Chapter 6

"Bro, you're amazing! First day of class and you made Old Liang keep you at it this long — that's insane!"

Xie Yucheng was about the same age as Qin Shi, both around sixteen or seventeen.

Unlike the latter's frail and refined look, the former was tall and lean, with dark skin and messy hair.

His whole person exuded a weed-like vigorous vitality, his temperament more like that of an Old Factory Street worker's son!

"You guys... first lesson, isn't it like this?"

Qin Shi gasped for breath, like a drowning man crawling ashore, his lungs burning as if on fire, waves of stabbing pain.

"I didn't offend Old Liang, how could he torture me to death! Meridian opening in Old Martial Arts has another name, called 'pulling tendons and flaying skin'.

Means going through it once equals having your original old tendons and old skin pulled off, swapping for a new body frame... terrifying just to think about!"

Xie Yucheng carried Qin Shi, who weighed a hundred-odd jin, with swift strides, clearly his physical quality was solid.

Looks like taking classes with Teacher Liang, his life force development has shown remarkable results.

"Our first lesson is simple, first get familiar with basic combat moves, then weighted frog jumps, rope climbing and obstacle crossing, five or six days of physical training to let the body adapt to the intensity, only then start meridian opening.

This stage is too torturous! Me and Li Yuan only lasted ten minutes, the next day we lay in bed unable to even get up, never tried again after that."

Qin Shi froze, he himself only paid two hundred tuition, shouldn't it start from the entry-level class?

How did it go straight to the advanced stage in one step?

"Bro, we're here. Where do you live?"

Xie Yucheng familiarly turned into the shantytown's alleys.

"Just drop me at that little shop up ahead, thanks."

Having recovered some strength, Qin Shi struggled down, staggering to steady his footing.

"Aunt Zhou, a bottle of Hong Bao Soda. Classmate Xie, my treat, thanks for the hard work."

The first sentence was to the shop owner, the second was addressed to Xie Yucheng.

"From now on, we count as half classmates. Around No. 9 Middle School, if you run into anything, drop my name Xie Yucheng, guaranteed to have you covered!"

Xie Yucheng didn't decline or hesitate, took the Hong Bao Soda boldly, stuck in the straw and drank with relish.

"Mm."

Qin Shi nodded.

Old Factory Street workers' sons, from childhood they loitered on the streets, in their free time liked to hang out in the video halls popular in the Old Era.

Perhaps influenced by those gangster movies turned antiques, they more or less picked up some jianghu air, habitually imitating big brother posturing.

After Xie Yucheng ran off, the shop-minding Aunt Zhou finally voiced her puzzlement:

"Little Shi, why are you limping, carried back? Did someone bully you?"

Qin Shi ached all over, grinning through gritted teeth:

"Just signed up for a tutoring class, training intensity high, be fine in two days."

Aunt Zhou relaxed:

"That's what I say, which rascal dares act up against our Bao Gong Street people, watch me not clean him up good!"

Qin Shi glanced at Aunt Zhou's imposing waistline, and the bright red armband on her thick arm.

On it prominently written the big characters "Market Security Management Committee".

Couldn't help but feel this speech was very persuasive!

In Old Factory Street where street vendors are as numerous as cow hair, Aunt Zhou's authority is not low!

Dead party Zhou Ning jokingly calls his own mom ministerial-level, not without reason.

"I can hop and jump fine, Aunt Zhou don't worry."

Qin Shi pressed a few coins on the counter, moved legs that seemed not his own, walking slowly toward home.

"Aiyo, look at you struggling to lift your feet, hurry sit a bit. Your sister's away on a long trip again, today just make do with a meal at Aunt's!"

Aunt Zhou urged.

"No need. Thanks Aunt Zhou, Lao Ya's still home waiting."

Qin Shi walked leaning on the wall, legs soft as noodles, comparable to an old driver who battled for days at the Hong Lian Mang Hair Salon.

A mere few hundred meters, took a hard ten-odd minutes to reach the door.

No one inside, little sister Qin Lan went out.

During this break, little sister occasionally takes tutoring or cashier odd jobs to subsidize school living expenses.

Qin Shi collapsed indoors, exhausted to the point of pale lips, hugging the water bottle gulping big mouthfuls.

Retina flashed with brand new text content——

【Body received moderate exercise...】

【Growth Degree +20】

【Achievement Activated - Muscle Memory】

"This is called moderate? I'm practically wrecked. Huh... seems the suffering wasn't for nothing."

Qin Shi was about to complain, but his eyes suddenly brightened.

Only to see on the black-framed panel, that gray oval object shattered at some unknown time, hatching embryo-like flesh and blood.

Data information quietly changed——

【Anchor Point: Qin Shi】

【Growth Stage: Embryo】

【Progress: 0.008%】

【Monument Count: 2】

Qin Shi stared tightly at the two small mound-like gray stone tablets, text refreshing like a waterfall, jumping into view.

【Muscle Memory: Strength needs to be watered by sweat. As long as training doesn't kill you, train to the death, and willpower will bring you out of the encirclement!】

【Trait: Muscles will remember every movement you have completed and replicate it precisely.】

【Advancement Route: Persist in doing more than twenty sets of exhaustion training every day, and replenish a large amount of protein nutrition; maintain this long-term to unlock the corresponding skill.】

"Muscle memory? I've made it!"

Qin Shi instantly perked up and roused his spirits.

Normally, muscle memory requires years of cultivation.

For example, professional athletes train day and night to let their bodies get used to the rhythm and enter the state at will.

And it seems I can save this part of the time by unlocking achievements!

"Old Liang wants me to retreat in the face of difficulty! What are cramps and flaying? As long as my eyes are open, I'll do it!"

Recalling Liang Laoshi's cold attitude, Qin Shi pondered the flavor of it.

He of course understood that this No. 9 Middle School Physical Education Teacher's action was entirely out of goodwill.

He didn't want to lose the big picture over a small matter and ruin his future.

But having scraped by on Old Factory Street for a lifetime, what future was there to speak of?

Living out his life under this gray sky, guarding this dilapidated old street lined with chimneys and piled with factory buildings?

"In the dazzling Star Sea of the Great Universe Era, are the children of workers in the Old City District not worthy of appreciating it?"

"Even if I am but dust, I hope to float in space, rather than fall into the mud and be trampled."

After silently cheering himself on, Qin Shi took a deep breath, and the thousand words in his heart coalesced into two words:

"Start training!"

The room was dim; Qin Shi calmed his mind, relaxed and rested, waiting for his physical ability to recover.

Time passed quietly, and about forty minutes later.

"Muscle memory, activate!"

Qin Shi pressed his lips tight, gritted his teeth, and his trembling legs spread into a horse stance.

He straightened his waist, tightened his muscles, and carefully sought that feeling Liang Laoshi had trained him in.

Exhale, inhale!

With the rise and fall of his chest and abdomen, the taut large tendons like springs jumped slightly again and again inside his skin.

"Hiss, this is too sour and refreshing! Swollen and hot, numb and tingly like an electric shock, as if being gnawed by millions of ants..."

Qin Shi couldn't help but gasp in cool air, striving to mobilize the last bit of his physical ability to ensure his posture remained stable and undeformed.

Then he went through Liang Laoshi's careful guidance from beginning to end once more.

After a moment, a strangeness arose within his body.

Arms, chest and abdomen, waist and hips, two legs...

Fine and dense streams of heat converged everywhere, surging like a spring.

The scraping and stabbing of fascia knives reappeared suddenly!

"The splenius, levator scapulae, semispinalis capitis, trapezius, erector spinae, latissimus dorsi... they all seem to have come alive!"

Qin Shi endured the burning stabbing pain, familiarizing himself with this replicated muscle memory.

He gradually discovered that between the bone and flesh of his own back, there seemed to be an interwoven skin membrane net.

From both sides of the neck to the waist, hips, and tailbone, large tendons connected blocks of bones and wrapped around bundles of muscles.

It was like a whole!

They seemed like slow-wriggling small mice, closely following Qin Shi's breathing rhythm, either surging upward or moving downward, driving the large tendons and pulling the muscles!

"It seems not as torturous as before, the longer I stand the easier it gets! The flesh seems to have awakened from sleep!"

On the first day of class, relying on eight points of Qi Life Force, Qin Shi stubbornly persisted for twenty-seven minutes and endured Liang Laoshi's muscle-opening technique that could be called corporal punishment.

And now, a full thirty-four minutes had passed, and he still had energy to spare.

【A refreshing and satisfying training session...】

【Growth Degree +30】

"Training for a moment is refreshing, training always is refreshing!"

Inside the narrow shed house, Qin Shi accepted the subtle transformation of his body with a satisfied mood.

The stiff and dead weight originally deposited in the flesh and blood inside was like the stratum corneum of human skin, being ground away bit by bit.

This made him spontaneously feel a sense of clear and clean refreshment!

(Chapter End)