Chapter 16: Clearance Fragments, Dropped Items

Chapter 16: Chapter 16: Clearance Fragments, Dropped Items

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The Cosmic Light Fragments. A cypress forest.

Chen Sha sat cross-legged on a large bluestone. This location was at least a dozen miles away from where Hong Qigong taught his disciple martial arts.

Currently, he had entered the first section of the Hong Qi Chapter thousands of times. He could not be any more familiar with the scenes of this subsection.

The entire scene consisted of three people, a cypress forest, and a small town. The area spanned no more than a hundred miles in radius. This Chapter was effectively a small dungeon world constructed from the Cosmic Light Fragments.

However, Chen Sha no longer pondered the mysterious and fantastical principles behind it all. He only knew that this Cosmic Light Fragments world behind the Southern Heavenly Gate allowed him to accelerate his martial arts training. Compared to the outside world, time barely flowed when his spirit entered this place...

He possessed an infinite margin for trial and error within the Cosmic Light Fragments.

WHOOSH.

After hearing a few unintentional remarks from Yao Qingru of Jiangnan Dao in the Divine Hall, Chen Sha had comprehended the true essence of his sect’s Great Yellow Court inner power.

Sitting cross-legged in the world of the Cosmic Light Fragments, Chen Sha guided the true qi within his "body" through the Girdle Vessel, along the Yin Linking Vessel, and then poured it into the Conception and Governing Vessels before circulating it through his surrounding acupoints...

Gradually, his heart nature began to change.

Within his spiritual domain, a momentum began to form—one of sitting upright in the Yellow Court, suppressing all directions, and ruling the ten extremes. It was as if all creations in the universe had to revolve around him.

Occupying the position of the Yellow Court could make all gods come to worship.

He thought, "Who is worthy to sit in the Yellow Court? I am that person!"

Only with this confident momentum and mindset could one cultivate the Great Yellow Court to a higher realm.

...

Inside the Cosmic Light Fragments, time passed incredibly slowly.

On Dao Yi Mountain.

Chen Sha’s physical body had sat upright in the guest room for a day and a night. Meanwhile, the time that had passed within the Cosmic Light Fragments amounted to nearly half a year.

...

One day.

Chen Sha suddenly opened his eyes and stood up straight. "Sure enough, after more than a dozen previous attempts, I’ve finally found the correct shift in mindset for truly cultivating the Great Yellow Court. It is this exact momentum..."

Sitting in meditation within the Cosmic Light Fragments for half a year and circulating the Great Yellow Court true qi with the confident, majestic mindset of "sitting in the Yellow Court" yielded results that were drastically different from his usual daily training.

Chen Sha recalled something Chen Canxuan had told him in the past when teaching him martial arts:

"Superior martial arts require a matching heart method in addition to the circulation of inner power true qi.

"If a martial art only has a method for circulating power without a heart method, the practitioner will not achieve much, even if they cultivate it to the very end.

"However, unlike a qi circulation technique, a heart method is generally not recorded in writing.

"This is because words cannot describe even a fraction of the momentum, mindset, and spirit of the soul. One can only search for and comprehend it on their own."

The Great Yellow Court of the Dao Yi Sect was exactly the same.

He thought, "I have finally comprehended the heart method of the Great Yellow Court."

After comprehending the heart method that matched this martial art, training with this special mindset would allow him to cultivate the grand momentum unique to this technique.

"After sitting in meditation within the fragments for half a year, I can finally clear this section!" he said.

Chen Sha began walking toward the place where Hong Qigong taught martial arts.

...

Although the characters within this fragment were indistinguishable from real people, possessing emotions and intelligence, they were bound by the limitations of the Cosmic Light Fragments themselves. They were nothing more than memory projections of the true body of the "clay-sculpted Hong Qi" in the Earth God Temple behind the Southern Heavenly Gate—or rather, just a segment of parallel Cosmic Light Fragments.

Here, Hong Qi repeated the story of teaching Guo Jing martial arts. Therefore, even though Chen Sha had sat in meditation far away for half a year, the story’s progression here remained the same.

Every time a month passed and Hong Qi was about to finish his teachings, everything within the fragment would revert to the first day of instruction, starting all over again.

At this moment, it was the twenty-eighth day of Hong Qi’s instruction in the cypress forest. By this time, Guo Jing had already learned the first fifteen palms of the Eighteen Dragon Subduing Palms.

The wind blew through the branches as Hong Qigong lay comfortably on a fork in a tree, picking his teeth with his finger. "Little Rong’Er, for the past month, you haven’t repeated a single dish. You must be running out of recipes by now. In two more days, Qigong won’t teach him anymore. I’ve never taught a single person for as long as a month in my entire life, and he is no exception..."

Huang Rong said urgently, "I still have several signature dishes I haven’t made yet! Qigong, please teach Brother Jing a little more..."

Right at this moment, alongside the sound of Guo Jing chopping trees in the cypress forest, a fourth person’s footsteps echoed.

STEP.

STEP.

A tall, young, and handsome Daoist dressed in a simple Daoist robe with a jade hairpin in his hair walked toward them step by step.

Hong Qigong shouted loudly, "Who is it? What brilliant footwork! To think you could get so close to this old beggar without me even noticing!"

Chen Sha smiled but said nothing. Taking a step forward without a single word, he appeared three feet in front of Hong Qi like a lunging, ferocious beast.

DANGER!

The hairs all over Hong Qigong’s body stood on end. He only saw the young Daoist’s face drawing closer and closer, accompanied by an incoming fist...

BOOM!

This punch pressed directly into Hong Qigong’s face, forcing away all the airflow. It was so fast and fierce that it was almost suffocating!

"Hah!" Hong Qigong barked. Although he was caught somewhat off guard by this "stranger" of a young Daoist attacking him with a punch, the realm of one of the Five Extremes Grandmasters was anything but ordinary.

BOOM!

He retreated with lightning speed, opening up a distance of three feet, and launched a diagonal palm strike from his chest.

BANG!

Fist and palm met.

BANG! BANG BANG!

Hong Qigong felt as if he had been struck by a heavy hammer. Because he had met the strike hastily, he hadn’t managed to muster even half of his power. He was blasted thirty feet away by Chen Sha’s punch.

"Excellent! To think there’s an expert like you in this world!"

Before his voice could fade, Chen Sha transformed his fist into a palm and struck out again.

BANG!

The two instantly became locked in combat, exchanging punches and palms.

WHOOSH WHOOSH!

For a moment, the air was entirely filled with afterimages.

BANG BANG BANG!

In the blink of an eye, dozens of moves had been exchanged. Chen Sha could not be any more familiar with Hong Qigong’s palm technique. Spotting an opportunity, he unleashed a punch.

BANG!

Hong Qigong was once again knocked back thirty feet. Instead of being deterred, he let out a long, loud howl. "What an expert! Take my full-power palm strike, watch out!"

As he spoke, he planted his feet firmly, as if taking root in the ground. He raised his palms from his lower abdomen, appearing as if he had seized a heavenly dragon by its hind legs and hoisted it into the air. His palms shifted continuously, making it seem as though the heavenly dragon was struggling violently in his grip, desperate to break free!

At the same time, Hong Qigong’s momentum continued to soar!

ROAR!

Hearing this incredibly familiar dragon roar once more, Chen Sha let out a hearty laugh. "Bring it on!"

Facing the impending palm strike that Hong Qigong was gathering all his power to deliver...

STEP!

Chen Sha stomped his foot fearlessly, shooting forward like a fired ballista to meet the palm strike head-on. Stepping forward, waving his sleeves, and spreading his arms, he opened his long, slender fingers before suddenly clenching them into a fist!

WHOOSH!

All the airflow within thirty feet of the cypress forest rushed backward toward Chen Sha as he threw his punch.

BANG!!

It was impossible to tell whether Hong Qigong had launched his palm strike first or if Chen Sha’s punch had struck first despite being launched later.

RUMBLE!

All that was clear was that their fist and palm clashed once more. Their auras collided, causing both of their robes to whip fiercely backward.

BANG! BANG BANG!

As their fist and palm remained locked, their auras continuously clashed.

"This punch!"

Hong Qigong could feel that beneath the punching force of the young Daoist before him lay a vast and surging heart qi, brimming with unbridled spirit. It felt less like he was receiving a punch from a mortal and more like a Celestial God seated in the center of a temple was throwing a strike at him.

He thought, "How terrifying!"

The endless true qi behind the punch fused perfectly with that unbridled spirit. It had already taken a half-step beyond the Grandmaster Realm—the same level as Hong Qi—and was striding boldly toward an even stronger echelon.

On the third breath of their clash...

CRACK!

Hong Qigong’s face turned beet red. Unable to withstand the immense force behind Chen Sha’s punch any longer, his wrist gave way. Chen Sha’s fist crashed through his guard and landed solidly on his chest.

BANG!

"For an expert like yourself to exist... this old beggar has never even heard of you." Coughing up a large mouthful of blood, Hong Qigong staggered back another thirty feet. He looked at Chen Sha and sighed in awe, "I, Hong Qi, concede defeat. I admit I am inferior!"

After Hong Qigong spoke those words, the cypress forest, Hong Qigong, and the others suddenly dissipated like phantoms.

The surroundings transformed into a vast expanse of white. At that moment, Chen Sha also saw text from the Southern Heavenly Gate synchronize within his mind:

"The Sect Leader has consecutively defeated Hong Qigong, Guo Jing, and Huang Rong within this scene, successfully clearing the Hong Qi Chapter — Section One.

"Items dropped in this scene..."