Tong Yu produced a thin manual, which shimmered with a faint golden glow. "This is the cultivation part of the Thirty-Six Heavenly Ways," she said with a smile. "I've already memorized it, so it's for you, Brother Lin Zhao."
Lin Zhao scratched his head. "Then... I accept your generous gift?"
"Mhm!"
Tong Yu nodded with a smile. In her heart, Lin Zhao's importance was equal to that of her master. After all, without Lin Zhao, Tong Yu would never have met her master and might have died in that massacre. Even if Lin Zhao had been greedy and wanted the sword techniques of the Thirty-Six Heavenly Ways as well, she would have secretly given them to him.
"Old Daoist."
Lin Zhao held the cultivation manual of the Thirty-Six Heavenly Ways, cupped his fists towards the sky, and chuckled, "Though I feel I don't deserve it, I won't refuse! Thank you, I'll treat you to a drink next time you descend to the mortal realm!"
With that, he picked up the manual for the Thirty-Six Heavenly Ways, returned to his residence, and lay on his bed, poring over it. In an instant, a stream of golden text shimmered in his sea of consciousness. Soon, the progress bar filled, and the manual vanished from his hand. In its place, a golden passive skill icon appeared in his skill list:
[Thirty-Six Heavenly Ways] (???): Passive Skill. Cultivation technique of the Thirty-Six Heavenly Ways. All sword-based skill damage +25%, and allows the flying swords nurtured in the Immortal Gourd to launch attacks using the Thirty-Six Heavenly Ways, greatly enhancing their lethality.
Lin Zhao was dumbfounded. What was a supreme technique? This must be it. The cultivation of the Thirty-Six Heavenly Ways didn't even display a rank, not S-tier, nor Immortal-grade. This likely meant it was "forbidden." Judging by the skill effects, the mere 25% increase to all sword-based skill damage was already incredibly formidable. Coupled with the ability to significantly boost the lethality of the Mayfly flying swords, it was simply invincible.
Furthermore, the Thirty-Six Heavenly Ways had levels. It was likely that each trigger would increase the skill proficiency. This meant Lin Zhao couldn't slack off recently and needed to go out and grind some monsters.
Therefore, he packed his belongings and set off in the afternoon, with Spirit Badger Valley as his destination.
A short while later, he arrived at the depths of Spirit Badger Valley and began grinding a group of level 165 Flame Badgers. These Flame Badgers were Ghost-God tier monsters, with an extremely low chance of dropping Ghost-God artifacts. Although no small monster had ever dropped a Ghost-God artifact in the national server yet, this slim chance drove players mad. It was like a lottery; the grand prize was right there, but it would never be yours.
"Beep!"
In the guild channel, Lin Zhao said, "I'm leveling up around Spirit Badger Valley. If the Brotherhood shows up again, let me know their coordinates immediately, and I'll go meet them."
"Be careful," Shen Xingchen said with a frown. "Lin Zhao, you need to be wary. After they're cornered, they might resort to unconventional invincibility tactics, and you might suffer."
"Huh?" Lin Zhao asked in surprise. "Xingchen, can you elaborate? What kind of tactics?"
"Tiered use of invincibility tactics." Shen Xingchen explained. "Imagine this: when you attack Passerby Wuming, he immediately activates his invincibility skill and then attacks you. Do you have to activate your invincibility? Once you do, they have ten people, and they can stagger their invincibility times. Every second, someone will be chasing you with invincibility active, and you can't attack everyone simultaneously. This way, you risk being killed."
"Understood," Lin Zhao said, his heart sinking. "Xingchen, you're truly meticulous."
Shen Xingchen smiled. "But there's no need to worry too much. If the situation becomes unfavorable, just use invincibility to return to town and start over. It's difficult for them to kill you, but it's not that difficult for you to kill them."
Ding Chi added, "Exactly, Ah Zhao should do that. There are truly few people on the human race's side in the national server who can suppress Passerby Wuming and Ding Chunqiu when they team up. Letting them run wild in the Northern Region would not be good. Conversely, if Ah Zhao can defeat them a few more times, this Brotherhood might lay low for a while."
"The arrogant fear those who don't fear death, it's always been like this," Zhang Jun frowned. "Don't let Lin Zhao handle it alone. We also need to select experts from the guild and form a hundred-man team to hunt down Passerby Wuming and his crew. We can't let them be too rampant. If our Scarlet Moon Knights can form 10-20 hundred-man teams that can definitely defeat them, it would be enough to bring peace to half of Spirit Badger Valley."
"Da Jun is right," Lin Zhao said with a smile. "A Xue, you organize this. I'll leave this matter to you."
"Understood," Chen Xue nodded with a smile.
Lin Zhao continued to level up. When he charged into a group of Flame Badgers and swung his sword wildly, and then defaulted to using his orange gourd to launch flying sword attacks, he found he could no longer default. This was because the orange gourd's attack now had two options: "Launch an attack in the normal way" and "Launch an attack using the Thirty-Six Heavenly Ways." Thus, Lin Zhao chose to default to the Thirty-Six Heavenly Ways as the orange gourd's attack method. In an instant, thirty-six Mayfly flying swords continuously shot out of the gourd like swimming fish.
This time, the Mayfly flying swords' attacks were clearly different. After one wave of flying swords shot through the bodies of a group of Flame Badgers like a dense, sharp rain, another wave attacked from the flank, followed by a wave attacking from the front. The attack pattern had completely changed, becoming quite strategic and fluid. Furthermore, the flying swords' speed and attack rate had significantly increased. In an instant, the Flame Badgers cried out incessantly, their health bars dropping rapidly. Under the onslaught of the Thirty-Six Heavenly Ways, they fell in large numbers within moments.
Lin Zhao frowned. They were dying so fast!
He continued to aggro monsters, launching attacks with his sword Lìquán and twenty flying swords, constantly replenishing his health through lifesteal. As for the Mayfly flying swords in the orange gourd, he no longer needed to manage them; they automatically locked onto and attacked nearby targets. When Lin Zhao didn't intervene, they would prioritize attacking clustered monsters.
When the Mayfly flying swords shot out of the orange gourd and launched attacks, the proficiency bar for the Thirty-Six Heavenly Ways passive skill began to steadily increase. One could imagine that the higher the level, the stronger the lethality of the Thirty-Six Heavenly Ways, as if a new treasure had been unlocked. After a few minutes, when Lin Zhao checked the damage statistics again, he was so delighted he could barely close his mouth. The overall damage from the Mayfly flying swords had surprisingly risen to 52%!
This was truly terrifying. Lin Zhao was overjoyed. With this output, the Mayfly flying swords could instantly kill enemies. More importantly, the Mayfly flying swords released from the orange gourd could fly 200 yards to attack monsters. This meant they could also kill people from 200 yards away in PvP, which was somewhat overpowered. Furthermore, the Mayfly flying swords were too small, like gray gnats, and were almost invisible without careful observation, thus possessing the effect of killing without a trace. Now, with the assistance of the Thirty-Six Heavenly Ways cultivation, Lin Zhao's overall killing power had been elevated to a new level!
He happily ground monsters and leveled up.
As dusk approached, with a chime, the passive skill Thirty-Six Heavenly Ways upgraded again, now at level 4. Lin Zhao had been grinding monsters continuously and was feeling a bit dizzy. At this moment, a "beep" sounded, and a message from Ding Chi arrived: "Ah Zhao, Passerby Wuming's group is out killing again. Real-time coordinates: [Spirit Badger Valley] (2112,10023). We're sending people over. What do you say?"
"I'm coming too!"
"Ok!"
Lin Zhao immediately drew his sword, summoned the flying sword Hong Ye, and transformed into a fiery red streak of light along the ground, charging towards the coordinates. Although he was already the strongest sword cultivator in the national server, he was still learning. Sword cultivators should not fly too high when ambushing, because sword cultivators would leave a trail of sword light in the air when flying. Therefore, to catch the opponent off guard, one must adopt a "low-altitude penetration" method. When the sword cultivator's position was very close to the treetops, it would be impossible to detect from a distance.
"Whoosh!"
Wherever the sword light passed, the branches above the jungle bowed their heads. Even many players grinding in the forest looked up at the sword cultivator streaking across the sky, their eyes filled with envy and astonishment. That sword cultivator was not a Golden Core, but a Nascent Soul sword cultivator. The national server currently had only one Nascent Soul sword cultivator, the one who frequented the Peak Villa every day.
A short while later, Lin Zhao lowered his altitude and flew his sword into the jungle. This area was a terrain where forest and stalagmites intertwined. At this moment, the end of a battle was unfolding ahead. Bodies lay scattered on the ground; they were all members of a small guild from White Emperor City. Passerby Wuming, Ding Chunqiu, and others were finishing off the last few people with their swords, reaping bountiful rewards. The advantage of players from the four northern tribes was that they could gain a portion of the experience points from killing others, so their levels tended to be higher.
Lin Zhao descended gracefully, his figure gliding past and leaning against a stalagmite rooted in the ground. His back was to Passerby Wuming and his group, about 80 yards apart. This distance already exceeded the range at which the minimap displayed hostile player red dots. The next moment, Lin Zhao subtly raised his hand, twisted open the orange gourd, and released his Mayfly flying swords, locking onto Ding Chunqiu, Li Canghai, and others as targets.
"Huh?!" Ling Ren Fazhi slapped his own neck as if he had been bitten by something. He frowned and said, "Damn... it's already winter, why are there still mosquitoes? I just got bitten by a mosquito."
However, his neck showed fine bloody holes and was oozing blood.
"Damn it!" Xi He Da Guo Kui pointed, looking as if he had seen a ghost. "You idiot Fazhi! Can a mosquito bite off 62% of your health? Haven't you looked at your health bar?"
"Health bar..." Ling Ren Fazhi, in the moment of realization, his body went limp and he fell down. Immediately after, Xi He Da Guo Kui's health bar also began to drop rapidly. The thirty-six Mayfly flying swords were much faster than before. Under the control of the Thirty-Six Heavenly Ways, their stealth was far superior to before. Two seconds later, Xi He Da Guo Kui also fell.
"Damn it!" Ding Chunqiu exclaimed in exasperation. "It's Lin Zhao's flying sword attack! Quickly, find him!"
"Son of a bitch!" Passerby Wuming roared, flying his sword dozens of meters to the south, but he saw no one. Behind him, Jiumozhi, Qiu Qianren, and Ben Moruo fell silently one after another, all killed by the Mayfly flying swords. Yet, this group of people didn't even know where the target was.
Behind the stalagmite.
Lin Zhao stood there quietly. This feeling was too exhilarating!