Chapter 46: The Secret of Transmission

“What boundless internal force!”

Zhang Jie was stunned by Wuyaszi’s boundless internal force.

If his own internal force had been a small puddle,

then Wuyaszi’s internal force was at least a lake!

“Is this the effect of the Northern Darkness Divine Art?”

Zhang Jie’s heart trembled with awe.

He felt that in terms of boundless internal force, Wuyaszi surpassed every master he had ever known.

Even all seven Masters of Wudang combined could not match Wuyaszi!

What about the Wudang founder, Zhang Sanfeng?

Hmm, back then, the Zhentian Zhang Jie had been too insignificant to gauge Zhang Sanfeng’s depth.

Just as a man can measure the height of a tree—or even a mountain—he cannot fathom how high the sky truly is.

Zhang Sanfeng had felt to the Zhentian Zhang Jie like an empty, hazy heavens,

neither knowing its height nor its width…

“Excellent! Your talent exceeds my expectations!” Wuyaszi’s heart swelled with joy.

Transmitting internal force is not exclusive to the Xiao Yao Sect, nor is it unique to the Northern Darkness Divine Art.

Any top-tier martial artist or elite scripture inevitably touches upon the secrets of internal force transmission.

Then why have no legendary masters emerged with centuries of accumulated internal force through generations of transmission?

The answer is talent limitation.

If transmitting internal force is like filling a bucket with water, then talent is the bucket itself.

The larger the bucket, the more water it can hold.

Although internal force can improve talent, the amount consumed to enhance talent is enormous.

For those with abysmal talent, it sometimes takes over a decade of transmitted internal force to raise their limit by just one year’s worth!

Moreover, after a certain point, diminishing returns set in:

once a threshold is reached, internal force barely improves talent at all.

Also, a person’s body has a hard limit to how much internal force it can endure.

If someone truly could inherit centuries of internal force,

either they were born with extraordinary talent, naturally strong enough to lift a cauldron like Xiang Yu,

or they had perfected an ultimate body-refining martial art like the Dragon and Elephant General Power.

A normal person forcing the inheritance of centuries of internal force would explode and die—no other outcome.

That’s why he didn’t transmit his internal force to Su Xinghe decades ago and have him avenge him,

partly because Su Xinghe refused to see him die after the transmission,

and partly because Su Xinghe’s talent was “too poor.”

Back then, his Northern Darkness Divine Art was only about forty years’ worth; even if he passed it on, Su Xinghe might retain only twenty years.

And twenty years of Northern Darkness Divine Art held no absolute advantage against Ding Chunqiu’s Dissolving Power Art.

Now, Zhang Jie’s talent surpasses his expectations—

seventy years of Northern Darkness internal force passed to Zhang Jie might leave him with fifty!

Fifty years of Northern Darkness internal force is more than enough to defeat Ding Chunqiu.

Overjoyed, Wuyaszi focused even more intently on controlling his internal force, striving to let Zhang Jie inherit even more.

If Zhang Jie knew Wuyaszi’s thoughts, he would smile silently.

Though his current body began as a beggar’s, with mediocre natural talent, he was a man with an external aid,

and with the help of the Zhentian Zhang Jie and the Water Margin Zhang Jie, his natural talent had long become peerless.

As for transmission, in Zhang Jie’s view, internal force could be divided into two types.

The first is what martial artists commonly mean when they say, “I have decades of internal force.”

This internal force determines a martial artist’s upper limit; Zhang Jie called it foundational internal force.

The second is internal force that can be rapidly restored after consumption.

Zhang Jie simply called this type consumptive internal force.

If you imagine both types as a complete reservoir,

then foundational internal force is the bricks, soil, and foundation determining the reservoir’s size, depth, and inflow/outflow speed.

And consumptive internal force is naturally the water inside the reservoir.

When martial artists speak of “cultivating,” they usually mean expanding the capacity of the Eight Extraordinary Meridians and the dantian.

So, martial artists are all bricklayers.

Transmission is when the transmitter directly passes foundational internal force to the recipient to build their reservoir.

Just as building a reservoir inevitably wastes or loses some bricks,

the foundational internal force transmitted also diminishes somewhat,

causing the recipient’s martial skill to usually fall short of the transmitter’s.

Worse, some recipients lack even the foundation to build the reservoir,

forcing the transmitter to sell off some bricks to buy land

(consume foundational internal force to build their base), drastically lowering transmission efficiency.

As for martial arts used in desperation, which leave the user with drastically reduced power or severe injury and shortened lifespan—

like the famed Devil’s Body Liberation Art—this becomes easy to understand.

While other martial arts merely release water to strike,

these arts literally pull out the bricks of the reservoir to hurl at enemies.

Between equal volumes of water and bricks, which causes greater harm? The answer is obvious.

Soon, the transmission was complete. Zhang Jie relaxed his entire body and cleared his mind.

He adopted natural breathing, waited until his breath stabilized, then focused his intent on his dantian, guiding the internal qi to slowly coalesce there,

feeling the warmth in his dantian, as if nurturing a newborn force.

When the internal qi in his dantian was sufficiently condensed, he began attempting to circulate it along specific meridian pathways.

From the dantian, through the Huiyin point, upward along the Du Meridian to the Baihui point at the crown,

then downward along the Ren Meridian back to the dantian, forming a circular flow—the initial Xiao Zhou Tian circulation.

Time passed slowly, and Zhang Jie had already preliminarily mastered the Northern Darkness Divine Art.

Within his body, his true qi formed a vortex spinning rapidly inward at his dantian,

and every acupoint across his body generated a vortex-like suction.

This force could absorb others’ internal force and transform it into Northern Darkness true qi.

Zhang Jie also discovered that the Northern Darkness Divine Art, like Wudang’s Nine Yang, possessed both yin and yang.

The Northern Darkness true qi was yang, searing like a furnace, and yin, colder than ice by many times, yet compatible with all martial arts;

it was immune to all poisons, fiercely dominant, and any casual strike carried immense power.

His true qi enhanced defense dramatically and could even rebound attacks against enemies.

When his cultivation was complete, Zhang Jie slowly opened his eyes.

Then he saw Wuyaszi, aged as if by over a decade,

his once-smooth face now covered in dense wrinkles,

his beard and hair turned sickly white.

“Master…”

Zhang Jie’s eyes welled with tears.

He knew Wuyaszi’s life had been sustained solely by these seventy years of Northern Darkness true qi.

Now that he had passed it on, Wuyaszi’s life was nearing its end.

Even though Zhang Jie had long known this outcome,

even though he had come solely for the Northern Darkness true qi and the Northern Darkness Divine Art,

seeing this moment still left him unable to remain unmoved.

After all, humans are not grass or trees—who can be without feeling?

In this brief time spent with Wuyaszi,

he had experienced warmth he had never known in over a decade as a beggar.

“Foolish child, your master has been liberated today—you should rejoice for me.”

Wuyaszi’s face showed no fear of death, only the joy of release.

For one as free-spirited as he, decades trapped in this secret chamber on Leigushan were worse than death.

Had it not been for his remaining internal force, his paralyzed body couldn’t even control his bowels!

He had once been one of the Three Immortals of Xiao Yao, alongside his senior sister Wu Xingyun and his junior sister Li Qiushui!

Had it not been for his burning hatred toward the traitor Ding Chunqiu, and his concern for his devoted disciple Su Xinghe, who had served him loyally for decades,

he would have freed himself long ago.

Today, having taken Zhang Jie—a disciple of such excellence—he now had hope of revenge,

and the revival of the Xiao Yao Sect was within reach. He died with no regrets.

“Disciple, how many years of Northern Darkness internal force do you have?”

If it’s less than fifty years, you still need to cultivate for several more years—don’t rush to seek out Ding Chunqiu.”

“That traitorous disciple, since acquiring the Divine Wood King Cauldron, has made his Dissolving Power Art far from negligible.”

Wuyaszi, fearing Zhang Jie’s youth might make him impulsive, warned him.

At the same time, a look of solemnity flashed in his eyes.

He had never imagined that Ding Chunqiu, without ever receiving the Northern Darkness Divine Art,

had managed to create the Dissolving Power Art based merely on fragments of information leaked by his sister Li Qiushui.

With such extraordinary talent, coupled with the aid of the Divine Wood King Cauldron—a rare treasure—

Ding Chunqiu, after decades of secluded cultivation, is likely only one step away from becoming a supreme expert.

Not to mention that Ding Chunqiu’s most terrifying strength lies in his poison-infused martial art, blending martial skill with toxins.

Under his poison, even a supreme expert could fall victim with the slightest lapse in caution.

“Master, I estimate I’ve inherited about sixty years of internal force.”

Zhang Jie roughly calculated and arrived at this answer.

“What? That much?”

Wuyaszi frowned, sinking into thought.

“That’s impossible!”

Wuyaszi muttered in disbelief.

This violates the fundamental principles of power transmission!

Even when his own master, Xiaoyaozi, transmitted power to him, it consumed nearly a third of his own.

Back then, when he first joined, Master Xiaoyaozi had deliberately transmitted ten years of internal force to him as a foundation.

Even so, the power he received was barely over six years—less than seven.

“Could Zhang Jie’s talent far surpass my own?”

Wuyaszi racked his brains but found no answer, attributing it to innate talent.

Zhang Jie, however, had his own suspicion:

His current talent certainly did not far surpass Wuyaszi’s—but the Nine Yang Divine Art internal force Wuyaszi had just absorbed had been shared through the Shared Space.

With the power of the Shared Space, even if it fused the magical energy of a xianxia world, the primordial chaos force of primordial demons from the Honghuang realm, the divine power of gods from the Panlong world, and the magic of a magical realm—all without any loss—Zhang Jie would not be surprised.

How much less so the mere Northern Darkness Divine Art qi?

The chaotic power of the primordial demonic gods and the divine power of the deities of the Panlong world

all fused together without any depletion, and Zhang Jie found nothing strange about it.

How much less so the mere true qi of the Northern Darkness Divine Art?