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The next morning, Xu Yunfan had just woken up when he habitually opened the Mechanical Box and took a breath of the Ginseng Doll’s Qi of Ginseng. Ignoring the Ginseng Child’s bared teeth and grimaces, Xu Yunfan took a deep breath, drawing the wisp of Qi of Ginseng deep into his lungs.

After circulating through his lungs, it quickly dispersed into his four limbs and throughout his body.

Without the slightest hesitation, Xu Yunfan assumed the Pure Yang Stake stance of the Pure Yang Qi Skill in his courtyard. He began to guide the Pure Yang Inner Breath hidden within his flesh and blood, forming a constantly revolving Minor Celestial Cycle between his torso and arms.

Yesterday, he had been utterly crushed by that woman in white. After entering the Linn Character State for the third time, Xu Yunfan had tried every possible way to get close to her.

On the fourth try, he grabbed her wrist; on the seventh, her ankle; on the tenth, her thigh.

Seeing the plainly dressed woman go from expressionless at the start to furious and embarrassed later on, he felt a wave of satisfaction.

At this moment, the Pure Yang Inner Breath surged within him like a babbling brook, constantly flowing through his muscles, skin, flesh, and blood. With every circulation, his Blood Qi ebbed and flowed like the tide.

The initial movement of his Inner Breath felt like ten thousand ants gnawing at his bones, a fine tremor spreading from the depths of his marrow. The searing torrent flowing through the crevices of his muscles gave him a pleasure akin to soaking in a hot spring.

As the morning light pierced through the thin mist, Xu Yunfan’s back muscles suddenly trembled violently.

Seven dark-red ridges of flesh bulged up from the Dazhui acupoint behind his neck, slithering down his spine like living snakes before sinking into his lower back.

The trapezius muscles, forged by years of swinging a hammer, tensed up like anvils. Twelve tendons wove a dark-gold net beneath his skin, locking a Strength capable of overturning an ox-cart within the layers of his fascia.

The essence of the Thousand-Pound Mountain-Shaking Hammer Technique was hidden in the articulation between the scapula and the costal arch.

When swinging the hammer with the right arm, the left latissimus dorsi had to be as taut as a bowstring. The instant the hammer head slammed down, the rhomboid muscles would instantly unfurl like an eagle spreading its wings.

If one were to dissect his bronze-colored flesh and skin right now, one would see the elastic fibers deep in the core of his spine coiling in a peculiar spiral. This was the Transcendence of having perfected sinew, bone, and skin. With the Outer Three Harmonies Realm nearing Great Success, he was on the verge of stepping into the Flesh Refining Realm, and his muscles were slowly changing to adopt the optimal power-generating method for the Thousand-Pound Mountain-Shaking Hammer Technique.

As he practiced the Hammer Technique, Xu Yunfan’s opening stance was extremely slow, yet the head of the hammer actually created a low hum as it cut through the air.

Just as he was about to unleash the third form, Overlapping Waves Shattering Mountain, a sound like tearing leather erupted from his back muscles. The Iron Hammer’s descent suddenly tripled in speed, yet it stopped, hovering half an inch from the bluestone slab. 𝑓𝓇𝘦ℯ𝘸𝘦𝑏𝓃𝑜𝘷ℯ𝑙.𝑐𝑜𝓂

The core of power generation for the Thousand-Pound Mountain-Shaking Hammer Technique lay in the back muscles. The wisps of Strength cultivated there lay dormant, but with a mere stir of his Blood Qi, they could erupt in an instant, unleashing earth-shattering power.

After breakfast, Xu Yunfan swung the Thunderfire Qilin Hammer, slowly practicing the Thousand-Pound Mountain-Shaking Hammer Technique, going through it form by form.

After finishing his cultivation, Xu Yunfan rinsed the sweat from his body, shouldered his gear, and carried a Profound Steel Forging Hammer he had personally forged to the Earth Fire Room in the Weapon Casting Hall, ready to begin the day’s forging.

His Celestial Craft Forging Technique was on the verge of reaching Minor Achievement, and he was about to forge a weapon of the Sharp Blade Level, so he was naturally focused.

Today, he was forging a piece of North Sea Cold Iron. It had been quenched nine times in the Ice Spring last night and was now entirely covered in frost-like patterns.

When the iron billet in the furnace was heated to a cherry-red, he suddenly reversed his grip on the hammer and plunged the tungsten steel spike on its pommel into the iron block.

This was the ’Bone-piercing Needle’ technique recorded in the Celestial Craft Forging Technique, capable of creating stress fractures within the metal.

After eight hundred strikes, the surface of the iron block was crazed like a dry riverbed, yet it remained whole.

When the Earth Fire turned a pale blue-white, the Heavy Hammer finally smashed down with the sound of wind and thunder. The splashing sparks seared stunningly beautiful Cloud Patterns onto the glazed windows.

At a quarter to four in the afternoon, a dragon’s cry echoed from the white mist rising from the Quenching Pool.

A Straight Blade, three-chi-seven-cun long, slowly took form in the saltpeter water. Its grain pattern actually resembled a hundred overlapping waves, proving that not a single hammer strike had been off during the four hundred and seventy folds.

Xu Yunfan flicked the blade with his finger. The reverberations traveled up his finger and into his bones, causing them to subconsciously hum like a cicada. The body of the blade emitted a chime-like vibration that resonated in harmony.

The blade’s surface reflected the beads of sweat on his brow and the joy in his eyes.

A sharp blade of the Lower Grade Level. He had finally forged one today.

’You have diligently practiced the Celestial Craft Forging Technique without interruption, successfully forging a weapon of the Lower-Grade Sharp Blade Level. Your Celestial Craft Forging Technique Skill Level has greatly increased.’

"Excellent. To think you could forge a weapon of the Sharp Blade Level in just half a year... it just goes to show your talent for weapon forging is astonishing."

Fu Jin’s voice came from the side, making Xu Yunfan grin.

He turned his head. "Senior Brother, what brings you here today?"

Only then did he notice the indescribable sense of melancholy on Fu Jin’s face.

It made sense. Fu Jin had grown up on Divine Weapon Ridge and had been exposed to weapon forging for over forty years. It had taken him fifteen years from the day he officially started forging to create his first sharp blade.

That night, on a sudden whim, his hammer had moved as if guided by the gods. He finally broke through the shackles of his craft and successfully forged his first sharp blade.

But compared to the Xu Yunfan before him, who had succeeded in forging a low-grade sharp blade in just half a year...

It was simply inhuman.

The embers in the Forging Furnace had yet to die down, and blue smoke coiled up, winding around the ice-crackle patterns on the blade’s body.

Fu Jin walked forward and ran a finger along the edge of the blade. The friction between his old, calloused skin and the newly born Cold Iron produced a faint, metallic sound.

"The ice-crackle pattern is deep but doesn’t pierce the spine of the blade. You’ve mixed the Overlapping Wave Force from the Thousand-Pound Mountain-Shaking Hammer Technique into the Nine Forging Techniques."

Fu Jin’s Adam’s apple bobbed as he swallowed a sigh. He tapped the blade with his knuckle, producing three long and two short, clear notes. "Four hundred and seventy folds? No... there’s a mother-and-son tempering pattern hidden in this vibration."

Of course, he knew what Fu Jin was counting.

As the Earth Fire was about to die out, he had used the Double Anvil Impact Method from the Celestial Craft Forging Technique.

He had placed two blocks of North Sea Profound Ice on either side of the anvil, rapidly quenching the blade after every nine folds. That was how he’d managed to squeeze out an extra fifty layers of steel grain on top of the standard four hundred and twenty.

Fu Jin suddenly lifted the leather bracer on his left arm, revealing three centipede-like burn scars. He then looked at Xu Yunfan’s hands, which were as white and smooth as jade, without even the slightest callus on the fingertips. A true bitterness welled up in his heart.

Skin Cultivation Perfection meant that his old skin had sloughed off and new skin had grown in its place. He could maintain his skin in its optimal state at all times, yet it was as tough as treated leather and difficult to cut. This was even more true since he practiced the Thousand-Pound Mountain-Shaking Hammer Technique and had the protection of a Horizontal Training True Skill like the Profound Steel Hundred-Forged Body.

Ordinary mortal weapons could hardly scratch him.

Although his own hands were enhanced by the Profound Steel Hundred-Forged Body, they were still unbearably rough.

"I got these when I was thirty-five, trying to force a breakthrough in my craft by forging a five-hundred-fold Dragon Scale steel."

His fingertips caressed the deepest scar, but his eyes were glued to the Straight Blade in his hand, the one Xu Yunfan had forged.

"The Cold Iron you used, was it from the ore Chen San mined three years ago?"

"It’s new ore from last year’s Frostfall."

Xu Yunfan said, "It was soaked in the Ice Spring for seven days and nights, with the water changed nine times every Hour."

Of course, he hadn’t done this work himself. Now that the Celestial Craft Cave had opened its gates wide to recruit disciples under the age of fifteen, the entire Shuzhou province knew of this Great Foundry Sect. This kind of labor was naturally handled by the servant disciples.