Martial King's Retired Life

Shifu detailed every single match enough to easily visualise.

The three factions that the branch members formed during the period Grandmaster disregarded sect affairs were “Sword Sanctuary”, “Hall of Gods”, and “Asura Path”. On account of Mount Daluo’s long history, they managed to learn a plethora of disciplines, but they were unable to match those who returned from self-study in Vast Sea Submerged Pearl Hall. Since it was impossible for them to achieve mastery of every discipline, they chose to focus on particular elements.

Sword Sanctuary focused solely on developing their swordplay, sorting out numerous lost swordplays in the process. Although Grandmaster’s “Ultimate Swordplay” rendered their decades of toiling for naught and became a trauma they couldn’t shed, nobody would’ve taken Mount Daluo serious when it came to swordplay before Grandmaster developed Daluo’s Five Divine Styles Manual. Sword Sanctuary would’ve been competitive up against the likes of Mount Hua, Kunlun and other sects that predominately focused on swordplay.

Hall of Gods focused on internal disciplines and palm techniques – primarily using Moon Weaver Palms, Empty Palms, and other Mount Daluo palm disciplines as their foundation. Their internal discipline was based off Cast-off and an assortment of other disciplines. Their plan was to start on internal disciplines and raise a disciple who excelled in both internal and external disciplines.

Asura Path didn’t have any preference for what disciplines they learnt as long as it was practical. Their members chose to train in dangerous terrain on the mountain, spar without holding back, and would fight until someone was bloody. That was why, despite not leaving any new knowledge behind, they were the best at combining everything among the three factions.

The first person Shifu beat with a tree branch was Lu Duanming, a member of Sword Sanctuary. Owing to his swordplay level and decent level in his internal discipline, he was considered as one of the top candidates for succeeding Grandmaster. The reason for the “Ming” part in his name was to later change his surname to the “Ming” reserved for patriarchs, which would make it easier for everyone to get used to calling him Ming Luduan. Had Shifu lost that day, the current patriarch of Mount Daluo would probably have been Ming Luduan.

Based on Shifu’s description, Lu Duanming wasn’t weak; he could’ve very well rivalled the current Lian Zhuiyue. Even though he never had the benefit of learning Grandmaster’s Daluo’s Five Divine Manuals or any other Mount Daluo classics, he wasn’t a pushover even now, yet Shifu beat him using a tree branch and in less than ten exchanges. Shifu’s successive opponents didn’t fare any better.

The only way you’d be able to beat someone with a tree branch was if the gap between your levels was enormous, or you knew what was coming and had a counter prepared. I believed Shifu could’ve remembered all the weaknesses of branch disciples considering his talent and the fact that he had access to all books on the mountain for years prior. Still, counters only applied to technique. Someone well-versed in an internal discipline from Hall of Gods should’ve given him trouble since there would’ve been a physical strength difference even if Shifu was more technically sound, let alone members of Asura Path, whom were experienced at adapting as the situation required.

Shifu didn’t beat them based purely from superior knowledge and scouting reports. It was his creation of Pure Yang One Qi that empowered him to be successful against them.

“I see.” I picked up the two manuals and flipped through them through new lenses. Once I put together what Shifu told me with my knowledge, it finally clicked for me. Following an exhale, I remarked, “I finally understand how this discipline works.”

“Shifu, what is the matter?“ queried Zizi.

Nobody who read the two manuals ever understood it as it was meant to be understood, not the two who practiced according to it, not the four who read it after I asked them, not the head of Confucianism, not even the talented Zizi. By extension, I finally understood why Young Shiyi was the only person who was able to learn Shifu’s “Heavenly Net Sacred Records” discipline. No “normal” people could understand them.

The two manuals conveyed the same things notwithstanding them appearing nowhere remotely similar. No matter which manual you followed, you should’ve achieved the same results. You could say that it was basically having Shifu teach you personally as people would still get it wrong even if he did personally teach it to them – which wasn’t to say that it was impossible to learn correctly. Shifu’s mind just worked too differently to the normal man.

I heaved a big breath. Having Zizi continue down his current path of learning Pure Yang One Qi would only get him past Zhao Tiankui and Yuan Kou by a smidge; he wouldn’t have been able to crush all three branch factions in a short year as Shifu did.

“What is the matter, Shifu? That was a big sigh.”

As I stared at the inquisitive boy, it dawned on me that… it was likely impossible for him to replicate Shifu’s success. For all I knew, there was probably only one freak of nature of that calibre in Mount Daluo’s history. Nonetheless, achieving 30% of what Shifu achieved would’ve been plenty.

“I have good news.” I smiled. “I finally understand these two manuals in their entirety.”

What I couldn’t comprehend was different to what the others couldn’t comprehend. I didn’t read internal disciplines’ manuals through the lens of a student. Instead, I read them from the perspective of the end product and reverse engineered how to get there. Since I had learnt numerous internal disciplines, I didn’t need to learn every single one. I just needed to read it once, circulate true qi a few cycles, and I’d be able to formulate a rough idea of the system.

Normal manuals would focus on the learning process, while less than 10% of the contents would be dedicated to the end result. In contrast, Pure Yang One Qi’s original text used a huge chunk of bizarre content to describe the end result of mastering it. The common denominators in the two manuals that didn’t seem remotely related were the degree of innovation and bizarre descriptions. From my perspective, the descriptions resembled qi deviation more than awesomeness following mastery. That was what baffled me.