Unparalleled Double Harmony

Chapter 598 Transcendence (Part 2)

Early spring, afternoon.

Inside the Murong residence.

"Father, you've finally arrived! Your son greets you." Murong Xiao, who was practicing his martial arts in his room, heard footsteps outside and quickly recognized that it was his father. So he immediately stopped practicing and went out to greet him.

"Heh... It's been a long time. Xiao'er, you look quite well. I suppose your skills have improved again?" Murong Shu was also beaming and full of energy.

From their conversation, it's not hard to tell that they haven't had a private conversation like they did when they first acquired the Heavenly Silkworm Divine Skill.

Of course, this wasn't because there was any rift between the two; it was just that both father and son had been quite busy lately.

Everyone knows what Murong Shu is busy with: Since it is now spring of the twenty-second year of Yongtai, the new session of the Young Heroes Gathering will be held in half a year. Therefore, as the head of the family who is the "organizer", he has a lot of trivial matters to oversee and implement every day.

As for Murong Xiao, he was undoubtedly busy "practicing martial arts".

In any case, his whole family, as well as some of the closer servants and retainers in the mansion, already know that Ah Xiao's health has been "cured," so he can directly declare to people that "I want to spend more time studying martial arts on my own these days," in exchange for a lot of time alone.

After all, in other people's eyes, Ah Xiao was a person who worked extremely hard in everything he did, and he never gave up studying martial arts even when he was in a wheelchair. Now that he has recovered, isn't it perfectly normal for him to work hard to practice martial arts?
In addition, Ah Xiao's actions also affected two other people, namely his two half-brothers, Murong Ji and Murong Dian.

These two guys didn't actually have a bad relationship with Ah Xiao before; at most, they just couldn't get along. In contrast, it was the brothers Murong Ji and Murong Dian who were constantly arguing and fighting amongst themselves...

This is normal, because until a few months ago, they thought that the "future head of the family" could only be chosen from among the two brothers, and that Ah-Xiao and San-Ya-Tou were not qualified at all. So all they needed to do was think about how to appear a little better than the other party.

However, everything is different now—Ah Xiao, this "useless person," can now move freely like a normal person, and has even started practicing martial arts. Who can beat him?

Therefore, both Murong Ji and Murong Dian chose to seize the opportunity while Murong Xiao had not yet mastered his martial arts skills, and prepared to make a good impression.

In just these past few months, these two spoiled brats have devoted all the time and energy they used to spend on eating, drinking, having fun, and tripping each other up to practicing their skills and helping Murong Shu with household affairs.

Then do you think... Murong Shu's mood has been bad lately?
In terms of external affairs, the Murong family is about to hold the largest gathering of young heroes in its history, in order to restore the family's prestige in the martial arts world.

As for the family, Ah Xiao, whom they have chosen as their future successor, is currently studying the Heavenly Silkworm Divine Skill. When he succeeds in the future, they can change the name of this martial art and say that it is a martial art created by the current generation of the Murong family. In this way, they can rightfully claim it as their own and pass it down as a family martial art.

Even his two good-for-nothing sons have become very motivated and ambitious during this period, which has saved him a lot of trouble.

Therefore, for Murong Shu, these past few months can be described as another peak in his life after reaching middle age. Everything around him is developing in a positive direction, and the future is bright.

By now, many readers have probably guessed that at this point, the saying "extreme joy begets sorrow" is about to come knocking.

"Dad, please sit down first. Let's sit down and talk."

"okay."

Murong Xiao invited his father into the house and then closed the door behind him.

“I’ll get straight to the point.” A few seconds later, Murong Xiao quickly returned to his father’s side and sat down, saying, “I have completely deciphered the secret of the ‘Heavenly Silkworm Divine Skill’.”

"Oh?" Murong Shu was taken aback for a moment upon hearing this, but his face immediately lit up with joy. "Hahaha... Good, as expected of a filial son, you did well!"

Upon hearing such astonishing news, he was only stunned for a second before bursting into laughter without hesitation, showing that he had no doubt about what his son had said.

"Father, don't rush to praise me, let me finish speaking first..." However, Murong Xiao's expression at this moment looked rather serious.

Seeing this, Murong Shu also stopped smiling and said in a deep voice, "What? Could it be... that the drawback of this martial art that makes people turn into cocoons is still unresolved?"

“Well… let me start from the beginning.” Ah Xiao didn’t answer the question directly, but instead continued slowly, “As far as I know, this ‘Heavenly Silkworm Divine Skill’ is a martial art that has undergone many integrations and changes. If I’m not mistaken, its origin should be a fragment of some kind of evil demonic skill.”

“Hmm…” Murong Shu was not surprised by this statement. After all, he had seen a lot of scenes and information that caused his sanity to drop in the “Heavenly Silkworm Cave” and was already mentally prepared for this. “It seems that the words left on the stone tablet by that nameless senior were not false.”

"No, no," Murong Xiao shook his head and said, "The way Hero Yun died has no direct relation to the source of the demonic art, but is related to the Miao Gu technique that was incorporated into this martial art."

Upon hearing this, Murong Shu immediately recalled the celestial silkworms she had seen in the cave: "So, the 'celestial silkworm' in this Celestial Silkworm Divine Skill actually comes from Gu magic?"

Murong Xiao replied, "'Heavenly Silkworm Divine Skill' is just the name used by the Wudang School outsiders. What this martial art was originally called, only Hero Yun and those who experienced the grudges back then probably know... However, I can roughly deduce and reconstruct the process by which this martial art gradually changed..."

He paused for a moment, then continued in detail: "Initially, there was a demonic art. Although its power was astonishing, it would affect the mind of the practitioner, turning them into a madman who could not control his own desires."

"Later, for reasons unknown, someone combined a part of this demonic skill with a part of another extraordinary skill that could absorb other people's internal energy, and created a new martial art."

"But this new martial art clearly has a bigger problem..."

"You must understand this, Father. Generally speaking, unless the nature of the internal energy practiced by two people is very similar, or the recipient has some special talent or opportunity, it is impossible for a person to take away or receive too much internal energy from another person in a short period of time. This is because if there is too much of that 'external internal energy,' it will cause the recipient's internal energy to become disordered. At best, it will cause the recipient to suffer from qi deviation, and at worst, it will cause the recipient to die on the spot."

"The person who created that new martial art was undoubtedly possessed by a demonic possession... But he was a ruthless man, who actually thought of using Miao Gu techniques to reshape his body and forcibly solve the problem."

"This is the truth about the Heavenly Silkworm Technique, the true origin of the Heavenly Silkworm Technique."

"The true Heavenly Silkworm Skill does not require 'complete lack of martial arts' to cultivate. The practitioner can also absorb the power of others at will, as long as it is within the limits of their body's tolerance."

Murong Shu's face changed color upon hearing this: "Could it be... that the Jade Bridge Master of Wudang back then was...?"

“That’s right,” Murong Xiaodao said. “Father, you are indeed quick-witted. Back then, Wudang was able to defeat the Wanyuan Sect because of the Heavenly Silkworm Skill. That’s also why Master Yuqiao’s personality changed drastically later and caused chaos in the martial arts world.”

"And what about the Heavenly Silkworm Divine Skill that Hero Yun practices?" Murong Shu asked again.

"Naturally, it was modified by the senior masters of the Wudang Sect from the original Heavenly Silkworm Skill," Murong Xiao replied. "Back then, Wudang was indeed full of talented people. They directly removed the 'absorbing internal energy' part of the original Heavenly Silkworm Skill and used the superior internal energy principles of Taoism to reverse the original demonic skill's principle of causing mental confusion, creating the brand new 'Heavenly Silkworm Divine Skill'."

"At first glance, this Heavenly Silkworm Divine Skill is stronger than the original Heavenly Silkworm Skill in every aspect, except that it requires 'starting from scratch' and the speed of mastery is not as fast as the original Heavenly Silkworm Skill."

"But there were clearly some things they hadn't considered, simply because... their understanding of Miao witchcraft was too superficial."

Murong Shu then revealed a look of sudden realization: "I understand! The creator who incorporated Gu techniques into this demonic art back then was thinking based on the demonic art. Changing the technique without changing the Gu techniques might not be noticeable in the short term, but it will change over time!"

“That’s right.” Murong Xiao nodded. “The creator of the Heavenly Silkworm Technique incorporated Gu techniques in order to allow the body to ‘forcibly operate the incomplete demonic art’ and ‘coexist with a large number of different internal energies within the body.’ But the Heavenly Silkworm Divine Art has changed precisely these two things…”

"The seniors of Wudang regarded the Heavenly Silkworm Skill as a 'whole,' but they knew very little about the Gu technique part of this whole, so they dared not act rashly."

"So they used Taoist internal energy cultivation techniques to supplement and modify the original demonic energy cultivation techniques, and removed the ability to absorb internal energy. Then they thought that as long as a person with no martial arts skills practiced it, they could be 'reborn' through this cultivation method and everything would be fine."

"Unfortunately... as it turns out, this only delayed the time when the Gu technique would malfunction."

Murong Shu's expression changed again: "So, Xiao'er, you've already come up with a method to modify your cultivation technique that's even more sophisticated than those advanced masters from the Wudang Sect?"

Murong Xiao shook his head, but smiled.

It wasn't a bitter smile.

"I don't know I can modify internal energy... No matter how fast I learn, in such a short time, I can't possibly have a deeper understanding than those Wudang seniors who have specialized in Taoist internal energy for decades." Ah Xiao then smiled and said, "But what if we start with the part of the 'creator' who might have some mental issues?"

He paused for a moment, then continued, "In our family library, there aren't many manuals on superior internal martial arts, but we have countless books on human anatomy, medicine, and toxicology, not to mention those related to Miao witchcraft... And I've been immersed in that kind of knowledge for many years."

His words, and the smile on his face that seemed to say "I have already achieved something," only made his father feel confused.

However, this cannot be blamed on Murong Shu. After all, what Ah Xiao wanted to express was probably that he had created a shortcut for cultivating a peerless skill using scientific methods; this was... a bit too advanced.

"Xiao'er, what exactly did you..." Murong Shu hesitated for a moment, wanting to ask his son what he had done.

Ah Xiao then stood up and said, "Father, come with me first. When we get there, you'll 'see' it with your own eyes and you'll understand."

(End of this chapter)