Chapter 731 — Possessed by the Martial Soul
The Herdsman of the Wasteland · Page 2 of 5
Shen Mu and Hu Bugui fell to the rear, Shen Mu asking about the methods of cultivating the Martial Soul.
Shen Mu knew very little about the Martial Soul. He had only heard from the old farmer that to cultivate the spirit through martial arts was the Martial Soul, and that when the Martial Soul entered the Dao it became the Martial Dao. How exactly the Martial Soul came to be, he had no idea.
"The Martial Soul is in fact the Martial Dao Primordial Spirit."
Hu Bugui hesitated, glanced around, and lowered his voice. "I cultivate the Martial Soul by methods from the outside. There has always been an unwritten rule in the Bull-Fighting Realm: it is strictly forbidden to learn the divine abilities and Daoist arts of the outside world. But I learned some of those arts while following my parents out there, and my understanding of the Primordial Spirit differs somewhat from that of the people here."
Shen Mu was deeply curious. "What is the difference between a Martial Dao Primordial Spirit and an ordinary one?"
"Do not awaken the Spirit Fetus; forge the Martial Soul first."
Hu Bugui said, "You do not awaken the Spirit Fetus. You temper your own soul until it is like steel, like iron. In boyhood you slay a fierce tiger with your bare hands, cut down a horned python, kill a flood dragon! Few youths in the Bull-Fighting Realm can pass such a trial. Many die young."
Shen Mu was startled. Even in his own boyhood he had never undergone such brutal training!
The elders of Hidden Maimed Village had trained him cruelly enough, but never to the point of staking his life on it. And here the people of the Bull-Fighting Realm sent their children to pit themselves against fierce tigers, horned pythons, and flood dragons. They truly did not treat a child's life as a life at all!
Suddenly a violent crashing came from the great hall ahead, like ten thousand thunderbolts galloping. It was the thunder-sound of a martial powerhouse's body in motion. Though he had not yet stepped inside, Shen Mu could already picture it: bodies of sinew forged by a thousand hammerings colliding in an instant, sweat scattering like rain!
Hu Bugui was used to this. Walking on, he continued, "Once you have tempered it to a certain point, the soul fuses with the body. The martial spirit is forged into flesh and blood and marrow; in motion it is like galloping thunder, at rest like frozen lightning. When a martial divine ability carries your own will and spirit, the Martial Soul has taken possession of the body. Only then do you break the wall of the Spirit Fetus. The Spirit Fetus serves as support, nourishing the body with vital essence. Because I lived outside with my parents, by the time I returned to the Bull-Fighting Realm my Spirit Fetus had already awakened, and forging the Martial Soul afterward was far harder. I suffered more than any of my fellow disciples."
He spoke lightly, as of a breeze and thin clouds, but the hardships involved were clearly immense, beyond an outsider's imagining.
Shen Mu thought it over. In his own cultivation he had once walked this same road; but once his Mystic Body Three Elixirs Art came to fruition, he broke through the Spirit Fetus Realm and did not continue along it.
Who would have thought that the Bull-Fighting Realm had truly followed this road to the end, forging the Martial Soul and carving out a path unlike any in the outside world.
"When a martial divine ability carries your own spirit and will, the Martial Soul has taken possession."