Now that Yousti had finished the paperwork and made sure that officials would absolutely build a music building by ‘lightly’ convincing a few corrupt officials that were getting in the way of funding.
And Yousti debated heavily to himself on whether or not to confront the new duo of first rates in the school but he decided that it was ok to be unhinged for the sake of enlightenment and threw the report in the trash.
He could now focus on advancing martial arts for three days before the guest perpetual showed up.
Then he would perform the biggest Exam finisher he had ever done to over a thousand people.
Yousti went to his personal training field within the academy.
Every time Yousti advanced a realm the Martial Record gave him a god tier martial art, god tier mysterious power, or god tier enlightenment.
So he sat down and meditated to connect with the Martial Record.
‘What do you have for me now that I reached this realm?’
‘…’
‘Huh?’
This time the Martial Record didn’t give him any of those things.
Instead it warned him?
It states that when the martial world creates martial artists at the 8th realm and beyond, that something ominous will happen.
‘What could be so terrifying that the Martial Record would personally warn me of something and consider it ominous.’
Yousti felt like complaining.
“Well that’s useless. I don’t even know a single thing about those realms of martial arts. What am I supposed to do with this information until it happens?”
The worst part was that this piece of information was considered the one god level gift he gets for every stage and on extremely rare occasions.
Perhaps that new use of his mantra already counted and this was just the consequence.
“Stop teaching people martial arts? No way in hell. But at least the Martial Record says it will give something twice as good next time. But this confirms that the Martial Record thinks my plan will work.”
Yousti went back to connecting with the Martial Record to see what other martial arts it had in store for him.
Dual Energy Sword Control.
Split your consciousness with Heavenly Escape and imbue it and gang qi into your weapon to remotely control it.
‘Not bad, A pretty simple martial art considering it’s just an application of things I already can do, but not bad.’
For a martial artist who made use of fabrics and strings as weapons this would be a much more useful martial art for him than for others.
Compared to other weapons that can be manipulated easily, the string is quite difficult to control.
So for Yousti it was better to call it dual energy silk control.
But he respected the original name and would call it sword control whenever fully speaking the name of the martial art.
‘Ok anything else?’
Yousti probed the Martial Record again.
‘The name of the next realm!’
Ultimate Pinnacle (Reaching the Peak to Create the Ultimate)
And the requirement for Ultimate Pinnacle is to create Gang Spheres.
Eventually reaching the limit of nine gang spheres at once.
‘Huh there’s no early, middle, or late stage in this realm.
I guess they don’t matter anymore.’ Yousti noted to himself.
‘So then what could the 8th realm be to be considered ominous for the Martial World by the Martial Record?
It didn’t say the realm itself was ominous to reach in any way.
It just said that if lots of martial artists reach it something will happen that even the Martial Record, which contains things that I can’t begin to fathom, considers ominous.
So more accurately its calamitous.
No point dwelling on the future.
Back to the Ultimate Pinnacle Realm.’
But although the name and details of the next realm were revealed to him.
He didn’t know how he would go about creating this mysterious gang sphere.
But he did have one clue the Martial Record gave him.
Heavenly Escape is the key.
‘If Heavenly Escape is the key then the next realm probably involves some new way of utilizing consciousness.
Hmm maybe the dual energy sword control is actually another hint.’
Yousti as a 6th realm martial artist could now unleash endless unique martial arts by connecting his mind to the Martial Record and using it as a system granting him skills.
Of course he couldn’t do this with the higher level martial arts.
And he wouldn’t do this because it would get in the way of his enlightenment of martial arts.
But Dual Energy Sword Control is by all means something that he could have learned himself whenever he wanted or instantly used as a skill.
‘Maybe the Martial Record explicitly gave me dual energy sword control as a hint for reaching the Ultimate Pinnacle.
Why else would it give me such an easy martial art.’ Yousti had reached his conclusion.
‘Now for one last inquiry.
Martial Record…
Why am I a femboy now?’
It is the best physique for string martial arts.
‘So just because.’
Yousti began trying out silk control on his own.
At first he manipulated strings he was holding onto, waving them around like someone was holding onto the other end, pulling it tight.
It felt like holding onto an extremely thin rod now.
‘I no longer need to stiffen a string to cut like a wire through clay anymore.
I can just pull on it from both sides with silk control, neat.’
As Yousti was standing outside practicing his new silk control, Aurora walked up to him.
She had entered Yousti’s training space with a casual stroll.
“You’ve reached the next realm?”
Yousti just smiled before saying.
“5 Energies Converging at the Origin. Yep.”
“You look very young again. Close to my age even. But uh, why do you look like a girl?”
“It’s the ideal body for string martial arts.”
“Sure… So you said that you can now live for over a millenia. But with all the martial artists that exist now because of you. Aren’t you worried about creating too many immortal martial artists?”
“I understand your concerns but most martial artists here have their talent amplified by my presence allowing them to reach first rate and even peak at an incredibly fast pace. But all of them will go back to normal growth as soon as they reach the peak realm, this is true even for you.”
Yousti used silk manipulation to instantly comb his hair, making sure it never got tangled from jostling around when he used his martial arts..
“Martial artists who can reach the 6th realm are generational talents and will only occur every few centuries.”
“I have one last question.” Aurora asked.
“Ask me anything.”
“Will I attain the sixth realm. Or will you outlive me like the gods.”
“…”
Yousti contemplated those words
‘Maybe this is the ominousness that the Martial Record spoke of.
A world of immortals.
The ramifications on humanity and it’s civilizational progress worry me, even though I’m the one starting this.’
“You’d have to stake your life on it.”
“What?”
“In order to reach the next realm you’d need stake your life on it.”
“Why? I mean, I understand that you would push yourself far more if you were close to dying. But why? Does advancement happen when you’re close to death? You always say that. Like why does being close to death actually make you advance faster?”
Yousti felt ashamed.
He couldn’t answer.
Although he loved speaking of Martial Arts and his own enlightenment.
Always asking others to contemplate it too.
But sometimes he felt his enlightenment wasn’t good enough, especially for questions like these.
On the more fundamental aspects of martial arts.
He wished he could just tear open the Martial Record and learn everything it had to give sometimes.
“I don’t know. But when I know, I’ll tell you.”
Aurora made a serious expression.
“I’ll be leaving the Martia- Sumeru Academy soon. If what you say is true and that my growth will dramatically slow down. Then I will travel the world and stab every god I meet.”
‘Don’t get yourself killed doing that.’ Yousti thought to himself.
“Alright then.”
Yousti flexed his fingers as strings glinted in the air.
Aurora’s intent was challenging Yousti to a duel, with red lines crossing the distance between them.
She had been doing this for the entire conversation.
Aurora moved first as she went straight for Yousti’s heart with her knife.
Yousti performed a palm strike on Aurora passing through her intent and covering her red with purple intent, blowing her away.
He took off his robe and threw it forward.
“This should be the exact same as sparring with me.”
Dual Energy Sword Control
Yousti’s clothes animated themselves as if he were still wearing them and swung a string at Aurora as she dodged back.
“You’re not even going to directly spar with your disciple?”
“I am sparring with my disciple. I’m just trying out a new martial art, that’s all.”
The martial robes moved completely as if a person were still wearing them and attacked her with the same attack again.
Aurora deflected the string with her knife before swinging it down at the empty clothes.
The clothes grabbed her wrist by wrapping around them with the end of the sleeve and pushed back her knife.
But she had already threw the knife to her other hand.
Aurora spun around releasing her qi as slashes, cutting the many invisible threads that were encircling her and cutting up the clothes a little bit.
The clothes went for another string attack as quickly as possible.
But Aurora blocked it and swung her knife at full power.
Cleaving the silk robes into shreds with countless tiny cuts along her one slash.
Aurora’s martial art, Innocent Knife, was a martial art that maximized the use of her qi.
Turning her knife into a chainsaw fractal of qi that would create endless miniature slashes within her larger slashes.
“Those were my favorite clothes.” Yousti commented.
“All your clothes are your favorite clothes. And you make them on the spot.” Aurora pointed her knife towards Yousti as she retorted.
Yousti was already producing silk strings from his tear glands and weaving them into a new set of clothes.
His new body was still very novel and cool for him as he got excited over being able to make silk with his own body.
Aurora stared at him with a disgusted look.
“What?” Yousti felt offended by her look.
She gestured to her eyes.
Wiping down with her fingers.
Yousti did the same and felt the silk strings coming from his eyes.
He made an expression of realization.
“You’re a silk worm.”
Yousti acknowledged her words within his mind but he refuted them anyway.
His body was his sanctuary and he would not tolerate its offense.
‘At least she isn’t thinking of me as a god.’
“It is the best physique for string martial arts”
It’s the ideal body for string martial arts.