That night, at the Blackwood estate.
Butler Charles Whitmore entered the study and reported to Aron with an expression of complete disbelief on his face:
“Master, the man we sent to follow Mithburn has returned. Those two Americans turned into bats along the way and flew away!”
“The young man who came back is terrified. Henry is trying to calm him down now!”
Aron nodded and said to Charles:
“Legends about vampires have existed for a very long time, and now we have confirmed with our own eyes that they are real. The Blackwood family must prepare in advance. Ordinary firearms will not be particularly effective against such supernatural beings.”
“Inform our old comrades that tomorrow I will teach them a truly advanced martial art, one through which internal energy can be developed.”
Charles’s body trembled, while a storm raged in his heart.
Almost every man had dreamed in his youth of becoming a great warrior, but in real life he could only see internal and external martial arts.
More than twenty old members of the Blackwood family practiced the Five Elements Boxing that their master had taught them, and that skill belonged to the internal martial disciplines.
Whether it was internal or external martial arts, their levels of development were generally the same.
Manifest Force was the first level.
A fighter had to achieve perfect external coordination: shoulders with hips, elbows with knees, and hands with feet.
In this way, he would gain complete control over his muscles and unify the strength of his entire body.
Hidden Force differed from Manifest Force.
That level emphasized internal coordination: the heart with intention, intention with energy, and energy with strength.
By adjusting the center of gravity along the spine, which represented the central axis of the body, the fighter would achieve a sensation similar to a cat whose fur stood on end.
By closing his pores, he would retain the life energy created during training, and then release it through the part of the body that touched the opponent when striking.
Such a blow was extremely powerful and penetrating, while the internal injuries it caused were very difficult to heal.
Transforming Force was achieved when Hidden Force permeated the entire body and reached its extremities.
At that point, not even a feather could fall on the body without the fighter sensing it, nor could an insect land without provoking an immediate reaction.
Strength could penetrate from the inside outward and allow perfect control over the smallest movements of the body.
At that level, the body would expel accumulated toxins and impurities, the internal organs would become strong, and the muscles and bones firm.
The fighter could even transmit force across several centimeters of empty space.
His physical ability would then reach the ultimate limit of the ordinary human body.
As for Core Force and Astral Force, the levels above Transforming Force, their masters were extremely rare.
An even higher level, at which a person could break through the void, existed only in legends.
No one could claim to have seen it with their own eyes.
And what had Charles just heard?
The master said that he would teach them a martial art through which real internal energy could be developed!
A gleam appeared in his eyes as he looked at Aron in disbelief.
“Master, are you all right? Should I call a doctor?”
Aron gave him a sharp look.
He took the first two levels of the Yi Jin Jing, which he had previously copied by hand, from the bookshelf, threw them to him, and said seriously:
“Read it carefully. Do you think I would lie to you?”
“These are only the foundations. The later levels will be even more powerful.”
“For now, the skill will only be available to our old comrades. The guards will have to undergo checks before we select those who are loyal enough to the family to be allowed to learn it.”
Charles accepted the manuscript, looked at it carefully, and exclaimed in astonishment:
“Master, did you rob the Shaolin Temple? The Yi Jin Jing is their most closely guarded secret!”
As he turned the pages, he gradually became completely immersed in the text.
Only after a long time, when he had read the final page, did he return to reality.
Aron pointed toward the manuscript in his hands and smiled faintly.
“Now you know I wasn’t lying to you. The Yi Jin Jing you’re holding contains only the first two levels.”
“The first level teaches you to sense the different energies that exist in the universe. Using that energy, the fighter develops the body and opens the energy channels and points throughout the organism. The second level transforms and strengthens the body’s constitution, expels toxins, accelerates the flow of blood and life energy, increases endurance, and strengthens the spirit.”
“Thanks to this skill, which improves innate abilities, the Blackwood family will continuously produce fighters at the level of Hidden Force and Transforming Force in the future. Perhaps someone capable of breaking through the void and seeing the divine will even appear again.” This story is hosted at g.com.
In the study, Charles’s face filled with excitement.
Ever since the vampires appeared, he had constantly felt that the family was threatened by an invisible danger.
However, with the Yi Jin Jing their master had given them, the Blackwood family would surely continue producing increasingly powerful warriors.
“Master, we will never forget that you gave us the opportunity to be reborn. We would go through fire and water for you without the slightest hesitation!”
“I’ll inform the others immediately. Tomorrow they will gather at the training ground and wait for you to teach them!”
Trembling with excitement, he eagerly bowed and left.
Watching Charles’s back as he walked away, Aron felt many emotions.
The Blackwood family appeared very powerful on the surface, but the only ones he could truly trust completely and entrust his own life to were the old comrades who had crossed the ocean with him and built wealth and influence in Canada from nothing.
The loyalty of the servants, guards, and musketeers who had joined later was still far from the willingness to lay down their lives for the family.
It would probably take three or four generations to raise people who would be unconditionally loyal to the Blackwood family.
…
More than twenty strong men gathered at the Blackwood family’s training ground.
They stood neatly in formation, heads raised and eyes burning with anticipation.
James stood at the end of the row and curiously watched the others from the corner of his eye.
It had been almost a year since he came to the Blackwood estate.
His foster father was busy with family matters, so James did not see him often.
These men were the people with whom he spent the most time.
He had never seen them so excited before.
He wondered what kind of power the Yi Jin Jing that the butler had told them about possessed, when even these men, who would not blink before a sword or an axe, had lost their usual calm.
Charles swept his gaze over the gathered men.
Many among them had been stuck at the level of Hidden Force for years.
He hoped that after practicing the Yi Jin Jing, they would finally manage to advance to Transforming Force.
Not long afterward, Aron entered the training ground and smiled faintly when he saw James.
The previous night, he had not told Charles to inform James.
However, since the boy was nevertheless present at the training ground, it was obvious that everyone there already acknowledged his loyalty to the Blackwood family.
Wolverine was already exceptionally talented in martial arts.
If he also mastered the Yi Jin Jing, Aron could not even imagine how powerful he would become in the future.
The Marvel Universe was becoming more and more interesting.
“The butler has surely already explained why I gathered you here today.”
“Before I begin teaching you, you must remember several rules. Whoever breaks them will die!”
“First, never betray the family. Second, do not turn your weapons against one another. Third, do not reveal this skill to anyone without permission. Fourth, do not use your strength to provoke unnecessary conflicts.”
“Do you understand?”
Everyone thundered at the same time:
“We understand!”
Their voices echoed like an enormous bell that shook heaven and earth.
“Excellent!”
Aron nodded with satisfaction.
Through his Telepathy, he could sense that everyone was completely sincere and firmly determined.
He walked to the mat in the middle of the training ground, sat cross-legged, and began teaching the Yi Jin Jing.
The first level was simple and easy to learn, without overly complicated methods.
It was enough to endure nine movements that pushed the body beyond normal human limits and continue until the fighter sensed the energy of the universe.
At that point, he would be considered a beginner.
If everyone managed to overcome the first barrier and significantly improve their innate abilities, learning the second level would be much easier.
It expelled toxins and impurities accumulated during everyday life, while the muscles, bones, connective tissues, and internal organs became stronger.
Explained in the language of science, it represented evolution.
Aron performed the movements while simultaneously explaining their key details.
Everyone imitated him with complete concentration.
Thanks to their total focus, Aron’s movements from beginning to end were engraved into their memories, as though carved directly into their brains.
Even if they wanted to, they would not be able to forget them.
Of course, that was Aron’s doing.
Using his mutant ability in a manner similar to the direct transfer of knowledge, he inserted his own understanding of the skill into their minds through Telepathy.
When he finished the entire sequence of movements, Aron felt his body become completely refreshed.
The miniature star in his brain radiated endless light.
Energy continuously penetrated every part of his body, purifying his already exceptionally powerful organism from the inside out.
Perhaps his body was already very clean, because no impurities emerged from it.
He could feel his muscles, bones, skin, and internal organs becoming increasingly stronger and more resilient.
Their toughness continuously increased, as though there were no end to that development.
Aron had not expected the very first practice of the Yi Jin Jing to produce such obvious results.
At first, he thought the reason was the skill itself, but when he examined the other people on the training ground, he dismissed that assumption.
Of the more than twenty people present, only James, thanks to his Accelerated Healing Factor, managed to perform all nine movements.
The others completed at most three.
Even James, the only one who completed the entire sequence, merely increased the amount of life energy and blood in his body slightly.
He failed to attract even the smallest amount of cosmic energy.
“Perhaps the miniature star in my brain isn’t a reflection of higher-dimensional energy, as I previously assumed, but an actual star?”
“Maybe the results of my training are so much better than theirs because I possess my own source of energy and don’t need to learn how to sense the energy of the universe!”
Aron could not resist performing the exercise again.
This time, he paid no attention to the others, but instead used the microscopic vision derived from Gravitational Electromagnetism to carefully observe the inside of his own body.
He saw that the miniature star in his brain, following the changes of the nine movements of the Yi Jin Jing, released different types of energy.
Each one perfectly corresponded to the movement he was performing at that moment.
The energy followed the path of the exercise, continuously expanding and nourishing the energy channels and points, while simultaneously increasing the strength of his body.
He could vaguely sense that an enormous amount of force was hidden within the energy points through which the exercise passed.
It was very similar to the miniature star in his brain, yet still somewhat different from it.
Aron examined them again, unable to believe his own senses.
There really was a force similar to the miniature star within those points, except that it had not yet awakened.
“I’ll try opening one point. That way I’ll be able to confirm the hypothesis.”
He mobilized all the energy in his body and directed it straight toward one point in his palm.
However, just before the energy struck it, he was overwhelmed by an intense sense of impending disaster.
It seemed to him that if he opened that point, his life would be in mortal danger.
Aron quickly dispersed the energy, and the sense of crisis instantly disappeared.
“Why did this happen?”
He took the Yi Jin Jing out of the system space and began searching through the notes left by previous practitioners over the centuries.
In the end, among the records of the Sixth Patriarch Huineng, he found a description of a similar event.
The note spoke of a young genius who had been too impatient to advance, so during a single night he opened more than ten energy points.
His body could not withstand the violent influx of cosmic energy and eventually exploded into pieces of flesh and blood.
After finding the cause of the problem, Aron felt relieved.
Since his body was still not strong enough, he could not rush to open the energy points.
It was enough to continue practicing the first level of the Yi Jin Jing, constantly purifying his body with cosmic energy, while at the same time using the Golden Bell Body of the Thirteen Guardians for additional strengthening.
Sooner or later, his physical strength would reach the required level.