Chapter 258: Pencil Case
Cities on Dongtu Island had their street gas lamps turned off after nine o’clock at night. As for Xuan Chong, the training to strengthen his body inside the Prince’s Mansion stopped once it reached a certain point.
That Martial Arts Grandmaster in the Prince’s Mansion, after Xuan Chong’s fourteenth birthday, suggested to him: to supplement with medicinal baths, and carry out steps like tempering the skin, tempering muscles, quenching bones, and the like.
Xuan Chong smiled and declined. He vaguely remembered from the Da Yao Plane that his history teacher had mentioned “moral, intellectual, physical, aesthetic, and labor education,” where sports should focus mainly on healthy development.
Xuan Chong: As long as there’s healthy development, that’s fine; no need to get too serious. —Once he got too serious, his upcoming energy would be dragged in, to the point where he couldn’t do other things.
Now it’s the technology era, and the cost-performance ratio of martial cultivation isn’t high. If he were to further practice martial arts, there would be demands for precious medicinal materials like “tiger bone” and “whale incense” next; and after using these precious medicines, there would be even more demanding training, and during the training process, he would inevitably come into contact with all sorts of messy circles.
Xuan Chong didn’t want to be pulled into those circles.
Nowadays in the Dongtu Prince’s Mansion, Xuan Chong’s daily life as the heir appears stable in the eyes of the outside world; many forces want to pull him into their circles.
Just like those princes from dog rich households in his previous life, who in the outside world’s view spent their days dancing and eating camel banquets; but who wouldn’t want to pluck a few feathers from this rich fool?
Xuan Chong: “Even when I go out to do a ritual, there are beautiful women attending to me; now my instructor master is being overly enthusiastic toward me too—this is pulling me into the gang!”
…Martial World roads are long and distant…
As the world entered modernization, ironclad ships replaced sails, and railways connected various cities. Various train stations replaced those old government offices guarded in the center by city walls, becoming the new centers.
Martial World sects still exist, and in a certain sense, this is an era where knights roam freely.
Xuan Chong: In his previous life, there was always this saying that Eastern commoners are the most hardworking and enduring, the most patient; actually, this is the result of education and indoctrination under a long civilization system.
Confucian education and indoctrination ultimately aims to make people of all social strata restrain themselves and return to propriety, becoming Puritans. For example, the requirement for men is to establish a family and career; as for other paths, don’t pursue them, otherwise, it’s being a “vagabond.”
The teaching methods or rather the rules invisibly envelop all those under governance.
Xian Han is conservative, with scholars, farmers, artisans, merchants each staying in their place. Long ago, a series of major rules were formed.
Of course, the various rules within the governed world are not unbreakable for everyone; in the top structures that create the teaching methods, there are always some cunning types who exploit information gaps to go beyond bounds, stealthily drilling system loopholes, such as corrupt officials and powerful clans who are rich but unrighteous.
Knights violate prohibitions with martial prowess, jumping out of the rules, going beyond the law to punish those high-positioned vermin who drill loopholes.
Due to lacking legitimate status, these knights are like water, adapting to circumstances. And these wandering people, when gathered together, become the “Martial World.”
This Martial Arts Grandmaster in the Dongtu Prince’s Mansion who helps him adjust his body was a famous “great thief” in the Martial World before the age of twenty.
He studied under the Hua Shan Sect, and in his early years in Jing, Xiang areas, he teamed up with a former Tang Sect disciple to blow up eight vaults in one night. The ticket offices behind these vaults all owed blood and sweat money to the local coolies; after he blew up these eight vaults, he threw part of the money to the gangs that the local coolies depended on, left leaflets, and preached that this money was “unrighteous wealth.”
Then he split the remaining money with the local guilds, and under the guilds’ covert protection, left dashingly. Even on the bricks and tiles, he whitewashed with ash powder the message “The one acting on behalf of heaven, xxx.”
Because the poor folks who got part of the money firmly believed it was “unrighteous wealth,” the local government office couldn’t recover this money at all.
Such actions also provoked the local government office, leading to him being wanted across several provinces in succession, even his fellow sect members from that year were hired by the government office to catch him.
In his early years, he was young and vigorous, not caring that he could go anywhere under heaven; but as his body declined and he was no longer vigorous, he hid in this Dongtu place, attached himself to the Prince’s Mansion, changed his household registration, and vanished without a trace.
In the Prince’s Mansion, he was just an instructor, with no extra status, still having one foot in the Martial World.
And Martial World people want to use interpersonal relationships to connect, pulling some people in to establish unique personal ties.
This Prince’s Mansion instructor very much hopes that Xuan Chong will turn his master into a Master.
Unfortunately, Xuan Chong doesn’t care. Every day he just sticks to the most routine body exercises, with no interest in those secret cultivation methods.
…Candy can lure kids, but Xuan Chong isn’t a kid…
This body technique master also let Xuan Chong know that “divine skills” exist; he can step onto the roof of a train speeding head-on. He can also pierce a soil wall ten meters away with a pencil. Even more, he can turn true qi into a cage, making a flying bird flap helplessly in his palm.
Through this, Xuan Chong finally understood that this world truly has “true qi.”
In Xuan Chong’s understanding: it’s like a “magnetic airflow” stimulated from the acupoints, then converging into the body and flowing out.
Contemporary Heavenly Dynasty’s physics academies have specialized research on “qigong.”
After old scholars studied a series of martial artist corpses that had condensed true qi, their bones had undergone magnetization; it was precisely this magnetization that produced the effect called “true qi.” However, what medium allows “true qi” to exhibit mechanical properties outside the body is currently unknown.
Note: The most active in researching martial artist corpses are some old eunuchs; they want to fill in that missing part below their bodies. Of course, the sources of the corpses are not from the Heavenly Dynasty’s large-scale capture of martial artists, but from after invading India, killing quite a few grandmasters who practiced yoga skills, their corpses. Xian Han’s martial artists hold up the great righteousness, and the Imperial Court suppresses them, not daring to slaughter them.
Winter passed and spring came; after all the fat on his body completely disappeared, Xuan Chong practiced a set of qi nurturing and breathing method, then stopped at a superficial taste.
As for ingestion, he didn’t use those readily available precious medicinal materials, still eating “pig,” “sheep,” “fish,” and grains!
In the sports outline given by his history teacher, the dietary concept related to Body Fixing Technique: Food sources should avoid the exotic, and should be stably produced in the environment, fitting human production activities.
For example, grains and the five livestock are produced in human activity areas, and this activity area has been regulated by humans for at least a thousand years, long forming a steady-state ecology.
Although Xuan Chong doesn’t have the “sports precise perception system” from his previous life, he approves of this theory. Steady development, with body energy rising in daily waves, that’s enough.
In the previous plane, he had witnessed the depth of the sports “system.” Xuan Chong subconsciously ranks cultivation guided by famous teachers as low-grade.
Xuan Chong is very clear that once he follows the instructor’s plan for medicinal baths and ingestion; not only would he be indebted to him, but the precious medicinal materials ingested would also have to be shared with him. Even more importantly: he would be pulled into the Hua Shan Sect, and would have to use resources to build relations with the Hua Shan Sect.
Xuan Chong, who is extremely calculating: Does he think our family’s money is blown by the wind? Resources are scraped from below? Our family still bears the karma of the local commoners.
…Tap tap tap of the abacus…
Petty-minded Xuan Chong: “Otherwise, whether it’s him or the sect, why come to pull on me? Is it really because my aptitude is brilliant and sought after by all sides?”
If he were led into this path by him, it would consume too much energy and time. Wouldn’t that be just like falling into a mobile game pit? Xuan Chong glanced at the few “junior brothers” and “senior brothers” that the “body technique master” brought in to train together; polite on the surface, but in his heart sneering “the future isn’t just one path.”
Xuan Chong is very clear about himself: once he consumes too much energy and time, he’ll get hooked! Speaking of which, in his previous life, he suddenly started awakening in studies because he invested enough time and energy into math, physics, and chemistry, so he got hooked.
Easy to get hooked means easy to gamble.
Xuan Chong’s self-analysis: And precisely, he has poor gambling luck and can’t afford to lose. Once he loses, he suspects if someone set him up; once he confirms someone set him up, he can’t swallow this anger, wants to flip the table. And between “thinking about the consequences of flipping the table” and “holding back the anger and feeling upset,” he’ll have internal friction, leading to accomplishing nothing.
Xuan Chong couldn’t help recalling the segments from the Jin Yong series martial arts novels he saw in his previous life.
If by any chance, one day, after being led into the sect, he enters as a pay-to-win player. Suddenly one day, this instructor master brings in a junior brother with extremely good aptitude who cultivates soaring past him; he expends massive energy, only to be outdone by the junior brother in this path, unable to gain top influencer discourse power in the circle.
Xuan Chong sucked in a cold breath: I really would, would break down!
After rebirth, Xuan Chong still chooses to study hard every day and make progress, blending into the thousands of troops and horses to squeeze onto the single-log bridge, rather than choosing other paths that seem to offer an early advantage, for the same reason.
Because even if he seizes the early advantage, so what?
Even if there’s temporary glory, can his petty calculating mindset handle interpersonal relationships humbly?
Xuan Chong’s answer is to not enter those small circles.
Thus, every day Xuan Chong goes to the training room on schedule. One hour in the morning, one hour in the afternoon; thus, under the body technique grandmaster’s astonishment, Xuan Chong’s essence is full, but he steadily stands outside the door, unable to enter.
Xuan Chong’s “aptitude” is good—this nutritional condition surpasses 99% of entrants under heaven;
Xuan Chong’s “temperament” is excellent, doing daily tasks meticulously—speaking of which, how could it not be strong? Inheriting the commander memories from the Da Yao Plane, planning, execution, and decisiveness are all top-tier.
The martial arts instructor is baffled: Why, just unwilling to go further, to enter the inner sanctum?
For the martial arts instructor, he is actually trapped in his own Martial World perspective—in his view, the Martial World is the biggest.
…Transmigration absolutely isn’t to become a great hero…
In the fifth month after transmigration, Xuan Chong came to the shooting range and began trying to learn marksmanship.
Currently, the weapons used by knights in the Martial World? No longer swords, but guns.
The newly popular saying in the Martial World: You never know what caliber is hidden in a great hero’s sleeve.
The most common weapon in the current Martial World is the Broomhandle Mauser; that thing can fire continuously and has great power.
Xuan Chong continues calculating: Compared to the various tiger bones and ginseng consumed in medicinal baths, bullets and gun barrels for gun practice are industrial products; he can still afford to supply them, and isn’t afraid of his family’s instructor finding a few training partners to practice guns together. Xuan Chong very “generously” said: Bullets are plenty.
As for the instructor having those few disciples soak in medicinal baths, he’ll have to consume his own favors to exchange from the Prince’s Mansion warehouse; and can’t just take medicinal materials on credit without recording because “Liu Haoxing is also using them.” —Xuan Chong isn’t Precious Jade, he keeps strict accounts.
This day, while Xuan Chong was practicing rifle shooting at the range, he had his master demonstrate. However, the martial arts master, to finally win back Xuan Chong’s heart, also showed his bottom-of-the-box skill.
The master said to Liu Haoxing and the other disciples at the range: “Watch closely, this is the most basic skill. If you enter the perception state, practice a few months and you can master it.”
The master faced the target fifty steps away, a gun barrel appeared from his sleeve in a flash, his raising hand and shooting movement was so fast only an afterimage remained, and subsequently all six targets on the range were hit.
And Xuan Chong only felt that some of his raising hand angles were off, but they still hit.
In boredom, Xuan Chong took out a protractor from his pocket and placed it in front of his eyes. This thing from the pencil case was brought by Xuan Chong from the space before transmigration, kept as a memento.
He didn’t intend to do anything with this action, but the moment he picked up the protractor! Xuan Chong saw multiple dashed lines through the protractor; these dashed lines were the trajectories just hit by the bullets. And among the dashed lines, there were several obvious turning points.
Xuan Chong abruptly put down the protractor; not to mention how this grandmaster master bent the bullets, um, the reason for the bending, Xuan Chong roughly guessed it was true qi attachment, causing the bullet to deviate due to spin upon exiting the barrel.
As for how this protractor let him see the “trajectory.” That’s the most important!
This “protractor” was an item used in the exam hall before transmigration; due to its roundness, it could be put in the pocket, while those sharp triangle rulers, he left at home.
The dashed lines on the protractor were very clear to him, but the others nearby, seeing his surprised reaction, also curiously looked at this ordinary protractor; Xuan Chong quickly put away the protractor.
…After returning from the range, Xuan Chong hurried back…
Back in his room, he hastily opened his schoolbag, his hand slightly trembling, opened the pencil case, hesitated a moment, and took out a ruler.
Holding this ruler, he paused, um, slapped his own cheek, um, not painful, ordinary ruler appearance.
Then he measured the ground, nothing happened, and when he confirmed nothing, his hand accidentally pulled, and in his vision, the ruler suddenly stretched long; Xuan Chong abruptly rubbed his eyes. He discovered that in his vision, a “line” appeared right in front of the ruler.
This line was just like computer Photoshop, directly copy-pasted into reality.
Xuan Chong silently chanted “as one wishes, as one wishes, according to my heart” and the ruler returned to normal. Xuan Chong breathed a sigh of relief: “Just now I was seeing things.”
Xuan Chong paused, then walked to the window, aimed the ruler at the distant chimney, then his finger slid forward sharply on the ruler, instantly the entire ruler extended in a flash, directly reaching the chimney; and instantly, Xuan Chong knew the distance between himself and the chimney!
6454.3456 meters. A straight line connected from himself to the distant chimney; this time Xuan Chong was sure it wasn’t his eyes playing tricks.
And in an instant, the view also came to the chimney, seeing the dust textures on the bricks clearly visible.
Such a long ruler precise to the millimeter suddenly appearing, Xuan Chong was stunned, quickly put it away. The servant nearby who was delivering afternoon tea asked: “Young Master, what’s wrong?”
Xuan Chong held the ruler, watching the servant unknowingly approach the “dashed-solid line” he drew in the air, and asked: “You didn’t see that just now?”
The servant looked puzzled at Xuan Chong, then said: “You just held the ruler in front of your eyes.”
After a round of questioning, Xuan Chong confirmed that the ruler’s extension could only be seen by himself.
Then, Xuan Chong thought for a bit, thought of something, and took out a pencil and eraser from the pencil case.
Once again, Xuan Chong lightly drew; but this time, as the pencil slid along the ruler’s line, an actual line connected between himself and that cup of tea.
Xuan Chong’s heart trembled as he looked at this line, then raised his finger and lightly touched it; the line shifted and knocked over the teacup. The servant wiping the table nearby turned his head to see the teacup fallen, while Xuan Chong was six meters away, and hurried over to wipe the table, apologizing: “Sorry Young Master, I didn’t place it properly.”
Xuan Chong asked: “You didn’t see this line?” Xuan Chong pointed at the ruler line “drawn in the air in his hand.”
The servant was astonished, but Xuan Chong pushed the line in front of the servant, and at that moment the entire table shook.
The servant quickly retreated a few steps.
Xuan Chong took a deep breath and said: “Alright, it’s fine, don’t mention this matter, I was just a bit dazed practicing qigong.”
Xuan Chong said this while slightly moving the eraser in his hand, erasing the line!
(Xuan Chong already understood clearly: The stationery changes can only be seen by himself, but the effects are real and act on this world)
The servant seemed to realize something, his face showing delight, then flattered: “Young Master, the clan always says you’re impossible; how do they know your aptitude? You glance and can control objects from afar. Truly the ancestor spirit has manifested.”
Xuan Chong didn’t understand, smiled, then picked up the rag himself to wipe the table clean, and said to the servant: “Mm, from now on, I’ll clean my own room.”
…The servant hurriedly left…
After the door closed, Xuan Chong fiddled with his pencil case,
Xuan Chong habitually muttered: “System, what is this?”
At this time, the long-unseen system popped up, and sighed: “You’re too slow, only now discovering it can be used like this.”
Xuan Chong’s mouth twitched: “You couldn’t tell me?”
System: “During exam time, students must not ask the chief examiner about content unrelated to the exam.”
Xuan Chong: “Wait, you’re not a teacher too, are you?”
The system gave no answer.
In the room, Xuan Chong picked up the pencil case, then paused; the novel “Brave Soldier” fell out from the schoolbag. He flipped through the book a bit, slightly stunned—Yao San Gu this name seemed to flicker under his gaze. Then, uncontrollably, Xuan Chong picked up the pen, drew over this name, and the name disappeared.
Xuan Chong’s heart stirred inexplicably, vaguely looking toward the West; though separated by thousands of kilometers, he faintly felt that “she” was also here.
…The view comes to Dragon State…
On the other side of the ocean, in an underground technology site, Benjamin (Xie Ming) was sitting in a Beetle-style small car with Green, this small car having a large cabinet-like gas generator on the back. And this kind of car is also a luxury item here. The metal spokes of the rubber wheels are plated with silver, and on top of the hood is a “little golden man,” no, a totem pole.
The two arrived at the latest electricity laboratory. This is purely electric; to contemporary other scientists, it’s science fiction, but to modern people, it’s still this era’s unique “punk.”
In this underground base, exposed red copper structures and circles of circuit breakers can be seen everywhere.
Speaking of which, in the 21st century’s underground substations, they are all neat square cabinets with electrical equipment placed inside. Far simpler and clearer than this “super-era” power base now.
After summarizing the current technology baseline results, Benjamin said to this classmate: “Currently, I don’t know what will happen next.”
Green, who had already put on the inhibitor helmet: “Oh?”
Green, as required, is now forming the “supernatural ability academy,” codenamed x. To replace the current overly barbaric “ancestor spirit awakening” organization.
Green: “Aren’t you taking over the war task?”
Benjamin: “Yes, someone else has entered; in that exam, someone scored higher than me. Right, tell me about your investigation.”
Green: “This is the core of this plane’s supernatural system, divided into five levels, but the characteristic types are slightly different; some can distort steel, some communicate with the dead, others control the minds of the living.”
At this point, Green looked at Benjamin and asked: “The seven classmates I’m currently contacting?”
Benjamin: “They are not war-related.”
Green: “What are war-related.”
Benjamin: “This is an era equivalent to the first Europe war technology; but this world’s certain armaments are outstanding, like ‘ion shields.’ Currently, in the most frontline military domains, superpowers on various continents all master ion layer technology that can make warships invisible and airships invisible. With these elements appearing, do you think it’s for you to play with superpowers?”
Xie Ming slowly said: “During the exam process, read the questions carefully.”
