The Ultimate Divine Class

"Our Teacher has called us back."

Qin Feng said, "Taking in a Direct Disciple this time is just incidental."

"It's 'you,' not 'us'."

Lin Zhiquin lit a cigarette expressionlessly, took a deep breath, and watched as the light blue smoke slowly dissipated in front of him.

"The Teacher has always disliked seeing me."

Qin Feng gazed at the fleeting loneliness in Lin Zhiquin's eyes. Realization seemed to dawn on him, and he said softly, "Lin has taken out all the resource quotas accumulated over the past few years, preparing to train that Lu Yuan."

So that's how he intends to reconcile with the Teacher.

It seems that Lin has indeed made some progress in Burnt Rock over the years...

Qin Feng twitched the corner of his mouth, almost as if he wanted to laugh.

"But Lin might be disappointed. Lu Yuan may have talent, but he's still far from impressing the Teacher. First, with his strength, he definitely won't be able to pass the assessment. Second, purely in terms of aptitude, there are many candidates stronger than him. Unless Lin can find..."

"Enough!"

Qin Feng was abruptly cut off mid-sentence by Lin Zhiquin.

"What is it that you sought me out for?"

Lin Zhiquin's tone turned somewhat icy.

Qin Feng looked at him calmly without saying a word.

After a few seconds, he slowly began to speak.

"Please, let me finish, Lin. What I mean is, unless Lin can find a Martial Arts prodigy like that person... maybe... the Teacher might actually change his mind."

After Qin Feng finished speaking, the hand Lin Zhiquin used to hold his cigarette trembled fiercely, causing a large fleck of ash to fall.

He sharply turned his head to look at Qin Feng, his expression stunned, his eyes filled with utter disbelief.

...

HISS. HISS.

Leaning against the wall of the training room, Lu Yuan looked up and down at his arms, legs, and other parts of his body, wincing in pain.

Is this skin training? Nobody told me it would be this painful...

Once Lin Zhiquin left, Lu Yuan entered the 'Absolute Focus' state, trying out the 'Spirit Crane Body' moves that had been taught to him.

He couldn't continue after the twenty-fifth move.

It wasn't because the move was difficult, but the tearing pain that enveloped his entire body forcefully snapped him out of the 'Absolute Focus' state.

Lu Yuan figured out that this body-forging method aimed to strengthen the body through repeated cycles of destruction and healing.

The principle was sound. Human cells do indeed become denser and tougher after repeated external trauma. But the process itself was truly agonizing.

Right now, Lu Yuan looked "ruddy" all over. Not ruddy in the ordinary sense; rather, under his fair and delicate skin, patches of bruised crimson seeped through, looking quite alarming. Even a light poke with his finger was unbearably painful.

However, at this moment, the power of his 15-point physique became evident. Lu Yuan watched as the crimson marks on his body visibly faded, and the pain rapidly subsided. In less than five minutes, these contusions and tears beneath the epidermal layer were seventy to eighty percent healed. He was "Full Blood Resurrection" again.

Lu Yuan tried a starting movement from 'Spirit Crane Body' and felt he was in good condition.

Lin Zhiquin probably didn't expect my recovery speed to be this fast. The faster the recovery, the faster the body-forging progress. Perhaps, in less than a month, I'll completely finish the skin-toughening stage...

He scratched his arm forcefully with a fingernail and thought, Would the effects of the skin training be better if combined with some form of impact resistance training?

He'd seen in movies and novels that many external martial arts were trained this way: enduring strikes from rods, throat stabs with iron spears, stir-frying iron sand with bare hands... and even more extreme methods like being burned by fire or doused with ice, a true ordeal of ice and fire.

I'll ask about it later.

With Lin Zhiquin leaving in haste, Lu Yuan had no time to ask his multitude of questions, so not wanting to delay any further, he continued practicing 'Spirit Crane Body'. Whenever he couldn't bear the pain any longer, he would stop and wait for his injuries to heal.

This cycle repeated until he suddenly remembered that there was another part of the body tempering routine waiting for him upstairs. By then, nearly two hours had passed.

That's probably enough for now. Continuing might cause chronic injuries...

After this session, Lu Yuan felt a lingering ache in certain parts of his body that wouldn't subside, possibly due to blood stasis.

Immediately after, Lu Yuan pulled up his profession panel and saw that the Experience Points for 'Spirit Crane Body' had increased by 12 points.

The rate of growth was fairly decent—neither particularly slow nor fast.

After all, 'Spirit Crane Body' was a high-level professional skill, just one rank below a Professional Sure-kill. It was normal for its cultivation to be more difficult.

I wonder if 'Spirit Crane Body' counts as a prerequisite for 'Crane Shadow Floating in the Air'. If it does, to what level do I need to practice 'Spirit Crane Body' to satisfy the conditions to upgrade the Sure-kill Skill 'Crane Shadow Floating in the Air' to Level 2?

Seeing the words "Temporarily Unable to Upgrade" still displayed after the Sure-kill Skill 'Crane Shadow Floating in the Air,' Lu Yuan sighed lightly, packed his things, and walked out of the training room.

When he arrived at the massage room on the second floor of the martial arts hall, just as Lin Zhiquin had said, the follow-up procedures were already arranged for him.

He was first led to soak in a medicinal bath for ten minutes—the same kind he often used when practicing the Crane-shaped Pile. After soaking, he was taken to a private, quiet room to wait.

Not long after, an ordinary-looking, middle-aged woman in her forties walked in carrying a case.

"Lie on your stomach."

The middle-aged woman instructed Lu Yuan to lie prone on the small bed in the middle of the quiet room.

Lu Yuan had just lain prone for a moment when he felt a cold hand grab the edge of his underwear.

He was startled and quickly asked, "What are you doing?"

"The skin-training secret medicine needs to be applied to your entire body."

"Can I apply it myself down there?"

"Alright, I'll apply it to the other areas first then."

Lu Yuan finally managed to preserve a bit of dignity.

Next, the middle-aged woman took out a milky-white ointment and began to apply it to Lu Yuan, covering his entire body, not even sparing his face.

After Lu Yuan had hidden away in the bathroom to take care of his private areas himself, the woman took out a roll of silver needles and began to perform acupuncture on him.

"Stimulating certain special acupoints in your body can aid recovery. It also has a strengthening effect on your skin and muscles. Combined with the Martial Arts Secret Medicine, the effects of skin training will be several notches better..." the middle-aged woman explained to Lu Yuan as she inserted the needles.

In no time, she had turned him into a "porcupine."

Having done all this, the woman picked up her case and left, saying she would return in half an hour to remove the needles once the medicine was fully absorbed. Before leaving, she also mentioned, "The medicine taking effect might make your skin a little red. That's a normal phenomenon and will quickly subside."

Because needles were inserted in many parts of his body, Lu Yuan couldn't lie down, sit, or even lie on his stomach. He could only stand there, bored. He remembered there was a half-length mirror in the bathroom, so he ran to get his phone and took a selfie in front of it.

Staring at the wall clock as the second hand ticked by, he suddenly remembered what Lin Zhiquin had told him about the Direct Disciple candidacy.

Someone surnamed Xia... which Xia would be willing to spend twenty million to buy me an assessment qualification?

Lu Yuan thought for a moment, then picked up his phone and called Ge Wenjun, asking for information about the girl he had saved in the rainy alley earlier. This time, Ge Wenjun didn't play coy with him. However, he seemed to be in a meeting and, after hurriedly giving Lu Yuan two names, hung up the phone.

"Xia Chong, Xia Zhiqin... They really are surnamed Xia."

Lu Yuan's eyes held a peculiar light as he searched for these two names one by one. He found that this Xia Chong was the CEO of a pharmaceutical raw materials company in Burnt Rock City and was considered a fairly successful local entrepreneur. His daughter, Xia Zhiqin, was born with autism. Although she was later cured, she was left with a condition where she couldn't speak when she got nervous...

She stops speaking when she's nervous...

Lu Yuan blinked and couldn't help but smile.

No wonder she never says anything when she calls. Her breathing does sound quite tense. So that's the reason.

Lu Yuan had long suspected that the stranger who called him every day but never uttered a word was the girl he had saved in the rainy alley. Now it was confirmed.

Twenty million. Just because I saved his daughter's life. He's really generous...

How much better it would be if he had just given me the twenty million? Why buy a Direct Disciple candidacy spot?

To be honest, Lu Yuan wasn't particularly interested in becoming a Direct Disciple of the Crane Sect. He had just displayed astonishing Martial Arts talent in front of Lin Zhiquin; even if he weren't a Direct Disciple, Lin Zhiquin would probably still teach him the body-forging method. Taking a huge step back, even if Lin Zhiquin refused to teach him, he could just find another martial arts school. It wasn't like he had to hang himself on the single crooked tree of the Heaven Water Crane Sect. Spending those twenty million was truly unnecessary. With twenty million, his family wouldn't have to struggle so much.

Why didn't he give me a heads-up beforehand...

Lu Yuan was still lamenting the twenty million when he suddenly felt his body burning up. He looked down and saw that his skin was red all over, making him look just like a boiled lobster.

The effects of the skin-training secret medicine are kicking in...

Lu Yuan hurriedly began to pace around the room. The woman who had just applied the medicine for him had said that moving around when the medicine took effect would help with its absorption.

After walking briskly for about ten minutes, the symptoms of his skin burning and turning red gradually subsided.

My skin does seem a bit firmer.

Lu Yuan pinched the back of his hand, unsure if it was a psychological effect or if the secret medicine was truly working.

...

「That night, on the rooftop.」

BANG!

THUMP! THUMP!

Dressed in a tank top and shorts, Lu Yuan was intently striking a cement pier in front of him. Unlike before, the cement pier he used as a punching dummy now had an extra layer of black sandbag wrapped around it for protection. Lu Yuan made sure to hit the black sandbag with every punch or kick.

After a flurry of strikes, Lu Yuan stopped. He lifted his hands to examine their backs and found both fists completely red. There were also numerous red marks on his legs, all where he had made contact with the punching pile. He touched the reddened areas; the skin there seemed to have hardened slightly, developing a thin callus.