Chapter 209: The Modified Tang Sect Techniques
After watching what could barely be called a farcical spectacle, Han Li made his way back home. By the time he arrived, the others were already waiting for him to eat.
During the meal, Han Li casually mentioned the situation with the Ye family and briefly touched on what had happened at Heaven Dou Academy, mostly to reassure them.
"Why does everyone seem to think Zhu Qing is already dead?" Shui Bing'er asked curiously.
If it were just Yu Xiaogang, it would make sense Han Li often made fun of him anyway. But even Ning Fengzhi had reacted that way, and that didn't quite add up.
"Well, probably because Tang Hao is also in Heaven Dou City," Han Li replied with an odd expression. While he had certainly played a role in guiding the narrative, Tang Hao's own reputation among the upper ranks of the sects wasn't exactly stellar. It was no surprise that both Yu Xiaogang and Ning Fengzhi instinctively blamed him.
"Tang Hao? Is he here looking for a soul bone? But what does that have to do with Zhu Qing?" Dugu Yan asked in surprise.
They all knew that Han Li's Blue Silver Emperor right leg bone had come from Tang Hao's soul beast wife. They thought perhaps Tang Hao had uncovered some leads on soul bones, but how was this related to Zhu Qing's disappearance?
"Did I not mention it before? Oh, maybe I forgot," Han Li mused.
Of course, he remembered now last time he had only mentioned Tang Hao's presence, but since the timing hadn't aligned, the group hadn't personally encountered Tang San or Xiao Wu. So, he simply hadn't brought it up.
"It's because his son is also in Heaven Dou Academy, and Zhu Qing fought him yesterday. Given Tang Hao's usual methods, Ning Fengzhi suspecting him is actually pretty reasonable."
Han Li smirked at Zhu Zhuqing, though there was a hint of mischief in his smile.
"Tang San is his son?"
Zhu Zhuqing ignored his expression, but internally, she was shaken. Among their previous teammates, there had only been one person with the surname Tang.
"Yep. Otherwise, why would they immediately jump to the conclusion that you had been kidnapped and killed by Tang Hao?" Han Li shrugged, watching her reaction closely.
Unfortunately, Zhu Zhuqing's face remained as stoic as ever, giving away nothing. Han Li felt a bit disappointed.
"So, by your logic, that means Tang San isn't fully human either? I guess that makes him and that transformed hundred thousand year old soul beast… quite a match?"
Dugu Yan carefully chose her words to describe the two former teammates Zhu Zhuqing had mentioned before.
"Maybe that Xiao Wu girl is actually the soul ring and bone that Tang Hao left for his son on purpose. After all, based on his history, he's done something like that before," Shui Bing'er analyzed calmly.
"You both make valid points, but until something actually happens, who knows what they're thinking?"
Han Li neither confirmed nor denied their theories. In his mind, Tang Hao could easily go either way.
Zhu Zhuqing, on the other hand, remained silent, her head lowered.
She didn't care about Tang San, but Xiao Wu… well, they had at least been teammates once. Even now, knowing she was a hundred thousand year old soul beast, Zhu Zhuqing still retained a shred of sympathy for her.
After everything that had happened, she leaned more toward Shui Bing'er's theory that Xiao Wu had been preordained as Tang San's sacrifice.
Of course, Xiao Wu had chosen to stand by Tang San that was her choice. But at the same time, Zhu Zhuqing wouldn't interfere with whatever Han Li and the others decided to do.
"Alright, enough about that. We can deal with it later. For now, let's focus on training. You can take it a bit easy, but you still need to meet your daily quota. No slacking, got it?"
Han Li glanced at the group. Gossip was fine, but training was non negotiable.
"No problem!"
The group answered cheerfully compared to their past struggles, this lifestyle was practically a vacation.
"Zhu Qing, you'll continue special training. It's not time for you to rest yet."
Han Li turned to Zhu Zhuqing, who was still too weak compared to the others. She couldn't afford to relax yet.
"Understood," Zhu Zhuqing responded, her determination reignited.
Just after joining the group, she had already recognized the gap between herself and the others.
She needed to catch up as soon as possible.
At the very least, she needed to become stronger than she was now.
The Next Ten Days
For the following ten days, Han Li and the others returned to their usual training routine.
Meanwhile, Qian Renxue began secretly establishing connections with the Ye family, yet there wasn't the slightest rumor about it on the surface.
This made Han Li's opinion of her rise yet again.
She had an even greater grasp over Heaven Dou City than he had originally expected.
And that was a good thing Han Li, at his core, was a lazy person. The less he had to do, the better.
Of course, he wasn't just slacking off during this time.
He spent the past ten days helping Zhu Zhuqing develop her martial soul even further.
Every night, he personally guided her through medicinal baths and body conditioning, never once skipping a session.
Even when she no longer truly needed them, he still insisted on continuing.
Zhu Zhuqing had noticed this as well, but since she had already prepared herself mentally from the moment she chose to follow Han Li, she simply accepted his methods.
After all, no matter what, this was still far better than the life she had before.
Han Li didn't do much else aside from enjoying the view every night, but most of his time was still spent helping Zhu Zhuqing cultivate. Over time, their relationship subtly changed.
Of course, that was just a side effect. His main focus was on refining the techniques he had obtained from Tang San, and at this point, he had almost completed his modifications.
Now that he could easily interact with the laws of the world, modifying these techniques had become much simpler.
Under Han Li's revisions, several techniques had begun to incorporate rule based applications. While still shallow, they were already highly practical.
Xuantian Skill was already well developed and mainly required personalized adjustments based on the user, so Han Li didn't change much.
As for Dragon Capturing, Crane Controlling, it was more of a control based technique, so instead of modifying it, he simply passed it on to the others and let them train with it on their own.
However, other techniques underwent drastic changes, to the point where they were barely recognizable.
At first, he had jokingly renamed everything with "Xuan" at the beginning, mainly because he was too lazy to come up with proper names functionality was more important than naming conventions.
Ghost Shadow Perplexing Step was now modified to interact with wind and darkness elements. The infusion of these elements enhanced its agility and unpredictability, making it even harder to track. Naturally, its speed had also greatly improved.
If one didn't mind, it could even be used as a movement technique for long distance travel.
The only thing that disappointed Han Li was that he had yet to modify it to function like "Lingbo Weibu" (Floating on Water Step), which would allow movement techniques to also increase soul power regeneration.
The biggest changes were to Mysterious Jade Hand and Purple Demon Eye.
For Han Li's group, Mysterious Jade Hand was essentially useless.
Instead of discarding it, Han Li repurposed its framework and rebuilt it entirely.
Now, instead of focusing on palm reinforcement, it had evolved into a short duration elemental shield, superior to ordinary soul power shields.
As for keeping it as a permanent enhancement, Han Li completely dismissed that idea.
Not to mention other concerns with the entire group being girls, he found the thought a little unsettling.
But the most significant overhaul was done to Purple Demon Eye.
From Han Li's perspective, this wasn't really a technique for training eyesight it was purely a mental power cultivation method.
The so called vision enhancements were merely external manifestations of heightened mental strength. The key feature was its built in spiritual attack technique.
Han Li himself had access to mental attacks, but they had always been dependent on his soul bones.
Even now, having gained insight into law applications, teaching the others how to use mental attacks remained difficult.
On the entire Douluo Continent, aside from soul masters with spiritual martial souls, even most Titled Douluos relied on sheer mental pressure rather than refined spiritual attacks.
Thus, a complete cultivation method like Purple Demon Eye, which combined training and offensive capabilities, was an invaluable resource.
Han Li's main modification was fixing its energy source issue.
Expecting someone to cultivate for over a decade just to absorb "Purple Qi" from the east? That was ridiculous.
After various experiments, Han Li discovered that killing intent and faith energy could serve as excellent substitutes for Purple Qi.
Essentially, Purple Demon Eye's training method involved capturing high level energy to refine one's spiritual power and both killing intent and faith energy met that requirement perfectly.
Luckily, Han Li had both in abundance.
While he couldn't mass produce this training method, supporting a few people was manageable.
As for hidden weapons, Han Li didn't bother delving into them.
He had zero interest in throwing techniques or mechanical craftsmanship. The only thing that remotely intrigued him was the gunpowder formula inside Buddha Fury Tang Lotus.
That said, even if he wasn't going to personally research them, that didn't mean he would abandon the idea altogether.
There were plenty of people passionate about hidden weapons.
Since everyone had their own areas of expertise, Han Li had already instructed the merchant guild to investigate the situation in Gengxin City.
Once things were in place, he could tap into the massive pool of talent at the Blacksmith Association.
There was no way they wouldn't take this seriously.
Once his modifications were complete, Han Li dumped all of the techniques onto the girls and let them choose which ones they wanted to practice.
To be honest, aside from Xuantian Skill and Purple Demon Eye, the others were somewhat redundant at this stage.
Yes, even Ghost Shadow Perplexing Step.
To be precise, after reaching the Soul King level, battles became more about raw power.
Technique based skills were most useful either at the very beginning of training or at the highest levels of combat.
At lower levels, they allowed weaker individuals to survive and gain an advantage against stronger opponents.
At the highest levels, they allowed experts to dominate by leveraging superior technique and control.
But right now, the group was somewhere in the middle too strong for these techniques to make much of a difference, yet not strong enough for them to be truly essential.
Still, it was better to have more skills than fewer.
Besides, watching the girls chase each other around using Ghost Shadow Perplexing Step was pretty entertaining.
That alone made it worthwhile.
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