People say that when you’re speechless, you’ll just laugh.
Before this, Yang Mi didn’t really understand that.
But now, she finally got it.
Looking at Jiang Nian, who had just thrown her to the ground and now looked completely innocent,
Yang Mi took a difficult, deep breath and forced a twisted smile onto her face:
“I believe you, so can you please stop locking my neck?”
As soon as she said that, Jiang Nian realized that his hand, somehow, had gotten trapped by Yang Mi’s neck.
“Whoa, Mi Jie, what are you doing? Don’t do anything drastic!”
“Do I look like I’m trying to do something drastic? You let go of me right now, I can barely breathe!”
Hearing that, Jiang Nian finally struggled to pull his hand free from Yang Mi’s neck.
Yang Mi, feeling like she had just escaped death, clutched her neck and coughed violently. Between coughs, she said, “Jiang Nian, are you trying to kill me?”
Jiang Nian scratched his head: “Believe me, this was really just an accident. You know I’m a martial artist. My kung fu is ingrained in my bones. Having a bit of a muscle reflex, that’s pretty normal, right?”
“Normal, my foot! You—”
Yang Mi wanted to say more, but the words got stuck in her throat.
Because there was no point in asking further.
What’s done is done, what could she do about it anyway?
Besides, judging by the wave of air Jiang Nian had slashed out earlier…
It wasn’t entirely impossible that his martial arts practice had created muscle memory.
“But… is this really something a human being can control?”
Recalling what she had seen earlier, Yang Mi gave Jiang Nian a deep, thoughtful look.
Originally, she had only been attracted to his looks, but now it seemed she had unexpectedly stumbled upon a real gem.
Great acting skills, a fantastic body, and on top of that, a highly skilled martial artist.
“A real catch!”
Yang Mi made her assessment of Jiang Nian in her mind.
She no longer saw him as just a simple bed buddy, but as someone worth investing in and cultivating seriously.
After that, the two exchanged a few more awkward pleasantries.
Since she had gotten dust all over her clothes from being thrown by Jiang Nian and felt dirty, Yang Mi went back to her room to take a shower.
Meanwhile, Jiang Nian was practicing his martial arts while pondering his own situation.
After running through it a couple more times,
Jiang Nian finally understood why his internal energy had been activated!
It was because the moves of this [Sword-Breaking Technique] connected directly with Jiang Nian’s meridians!
And internal energy is a special kind of energy that resides in the middle dantian and needs the meridians to be brought out.
This meant that whenever Jiang Nian used the [Sword-Breaking Technique], without even realizing it, he would trigger his internal energy, making it attach to his sword and slash out a wave of air.
At first glance, this might seem pretty great.
He had somehow stumbled upon a supernatural ability.
But in reality, for Jiang Nian, this wasn’t a good thing at all!
Because internal energy has another name: Acquired Qi!
Anyone with a little bit of spiritual or traditional background has basically heard this saying:
“The heavens have three treasures: sun, moon, and stars; the earth has three treasures: water, fire, and wind; humans have three treasures: essence, energy, and spirit!”
This is a common folk saying.
But it contains the cultivation methods of Taoist internal alchemy.
As we all know, in Taoist belief, the foundation of human life is ‘Essence, Energy, and Spirit’.
Among these, Qi (Energy) is the source of all things.
The Taiping Shengjun Mi Zhi states: “It originates from the Qi of Yin and Yang. This Qi transforms into Essence, Essence transforms into Spirit, Spirit transforms into Enlightenment. Therefore, those who wish for longevity should guard their Qi while uniting it with Spirit and Essence, not letting it leave their form.”
To put it simply, it means that if you want to live a long time, you can’t squander recklessly; you have to preserve the good stuff inside your body.
Normally, this wouldn’t be a problem.
But the crucial issue right now was that Jiang Nian was leaking.
Whenever he practiced the [Sword-Breaking Technique], his internal energy would be drawn out by the movements themselves, uncontrollably spilling outwards.
Basically, after practicing once or twice, his internal energy would be completely depleted.
And if his internal energy, which is ‘Acquired Qi’, gets used up, then the next thing his body would start consuming would be ‘Innate Qi’.
That’s the common idea: use up your mana first, then use up your health points.
Therefore, Jiang Nian currently had only three choices.
One, just keep practicing slowly. Getting some proficiency points is better than getting none at all.
Two, simply stop practicing the [Sword-Breaking Technique], solving the problem at its source.
Three, force his way through it, gamble on his fate, and see if he’s tough enough to survive.
First of all, practicing slowly just isn’t realistic.
He would run out of internal energy after one or two practices, and it would take ages to recover. That means, at this rate, he’d be lucky to get three or four proficiency points a day.
At this pace, he probably wouldn’t even master this martial art in a whole year.
The payoff would be ridiculously low!
As for forcing his way through, Jiang Nian couldn’t do that either.
Having lived two lives, he cherished his own life greatly and didn’t want to end up broken.
But giving up on practicing entirely didn’t sit well with him either.
So, after thinking it over for a long time, Jiang Nian finally decided on a fourth path—improvement!
He knew this was absurd.
Using his own knowledge to improve a completely made-up martial art.
It wasn’t even a question of difficulty anymore; it was just fundamentally unrealistic.
But for now, this was all he could do.
He couldn’t just do nothing, right?
His name was Jiang Nian, not ‘Knight’!
With that thought, he pulled himself together and threw himself into the improvement process.
At the same time.
“Did you find what I asked you to find?”
At a private club in the capital,
Liu Kaiwei sent a golf ball flying with a thwack and asked the person beside him.
Hearing this, the man in the black suit nodded, opened a pre-prepared file, and handed it over.
“Mr. Liu, this is the information we found. Please take a look.”
Liu Kaiwei looked over, and the first thing he saw was Jiang Nian’s personal information.
[Jiang Nian, Male, 20 years old.]
[Born in a remote village in Harbin, Heilongjiang Province. Got into Harbin No.3 High School with excellent grades, consistently ranked in the top ten of his grade year after year. Highly praised by teachers, good relationships with classmates.]
[However, after graduating at eighteen, he turned down invitations from all the prestigious universities and came to the capital alone to become an actor.]
[According to the investigation, during his two years in the capital, his main sources of income were film sets and bars.]
After reading this information, Liu Kaiwei frowned.
Ever since he had guessed that Yang Mi was involved with Jiang Nian,
Liu Kaiwei had sent people to secretly investigate Jiang Nian’s background, planning to find a chance for revenge.
And in Liu Kaiwei’s imagination,
Jiang Nian’s identity, while maybe not astonishing, should at least be more substantial than what this file suggested.
“Are you sure this is the person I asked you to investigate?”
Liu Kaiwei asked, his face full of suspicion.
Hearing this, the private investigator nodded: “I’m sure.”
“Then how much in assets does he have?”
“No assets. According to our investigation, the amount of money he has at his disposal has probably never exceeded fifty thousand.”
“What about his parents?”
“Both are ordinary workers, no status, no social connections. They were laid off in 2009 and currently run a small convenience store in the countryside.”
“Damn it!”
Liu Kaiwei cursed angrily.
Now he clearly understood that he had been played the other day.
Jiang Nian was never the owner of that house.
He was just a thug Yang Mi had sent out!
“Bitch! Bastard!”
“How dare you humiliate me like this!”
“Do they really think I’m some kind of pushover?!”
