Chapter 77 Three Thousand Skill Tempering (1)

Facing the teasing smiles of his teammates, Zhou Weiqing fled out the door with a quick “I’m going to cultivate.” As soon as he left the room, he heard a loud explosion of laughter behind him. In their eyes, he had definitely been trying to flirt with a girl and gotten slapped, and were all extremely amused. Of course, Zhou Weiqing did not try to tell them the truth, that he had been slapped because he had mistaken the identity of his wife...

Having a thick skin had a great benefit, by the time Zhou Weiqing returned to his room, he had already dismissed the teasing jokes.

Power was the best way to prove himself, and only if he could display his true power, would Shangguan Tianyue accept him.

The Second Palace Master of the Heaven’s Expanse Palace, what kind of status and power was that? He should be at least a Heavenly King Stage or higher, perhaps even emperor or god stage! No wonder he looked down on such a lowly three-Jeweled Heavenly Jewel Master like himself. In the Heaven’s Expanse Palace, at his age and still being three-Jeweled, there should be at least a few hundred or more.

Of course, it was impossible for him to raise his Heavenly Energy in a short period of time, and he had just reached the first stage of Heavenly Shen Energy not long ago. Even though the Immortal Deity Technique was extremely powerful, and now that he had completed the second portion of it, he had thirteen energy whirlpools working all the time, allowing his cultivation, training and even recovery rate to be much faster than any ordinary Heavenly Jewel Masters. Even the Immortal Deity Shield had improved. Despite that, it would still take time and effort to continue improving, especially since he had not raised to the 13th stage on his own effort, but due to Fat Cat’s evolving. Up to now, he still had not figured out what exactly had happened yet.

Since his Heavenly Energy could not be increased in such a short period of time, there was only two methods for him to improve his combat prowess and power. One, was to use the Demonic Change, and the other was combat skill, and to improve his Skills.

What was his greatest advantage? Naturally, it was his six attribute Alexandrite Cat’s Eye Elemental Jewel. Tang Xian was Shangguan Tianyue’s wife, and as a powerhouse herself, she had naturally seen a lot as well. If even she had been surprised to see his own six Attribute Alexandrite Cat’s Eye, that meant that such an Elemental Jewel would be extremely rare, even for Heaven’s Expanse Palace.

Among his six main attributes, the ones he used the most were the darkness, spatial, wind and lightning attributes. Of the four attributes, there were twelve skills he had stored in total, and amongst those only the Darkness Seal Skill Blood Rites was not able to be used in direct combat. Adding the Absolute Delay of the Time Attribute, he usually had twelve skills which he used often in his combat.

Earlier, when they had all been on the road to ZhongTian City, Zhou Weiqing had sought the advice of Lin TianAo, Xiao Yan and the rest regarding how to make full use of his Stored Skills. At that time, Xiao Yan had told him: When studying a book you read it a hundred times, and you will comprehend it; when training a skill, you practice a thousand times, and you will comprehend it [1. Alright, that’s super clunky, but you guys should get the point of this direct translation]

At that time, when Zhou Weiqing had heard it, he had not thought much about it. To practice each skill a thousand times continuously without stopping, wasn’t that a huge amount of time? Furthermore, Xiao Yan had said, the thousand times had to be done without any breaks in between in order to gain the benefit, to fully understand and grasp the true meaning and usage of the Skill. Yet, each time one used a skill, it was a drain on Heavenly Energy. For any Heavenly Jewel Master, to even be able to use about a dozen or so Skills continuously without running out of Heavenly Energy, that was already considered very good. With specific Consolidated Equipment to reduce the amount of Heavenly Energy needed, they would still at most be only to use about two dozen Skills continuously. After expending all their Heavenly Energy, they would have to cultivate and meditate to recover; in order to continuously practice a skill for a thousand times, even three days and nights of continuous training would likely be insufficient. Without sleeping or eating for that amount of time, who could take it?

At that time, Lin TianAo had given his opinion that the effects of such a training method were extremely good, but the side effects were also quite huge, taking a large toll on the mind and body of the practitioner. Generally, every person would only go through this once on a skill, and not more than once, as the first time usually had the best effect. Of course, most Heavenly Jewel Masters placed a greater focus on cultivating their Heavenly Energy, and not spending time on such tempering and training of skills. Not only was this method of training boring and tough, the constant lack of sleep and eating would take a huge toll on the body, causing long term damage. At that time, Lin TianAo had suggested that given sufficient time and energy, going through all his skills once over would still be good.

Originally, Zhou Weiqing had thought of trying this method once they returned from the Heavenly Jewel Tournament. However, at this moment, provoked by Shangguan Tianyue, he immediately thought of this training method. Perhaps, this was the only way for him to raise his power in a mere three days. Hmph, wasn’t it just a thousand times of using a skill? For Bing’er, I’ll risk everything!

As he thought up to this point, Zhou Weiqing charged out of his room, running to the dining hall of the inn to have a large meal. After which, he carried two large bottles of drinking water back to his room, and told everyone else not to disturb his training before he started on his first journey of this rather ‘crazy’ training method.

Although he couldn’t stop during the training, without food and sleep, he still needed to take a quick drink once in awhile. After all, without water, he probably wouldn’t last more than a day of such intense training.

After all the preparation, Zhou Weiqing went through all his skills in his mind, finally deciding upon the Spatial Rend as the Skill he would train. The reason why he chose it was because it was the highest rated skill out of all his skills, and furthermore it was a skill that held both offensive and defensive capabilities in one. More importantly, it was also part of the fused skill together with the Wind Attribute Silver Emperor Wing Slash, which was his most powerful offensive skill!

Without question, to temper this skill first would give him the greatest benefit.

In truth, Zhou Weiqing’s greatest advantage was his Immortal Deity Technique, which did not require him to sit down and meditate to cultivate his Heavenly Energy. As long as was using and expending Heavenly Energy, the energy whirlpools at his Death Acupuncture Points would constantly draw in energy from the atmosphere, replenishing his Heavenly Energy and constantly building up and improving. Once a sufficient amount had built up, it would be followed by breaking through the next Death Acupuncture Point, thus breaking through to the next level. Although each time he attempted break through was nigh tantamount to dying once, it was without question that it was a much simpler process than any other cultivation method. As such, even when Zhou Weiqing was tempering his skills, it would not affect the speed of his cultivation of Heavenly Energy!

Even Zhou Weiqing did not realise that he had stumbled upon the training and cultivation method that suited him the most!

A bout of silver light appeared around Zhou Weiqing’s hands, as the Spatial Rend drew a long three chi rend in space. It lasted for about three seconds before slowly disappearing.

To Temper the Skill, it was not just a matter of continuous using the skill, but while using the skill, one had to feel the profound secrets and mechanics behind the skill, to fully understand it.

As Zhou Weiqing sensed the changes of the Spatial Rend, he slowly realised that when the Spatial Rend appeared, it would have a great suction effect on the other attribute elements in the air, yet it did not have any such effect on actual objects. However, it was like a strange shield, if an actual object attacked it, then the Spatial Rend would actually have a powerful cutting effect, even normal metals would be sliced apart instantly. If this was used on a human body, it wasn’t necessary to describe the sheer power and effectiveness of that.

That was also one of the reasons why the Spatial Rend could fuse together with the Silver Emperor Wing Slash to increase the offensive power. After all, a King Stage Skill like the Silver Emperor Wing Slash already had great destructive powers, and was extremely sharp, adding the Spatial Rend’s cutting powers and the explosive effect after the Space itself was torn apart, naturally the increase in power was so strong.

Three seconds quickly passed, and Zhou Weiqing released the Spatial Rend again the second time. He constantly put his senses to the max in feeling the skill as he used it over and over again, as Spatial Rend after Spatial Rend appeared in the air in front of him. His Heavenly Energy also started draining at high speeds, and his thirteen energy whirlpools at his Death Acupuncture Points started whirling at full speeds, aiding his recovery.

Without any stopping, he continued releasing the Spatial Rends. Zhou Weiqing also wanted to try out how many he could release continuously without rest.

The cooldown of the Spatial Rend skill was about six seconds. That was to say, after using a Spatial Rend, which lasted three seconds, he would have to wait three more seconds. That was already his maximum output of the skill, and corresponding Heavenly Energy.

Amongst all of Zhou Weiqing’s skills, the Spatial Rend was not the one which expended the most Heavenly Energy. This was also one of the reasons why its rating was so high. It wasn’t that the higher level the skill, the greater the toll on Heavenly Energy. The greater the power with the lower expenditure, the greater the rating the skill would have.

After using the skill repeatedly, Zhou Weiqing discovered that as he continuously used the skill, every nine times that he used it, the recovery rate of his energy whirlpools would recover enough for him to use the skill one more time. This was of course impossible for normal Heavenly Jewel Masters, but with his Immortal Deity Technique, he managed to do so.

After using it seventeen times, Zhou Weiqing finally depleted his Heavenly Energy. That feat was accomplished without using any Consolidated Equipment to aid him! Furthermore, the skill was currently at the three-Jeweled stage, but Zhou Weiqing’s Heavenly Energy was only at the thirteenth level, still relatively far from the sixteenth stage! To be able to use the Spatial Rend seventeen times, that was indeed an impressive number.

More importantly, at this point, Zhou Weiqing did not need to sit down to meditate and recover his Heavenly Energy. He just needed to stand there waiting, and as soon as he had sufficient energy, he would release another Spatial Rend instantly. This also caused his Heavenly Energy to be in a constant state of depletion, with his thirteen energy whirlpools to be at the maximum draw.

Just depending on the energy whirlpools to recover Heavenly Energy, Zhou Weiqing could use the skill once every minute!