Could it be that I am the cruel villain?

"The beginning of all things originates from the Dao. Only by comprehending it can one attain wisdom; when the heart is calm as still water, the Dao manifests itself. My wisdom is clear, and all things follow."

"Virtue grows with practice, and actions are forgotten. People forget what they should forget but remember what should be forgotten. This is called true forgetting..."

"Wu Wei surpasses action; a calm heart deepens the realm..."

The dog's eyes widened.

To tell the truth, Mr. Jiang's memory is actually quite decent.

But even someone with a good memory would probably have a headache in front of such a large volume of this broken stuff. In the entire Mountain Gate, perhaps only Lin Jiangxian memorizes it as easily as drinking water. But the problem is.

Mere memorization isn't enough.

You must be able to understand it.

This thing isn't like cramming before his college entrance exams; this is a mental method, an actual thing used for cultivation. If you can't thoroughly understand it, how can the mental method be effective?

The text is obscure and hard to understand. Even though there are special annotations and explanations on it, the reader is still confused. Last night, he sneaked into his senior sister's room quietly to have her interpret this Heavenly Clarity and Serenity True Technique for him, but the result was...

"Who gave you the illusion that I understand this?"

Silence with a breakdown.

However, thinking about his senior sister's character, he really couldn't imagine her holding a pen and annotating the mental method seriously, much less internalizing it. So in the end, he has to study it by himself.

Sitting inside the pavilion waiting for the cool breeze, it was already summer, and the temperature had clearly risen and stabilized considerably. Many birds and beasts could be heard calling throughout the Mountain Gate, offering a rather unique experience. Upon close observation, this so-called "Mountain Gate" wasn't Swordmaster Peak.

Instead, it was Heavenly Power Peak.

"Look, isn't that Jiang Feng? His realm doesn't seem high."

"Yes, most of you who haven't entered the Inner Sect probably haven't seen him in action. He fought evenly with the chief among our Purple Cloud Palace's third generation disciples, battling for several hours."

"Although he lost, he ranks ninth among the third generation disciples. If he hadn't run into Chief Gu early, he might have gone even further."

"Senior Brother Qian is right. How old is he this year? In his twenties?"

"Not sure, but it can't be far off. However, this kid, though impressive, has plenty of flaws, such as..."

A few young disciples from Heavenly Power Peak gathered together, chattering.

It's evident that today's Heavenly Power Peak is still quite desolate. Ever since the scandal a century ago, the once-glorious Heavenly Power Peak has been declining day by day. Whether in terms of the quality or the quantity of disciples joining, there has been a noticeable drop.

And the biggest reason why the entire Mountain Gate couldn't recover, even to this day, came down to two words.

Disconnection.

The former Peak Master, having found out that the disciple he had nurtured for decades was a Xuanyin Sect spy, and after his most prized and excellent disciple murdered countless Purple Cloud Palace disciples, was so grief-stricken he went mad, vomited blood, and was severely wounded.

In that year, more than half of the sect members who came out of the Grotto Heaven were lost, and the remaining ones paid numerous lives just to hold onto half of the resources. Knowing this outcome, the former Peak Master chose to sever his meridians, destroy his Divine Soul, and die to atone.

The future benefits of the sect for a hundred years became the last straw that broke the camel's back.

The old Peak Master committed suicide, the most capable and promising top disciple in the Mountain Gate was a mole, and then almost all of the somewhat skilled Inner Sect Disciples perished during that year's Cave Heaven Secret Realm, practically draining Heavenly Power Peak dry.

For more than ten years after that, there was no clear leader until the twelfth-ranked Inner Sect Disciple under the former Peak Master, today's Peak Master Shan Yu, broke through to the Divinity Transformation Stage and officially took over as Peak Master. Only then did the Mountain Gate marginally have a backbone.

Random trivia.

Yu Ying ranks fifteenth.

But the problem is, even if one succeeds to the position of Peak Master, what of it? Previously, because the Mountain Gate suffered heavy losses, there were almost no Inner Sect Disciples left, so most of the resources were taken to compensate other Mountain Gates.

The mess left by the old Peak Master is still unresolved. The young Peak Master can only find another way, even to the extent that the then-young Yu Ying chose to go to the far frontiers, returning every few years, but bringing back many good items for the Heavenly Power Peak disciples each time.

This is why she has so many collections. Back then, Jiang Feng even speculated why she was preparing so many Cultivation Techniques and treasures that didn't match her realm.

Did you think she liked picking up garbage?

She was diligent in work-study, not only supporting herself but also supporting the large group of young disciples in the mountain. The eldest among the current third generation disciples in the Mountain Gate are only forty.

And they were recruited from outside.

"The way of heaven advances and retreats, the way of yin and yang..."

Someone was still studying seriously.

The reason why he appeared in Heavenly Power Peak today is naturally simple. First, he hadn't visited Heavenly Power Peak before, and second, because of a promise to Yu Ying some time ago, once the Nine Peaks Martial Arts Ceremony concluded, he would visit in person and find a way to steal a little something from Heavenly Power Peak.

Oh, it means stealing knowledge.

After informing the Mountain Gate disciples, he found out that neither Yu Ying nor Peak Master Shan Yu were in the Mountain Gate. The former had gone for a stroll, while the latter had matters to attend to, leaving him to wait there for a while while they searched the mountain for someone.

Sitting there idly anyway, he might as well pull out the Heavenly Clarity and Serenity True Technique that had tormented him all night and read it; the more he read, the more he felt the unique power of the text.