Chapter 4: Nine Astra Skies

Ye Chen returned to his own cabin after leaving his father's residence. It was a simple room with only a bed and a wardrobe; both made of wood.

The Flying Dagger seemed to be engaging in some form of contact with him as if it was passing on some coded messages. This terrified Ye Chen a little as he did not expect the Flying Dagger to act similarly to an animated being or to even possess something equivalent to sentience.

However, Ye Chen did not remain terrified. He was already at the lowest point of his life so what could possibly be worst?

He sat cross-legged on his bed and soon, his mind quickly entered the state of meditation. Again, he tried to reach out to the Flying Dagger with his mind...

A crimson halo orbited around the Flying Dagger as it hung silently above Ye Chen's sea of consciousness like a bright sun emitting rays to all corners.

Time seemed to hasten - an hour passed, then two and then three. The Flying Dagger's activity grew more and more frenzied until -

Thump!

An unbridled flow of power spewed out of the Flying Dagger. The energy was immeasurable that the original Celestial Chi from Ye Chen's body was pale in comparison to it. As if the former were waves from the sea and the latter merely streams of a river.

Tides of power came from the Flying Dagger and into Ye Chen's damaged meridian channels. They fanned out rapidly to whatever that crossed their path. Astonishingly, even if some of the power had unsurprisingly leaked out of his body through the damaged openings of his channels, the remnants still managed to stay palpable as they continued to race through his meridians.

It was as if someone had struck his fleshy heart. Ye Chen's could not help but cough up blood as his hands gripped onto the edge of his bed. He gasped and panted for deep gulps of breaths.

'Wh-what frightening power!' A thought zipped through his scrambled mind. Even the most formidable amount of Celestial Chi that he could muster when he was at his peak three years ago could not be compared to the unbridled torrent coursing within him now. In fact, this particular power was so pure, it managed to be even more absolute than Celestial Chi itself.

'Could this be some sort of unique variation of Celestial Chi?!'

What was more fascinating was that a change had swept through Ye Chen's body after that unsolicited incident. Unlike animals going through ecdysis, layer after layer of epidermal flakes shed off his body until it stopped and settled on a layer of fair, radiant skin. Now, his entire body seemed to be gifted with a new breath of life.

His damaged meridian channels remained broken still but Ye Chen somehow understood that his body had now been imbued with a new ability to rejuvenate itself.

He was in a daze. Ye Chen felt himself approaching another place of existence altogether.

He was hovering in the sky, above the vast ocean, so much so that he could not see the point where the sky and water parted ways. He heard a voice calling out to him from a distance but he failed to make out what was being said.

Thick vapors of unadulterated Celestial Chi rushed to his feet from below, blown apart only when the wind swept through them. In a shock, Ye Chen realized that the ocean was made entirely out of the very same strange but condensed Celestial Chi!

'How pure would Celestial Chi have to be before it could even condense into a liquid form from its gaseous state?'

'How much would the original volume be to the point that liquid Celestial Chi managed to join into an endless ocean?'

'A Celestial Chi this enormous, even a hundred - no, a million fighters would not be able to exhaust it overtime!'

Meanwhile, the bodiless voice calling to him seemed to be drifting further and further into the distance until it faded into thin air.

'What is this place? Am I dreaming? But, this doesn't feel like a dream...' A jolt of realization overtook him. 'Could it be that this bizarre place is connected to the Flying Dagger in my head?' The sensation felt on every inch of his body was too convincing to be a dream!

'Could it be,' another thought dawned on him, 'that this vast ocean was just a hidden world inside the Flying Dagger?'

Ye Chen was filled with uncontrolled wonder toward the mysteries hidden in the Flying Dagger. He recalled hearing the legend of the Dagger, that it was an ancestral treasure of his family but more personally, it was this Flying Dagger that had brought him to this world.

He was half-awake at this point. The Flying Dagger continued to pour out endless streams of energy and the torrent coursed through all parts of his body, unperturbed. Even the meridian channels that had been damaged were slowly starting to heal on their own as this Celestial Chi soaked and nurtured his wounds.

Ye Chen's mind was floating in the air, being drifted. Was he asleep or was he awake?

He lost track of time until he heard a rustling outside of his little cabin which jolted him up from his bed.

"So was it all a dream or what?" Ye Chen thought out loud. He was drenched in cold sweat but soon realized something had changed. Previously, he had always woken up in excruciating agony as if his body was being ripped apart but today the pain was absent.

He tried revolving the Chi inside of his body and to his pleasant surprise; his entire meridian channels were filled with the familiar, enigmatic Celestial Chi!

'My meridian channels!'

'They're healed? My meridian channels are healed!' Ye Chen could not stop shaking. He had just woken up to his damaged meridian channels being mysteriously linked and connected again whilst tidal waves of Celestial Chi coursed about in his newly mended channels all the way to his dantian!

He could not possibly remain nonchalant to this change. In fact, he was filled with euphoria. Three years! For three years his meridian channels had been punctured useless, forcing him to live through all kinds of pain in his life...

Today, today was the day he finally emerged from the darkness that he had succumbed to for three years!

However, it was those three years that had shaped Ye Chen's mental fortitude. Hence, despite being healed, he did not lose sight of what needed to be done. Patiently and meticulously, he started to inspect his body.

Every part of his body, as well as his internal organs, seemed to have been given a new life as a stream of Pure Yang Energy raced through.

A term sprang into the young man's head; Pure Yang State!

It was said that when a baby was born, their body was initially filled with Pure Yang Energy; their body clear as jade without a single impurity. Yet as one grew up, the number of toxins accumulated made the body harder to cultivate and train. It was rumored that only when one attained the Tenth Stage would they unlock the ability to cultivate Celestial Chi that is pure enough to cleanse their body; until it returned to the Pure Yang State akin to a newborn. By then, both the warrior's martial art prowess and longevity would be improved exponentially.

Some of the noble families even took the steps to help newborn babies in cultivating their bodies while their Yang Energy was still at its peak by giving them rare alchemical pills in order to maintain their Pure Yang State while they age.

A person's Celestial Chi may not be incredibly formidable when they had reached Pure Yang State but it would improve a person's ability to absorb Celestial Chi, especially when compared to the body of an average person. Even their cultivation speed would increase tenfold or beyond any average person's. This was why noble families often produced many martial art prodigies.

Ye Chen never thought that he would one day attain Pure Yang State this way. He snuck a glance at the Flying Dagger in his mind and thought about the distant voice that whispered in his ear. This Flying Dagger was simply an unsolvable enigma; its origin just as big of a mystery as its purpose.

When Ye Chen had woken up from that trance, he realized his Celestial Chi was already in the First Stage.

He started revolving the enigmatic Celestial Chi within his body and discovered that the speed in its circulation was drastically faster in comparison to what it was in the past; including when he was at the prime of his Sixth Stage.

Now, whenever he willed it, the Flying Dagger would automatically pour a wave of Celestial Chi into his body. As he thought back to the sight of the vast Celestial Chi ocean, Ye Chen wondered if he had a similar, albeit personal ocean of Chi lying within the dagger at his beck and call.

He absorbed the torrent of Celestial Chi in hunger and felt it expanding within his body, stronger and stronger.

Soon, Ye Chen could feel himself approaching the rank barrier separating the First and Second Stage. He may only have the actual prowess of a First Stage Fighter but with the unrestrained surge of Celestial Chi, the rank barrier crumbled before him.

'I've advanced a stage - The Second Stage!'

When was the last time Ye Chen ever felt such joy in achieving a new stage? Even when he had broken through the Sixth Stage back then, his joy now could not be compared to before as he entered the Second Stage.

'Destiny would always reward those who forge ahead with indomitable resolve.' The proverb proved itself to be true after all! Ye Chen balled his hands into fists as the despair that plagued him for three years now has been displaced with a strong sense of conviction. He was no longer a crippled man!

Since his First Stage Advancement, Ye Chen started to consolidate his Celestial Chi again in preparation for another breakthrough.

It was then, a discourse, whispering about some form of technique gradually surfaced in Ye Chen's mind.

It declared its name as 'The Nine Astra Skies'- an enigmatic discourse on chi-cultivation techniques. It consisted of nine different chapters named after nine different elements: metal, wood, water, fire, earth, ice, wind, thunder and lightning. The materials listed in the entire discourse were complex yet, Ye Chen realized that every detail and content of Nine Astra Skies seemed to be carved right in his mind. Every single word was crystal clear.

'The Nine Astra Skies - Striving through nine deaths, nine births, one transcends heavens.'

He was not sure what sort of state it would be like for anyone to 'transcend heavens' but he was even more puzzled by 'nine deaths, nine births.' It could not possibly mean that a person would have to die and be reborn eighteen times altogether in order to reach the highest level described by Nine Astra Skies, could it?

'I mean, when people die, it is as if they have reached the end of a candle. How could anyone ever come back from death?'

This was not the only strange discovery Ye Chen had uncovered. Among the nine chi cultivation techniques described, there was a technique called The Thunder Emperor Discourse under the Thunder chapter, detailing methods and steps that were suspiciously similar to the Inner Thunder Clap Energy Cultivation technique that the Ye clan had always practiced. However, there were still some differences between the two as the Thunder Emperor Discourse was more substantial and advanced.

There were three grades within Inner Thunderclap Energy Cultivation and the apex level that was only known to his father, Ye Zhantian was rumored to be capable of elevating a fighter straight to the Tenth Stage if practiced. On the other hand, the Thunder Emperor Discourse was divided into six grades, with the very paragon of its practice awarding the cultivator to master the ability to control thunder and power that rivaled nature. Ye Chen could not even imagine how great that was going to be.

What he did know for sure was that after comparing the two techniques, it became apparent that the Inner Thunderclap Energy Cultivation was nothing but a watered-down version of the Thunder Emperor Discourse. It was so incomplete that it hardly encompassed one-tenth of the latter's content.

What was the Flying Dagger's connection with the House of Ye?

Every martial arts technique could be rated with nine tiers. The Inner Thunderclap Energy Cultivation technique was already considered an advanced technique that was on the third tier and above, occupying a position of prestige among all martial arts techniques practiced by factions within Donglin county. So what more of the highly advanced Thunder Emperor Discourse?

It was probably a bad idea to try and rate the Thunder Emperor Discourse, so Ye Chen abandoned that idea. Instead, he thought of following the discourse itself. This was because he had been a practitioner of the Inner Thunderclap Energy Cultivation over a long period of time and had thus accrued some Thunder-style technique basics. Secondly, this was a martial art more profound than the Inner Thunderclap Energy Cultivation.

Ye Chen found himself completely immersed in the mysteries brought by the First Grade of Thunder Emperor Discourse. He may possess a superficial understanding of the technique's secrets but it was more than enough to charm the young man.

A joyful silence hung over the cabin until the sun peeked through the clouds.

Morning mist shrouded the surrounding of the wooden cabin and because it was situated in the farthest area, they were never many visitors around his part of the Ye Castle complex. As a result, a serene silence hung around under the backdrop of evergreen trees and a quiet creek racing under a small bridge. The surrounding was akin to a wild forest due to the lack of maintenance but within the wilderness was an exhibit of liveliness.

Ye Chen stepped out of his cabin and took a deep breath of fresh morning air. Since dawn, he felt that the world had taken on a new canvas, so much so that the scent of flowers was dewier. Most of all, he had felt a sense of tranquility which was never felt before.

After a night of studying the Thunder Emperor Discourse, Ye Chen found many flaws within the Inner Thunderclap Energy Cultivation and had since made some rectification in order to promote the speed of its practitioner's cultivation by manyfolds. In fact, ever since he had known the dictums of Nine Astra Skies, Ye Chen realized that his overall innate understanding of martial arts increased.

The Flying Dagger's supply of Celestial Chi never ceased which increasingly fortified Ye Chen's personal Celestial Chi reservoir until he was once again, at the brink of surpassing the Second Stage.

Boom!

A loud peal rang from his dantian as the barrier crumbled instantly before his Celestial Chi.

'I'm in the Third Stage now!'

An average person would take at least one or two years' worth to advance from the First to the Third Stage. Yet, in a bewildering speed, Ye Chen had recovered so much Celestial Chi in just one night!

'Should I tell Father about the Thunder Emperor Discourse?' Ye Chen thought, 'With its aid, Father would be able to improve his powers exponentially and shoot past the Eight or even Ninth Stage. Then, with Old Gramps with us, there would be two Ninth Stage powerhouses in the family. Our force would be very much different from the present. The House of Ye will finally be free of our perilous state.'

However, as the last three advanced grades of the Thunder Emperor Discourse may come as a shock, Ye Chen thought it best to only share the first three grades with his old man. He would, of course, have to come up with a lie for the origin of his newfound knowledge.

His father had been exhausting every resource the family had in order to gather enough Chi-amassing Pills for the nourishment of his meridians, which caused the family to be less influential and less powerful over time. Yet, his father had never complained once while most of his uncles had only love and care to offer their unfortunate nephew.

'A deed as massive as this cannot possibly be sufficiently repaid just by sharing the Thunder Emperor Discourse.'

A cold glint of light shone in his eyes. 'The ones that had put me through this ordeal will reap worse winds than they have sowed!'

Ye Chen inhaled and exhaled, calming the anger within him. Ever since he had achieved Pure Yang State, he found his senses sharpened, his mental reflexes nimbler; things he never possessed before.

After meditating for hours, he got up to get reacquainted with his family's martial arts techniques such as Rumbling Thunder Burst and Roaring Thunder Fist.

Of all martial arts, Thunder-style techniques were the most lethal. For example, to perform Rumbling Thunder burst, the warrior would muster Thunder-style Celestial Chi to the center of their palms before hurling it at their opponent. When the palm met its target, Thunder-style energy would be blasted into their body, therefore amplifying the impact of a purely physical strike many times more. Meanwhile, to perform Roaring Thunder First, one must always strike fast and in full force, as if the goal is to render the opponent dead.

Ye Chen had already mastered the two techniques back when he was at his prime at the Sixth Stage. After years of disuse, he was a little rusty with them at the beginning but he mastered it soon enough.

Deep inside Ye Chen's core, the realization that he was once again able to practice martial arts stirred up an amalgamation of indescribable sentimentalities.