Chapter 2661 — An Old Friend's Visit
The Blossom Guardian · Page 2 of 2
"Brother Arrowbrand?" Yu Dake was slightly taken aback, but guessed it must be a nickname of Wei Zhao's and paid it no mind, speaking directly instead. "Mr. Lin, to be frank, I am a rogue cultivator with no sect and no school. You know as well as I do that for rogue cultivators, advancing and breaking through is terribly hard. We rogue cultivators are nothing like scions of great houses such as yourself, Mr. Lin. We have no renowned masters to guide us, no cultivation resources. The pills those clan children eat like candy are worth a fortune to us, and we cannot even get them; when we fail to grasp some point of inner-energy method, we can only puzzle it out ourselves; when we advance or break through, no expert is there to guard the rites for us. So everything, absolutely everything, is so very difficult..."
"Er... hold on. Let me make one thing clear first: I count as a rogue cultivator too..." Wei Zhao shook his head with a bitter smile. In the eyes of outsiders, he was actually the scion of a great house? How absurd. But then, given the formidable strength Wei Zhao now displayed and his terrifying speed of advancement, such misunderstandings were only natural. In truth, Wei Zhao knew perfectly well that what Yu Dake described was precisely the hardship he himself had endured all these years!
Sometimes, seeing Zhao Qibing suddenly become an Earth-rank expert, Wei Zhao truly felt a twinge of envy—though strength raised by pills was unstable. Without proper reinforcement and training, such a cultivator was no match at all for one who had advanced step by step, footprint by footprint.
First of all, their practical combat experience fell far short. And comparing the two was like comparing two people of identical weight—one puffed up with fat, the other pure muscle. Their fighting indices were surely worlds apart!
So Zhao Qibing, for all his strength, was like a man who had never turned fat into muscle: his combat power fell far below that of experts of the same rank. And yet that inconceivable speed of cultivation still left Wei Zhao endlessly envious!
Wei Zhao had two masters, but neither had taught him anything about cultivation itself. One had taught him the arts of assassination and the Butterfly Subtle Step, a lightness skill whose speed rivaled that of Heaven-rank experts; the other had taught him medicine and helped temper his constitution.
But as for cultivation, Wei Zhao had groped his way forward bit by bit on his own. The only one who understood a thing or two and could offer him guidance—Jiao Yazi, Old Jiao, half a master to him—was a man with fragmented and incomplete memories, who knew nothing of what he was asked. It was agony beyond words for Wei Zhao.
One could say that Wei Zhao owed his present achievements entirely to his own bitter cultivation. In public he cut a splendid figure, able to overawe Heaven-rank experts—but who knew the hardship he endured in private while cultivating?
One minute on stage, ten years of toil off it—that was the principle. Now Wei Zhao no longer feared revealing his identity as a rogue cultivator, for he had gradually taken control at the clan level, and at the hidden-clan level he was already quietly ascendant. Only the ancient level remained—and at that level, feigning a mysterious background was meaningless. Your strength was plain for all to see; no amount of pretense would avail you unless you truly had an expert behind you who could step forward in person.
"What? Mr. Lin is a rogue cultivator too?" Yu Dake stared at Wei Zhao in shock, his eyes full of disbelief.
"Heh heh, naturally," Wei Zhao said with a smiling nod.
"Surely not! Mr. Lin, you're now an expert at the peak of the mid Earth rank, able to kill Heaven-rank experts in an instant—and you're a rogue cultivator? I always assumed there was an expert behind you, Mr. Lin, guiding you!" Yu Dake did not think Wei Zhao was lying; he was simply too stunned for words.