Chapter 226: The Dao of Water

Water Blade Art was a Dao method created by the ancestors of the human race, and its origin was even earlier than the appearance of the first Immortal Monarch. Water Blade Art was originally a water control technique, a technique used to pump water for irrigation. Later, some people changed it to use this technique to sweep courtyards during important ceremonies such as festivals, and its application became more widespread.

The first book in Little Wei Yuan's hand told this history.

Of course, the Immortal Monarch would definitely not write dryly, and he also wrote in several corresponding spells from his early years, so Little Wei Yuan also learned Pumping Art, Spraying Art, and Spring Art.

Little Wei Yuan patiently opened the second book, and after reading it in the blink of an eye, his face didn't look right.

The second book wrote about the first few Water Blade Arts. When predecessors used the Spraying Art, in order to clear stubborn dirt, they made the water flow thinner and faster, and when it broke through a certain limit, the water became a blade, capable of breaking stone and dividing gold.

The whole book talked about the Dao method structure of this most primitive version of Water Blade Art. The Dao method structure of the contemporary Water Blade Art that Little Wei Yuan learned was extremely exquisite and ingenious, with a core no larger than a bean; so-called learning a spell was just memorizing the entire Dao method structure, then constructing it without a single error, and then inputting Dao power, which would trigger one or several water blades.

As for why the Dao method structure was like that, it was like one plus one equals two; everyone felt it should be like that, and no one asked why.

The more Dao power input into Water Blade Art, the greater the power, but the Dao method structure had its upper limit; when it reached a certain level, it couldn't contain more Dao power, and inputting more would cause it to collapse and explode, instead hurting the practitioner's Primordial Spirit.

And in the two books in front of Little Wei Yuan, the Dao method structure was extremely complex, actually as large as a house!

With Little Wei Yuan's strong spiritual sense, he had to read it repeatedly three or four times to truly remember it. One must know that when he had achieved some success in cultivation after the age of ten, Little Wei Yuan could remember a history book of ten thousand words without a single error after reading it once. At that time, five or six people in the class were at a similar level, and the few stupidest people in the class needed to read it three times to remember it.

So with Little Wei Yuan's effort, he learned another somewhat powerful Rapid Flow Water Blade Art, which was just a bit big and useless.

A sense of unease rose in Little Wei Yuan's heart; he opened the fourth book, read it slowly, then read it from the beginning, and repeated it five times before he understood eighty percent of it.

Little Wei Yuan knew that the remaining twenty percent was the essence.

Little Wei Yuan steadied his mind and picked up the fifth book. This time, thirty percent of it he didn't understand. The proportion didn't seem high, but Little Wei Yuan knew his own situation; generally speaking, he didn't understand any of the parts of this book that weren't nonsense.

These two books detailed the Dao method structure of the Rapid Flow Water Blade Art and broke it down into dozens of large and small parts. The fourth book pointed out that some structures were actually useless and only served a decorative role. Seeing this, Little Wei Yuan suddenly realized; no wonder he felt that the Dao method structure of this spell was magnificent and atmospheric, actually having bird and beast patterns, looking quite good.

Decorative structures were not only useless but also successfully increased the difficulty of casting this spell. To put it vividly, this spell could originally be learned by fourth-rank Chichao Sect disciples, but after adding these decorations, it had to be a high-level cultivator of the Grand Void Palace to comprehend it.

Immortal Monarch Pei Hai guessed that in that era of master-apprentice systems and oral transmission without written records, these decorative structures were set by teachers to prevent their apprentices from learning.

In this way, it was normal for apprentices to fail to learn for decades, and when the master was about to die, if the apprentice was still filial, he would teach the apprentice the Dao method with the decorative structures removed. If the apprentice was unfilial, he would let him live with this big and useless Dao method.

However, heaven has unpredictable storms, and it was unknown which generation of master died early and didn't have time to pass down this secret, so the Dao method structure with many decorations was passed down like this. This Dao method structure had its advantages; it looked good, it looked difficult to learn, and it had the style of an immortal technique.

Little Wei Yuan didn't understand why the Immortal Monarch thought some structures that clearly had functions were decorative structures.

The fifth book alone talked about three small structures, believing that one could be removed and two could be improved, and detailed the principles. Little Wei Yuan read it once and learned the improved version of the Rapid Flow Water Blade Art; the spell's power increased by ten percent, and the improvement could be called immediate.

As before, Little Wei Yuan learned the spell, but didn't understand the principle part at all. Tinghai Xianjun Monarch was the Immortal Monarch; even for whether a strand of Dao power should bend upward or downward, he could write thousands of words.

Fortunately, in order to take care of the juniors who were eager to learn, Immortal Monarch Tinghai left a sentence at the end of the book: If there is anything you don't understand, you can exchange for my humble work "Principles of Dao Method Structure."

Little Wei Yuan's heart only rippled slightly at this time, and he immediately sacrificed Nether-soil to exchange for the Dao book. But this "Principles of Dao Method Structure" actually had to be exchanged three times to be complete.

Looking at the twenty books in front of him, Little Wei Yuan opened the first one with the heart of "at worst, death."

This one was a general outline, telling the evolution of Dao method structures from the ancient to the middle ages, listing a total of thirty-six core structures and seventy-two strange gate structures. If these twenty books could be understood, Little Wei Yuan should be able to learn one hundred and eight Dao arts, and the most core Dao arts of the early human race were all here.

If they could be understood...

Actually, whether they could be understood or not, the Dao arts could be learned, but Little Wei Yuan was unwilling.

These twenty books had already broken away from the Water Blade Art and began to talk about the basic principles of Dao method structures, already somewhat close to the Great Dao.

Little Wei Yuan's heart was as still as water, flipping through them one by one, only reading through without seeking deep understanding. After reading, Little Wei Yuan found that he indeed needed to exchange for four more books.

Little Wei Yuan sacrificed Nether-soil to exchange for the Dao book, and thus ten more books appeared in front of him. Little Wei Yuan opened them and found that books were valued for their essence, not their quantity. Any one of these ten was harder than the previous twenty combined.

These books started from the principles of the five elements of heaven and earth, telling the essence of Dao power, how to construct Dao method structures from Dao power, and some techniques for constructing Dao method structures.

Although Little Wei Yuan didn't understand, he sighed in his heart that this was the Great Dao. Sure enough, the closer to the Great Dao, the more difficult it was, and the techniques told later were all arts, which were not worth mentioning compared to the Dao.

But what followed were all further explanations of the arts.

Sacrifice Nether-soil, exchange for Dao book.

Then Little Wei Yuan found that the Dao of arts was not simple at all. How difficult it was, Little Wei Yuan didn't know, anyway, it was very, very difficult. This time, among the thirty-odd books, not only was there no repetition, but there was also no nonsense, and all the dry goods could make Little Wei Yuan not understand, and he didn't know why he didn't understand.

For example, a book talked about the internal structural change principle of changing from a water blade to an ice blade, which made Little Wei Yuan start to doubt the whole world, subconsciously wanting to break everything at hand to see.

At this time, the Moon Laurel immortal branch was quietly inserted beside the Jade Mountain, enjoying the peace of the years.

Then Little Wei Yuan saw a sentence like a curse again: If there is anything you don't understand, you can exchange for my humble work...

Sacrifice Nether-soil, exchange for Dao book.

!.

Sacrifice Nether-soil, exchange for Dao book.

Sacrifice Nether-soil, exchange for Dao book...

With the new Dao book in hand, Little Wei Yuan knew that the Dao of arts was not difficult, but the extreme of arts was truly difficult.

For example, one book talked about the Immortal Monarch specifically studying the flight process of a single water blade in order to maximize the power of a single water blade.

In the eyes of the Immortal Monarch, at this time, wind was water, and water was wind. The speed of the water blade was fast to the extreme, and the wind became a huge obstacle, and then the whole book was talking about how the wind flowed past the two sides of the water blade, what kind of force it would exert, what shape of water blade was most suitable for breaking the wind, and even how to use these forces to make the water blade change direction, and so on and so forth.

These few books were all written after Immortal Monarch Tinghai became an immortal.

Up to this point, Little Wei Yuan had spent over twenty thousand merit, exchanged for over two hundred and seventy Dao books, filling half a room. Little Wei Yuan suddenly understood that these two hundred Dao books were a complete path to immortality.

Tinghai Xianjun Monarch did not hide his secrets, displaying his own Great Dao completely in front of everyone; any disciple of the Grand Void Palace with enough merit could exchange for them, and not a single book in the whole set required heavenly merit. It was just that the Grand Void Palace disciples chose to turn a blind eye and didn't even mention it.

After all, it was not shameful to be inferior in strength, but it was truly shameful to be inferior in intelligence; walking this path of Immortal Monarch Tinghai was easy to lose one's Dao heart and breed inner demons.

Little Wei Yuan silently put down the few books on the extreme of arts in his hand, arranged them neatly, and then bowed to the whole set of books. In front of this pile of Dao books, Little Wei Yuan felt that he didn't seem to have a brain, and was only fit to be a mount for an immortal.

He suddenly thought that Xu Wenwu's so-called higher mathematics and higher physics from his world were blown to the heavens, but compared to this Immortal Monarch's path, they were probably just so-so.

After steadying his mind, Little Wei Yuan began to recall why he had exchanged for the entire path to immortality. At the beginning, he just wanted to learn an advanced Dao art.

Did he learn Water Blade Storm? He learned it. Did he understand it? He didn't understand it.

Not seeking deep understanding was a great taboo in immortal cultivation, so in order to understand, Little Wei Yuan kept exchanging all the way until he had to face the cold reality of being inferior in intelligence.

Little Wei Yuan suddenly understood that perhaps there were many, many advanced Dao arts similar to Water Blade Storm.

Now Little Wei Yuan knew how Immortal Monarch Tinghai's resources for becoming an immortal came from.

At this time, in the studies of many seniors in the Grand Void Palace, there was a bookshelf specifically for these Dao books. Little Wei Yuan believed that the vast majority were brand new.

(End of chapter) ===== CHAPTER 227 =====