Chapter 493: Level Up
Translator: Oneshotwonder Editor: Hitesh_
Wang Tong nodded as if he had been expecting Tan Bu’s breakthrough. Traumatic experiences often formed the nuclei from which power would grow.
Standing beside the collapsed body of Tan Bu, Duo Lun still hung in there. Ever since he came back from the tournament, he had devoted all of his time to cultivation as if he was obsessed with training.
There were only two soldiers left standing by now. Unlike Guan Dongyang’s painful expression, Tan Bu’s face was placid and indifferent to his physical suffering.
A few seconds later, a smile of resignation found Duo Lun’s mouth as the young warrior finally collapsed to the ground.
As soon as Duo Lun and Tan Bu fell, they passed out, a sign that they had reached their limits. Those who still had the energy to look left and right after failing, such as Ross, had given up too early. Ross’ mind reeled as he witnessed Tan Bu’s advancement into level sixteen. He found it hard to believe that he was no longer the strongest METAL warrior in Battle Wolf, as the title now belonged to Tan Bu.
Guan Dongyang was then the only person left standing on the training ground. It was evident that his power was much greater than his band brothers. However, it was not necessarily a good thing to have a wild gap between one member of the band and the rest. A war band should always work as a team, and the asymmetrical distribution of strength among the members could turn out to be a recipe for failure.
After having weeded out the weaker soldiers, Wang Tong could finally focus on Guan Dongyang. As the golden shimmer burnt brighter inside Wang Tong’s eyes, he doubled down the attack on Guan Dongyang.
The soul energy field was a very effective method of pushing normal soldiers to their limit without harming them. However, Guan Dongyang was not an ordinary soldier. Wang Tong conceded that he needed to add a little spice to the normal routine.
“Kom!”
Guan Dongyang’s vision went blank, and then he saw the scene that he had buried under the deepest layer of his memory, in an attempt to forget it.
“Dongyang, you are the hope of the mastery. You need to live!”
“Shifu, let me go and fight them!”
“Fight? Hehe. You will have a lot of fighting to do, but not right now. Take your brothers and GO!”
“Shifu, we all owe our lives to you. Let us fight for you, for our sect, even if it means our death!”
“You fool, leave me and leave Mars… NOW!”
When the Zergs came down on the Mastery Sect, Guan Dongyang wanted to die in the battlefield while defending his Shifu. But, his Shifu persuaded him to save himself, and in turn, save the future of the Mastery.
When he finally made it to the safety, he heard Shifu’s heart-wrenching cry coming from the room that was filled with Zergs. Beside him were five of his sect brothers, including Hamir; they were the last hope of the original Mastery Sect.
Guan Dongyang never left Mars, but neither did he ever return to what was left of the Mastery Sect’s headquarters. He had spent all of his courage in the final retreat, and had nothing left in him to ward off the guilt. Even if the world had already forgiven him for not fighting until the last drop of blood, he could not forgive himself. But, what other choice did he have?
“KOM!”
A surge of energy gushed out of from Guan Dongyang’s body and shot up to the ceiling.
He had finally breached the bottleneck. After the rogue energy subsided, Guan Dongyang locked his eyes with Wang Tong.
A level nineteen Mastery Caster was born.
However, it would still take Guan Dongyang a while to get used to his new power.
Ye Zi gazed at Wang Tong with reverential silence. Although she was not sure how Wang Tong had achieved it, she watched as he brought both Guan Dongyang and Tan Bu to the next level in their cultivation. Tan Bu, in particular, had skipped two levels and leaped from level twelve to level fourteen. Such a great leap was unheard of.
Although Guan Dongyang had only advanced one level in his cultivation, his achievement was no less than that of Tan Bu, because at a high level such as level eighteen, gaining any advancement was near impossible due to the tremendous difficulties involved.
The rest of the onlookers were also shocked by the development. As they watched the twenty soldiers lying on the ground, they knew that Wang Tong was about to usher in a new era to the Battle Wolf.
This was the first day of Wang Tong’s training, and it would be the last day that any Battle Wolf soldiers would have ever doubted Wang Tong.
…
In the few days that followed, Wang Tong started to teach the soldiers the way of double GN circulation. Since Guan Dongyang was very familiar with the subject, he offered his help, which made the process much easier. From the results of the few days of practice, Wang Tong noticed that the double GN circulation worked miracles in improving the power of the low-level soldiers. But, it seemed to have a much smaller effect on the high-level soldiers.
Regardless, little help was better than no help at all. After Ye Zi had tried the double GN circulation for a few days, she found that the small effects had accumulated to a discernible improvement in her soul energy movement. The results of Wang Tong’s training spoke louder than words. So, Ye Zi was quickly mired in admiration for furface’s ingenuity in creating such helpful tactics that were compatible with all tactics.
The Double GN circulation was particularly effective for warriors of level fifteen and below. But, since Wang Tong’s version of the double GN circulation was an add-on effect instead of the result of actual double GN nodes, its effect was greatly reduced for higher level warriors.
Wang Tong had studied the method that the Tactics of the Enchantress had used to reduce the double GN circulation to a single one. Based on his study, he reverse-engineered this version of the tactics that allowed the cultivators to expand the single circulation into a double circulation.
However useful these tactics were, they came with a catch: in order to double the GN circulations, the cultivator would need the aid of a powerful warrior who knew the exact point at which the expansion should take place.
Although the expansion processed could be done by the cultivator himself, it was much easier with the help of a powerful warrior who knew what he or she was doing.
Wang Tong had helped all twenty members of the focus group in expanding their GN circulation. When they were powerful enough and had gained more understanding about the process, these twenty soldiers could then help others to expand their circulations.
As the days passed by, Wang Tong gradually became the idol of Battle Wolf’s soldiers. They respected and adored him not only because he was strong, but also because he had helped them become more powerful.
The recent development of the Battle Wolf dumbfounded Lie Xuan. In her opinion, Battle Wolf should be taking advantage of their loot and expanding their group. But instead, she found out that the entire camp had been focusing on only one thing: training. Guan Dongyang had been so absorbed in his training that, at times, Lie Xuan felt like she was being ignored.
Sensing that something strange was going on, Lie Xuan requested to join the training.
Ye Zi was pleasantly surprised by Lie Xuan’s decision. It was always a good thing to see another female warrior among the ranks.
After some initial testing, Wang Tong threw Lie Xuan right into the intense training.
Every day, the focus group would receive METAL combat training in the morning and mastery training in the afternoon. In the evening, Wang Tong required everyone to finish an intense physical training routine.
After five days of the hellish boot camp experience, the focus group had finally met his expectation, and he reckoned that it was time to improve their combat techniques.
Ever since the dark ones entered the battlefield, the Zergs started to fight with an increasingly higher level of intelligence. They had learned to ambush and use different formations while facing difference compositions of human forces. These changes in the Zerg’s fighting style had spurred the humans to use greater caution and planning.
…
One day, Wang Tong suddenly called off the soldiers’ normal training routing and ordered the focus group members to stand still in a row with their backs straight. Lie Xuan felt a little bit of out of place while standing with weaklings on her left and right. She felt that she had returned to her academy days.
