Star Gate

“Whatever you wish,” the Black Armor responded indifferently after a while. “But remember, non-students are not allowed to enter the campus. They can only stand by the gates! Also, don’t forget that fines will be levied for destruction of school property. You better hand over the previous fines as well. Interest will be collected on it if you don’t!”

Li Hao blinked. Interest? There was even interest on that?

“Is the interest rate… high?”

“Not that high. Thirty-six percent a year..”

Li Hao started. Holy hell, how is that not high? You’re a loan shark! They’d been fined fifty-five million last time. A year’s worth of interest was… Li Hao’s scalp crawled. Almost twenty million stones! He’s so black-hearted!

But a year… dragging things out for a year might also be nice. Perhaps twenty million wouldn’t be much to him after a year. That’s also good!

“Thank you, senior!” Li Hao smiled. He vanished as he left the ruins, then returned with a group of people. They stayed outside the gates instead of entering the campus proper. The Black Armor floated in the air and silently watched the group, soon sensing various auras erupting on the scene. He only needed to observe for a while to know what they wished to do.

Puppets leaned on the windows of the various classroom buildings, all of them curious. Li Hao was oblivious to their presence. Gradually, some puppets wandered around the school gates like they were on patrol, and the ones shaped like toys at the gates also opened their eyes.

The young man could sense it now—it felt like a lot of people were looking at him. He turned around for a look, but didn’t see anything out of the ordinary. He couldn’t help but mutter to himself that the Black Armor’s gaze was quite intense! It felt like hundreds of people were staring at him!

Indeed, a group of puppets, toys, and the Black Armor were quietly watching the visitors’ actions. The Black Armor could sense more than the rest and detected some changes in the environment—not inside the ruins, but the world outside. It seemed to have loosened some of the restrictions on them. The void outside seemed more stable.

Does it have to do with these characters? They are very similar to Tranquil Star’s ultimate art, but they incorporate mental strength and life force. It rather suits these modern humans. Does this count as having created a new dao, which is why this world is revitalizing on its own?

The Black Armor was stunned by his trial of thought. If this was the case, then this world might soon return to the conditions that he was familiar with in his time.

Once more people walk this path, it might become a unique cultivation method that is similar to core origin. Or it might be a new dao of the inner world…

In the ancient civilization, core origin dao had been the mainstream dao of the initial years in New Martial. The later mainstream dao had been the one of the inner world as created by the Human King. It was much more difficult, however, so a lot of the old guard still cultivated core origin.

These visitors at the gates looked to be walking another path. How interesting! However, the Black Armor could also tell that this path was not complete. It needed the aid of external resources, which was not a good sign.

If only it could be combined with the golden body!

The Black Armor was of the opinion that cultivation methods for the body should be individually created. Otherwise, this path was not suited for widespread propagation.

Li Hao and the others didn’t pay attention to this hole in the method as they furiously summoned mysterious power and exhausted vast quantities of Water of Life. Their presences flared and word characters hovered in the air!

Everyone’s strength was truly leaping forward at the same time in a massive geyser. Even Li Hao was attempting to trace the next character. With metal, water, and fire already mastered, he wished to grasp the remaining earth and wood as soon as possible. If he succeeded, he would manage to count as a seven element Arcanus. It was just that his wind and thunder elements weren’t all that strong.

Li Hao kept experimenting, hoping to succeed. If he did with just one character, he stood a chance of facing Qi Pingjiang. He was still a bit lesser than the Military God, and he didn’t like being threatened all the time.

……

Evenround Martial.

Scores of puppets craned their necks around, staring at the outsiders with blatant curiosity.

The school gates.

The group gradually ceased cultivating, some with a frown, others with stern concentration, and some with great irritation. He Yong fell in the last category.

He frowned with annoyance and dissatisfaction. Li Hao’s dao of supernatural characters seemed incomplete. At least, he was facing a big problem. One aura could fortify only one character, which meant that they almost all had singular characters. However, their characters couldn’t transmute like Hong Yitang’s. Theirs were too focused on a single outcome. He Yong had coalesced a ‘fist’ character and incorporated the three elements of fire, metal, and earth into it.

The character was powerful and He Yong felt that it wasn’t any weaker than the supernatural abilities of those elements, but he wasn’t able to accomplish what Hong Yitang had. His punches were a messy combination of all three elements. In contrast, Hong Yitang could separate his elements into distinct abilities.

In this way, He Yong was… very similar to a martial master. It was just that his internal force had become combined with supernatural abilities. That was good enough as well, but seeing that Li Hao could form his characters individually and Hong Yitang could put his through a variety of changes… He Yong was naturally irritated that he could only use his in a mixture.

It was also aggravating that he could only incorporate three elements. He felt that he’d improved greatly in recent days and wasn’t necessarily weaker than anyone. He wasn’t worse than Hong Yitang or Yao Si!

But reality slapped him in the face as he’d only incorporated three elements into his character.

Off to the side, Light Sword was… doing well enough. She was also three elements, but He Yong couldn’t be bothered comparing to her. She was unique in that she’d coalesced the elements of light, dark, and wood. That was only one element out of the five organs, which indicated that she had much more room to improve than He Yong. At the very least, he hadn’t located the light or dark locks. So while she was a three element Arcanus for now, she might be a four or five element very soon.

Hou Xiaochen didn’t make a sound, but He Yong could tell that there were at least four elements in his character. And… he’d actually drawn a spear, not written a word. He’d created a drawing instead of tracing a character!

What the hell??

Everyone was looking at Hou Xiaochen and the spear in front of him that resembled their characters. The man smiled when he realized that everyone was staring at him. “I simply had a sudden stroke of inspiration. Words are not universal—the ones used in the ancient civilization are different from modern day. Therefore, writing isn’t fixed in stone. I was thinking… humanity did not know how to write in an even more far-off age. They only used simple symbols to replace words. So isn’t my drawing of a spear a kind of word too?”

The characters themselves weren’t the key—the intent held within was! Wasn’t a symbol shaped as a spear also a word after it had the relevant intent infused?

Li Hao bobbed his head up and down, new reflections striking him. These favored geniuses of heaven all had their own thoughts, alright. Hou Xiaochen was correct, the actual characters themselves were just an outward appearance. What was key was whether there was a change in its strength.

Hou Xiaochen sent the spear forward without a word! Despite the lack of the Flaming Phoenix Spear, the group struggled to hold onto their minds. An inexplicable pressure bore down on their weaker members and expressions shifted drastically.

Hou Xiaochen retracted the spear and his character vanished.

“The… Broken Will intent seems stronger than before,” Li Hao breathed. “Did the director incorporate the supernatural lock of the head that represents mind intent?”

It was said that the lock of the head indicated the strength of one’s mind intent, which was the mental intent in the ancients’ eyes.

“That’s too dangerous.” Hou Xiaochen shook his head with a smile. “I haven’t decided to integrate that for now. It’s just that my spear intent has solidified with mysterious power and is wholly contained by the character. That doesn’t inflict much strain on the body, so it’s easier to display the spear intent.

“There’s actually a massive benefit to forming these supernatural characters…” he mused. “If you wish to walk the path of multiple auras, interference from your other auras will be of grave concern. If you meld all of your auras into the characters and completely contain them within, it will be easy for you to comprehend other auras once you accomplish that with the auras of your five organs.”

Grasping one aura wasn’t hard for a genius like Li Hao, it truly wasn’t. The young man hadn’t encountered martial dao for long before comprehending the earth aura. He’d been an absolute rookie at martial dao then. The disruption caused by multiple auras after grasping them was what made cultivation difficult. But what if that disruption was not a factor?

“The same goes for all of us!” Hou Xiaochen looked at the rest. “If we completely place the aura inside a character, we’ll be able to easily comprehend another aura if we wish. We can meld that into another character and continue the process. It’s easy for us to grasp more without the interference of our pre-existing aura.”

His words raised eyebrows, particularly He Yong’s.

“Not everyone is suited for multiple auras!” Sky Sword said faintly. “One aura will do! My aura is the sword and my sword aura is the one and only! Pure and simple or multifarious, they all lead to the same destination in the end!”

“This depends on individual choice.” Hong Yitang nodded as well. “Director Hou is right, now is a great time to comprehend other auras. The characters isolate our current auras, making it easier to grasp new ones. Li Hao, for example, will easily understand more if he cultivates some secret arts.

“I don’t actually recommend the others to comprehend more… But Light Sword… You can comprehend one more, the dark aura!” Hong Yitang advised. “Your light aura is your primary aura—light and shadow occur successively. Those of us present won’t see much benefit from it because we focus on other elements, but I think two auras will find great effect with you.”

Light Sword turned over his words thoughtfully, then regarded the man square in the face. “Do you have other motivations in mind because you’re beginning to find me pretty lately?”

“……” A hush stole over the group as everyone looked to the sky, not saying a word. Light Sword… was certainly growing confident!

Yao Si smiled at seeing them engaged in earnest conversation. He was familiar with this group of Silver Moon martial masters. They either appeared fiery and explosive on the surface or were coolly aloof, but they were rather brainless in private!

“None of this is key,” he interjected. “Don’t you guys think that the supernatural locks are the most important at our current stage?”

Everyone looked at him.

etvolare’s Thoughts

Finally, a female character with more spunk. And HXC turned his characters into pictionary lol.