THUNDER CLOUD SECT - RESIDENCE OF THE SUPREME ELDER.

"Gu Zhu."

In the elder's great abode, all the elders were meeting with the sect's patriarch to discuss the arrival of a new variable.

When they were informed that they were chosen by the Thunder Prince, both Gu Zhu and the supreme elders, who are the ones who decide everything for the sect, were extremely happy. Using the reputation of someone important from Middle Heaven, they received many gifts from other sects and even a visit from the Emperor of Lower Heaven.

The status of hegemony over a region of the central country was so great under the Thunder Prince's influence that even the imperial family, who ruled the lower heavens with an iron fist, had to personally come to greet the thunder cloud sect.

Gu Zhu, who bowed more today than he had in years of his life, sighed deeply as he watched the sect council look at him in confusion.

They gathered mainly because Zheng Xiang called Gu Zhu to inform him of his departure. And the elders who were using the thunder prince's fame to gain resources were shocked and afraid of it.

"He's not leaving because of us, no need to worry." Gu Zhu passed the chairs where the elders were sitting around a round table, and on the highest chair, he sat down. "He's leaving for other reasons, he said to get on with recruiting that lesser sect and he said a friend will take his place while he's gone."

"A friend?" One of the elders who was sitting at the other end of the table grunted. "Who?"

Gu Zhu was silent for a while before facing the various elders and saying, "His name is Li Dao, he is heir to the Li clan of Middle Heaven."

While the elders were silent for various reasons, one of them found the name too familiar, so he tried to remember where he heard it.

"And where is he? I mean, it's not possible that another heir has descended and we don't know about it." one of the elders asked.

Gu Zhu stared at him. "He was in the little inner sect that the thunder prince chose. He was with the prince when he arrived, now we don't know where he is-"

"-Wait!" The elder got up from his seat quickly. "I know where he is!"

" "Where?" "They all said in unison.

"He started challenging all the body reinforcement disciples, I saw him on the way to this place." As if he understood something, he breathed a sigh of relief. "I'm glad it's him, I was shocked when a stranger started to demonstrate that terrifying talent!"

As soon as he finished, one of the elders next to him raised his eyebrow, this one, also relieved.

"Oh! So it's him."

Gu Zhu, like most, were confused.

"What are you talking Gu Che?" Gu Zhu clasped his hands in apprehension before asking.

"Ah! Patriarch, he showed up at the training ground and started challenging the disciples who were in body reinforcement. The amazing thing is that he was only in Tier 6 and he defeated the disciples who were in Tier 9!"

Despite being shocked, only Gu Zhu, the one who had already been in contact with the Thunder Prince, knew the difference between Middle Heaven and Lower Heaven cultivators. However, his elders were a little shocked.

"Do not worry." He closed his eyes and said as he tried to reassure the others. "It would be strange if he lost, after all he is heir to a clan that is also a great power in midheaven."

The worried elders felt a little more relaxed, but one of them, who still hadn't shown any reaction, placed his arms on the table and squinted his eyes at Gu Zhu.

"It's not just that, patriarch. Gu Che must have come quickly, but that boy is much scarier." He said. "I was there from the beginning supervising my disciple's combat, and I saw that boy watch our fight while fighting a disciple with a higher cultivation than his."

This elder, being one of the strongest, had a lot of credibility within the sect, so when even he was surprised, the elders beside him were shocked.

"Which?"

"And not only that, he didn't use any techniques while fighting, he watched his opponents and copied their sword techniques."

At this time, even Gu Zhu who was calm as he listened was surprised.

"That boy, even over the middle sky, is a genius, that I can tell you all." Leaning back in his chair, he relaxed. "When I saw him copy Wey Wey's technique, I quickly tried to attack him, but I felt such pressure on me that I gave up before attacking him. Good thing I didn't attack."

Gu Zhu placed his hand on his forehead and raised his head. "What a headache..." He faced the elders again and ordered. "Let everyone know his identity before our sect disappears from the map."

As was ordered, the elders glowed and quickly left that place using their techniques.

[...]

Li Dao was confused.

He didn't know why, but whenever he picked up his sword and entered combat, his heart raced with excitement, time seemed to slow down as he could read and understand every sword stroke his enemies used.

He knew it had something to do with the Dao of the sword, unlike palm techniques or any other weapon his opponents use, he could even feel time pass more slowly, but he couldn't read or predict the techniques.

He was already in his sixteenth fight, racking up exactly 1,600 mastery points. At first, for safety's sake, he only wanted to fight those from the same realm, but as soon as he defeated the third disciple in the ninth level of body reinforcement, the disciples started to feel anger and those who were in the second layer of the Foundation Establishment, started to challenge him.

Li Dao felt insecure, but just like before he could predict and copy the movements of his opponents, with the body reinforcement disciples, he thought he copied the techniques, but as soon as he fought the first cultivator of the foundation establishment, he realized that he didn't copy the techniques, but the movements.

Cultivators at the foundation establishment can expel metaphysical Qi and use it in techniques, and it was something that even copying the movements Li Dao could not do.

"I do not know who you are." His opponent, breathing heavily from exhaustion, recognized him. "You're a monster, but I'm different from the trash you've fought."

Li Dao felt sweat trickle down his cheek as he watched his opponent. Having fought several inner disciples, this was his first confrontation against a core disciple. Unlike the latter, this core disciple was a body cultivator, who uses body strengthening techniques.

Despite having a very good sword by the standard of the scorching sun sect, using only the moves copied from other fights, Li Dao could not injure the disciple's strengthened body.

The disciple closed the distance between them and attacked with his fist.

"You are fast!" Stiffening his body, Li Dao spun around and raised his sword, colliding with his hilt.

"There is!" He frowned. At the edge where the sword collided with the hilt, a curve in the blade could be seen. 'Who is this guy? besides being fast your body is capable of breaking my blade!'

The disciple, on the other hand, was surprised by Li Dao's reaction speed, so he instinctively took a step back. Unlike the others, the moves alone wouldn't work against him.

As the battle continued, you could see that the disciples huddled there were apprehensive about the battle.

"Damn! Who is this guy!?"

"This guy... is toe-to-toe with Lu Haotian."

"Senior has to win, he has..."

Li Dao grunted as he felt the pressure of the blows deflected by him. Knowing his sword wouldn't withstand the impact, he didn't try to defend using them.

His brain worked hard to think of a countermeasure. As soon as he took his eyes off his opponent, Li Dao felt an extensive pain in his belly.

Push!

"Argh!" Spitting blood, he flew a few meters backwards, falling to the ground on impact.

"THAT!"

"GO SENIOR!!!!"

Despite battling several times, this was the first time Li Dao was thrown to the ground.

Standing up, leaning on his sword, Li Dao faced his opponent who smiled at the sight of the blood he had spat out.

"My name is Lu Haotian."

Li Dao looked at him, who looked more relaxed than before. "You're not going to tell me to remember your name after you beat me, are you?"

The disciple fell silent, causing Li Dao's lips to curl up slightly. He opened up his status and took his eyes off Lu Haotian.

"My attacks didn't work on you as you are strong." Taking his points earned from other matches, Li Dao put 1,000 mastery points into his strongest technique.

Just as he thought, the image of a man holding a sword with a red blade flashed through his mind. This man, with long red hair, went into low guard and performed 13 fencing moves. With each swing of the sword, Nathan could feel the strength increase a little, and at the last swing, the trail of red fire turned to blue.

As soon as he finished, the man sighed heavily, he looked up at the dark sky and stared at the moon. "This is the second movement of art breaking the red sky, overlay."

"Since you managed to make me bleed, I'll also show you something special." Standing up, Li Dao wiped the blood from his mouth. Glad his theory has proved itself, he can't help but smile.

Seeing his opponent's smile, Lu Haotian couldn't help but scoff. "It doesn't matter what you show me." He opened his arms and grinned from ear to ear. "Nothing will break my Buddha body technique!"

Just like in his memory image, Li Dao went on low guard. Expelling metaphysical Qi from the fire, he startled the crowd when he saw the blade rise.

"B-but what!?"

"Metaphysical qi in body reinforcement!!? H-how??"

Lu Haotian's smile disappeared and he became serious.

Li Dao lowered his blade entering his guard. "Sword art breaking the red sky, overlap."

Watching the man execute the blow, Li Dao realized that it was a sequence of blows that was almost impossible to dodge.

As in the overlap where something is added on top, the overlap in the art of the sword consisted of making 12 strikes in the air using the same axis, and in the last strike, this axis intensified the flames increasing the potency of Qi and the strength of the movement.

Executing the move, Li Dao used all his speed to get to Lu Haotian, and as soon as he arrived, his blows fired.

Lu Haotian felt the force of the blows and tried to dodge, coming to the conclusion that it was impossible, he tried to receive them head on, which was barely possible.

With each blow that Lu Haotian received, his clothing was torn where the blade hit and with each blow, it seemed to get harder to withstand both the force and the temperature.

In the sixth movement, the blow that had only ripped through his clothing now left wounds.

Holding back the force of the blow a little, Li Dao executed the last move. Overlapping the shaft in the air, he struck from right to left, and as he did the movement, his Qi transformed making the flame turn blue.

Slash!

The cut went through Lu Haotian's belly opening a large wound in addition to burning.

"NOOO!!" One of the disciples shouted from the audience when he saw blood oozing from the wound on Lu Haotian's belly.

"Don't worry, I used very little strength from this blow." Li Dao swung his sword so that the fire was extinguished and placed it in its scabbard. "It's just a superficial wound, he'll be fine."

He scanned the crowd, the feelings the disciples felt were mixed, fear, dread, respect and most obvious, shock. The other core disciples who were watching approached and picked up Lu Haotian to take him to heal.

As the elder who watched everything without saying anything approached, he felt a powerful pressure focus on him forcing him to stop.

From the sky, a cultivator that was flying descended to the ground. Li Dao looked at him and immediately recognized him.

"F-flying!?"

"He is!"

"Saint! A true saint!"

Smiling, Li Dao said, "How long have you been there?"

The cultivator smiled before his feet touched the ground. "It was a mighty blow, young master Li, even though you held back most of your strength." He stared at the disciple being carried and the smile intensified: "If you hadn't held back, your blow would have cut him in half."

"That's why I held back." Taking people's eyes off, Li Dao opened up his status.

[Li Dao(Nathan Salt)]

[Main Cultivation: 6th Layer of Body Reinforcement. {Li Dao: 05%}]

[Secondary Cultivation: 9th Layer of Body Reinforcement. {Ye Chun: 20%}]

[Cultivation Techniques: Sword Art Breaking the Red Sky (2,000/10,000), Tiger Fang Fang (3,550/10,000)]

[Mastery Points: 820](↑1,600)

'Now that I've discovered how mastery points work, even without being able to increase my cultivation, I can still get stronger. Now I have to find out what this monstrous talent Li Dao has for the sword is...'

Nathan was silent for a few seconds wondering if in the novel there was ever someone as gifted with the sword as he was, until he remembered something. Turning to Hua Lin Chong, he asked. "Do you know where the gentle sword sect is?"

Hua Lin Chong nodded.

"Fine, then take me there."

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