color.

A roll of sheepskin.

Unfolded, it was a map, marking more than a dozen locations within the Crimson Sand Domain. The location of Burial Dragon City was circled in cinnabar, with tiny notes next to it.

Xu Hao squatted down and examined the sheepskin map.

The tiny characters used the coded language of the Wusheng Cult, but it was not complicated—it was nothing more than the code names of various strongholds, supply cycles, and personnel rotation times.

There wasn't much valuable information; what really caught his eye was a dotted line drawn at the corner of the map.

The dotted line extends from the northwest of the Crimson Sands, passes through three oasis city-states, and ends at the City of Burial Dragons.

A date was noted next to the dotted line.

Seven days later.

The estimated arrival time of the Bone Girl.

This perfectly matches his previous assessment.

There is indeed a communication channel between the Wusheng Sect and the Northern Frontier Bone-Eating Tent. The priests pull out the nails on one side, while the Bone Maiden travels behind, cooperating with each other.

The priest died, the great protector ran away, and this thread was broken.

But Bone Lady won't stop just because those in front of her have failed; she has her own methods.

Seven days.

Xu Hao put the sheepskin scroll into the Sumeru Warehouse, and also put the dominoes in his pocket.

The Blood Fiend Crystals were all left to the old man.

"What are you planning to do?" The old man sat down against the wall, his knees cracking a few more times.

"wait."

"Waiting for whom?"

"The one who came to pull out the nails."

The old man's white eyebrows twitched.

He understood the implication in Xu Hao's words: these bald monks were just paving the way; there were even more troublesome characters to come.

"Seven days?"

"Seven days at most." Xu Hao stood up, walked back to the edge of the round pit, and looked down at the secondary nail.

The dark gold nail was firmly embedded in the ground, and the faint light of the inscription flowed slowly.

The seal had no cracks, but it wasn't thick enough either.

Although he had broken the priest's blood sacrifice array, the continuous erosion over the past few days had left marks on the surface of the nails. The light of the inscriptions was 20% dimmer than that of the other nails on the Six Nails Diagram.

This is consumption.

The strength of a seal is not constant. If it is repeatedly tested and eroded, even if it is not pulled out, the seal itself will become thinner.

It's like a door; the lock wasn't pried open, but someone used a knife to scrape a thin layer off the door panel.

The next person will only need less effort.

"It needs to be reinforced," Xu Hao muttered to himself.