Chapter 128: The Sword Follows the Heart

Someone once said that weapon s are extensions of the human body, but few people can truly wield a weapon in their hand as easily as an arm! This requires long-term hard practice, sincerity toward the weapon used, enough talent and insight, plus a little bit of luck.

At least George had never achieved this before, or rather, the day before, George had not even touched the edge of it. Unlike those who focus on using a single type of weapon, a Knight serves only for war.

Even before crossing over, the martial arts of Tianchao were divided into battlefield martial arts and Jianghu martial arts. Battlefield martial arts were mostly grand and open, focusing on killing the enemy first. At the same time, because they often used heavy weapons and wore armor, it was hard to move flexibly. At this point, cooperation between team members became extremely important. Besides the 90-degree attack range directly in front, you had to trust your back and sides to your comrades.

Jianghu martial arts, on the other hand, were mostly agile and clever, focusing on changes between false and true, with many moves involving dodging, jumping, and shifting. Also, content about saving one’s life and escaping counted for quite a lot. You see, for those people, as long as the green hills remain, there will be no worry about firewood. Losing a fight is fine; as long as you are alive, there is a chance to win it back.

This is the change humans make to adapt to their environment. Similarly, a battle on the battlefield has far more restrictions than a typical Jianghu revenge killing. Take dodging, for example. If there are people all around you front, back, left, and right, trying to dodge would likely get you blocked eight times out of ten. And if you jump, you will definitely become a target for others. And fake moves? In a place where flesh and blood fly everywhere, they have absolutely no effect. At such times, who cares if it is a fake move? Of course, you just raise your shield and hack forward.

Similarly, battlefield martial arts have obvious disadvantages when used in Jianghu. This kind of life-or-death fighting easily leads to mutual destruction. Also, without throwing weapons, those who lack methods for dodging and moving often get into an awkward situation where they cannot catch up if they win, or cannot run away if they lose. Moreover, battlefield martial arts have high requirements for equipment—especially for armor. In ancient Tianchao, private ownership of armor was a serious crime, enough to get your family executed and your property confiscated. Its severity was even greater than owning powerful bows and crossbows. This made battlefield martial arts have very little use in Jianghu.

In this world, at least on the Western Continent, what was popular was still similar to battlefield martial arts. On one hand, this was because heavy weapons and armor were not strictly controlled here. On the other hand, adventurers here, similar to Jianghu wanderers before crossing over, would also go to the battlefield when necessary. As for mercenaries, their very existence was due to the needs of war development.

Another point is that, at its core, the human power limit of this world was higher than that of the world before crossing over, and the gap in individual strength between people was also larger. Similarly, spending time on refining the details of moves was less effective than spending time on training strength and speed in the early stages. The saying “one unit of strength defeats ten units of skill” and “nothing is unbreakable if it is fast enough” was not just talk. Even if your moves were practiced well, if you could not block the power of a casual strike or keep up with the speed of a casual strike, what was the point? Of course, once speed and strength reached a bottleneck and were hard to improve, some people would shift their focus to technique.

Now, as a Squire, George naturally followed the straightforward path of battlefield formation warfare. The weapons he learned ranged from long spears and great swords for horse fighting to long swords and javelins for foot fighting, as well as bows and crossbows for throwing and shields for defense. In short, it covered all common military weapons. This was to handle all sudden situations on the unpredictable battlefield as best as possible. So, actually, the time George could spend on each weapon was not very much, except for the most commonly used Longsword, which he practiced more.

Originally, these mostly grand and open martial techniques were not delicate, and the time spent cultivating them was not very long. For George to make the Longsword in his hand feel like an extension of his arm, with his sword heart and the sword in harmony, was not something a young boy could achieve. But today, under the combined strengthening of Ziwei Entering Fate and Blessing of Order, George seemed to have achieved resonance with the Longsword in his hand.

This was a strange and mysterious feeling hard to describe in words. If forced to say it, it was like when George tightly gripped the Longsword, the blade resonated with George’s heartbeat, and at the same time, the Longsword itself seemed to lose its weight for George.

Preparing to try his hand, George swung the sword and only then realized that the previous feelings were not his illusion. During the swinging process, the Longsword not only felt weightless but also the inertia, which should have been affected by mass, was not felt at all. This could truly be called “heart moves, sword follows.”

Do not think the difference between weight and mass is small. In fact, any junior high school graduate who listened carefully knows the difference. Mass is the amount of matter contained in an object. It is an inherent attribute of the object itself and does not change with the object’s shape, state, or geographical location. Weight is caused by gravity acting on the object, and it changes with geographical location.

From this, it is clear how significant these changes were for George, at least regarding weapons. Now, he could completely use that Longsword as a rapier. If there were suitable tools on hand, George would have performed a Wudang Feather Sword routine right there. Wudang Feather Sword, also known as the Eight Immortals Pure Yang Sword, involves holding a sword in one hand and a feather duster in the other, with dragon-like body movements, carrying the posture of the Eight Immortals drunk and playing with peonies. It is used for cultivating the elixir and realizing the Dao, for health preservation and self-defense. When practiced, the fist movements change between false and true, looking graceful and beautiful, giving a feeling of rising above the mundane dust.

But in fact, in the past, this was also a martial art for killing. The feather duster was actually a bismuth iron hammer, which could be used to block like a shield while killing enemies. The Tianchao sword techniques George practiced focused on thirteen forms: pull, guide, lift, parry, strike, thrust, point, crash, stir, press, chop, cut, and wash. It was not about clashing swords with others head-on. However, this was just the kind George practiced; not all Tianchao sword techniques were based on this.

Unfortunately, in this world, the Tianchao martial arts he had once learned were almost in an awkward position of having no place to use them. Only the Yi Jing Xi Sui Jing, which had amazing effects in relieving fatigue, easing physical pressure, and preventing hidden injuries, made George feel less disappointed. Sometimes George would ask himself: “Why do the Tianchao kung fu others practice become god-slaying and saint-destroying after crossing over to another world? But for me, they become either out of place or unsuitable for the environment, or there are even better or similar alternatives in this world’s hand-to-hand combat techniques. There is absolutely no sense of superiority at all!”

After looking around the training ground and seeing no one else, George began to try the basic movements of those thirteen forms with the sword he practiced. He surprisingly found it even smoother than the Chinese-style sword he had bought before crossing over. Excited by the sight, George could not stop, until he finished the entire solo routine of the moving-step paired sword forms.

Perhaps such changes gave George a hint. A flash of inspiration came, and he began to mutter: “Perhaps most of the techniques of the Tianchao martial arts I learned in the past are useless on the battlefield. But if I go out on a journey, perhaps in some situations, they can be a trump card for surprising victory. Also, I heard that in a country to the south, there are also schools that specialize in skill-based martial arts, called Duelists, I think. I should go see them sometime. After all, stones from other hills can polish jade.”

After doing all this, George put the Longsword back on the weapon rack. Then he took out a Spear for horse fighting and held it in his hand. Indeed, the Spear also had a similar feeling to the Longsword, though not as strong. But George did not swing the Spear this time. First, because although George had seen a few spear manuals before crossing over, he had never practiced them. There simply was not enough space. If he practiced in a public place like a park square, George would have been afraid of losing face. After all, practicing spear techniques for the first time at Li Desheng’s level back then would have been extremely embarrassing. Also, when practicing sword techniques, there were plenty of old men and women in the park to share the pressure. But holding a large spear was too eye-catching. Anyway, Li Desheng could not be so calm about it.

At the same time, the Spear in George’s hand was not a Knight’s lance for charging. Lances usually have a sharp metal cone mounted on a long wooden shaft about two meters long. The hard wooden shaft has a handguard at the grip position, and a weighted wooden cone at the rear. There is also a stirrup hole in the saddle to absorb the huge recoil of the charge and thrust. In actual combat, the user drives the mount to charge at the enemy, and as they approach, they point the lance horizontally or nearly horizontally at the enemy, using the charge bonus to thrust and kill the enemy. Due to the huge impact, the spear shaft is specifically made of a material that is hard but easily breaks to protect the user, because an overly sturdy lance would cause unnecessary burden on the user’s hand and even their body. So the user would immediately drop the lance after it broke and switch to another weapon prepared in advance to continue fighting. One could say lances were basically used as one-time weapons, because after one charge, the lance would almost certainly break and could not be used again.

Of course, it was not the spear from before crossing over either. It was a weapon more similar to a pike from before crossing over. In the world before crossing over, pikes had hard shafts, suitable for large-scale charges, while spears had slightly flexible shafts, making them more flexible in combat. Because the spear shaft could bend to some extent, after the opponent parried the thrust of the spearhead, the user could flip their wrist, and the spearhead would quickly curve around, passing the opponent’s parry to continue the thrusting action. This was the advantage in attack. For the opponent’s heavy weapon attacks, the appropriate bending of the spear shaft during blocking would dissipate some of the force. This was the advantage in defense.

Therefore, in legends, famous generals on ancient battlefields mostly used spears rather than pikes. The spear techniques that were handed down were also designed based on this type of spear. So even if George’s spear techniques were good before crossing over, the weapon in his hand now did not meet the standard. If the problem with the sword was its weight and size, as long as he achieved the feeling of lifting a heavy weight lightly and did not practice against others, he could still perform his past sword techniques. But if he wanted to practice spear techniques, this hard spear shaft could not bend. At least in George’s current state, he had no way to deal with this.

“So it is like this? Qi Penetrating Weapons can make all weapons in my hand coordinate and unify with me? As for the strengthening effect of the weapons themselves, it should not be worse than before, right? I will test this aspect next time when I practice with Hiren. I just hope it does not cause any damage to the weapons.” George said, stroking his chin after sticking the Spear back into the weapon rack.

After these experiments, George finally had a relatively systematic understanding of his comprehensive improvement this time. The “seizing the initiative to defeat the enemy,” according to the System’s explanation, was literally a bit like the Dugu Nine Swords in Jin Yong’s novels, while his past intuitive dodging was even inferior to “How to Reach Mount Tai.” However, this ability was more like a personal talent, unlike the martial arts concepts and martial arts experiences in Jin Yong’s novels that could be passed down. Of course, in terms of superiority, this ability of his could not only act on sword techniques but on all weapons he used. It could even be said that in the future, the success rate of ambushing people with a Longbow or Crossbow would also increase greatly.

Speaking of literal explanations, George thought with some amusement about the System’s notes on attributes: “I wonder if it is because of the increase in strength, but the System has started to learn to roast. Should I give the System a name, like ‘Harbor of the Sirens’ or something?”

Getting no response, George began to feel himself again. George found that besides those abilities that had already clearly shown a qualitative change under the influence of Ziwei Entering Fate, some other abilities had also improved to some extent due to its influence. Of course, this aspect of improvement had not yet reached the point where the System could count it as a specialty or special ability.

Among them, the Jade Pillar Golden Body Technique, which had been George’s long-term goal, now seemed to have made great progress. According to George’s original idea, this variant of protective Taoist magic, based on the highest achievement of Taoist physical protection, would take at least 5 to 6 years to cultivate using the method of refining with jade fluid that has not yet formed a Golden Core. If something unexpected happened midway, dragging it out for 7 or 8 years was also possible.

But he did not expect this optimization from Ziwei Entering Fate to save George three years of hard work. This might be related to the title of Ziwei Great Emperor, the Master of Ten Thousand Phenomena.

At the same time, the martial arts specialty “Child of the Storm” from the Ocean lineage, which George had not paid much attention to, had also improved rapidly. In this regard, George felt that as long as he participated in one ocean voyage, this specialty could be completely formed. This was consistent with the ability of the Ziwei Great Emperor to command the sun, moon, stars, mountains, rivers, gods, and the four seasons and solar terms to call forth wind and rain. After all, this was the ability to predict and fight against the climate during navigation.

As for other aspects, there might be some strengthening too! Either it was too weak and George had not used it specifically, so he could not notice it. Or the change was a slow process, and George would need to wait for a certain amount of time to clearly grasp it. In short, within this short day, George was still unable to fully confirm it.

“By the way, the Pure Mouth Divine Spell, Pure Body Divine Spell, Pure Heart Divine Spell, Pure Heaven and Earth Divine Spell, and the Golden Light Divine Spell were all used to assist cultivation before crossing over. I wonder if they still have such effects after mutating in this world. Next time, before entering meditation and Visualization, I will try using all these spells first. Maybe there will be some unexpected surprises!” George began to make his own speculation about the new spells he had obtained, but wasn’t this kind of experiment playing with fire? He hoped he knew what he was doing.

Before preparing to return to his room, George waved his hand at a flower bed on the side of the training ground, as if saying goodbye to the plants inside. In fact, a flower spirit was hiding in that flower bed. Her skin was a bright orange-yellow. She had no hair on top of her head; instead, she had rose-colored petals with white tips and centers. Her wings would have the same hue and pattern as her hair. But that guy’s height was really not high, only 1.5 feet.

However, with such a height, even if she hid in the flower bed, George should have noticed her as usual. Or maybe, as a Fey Creature, she was good at illusion spells. So, in the past, George had not noticed her existence. It was not until today, when his perception broke through the dullness of ordinary things, that George first saw this little girl and the layer of Spirit Light surrounding her.

“I never thought I would see a flower spirit like this here! But the data I saw in the documents said it should be in temperate forests! How did she appear here! And what is that layer of Spirit Light around her? Is this the illusion that stopped us from finding her before? But this thing should not be useful for Mr. Val, right? He actually did not tell us about this flower spirit. But this flower spirit is different from the records in many ways. Is the record in the book wrong, or is this flower spirit itself a special case. Truly, believing everything in books is worse than having no books at all!” With some doubts, George turned and entered the Manor.

On the corridor inside the Manor, George had not walked far when he saw Knight Val walking towards him. George was very grateful for his guard at the door yesterday. Although it was Viscount Bolerum’s idea, Val was the real executor. As for words of thanks, George had already said them when he left the meditation yesterday. Given the relationship between the two, saying it again now would seem too pretentious.

After waving to say hello, George asked quite casually: “Mr. Val, do you know the flower spirit in the training ground?”

“Do you mean Lijana?” Knight Val asked back very surprised, “You can actually discover Lijana?”