Martial Arts: My talent multiplier increased

The texture of the Breakthrough Pill upon entering the mouth is not the same as that of a regular pill.

It is alive.

The ice-like patterns on the surface of the pill cracked the moment it touched the tongue. The golden light threads inside, like a swarm of snakes awakened, darted out from the cracks and pierced the venous plexus under Fang Yuan's tongue.

Fang Yuan's Adam's apple bobbed. The pill shattered into a mouthful of dark golden powder, which, mixed with saliva, rushed down his esophagus.

The effects of the medicine did not materialize immediately.

Liu Ruyan's three-layered nested design—the outer layer releases first. The pure yang medicinal properties of the Crimson Flame Core penetrate the stomach wall, descend along the Ren meridian, and circle around the dantian. Fang Yuan's meridian walls begin to expand under the stimulation of the pure yang medicinal properties.

It wasn't stretched open. It opened voluntarily.

It's like a dried-up riverbed having its banks widened before the rainy season arrives.

Fang Yuan's body didn't stop during this process. He was launched off the roof of the cloth shop. His toes touched a broken brick at the top of the wall of the Fang family's main residence—the brick cracked in the half breath it was under—and his body flew over the wall and landed in the outer courtyard of the Fang family's main residence.

The outer courtyard.

Fang Yuan's nine-fold standing meditation completed the scan in the same breath as he landed.

There were two human-shaped figures lying on the ground in the yard.

Fang Yuanshan had arranged two late-stage Bone Refinement Realm guards. One lay face down at the bottom of the main hall steps. A diagonal line had been torn from the armor plate on his back, running from his left shoulder to his right waist. The wound wasn't deep—it didn't expose bone—but the tissue around the wound had an abnormal dark purple hue. Fang Yuan's divine sense swept over the wound—evil energy. The residual corrosive essence blood was spreading towards the surrounding muscle tissue.

Another figure leaned against the base of the screen wall. His head was tilted to the side. His cervical vertebrae weren't broken. But Fang Yuan's senses detected that his blood circulation was nearly stagnant. It was as if something had compressed his meridians from the outside, preventing his blood and qi from flowing.

Neither of them died.

But they're all ruined.

one strike.

Fang Yuan's brain completed the judgment in 0.2 breaths. Two late-stage Bone Refining Realm cultivators, knocked down with a single blow. Not killed. Crippled. Killing takes a breath. Crippled only takes half a breath. The Blood Bat Dharma King didn't even stay in the outer courtyard for more than a breath.

Fang Yuan's footsteps crunched over the broken stone slabs in the courtyard. The wooden door at the entrance to the passageway from the outer courtyard to the inner courtyard had been completely smashed open. The door panel was embedded in the wall opposite the passageway, about three inches deep.

Fang Yuan walked through the passageway.

At this moment, the second layer of medicinal power from the Breakthrough Pill was released from the stomach wall. The bitter medicinal properties of the snow ginseng root, combined with the gentle strength of the green lingzhi powder, flowed along the meridian walls that Fang Yuan had just widened with the first layer, pouring into the ends of the twelve regular meridians. The elasticity of the meridian walls began to become tougher under the reinforcement of the second layer of medicinal power.

That kind of resilience isn't softness. It's the resilience of a steel wire rope—it can bend, but it won't break.

Fang Yuan's body emitted a very low, muffled thud as he ran. It wasn't the sound of bones breaking. It was the sound of the elastic fibers in the meridian walls collectively taut as they expanded to a certain critical point.

Ordinary people can't hear it.

Fang Yuan heard it himself.

It rose from within me. Dull. Heavy. Like a distant drumbeat.

Inner courtyard.

Fang Yuan's feet landed on the stone slabs of the inner courtyard. Moonlight filtered through the gaps in the clouds, illuminating the courtyard in a cold, white glow.

He saw the Blood Bat Dharma King.

The figure in the dark red robe stood at the door of Fang Ying's room.

I didn't go in.

Fang Yuan's nine-fold stance training enhanced his visual precision to the point where he could count the opponent's eyelashes. The Blood Bat Dharma King's face was covered by a flowing, dark red membrane. The membrane gleamed stickily in the moonlight.

He didn't guard the door.

He was looking at the top of the door frame.

Fang Yuan's fourfold spiritual perception—no, it's still twofold. The amplification hasn't been allocated yet. The twofold spiritual perception tracked the direction of the Blood Bat Dharma King's line of sight—

Above the door frame. Stone bricks.

The stone bricks are gray. They appear no different from the other stone bricks on the entire wall. They are the same size. The grayness is the same. The lime filling in the gaps is also the same.

But the moment Fang Yuan's soul sense touched that stone brick, it detected something unusual.

Extremely weak energy fluctuations.

It was so faint that Fang Yuan had never noticed it during the days he lived in this courtyard. Even with twice the sensitivity of his divine soul, it would require deliberate concentration to detect a signal of that level at this distance.

Fang Yuan had never had the door frame of his house cleaned to that level.

That fluctuation wasn't qi or blood. It wasn't evil qi. It wasn't hot or cold. It was an energy form that hadn't been categorized within the knowledge reserves of a certain Fangyuan.

Silent. Asleep. Like a seed sealed inside a stone for many years.

It's not Fang Yuan's stuff.

It's not from the Fang family.

Before being allocated to Fang Yuan, this courtyard belonged to a deceased elder of a collateral branch of the Fang family. Fang Yuan never renovated the door frames after moving in.

The Blood Bat Dharma King came here—not for Fang Ying.

He was after what was inside that stone brick.

This realization sent a jolt through Fang Yuan's mind.

It wasn't an angry outburst. It was a sudden realization after a crucial link in the chain of deduction was filled.

He kept wondering—why would the Blood Bat King send twelve followers to attack the northwest corner of the city? The northwest corner was a trap zone, but the Blood Bat King couldn't possibly know it was a trap. What was his reason for sending them to attack the northwest corner?

Luring the tiger away from the mountain.

The twelve followers were the bait.

While Fang Yuan was killing bait in the northwest corner of the city, the Blood Bat Dharma King entered the city. He headed straight for the Fang family's main residence. His objective was so clear that he didn't need to linger in any irrelevant locations.

He knew where that stone brick was.

He knew that the stone brick was above the door frame of Fang Ying's room.

He even knew that Fang Yuan wouldn't be at the main house tonight.

A thin layer of sweat appeared on Fang Yuan's back. It wasn't from nervousness. It was from the heat generated by the second layer of the Breakthrough Pill circulating within his body. His Qi and blood foundation, four times stronger than his physical constitution, was expelling excess heat through his sweat glands while enduring the impact of the medicinal power.

Fang Yuan clenched his fist.

It wasn't for the stone bricks.

It's because Fang Ying is behind that door.

Regardless of whether the Blood Bat King's target was Fang Ying—he stood at the doorway. Fang Ying was inside. Only a two-inch-thick wooden plank separated them.

Fang Yuan opened his mouth.

"stop."

The sound echoed in the inner courtyard. The voice was steady. The nine-fold stance training had brought the vibration frequency of the vocal cords to an extreme level.

There was no shaking.

The Blood Bat King stopped moving.

His head slowly turned. The dark red membrane rippled a few times as he turned, revealing the sunken eye sockets beneath.

Dark red pupils met Fang Yuan's gaze.

Right in the center of the pupil—Fang Yuan's nine-fold standing meditation confirmed the detail he'd seen on the rooftop last time—there was a tiny bat-shaped shadow. Not a tattoo. Not an abnormal pigmentation in the pupil. It was alive. The bat-shaped shadow was slowly flapping its wings within the pupil.

"Oh?"

Two overlapping sounds squeezed out of that mouth that split open to the ears.

"It's you."

The Blood Bat Dharma King turned completely around, his back to Fang Ying's door. The hem of his robe trailed a fan-shaped arc on the stone slab.

"The little mouse that killed twelve of my followers."

"It was a stick of incense burned faster than I expected."

Fang Yuan didn't waste any words.

His brain accomplished three things in the two breaths it took for the Blood Bat Dharma King to turn around.

The first item—the mind-triggered board.