Once this thought took root, it was like a bucket of ice water poured over his head, instantly drenching and extinguishing all his former killing intent and greed.
Without hesitation, he turned around, true qi bursting beneath his feet as he prepared to step through the air and flee.
The middle-aged monk's eyes opened slightly, and he called out in a deep voice, “Where do you think you're going?”
With a sway of his body, he unexpectedly arrived first despite moving second, appearing before the grey-robed old man like a specter!
Tracing an arc from bottom to top with his right hand, the air froze wherever his palm wind passed.
The grey-robed old man felt an invisible force pressing in on him from every direction.
His body was pinned firmly midair, unable to move in the slightest.
“Deliverance Skill!”
Terror finally leaked into the grey-robed old man's voice.
By the time he shouted those three words, his face was already as pale as paper.
Deliverance Skill—one of the Seventy-Two Ultimate Arts of Grand Shuo's Buddhist Order.
Though not a lethal technique, it was the one most feared by martial artists across the world.
It did not kill people, yet it could ruin them.
It poured Buddhist true qi into the opponent's meridians, reducing a lifetime of cultivation to nothingness.
Those stripped of their cultivation by Deliverance Skill would be no different from invalids from that moment on.
Yet their lives remained unthreatened; in fact, their physical bodies would be even healthier than that of an average person.
The Buddhist Order called this “delivering from evil.”
Purging a lifetime of evil karma to grant a pure and clean body in return.
Standing behind Li Wu, Chen Zui kept his eyes fixed on every move the middle-aged monk made.
He recalled someone.
The Life-Severing Monk.
Legend had it that back in the day, the Life-Severing Monk had fallen into the demonic path precisely because he practiced a pirated version of the Buddhist Deliverance Skill.
The authentic Deliverance Skill was rooted in compassion, delivering both others and oneself.
The pirated Deliverance Skill, on the other hand, was rooted in obsession. Unable to deliver others, it ended up destroying oneself, ultimately leading to qi deviation.
Only now, seeing the authentic Deliverance Skill executed with his own eyes, did Chen Zui truly appreciate the brilliance of this Buddhist technique.
The path along which the true qi circulated was incredibly intricate, every link seamlessly connected.
Even with his current vision as a mid-stage Wind-Riding Realm master, he could only discern five or six parts of its crucial mechanisms.
This Buddhist technique was indeed profound and unpredictable!
And so,
in just a few breaths, the outcome was decided.
The grey-robed old man fell from midair, landing on his knees with an ashen face.
The fluctuations of Inquiry Realm true qi around his body were dissipating at a rate visible to the naked eye.
Wisps of true qi leaked out from his limbs and bones, dispersing into the howling northern wind.
The middle-aged monk slowly retracted his palm and pressed his hands together once more, his expression still calm as water.
“This poor monk has neutralized your cultivation. I hope you will conduct yourself properly from now on and commit no more evil.”
Knelt on the ground, the grey-robed old man trembled uncontrollably.
He lowered his head, staring blankly at his hands—hands that had once been stained with blood.
The martial skills he had painstakingly cultivated for over half his life had been nonchalantly wiped away by a total stranger of a monk.
Yet at this moment, there was nothing he could do.
Limp as a heap of mud, he stared hollowly at the monk before him. His lips twitched for a long time before he squeezed out a few raspy words.
“Y-You... you might as well have killed me...”
The middle-aged monk recited a Buddhist chant.
“Amitabha. Killing you would be as easy as turning my palm.
However, killing you would merely add one more corpse to this grassland.
Crippling you, on the other hand, creates a person in this world who can no longer do harm.”
At this point, the middle-aged monk paused briefly and shot a deliberate look behind him.
“Besides, by stepping in today, I am actually saving you.”
The grey-robed old man did not catch the monk's underlying meaning, taking it merely as standard Buddhist rhetoric.
All that rubbish about harboring mercy and purging evil karma.
It was nothing more than post-victory preaching.
Having lived for over sixty years, he had never believed in such nonsense.
Yet he also knew that saying anything now was meaningless.
A man stripped of all his martial arts didn't even have the right to speak loudly in front of his opponent.
The northern wind blew fiercely as ever, rolling withered grass past his feet.
He cast one final look at the middle-aged monk, then at the two young men behind him.
In the end, he pulled back his gaze, turned around, and walked into the depths of the grassland, step by step.
Only when the grey-robed old man's figure completely vanished into the distant dry grass did Li Wu finally exhale the breath he had been holding for so long.
Sheathing his sword, he rushed over to the middle-aged monk in three quick steps and respectfully pressed his palms together.
“Thank you for your help, Master!
If Grandmaster hadn't arrived in time today, my brother and I would probably have already reported to King Yanluo.
This great kindness is something I, Li Wu, will remember for the rest of my life!”
The middle-aged monk did not reply immediately.
His eyes looked past Li Wu's shoulder, settling on the green-robed young man slowly approaching from not far away.
“Benefactor is blessed with good fortune. With a master by your side, nothing could have possibly gone wrong.”
The middle-aged monk withdrew his gaze, pressed his palms together to return the salute, and spoke in an even tone.
Li Wu straightened up, momentarily stunned.
He felt there was something strange about those words.
A master by his side?
In this desolate wilderness, where would a master come from?
Could it be that this monk was praising him?
How immodest of him.
Still, he had witnessed the entire fight just now with his own eyes.
The grey-robed old man had been completely helpless before him.
The moment Deliverance Skill came out, it directly stripped away his entire cultivation.
Such methods truly earned him the title of master!
At this thought, Li Wu hurriedly pulled 《Hunyuan Qi Gathering Art》 out from his chest pocket, offered it to the middle-aged monk, and said with an eager look:
“Master, your understanding of the Dharma is profound, not to mention your martial attainments.
By a stroke of luck, this junior obtained this secret manual, but I don't know if it's suitable for me to practice.
Could I trouble you to look it over and give me a few pointers?”
The middle-aged monk took the secret manual and casually flipped it open.
Li Wu stood to the side, waiting in eager anticipation.
He watched as the monk flipped two pages without a change in expression.
Flipping two more pages, his brows knitted slightly.
Halfway through, he closed the entire manual and handed it back into Li Wu's hands.
“A third-rate technique, not worth treasuring.
From what this poor monk sees, the circulation path of true qi makes dozens of unnecessary detours, and its breathing rhythm is flawed as well.
Once practiced to the fourth layer, one will be stuck completely; going any further is not only useless, but harmful.”
He paused briefly before adding:
“It is not worth wasting your time on.”
Holding the secret manual, Li Wu felt as if a bucket of ice water had been poured over his head.
This high monk could casually neutralize an Inquiry Realm expert, so his judgment certainly wouldn't lie.
Wait!
Li Wu suddenly remembered that when Chen Zui first got his hands on this manual, he gave it the exact same evaluation as this high Buddhist monk!
Li Wu shot a quiet glance at Chen Zui, but immediately dismissed the thought in his mind.
The kid most likely just stumbled into luck, hitting the mark by pure accident.
It couldn't possibly be that he actually understood this secret manual, right?
Impossible. Absolutely impossible.
How could someone who hadn't even reached the Knocking Realm—someone who did nothing every day but drink wine and brag behind his back—judge a technique's grade at a single glance?
And so, he stopped dwelling on the matter.
He looked down at 《Hunyuan Qi Gathering Art》 in his hands.
On second thought, he felt it wasn't really a loss.
So what if it was a third-rate technique?
It was beneath notice to a high Buddhist monk, but to an unaffiliated wanderer like him—who had no lineage, relying entirely on secret learning and wild methods to reach the Candlelight Realm—even a third-rate technique was still a technique.
Those stray wanderers in the martial world with no heritage would fight to the death just to snatch the most basic breathing technique.
This 《Hunyuan Qi Gathering Art》 had at least driven five Mountain and Sea Realm experts to fight to the death.
Which meant it surely had something going for it.
He couldn't practice those profound arts anyway, so practicing this was better than having nothing at all.
Rate on N.U.
