The Nine Cauldrons
chapter-13

In order to get that ancient book, half of Li Shan’s body was in the vault behind the shelf. At that time, Li Shan clenched his teeth and rapidly crept into that vault that was as tall as half the height of a normal person, then the iron gate immediately closed. It took less than half a second to leap into the vault as well as closing the door. Obviously, Li Shan had practiced to do this many times.

“Whew, whew.”

After hiding in a secret room that was only two or three square meters, Li Shan breathed a sigh of relief.

“Fortunately, I prepared soon. Huh, he wanted me to believe him completely that he won’t kill me?” Li Shan slightly smiled.

Li Shan calculated a counter if someone had wanted to kill him. In this secret room, there was a credit card and many items that could attract the killer, and, of course, Li Shan could hide into the vault.

Li Shan only believed himself.

Thanks to this small trick, in twenty years, Li Shan had never been overthrown.

“You…” All of a sudden, the 5-centimeter thick door directly flew towards Li Shan.

That thick door could not be penetrated by anything, even a gun. If Teng Qing Shan had wanted to use his strength to penetrate this gate, he would have had to use the “Tiger Fist”. However, he did not do that, because.. shattering the latch was too easy for him.

Tang Qing Shan jumped in.

“Brother, you….” Li Shan hurriedly said.

“Poof.” A minor sound rang, on Li Shan’s temple, there was a hole and blood came out from it.

Li Shan stared in disbelief and could not do anything, in his look, there was anger.

Teng Qing Shan didn’t look at him, not even once. He turned around and quietly left.

***

In the living room of the house which Teng Qing Shan had rented.

“Don’t know what this “Millennium Chronicle” book contains. I already know that Liu Yan is a great master.” Teng Qing Shan was very curious. As an Internal Art master, he surely had a little knowledge about some famous people in history.

Liu Yan, nickname ‘Liu Monkey God’, a rare prodigy of ‘Monkey Master Sect’ . At that period of time, Liu Yan was on as the same position as “Tiger-headed Prosperous “ Lu Tang…

Since Liu Yan wrote it, Teng Qing Shan also had an impulse to look into it.

Teng Qing Shan opened ‘Millennium Chronicle’, all the words were written in traditional Chinese characters. Because many ancient books were written in traditional Chinese lexicon , Teng Qing Shan was Tengbo Lei’s disciple, Tengbo Lei had lived abroad and he knew traditional Chinese lexicon, thus, he taught this to Teng Qing Shan as well . Teng Qing Shan read this book with great ease.

“I didn’t think that Liu Yan belonged to Thief God Sect.”

Teng Qing Shan hurriedly opened each page. Because this book almost described the history of Thief Sect in the front of it, Teng Qing Shan finished about one-third of the book and stopped.

“According to historical records which I found, I realized that from past to now, the number of people reaching higher realm has become less and less and also more and more difficult.’

Teng Qing Shan looked at this sentence and could not help nodding.

“Also, even though all sects claimed that the history of Internal Arts had existed more than a thousand years, but in fact, the most long-standing Internal Arts named ‘Tai Chi’, which was created by ‘Wudang Zhang SanFeng’ in Ming period, has not existed up to a thousand years. In the 1000-year history of China, Internal Arts only appeared from 1000 years ago to now. Thus, what about 1000 years before that?”

Teng Qing Shan read these words and felt sympathetic.

Shang and Zhou, Warring States, Qin and Han, Three Kingdoms, Northern and Southern Dynasties, Sui and Tang…

In all these dynasties, did people only rely on brute force in the battle?

Teng Qing Shan did not believe it as well.

For example, revolutionary generals in Sui and Tang dynasties were able to use hands to carry heavy lion-shaped stone statue that was about 1000 kilos. Carrying and lifting were two different concepts. It was just like, a normal person could lift a 100-kilo pack of paddy but making him/her to hold a 10-kilo dumbbell and swing randomly, he or she would feel difficult.

To carry a lion stone statue whose weight was one thousand kilos, at least, you needed to have a strength that reached ten thousand kilos.

Even though Teng Qing Shan had to use all his energy to carry this statute, moreover, he was not be able to maintain this physical strength for a long time in battle.

In God Kingdom, some of the rebel leaders would depend on only one person’s strength to charge down upon million soldiers and kill the enemies’ leader. That was so incredible! Could the limited power of one person ignore a powerful army?

“That’s right. From a thousand years ago, this is the history of the Internal Arts, what about some thousands of years before that??” Teng Qing Shan could not understand so he continued to read other pages.

“It took me more than ten years to collect information. Finally, I have clear predictions based on evidence.”

“My prediction is – From the Sui and Tang dynasty, aura coming from the Reiki suddenly decreased dramatically!”

[ TL Note – Reiki is a type of healing energy

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Reiki ]

Looking at this point, Teng Qing Shan questioned.

“Based on my exploration on many documents, at the time of Spring and Autumn War, Sui and Tan, .. there was not anything called the Internal Arts. The masters were absorbing the essence from the Reiki, that is to say, Aura. They practiced “Refining the air” to make their body produce the interior strength. By practicing, their interior strength became stronger and stronger, trained each pulse over until achieving culmination.

“The masters of that period had very strong interior strength.”

When the mysterious channels in their mind open, they will start the process of ‘ Lianqi of spirit’. They would amalgamate ‘spirit’ with the interior strength and practiced them in the new region, gradually transformed into the innate natural strength to become the innate master.”

“The innate master can not stop practicing the natural strength and it would be practiced gradually in the body. That is the first phase of ‘virtual Dan Qiang’ realm. As soon as the natural strength condenses into the being, that is called the second phase of ‘Real Dan Qiang’ realm. At ‘Real Dan’ Realm, the natural strength will have to be practiced many times to reach the third phase ‘ Gold Dan Qiang’ Realm. The innate gold Danqiang practitioner is a master of masters! They have incredible power. In the ancient periods, it was rumored that a single person could attack million soldiers, the people who could fight against an army on their own were masters reaching the innate realm.”

Teng Qing Shan read these words and he felt incredible!

Why, why so?

Acquire, fundamentals?

“Spirit’ and ‘interior strength’ ‘s mixture could become ‘the innate natural strength’?

The innate realm was classified into three kinds ‘Virtual Dan Qiang‘, ‘Reak Dan Qiang’ and ‘Gold Dan Qiang’?

“In ancient times, this was what was called ‘Gold Dan Qiang Realm’. When entering ‘gold Dan Qiang Realm’, it means reaching the pinnacle.”

Teng Qing Shan nodded slightly.

He was afraid that if he claimed what he had read was true, some figures in history such as ‘Xi Yang’, and other masters … could not explain why were they so dangerous and powerful. Also, there were a lot of records which said that the ancient people called practitioners in Three Kingdoms and Five Emperors Period as ‘Lianqi’.

Perhaps they were called that because they practiced the Reiki.

Teng Qing Shan continued reading.

“But from the Sui and Tang dynasty, the Reiki suddenly dropped sharply.’’

“In this period, many heroes were possibly the last group of masters. Such as Li Pa, Qin Qiong, they were said to reach the innate realm so they could carry 1000-kilo objects without being tired.” Teng Qing Shan admitted what he read was true.

Teng Qing Shan practiced by himself to be the best master in the world. However, if he had wanted to hold tiger-shaped stone statues, carry them as well as fought against the enemies, doing that was even impossible for him.

“Based on the records of many sects from Sui and Tang dynasties and later, the number of masters has become less. Then, even an innate master never appeared again. Until the beginning of Song Dynasty, even absorbing the Reiki to produce the interior strength, was impossible.’’

Teng Qing Shan had a hint of sorrow.

At first, no one could reach the innate realm, but later, no one wanted to practice.

“The small number of masters could not make Song dynasty weaker. Once not being able to absorb the Reiki and practice the interior strength, people of Song dynasty had to find another way to do it.

Teng Qing Shan nodded again.

“In ancient times, people who did not achieve anything practiced the strength in their body because producing interior strength could not depend on the innate power in someone’s body. Practicing ‘from the outside to the inside’ was too difficult.”

“However, when naturally absorbing the Reiki and producing the interior strength could not be done, this problem was researched by talented people of this period. Over the time, gradually, people could depend on some techniques to produce the interior strength. For example, in the history, the leader ‘Yue Fei’ of Song dynasty was a soldier practicing the interior strength.”

“But in the Song Dynasty, the Internal Arts was just an original form. Only some lucky men could practice the interior strength, also opening meridians of the body and reaching the higher realm were impossible.

“After the short time of Yuan dynasty, Wudang Zhang San Feng was the first person to practice the Internal Arts to the master level, he took all vibrations over his body. He was the master practicing his muscles, skin and flesh and bone, maximizing their force. Also from this period, the system of the Internal Arts was reintroduced, then Tai Chi, Xing Yi Quan, Bagua … and various other ways gradually appeared,”

Teng Qing Shan read from the beginning to the end.

He could only take a deep breath.

The ability of people to adapt to the situations around them was really strong.

In ancient times, the Reiki was abundant, all people could learn absorbing the aura to produce the interior strength, even practice the innate natural strength.

Later, the Reiki suddenly fell, what could the human do?

After exploring for more than a hundred years, many talented people wasted their youth to learn the Internal Arts!

Until this modern period, the system of the Internal Arts had been completed surprising. There was even ‘Tiger Shaped Magical Arts’ ‘Basaltic Powerful Rock’ ‘Ichthyosaurus Magic’ and other skills which could only be practiced by a master. In the Spring and Autumn War, Qin and Han dynasties… how could people imagine that innate arts could be practiced to this achievement.

“In fact, this process of practicing was to ‘Transform the Essential Substance into the Divine Energy’ and ‘Transform the Divine Energy into the Spiritual Body’ In ancient time, ‘Essential Substance’ in ‘Transform the Essential Substance into the Divine Energy’ referred to the essence of the world, the Reiki. But now, ‘Essential Substance’ was used to call the blood in the human body!”

Liu Yan mentioned in the book : ”Because of not being able to absorb from the outside, we could only absorb the essence in human body. Thus, the masters practicing the Internal Arts were to a large extent based on eating more, eating half a lamb in a meal was really normal. Because they had to practice a massive amount of essence so obviously they had to eat in larger quantity.”

Teng Qing Shan slightly nodded.

Exactly, he had eaten too much.

In order to practice the Internal Arts, at first, you had to have a strong body, adequate blood. When the essence reached a certain extent, you could gradually practice the internal strength.