Longevity by Grinding Skills

"A Treasure Artifact?!"

Yan Yuwei nearly ground her teeth to dust, her face filled with jealousy.

"In any other Sect, even a master in the Blood Exchange Realm might not own a single Upper Grade sharp blade. He’s just a Third Level Martial Artist, so what gives him the right to wield a Treasure Artifact... The Weapon Casting Hall is blatantly cheating!"

Mo Shisan chuckled twice. "If you’re so upset, you can always ask your master to pull a couple of all-nighters for two months straight to forge a weapon for you. It might not be a Treasure Artifact, but you’d at least get something of Upper Grade sharp blade quality."

Yan Yuwei plopped dejectedly onto the ground. Her expression was awful, and for a moment, she was speechless.

After a long silence, she turned her head. "As the first disciple of the Mechanical Hall, don’t you have any thoughts on this? Your master personally went to the Thunder Fire Pool, used the Celestial Craftsmanship Forging Technique, and worked with Hall Master Zhan to forge that weapon."

Mo Shisan, who was fiddling with a miniature Tiger-shaped Mechanical Beast on the table, raised an eyebrow and looked at Yan Yuwei in surprise.

"Haven’t seen you for a few days, and you’ve grown a brain? Now you even know how to sow discord?"

Yan Yuwei’s gaze sharpened.

CRASH!!

A hole was suddenly blasted through the second floor of the Mist Rain Tower, and a black figure was sent flying out, crashing to the ground.

Mo Shisan scrambled back to his feet, his face furious. Several scorpion-tail-like mechanical arms suddenly shot out from beneath his wide robes. The sharp Mitsubishi Sabers at their tips glinted coldly as he pointed them at Yan Yuwei on the floor above.

"Yan Yuwei, if you have any guts, just you wait! I’ll be the first one to take you down at the True Inheritance Ceremony!"

Yan Yuwei crossed her arms, which were corded with muscle and bulging with veins, and snorted coldly.

"I’ll be waiting."

As Xu Yunfan crossed the Vermilion Bird Bridge chewing on a bamboo sliver, his nostrils flared slightly. A vaguely familiar scent wafted into his nose, making him raise an eyebrow. His previously relaxed expression grew somber.

Ever since the Celestial Craft Cave announced the Weapon Casting Hall’s True Inheritance Ceremony and invited various powers, all sorts of riffraff seemed to have crawled out of the woodwork, whether they were invited guests or just here to watch the show.

The Incense and Candle Sect!

He was all too familiar with that smell. Back when he passed through Wuzhou, he had lost count of how many Incense and Candle Sect members he had killed and how many of their strongholds he had destroyed. With his Drumming Jar Golden Hammer, he had carved a path straight through their so-called Demon-Vanquishing Celestial Army units.

The power of a long-handled heavy weapon on the battlefield was absolutely beyond imagination.

He followed the scent, turning into a sparsely populated alley. A glance told him that the pedestrians were mostly family members of past disciples of the Celestial Craft Cave’s Mechanical City.

The further he went, the stronger this unique smell of incense became. He walked all the way to the end of the alley before stopping.

He stared at the gate of a desolate residence thirty feet away. The scent he loathed so much was seeping from the cracks in the door.

It had to be members of the Incense and Candle Sect. ’Those rats, always hiding in dark corners, plotting their disgusting schemes.’

Xu Yunfan gripped his hammer in a reverse hold. His shoulder blades cracked like popping soybeans as the four-hundred-pound weight smashed through the air toward the iron-bound wooden gate.

The instant the iron gate exploded, Xu Yunfan took half a step back, his Thunderfire Qilin Hammer already held horizontally before his chest.

Twelve figures in black robes slammed their knees into the bluestone floor like iron stakes. Dark red blood from the soles of their feet mixed into the spiderweb of cracks.

The temples of these black-robed figures bulged like eggs, and earthworm-like golden lines surfaced on their exposed wrists. Their eyes were completely bloodshot; a closer look revealed that the veins in the whites of their eyes were actually writhing blood thread worms. Their bodies had been catalyzed by a Secret Medicine, and even their pain receptors had been devoured by the gold thread worms.

These were clearly the Incense and Candle Sect’s so-called Demon-Vanquishing Celestial Soldiers, created using their usual methods of stimulating human potential at the cost of Vitality. They were fearless of pain and could remain vigorous for a short time unless they suffered a fatal, destructive blow.

Back in Wuzhou, whenever he encountered such opponents, Xu Yunfan would almost always smash them to pieces with a single swing of his hammer.

"The little fellow from the Weapon Casting Hall is quite the hound, to have sniffed his way over here."

The old woman at the head of the group tapped her Iron Staff on the ground. Green smoke billowed from the eye sockets of the skull embedded in its head.

The copper eyepatch over her left eye suddenly sprang open, revealing the dark muzzle of a cannon.

Xu Yunfan’s brow twitched as he saw this. ’That’s clearly a technique from the Mechanical Hall.’

His expression was calm as he said lightly, "The stench you people from the Incense and Candle Sect give off is so polluting, I really couldn’t stand it."

"Sharp-tongued little brat. Since you sought us out, you’ve saved us the trouble of having to abduct you."

Xu Yunfan couldn’t help but raise his eyebrows, a little surprised and a little puzzled.

"Why were you looking for me?"

"In Wuzhou, you killed so many of our followers and disciples, took down several Altar Masters, and even destroyed a number of Ming Venerable Sacred Forms. You were marked by our Incense and Candle Sect long ago. Since you’re so forgetful, boy, allow this old woman to teach you what you should and shouldn’t do."

Xu Yunfan sneered. His mind raced. ’Even if I’m on the Incense and Candle Sect’s list, it’s probably not worth them going through all this trouble to chase me to Cangzhou. There must be another reason.’

"Just you?"

Xu Yunfan looked the old woman up and down. After confirming that she had not entered the Flesh Refining Realm and was, at most, a Grand Martial Master of the Outer Three Harmonies, he straightened up, lifted his head, and immediately understood the situation.

"Has your old, undying brain short-circuited? You think you’re worthy?"

The one-eyed old woman was so furious she laughed. She sneered, stepping out from the desolate gate while leaning on her Iron Staff. "Perfect. We’ll use your bones and sinews to consecrate the Ming Venerable!"

With a wave of her Iron Staff, the foremost Incense and Candle Follower pounced, his arms spreading to a seven-foot span. Iron claws shot out from his knuckles and tore through the cloth on Xu Yunfan’s shoulder, revealing the Extreme Dao Vest he wore underneath.

Xu Yunfan showed no sign of panic. He spun to evade the grapple, his Thunderfire Qilin Hammer whirling violently as he immediately unleashed the Thirty-six Cloak Hammers technique.

His right wrist suddenly flipped. The Heavy Hammer drew a semi-circular arc of light in front of him, and even the handle of the Thunderfire Qilin Hammer began to glow with faint, molten-rock patterns.

The joints of the pouncing follower’s arms twisted backward unnaturally. Amidst the shriek of iron claws tearing through the air, three-inch-long Refined Steel nails barely scraped across his arm, leaving only five white marks on the surface without even breaking the skin.

"KRAK!"

The hammer’s head precisely smashed into the follower’s elbow joint. The sound of his arm bone being pulverized was like the snapping of rotten wood.

Xu Yunfan twisted his waist and spun with the momentum. The nearly four-hundred-pound Heavy Hammer swept out with centrifugal force, making the air boom.

The second follower’s shinbone shattered the instant the hammer’s gale-force wind touched it. His broken body flew like a tattered sack and collapsed half a brick wall.

The remaining few surged forward one after another, scrambling to attack, but none could withstand a single blow from Xu Yunfan’s hammer. As he brandished the massive Heavy Hammer, it was said that a graze would wound and a touch would mean death.

Just then, the old woman’s Iron Staff suddenly burst into three sections. A mechanism at the end shot out a nine-foot-long Chain Blade.

As the poisoned edge grazed past Xu Yunfan’s ear, he could clearly see bits of flesh still stuck in the gaps of the Chain Blade, obviously not cleaned properly.

"Seventh."

Xu Yunfan let out a low shout. He spun and twisted his waist. The instant his Heavy Hammer hit the ground, a copper spring at the end of the handle suddenly shot out.

BANG!

An invisible force suddenly crashed down in a thirty-foot radius around Xu Yunfan. The immensely powerful Qi Force crushed the ground, sinking it three inches deep.

If the old woman hadn’t retreated in a hurry, she too would have been caught in that heavy blow.

(The remaining three Chapters will be released together later.)