The next morning, another new elder arrived to lecture the new disciples.
This time, the topic was scouting and patience.
The elder looked at the group of young disciples and snorted.
"Assassins without patience are just corpses waiting to happen."
To prove his point, he ordered everyone to stand still.
"For the next hour, none of you move."
"If you move, you get hit."
The disciples glanced at each other confidantly.
The hour began.
At first, it seemed easy.
But slowly their legs began to ache.
Sweat formed.
Itches appeared in the worst places.
Some disciples shifted slightly.
Smack!
A thin bamboo stick struck their shoulders.
Even Li Mingfu struggled.
He had never stood perfectly still for an hour before.
Several times, his body instinctively adjusted its balance.
Smack.
He was hit a few times as well.
When the hour finally ended, many disciples collapsed.
The elder nodded.
"Good. Now you understand how difficult patience really is."
He then continued the lecture.
Patience while observing a target.
Patience while hiding in ambush.
Patience while waiting for the perfect moment to strike.
Several disciples fell asleep during the lecture.
They were immediately punished.
Li Mingfu forced himself to stay awake.
To remain alert, he began quietly studying his own body.
He observed the circulation of his Qi.
Something interesting caught his attention.
Even though he wasn't actively cultivating, his Qi was still moving.
Very slowly, but it was still moving.
Li Mingfu smiled slightly.
"So my theory was right."
His Thousand Thread Qi Weaving Art had reached a point where it circulated automatically.
The threads drew in Qi and continued their work even when he wasn't cultivating.
That meant he could spend more time focusing on other things.
In the past, he had to focus part of his mind to remind his body to cultivate.
Now, the Qi threads circulated on their own.
When the lecture ended, Li Mingfu immediately ran toward another peak.
Thousand Mechanism Peak.
As soon as he arrived, his eyes widened.
The place was completely different from Shadow Weave Peak.
Disciples everywhere were discussing inventions, tools, and weapons.
The entire mountain buzzed with creativity.
Some disciples demonstrated mechanical puppets.
Others tested strange weapons.
There were even bizarre inventions Li Mingfu couldn't immediately understand.
He wandered through the outer sect market area.
The more he saw, the more jealous he felt.
"I should have chosen this peak…"
Everything here fascinated him.
Machines.
Weapons.
Puppets.
If he had come here, he might already be building firearms.
Unfortunately, only disciples of Thousand Mechanism Peak could access their inner sect workshops.
So Li Mingfu could only explore the outer sect shops.
Still, it was amazing.
He wandered around so long that he almost forgot the time.
Eventually, he noticed the sun was setting.
He quickly entered a weapon shop.
"I need daggers."
After seeing the prices, his excitement immediately dropped.
Weapons were expensive.
Very expensive.
In the end, he could only afford the cheapest pair of daggers.
He had to spend almost all the sect contribution points he currently possessed.
The shop owner smiled widely.
Clearly, she was very happy with the sale.
Li Mingfu, however, sighed.
"If I didn't need them right now, I wouldn't buy such low-quality daggers."
Along with the daggers, he bought a sheath and a belt designed to carry two blades.
Once home, he strapped the belt around his waist.
One dagger rested on each side.
Left.
Right.
He reread Shadowless Daggers carefully.
Then he began practicing.
Draw.
Sheathe.
Draw.
Sheathe.
At first, he practiced standing still.
Then, while walking.
Then, while sitting.
It was harder than he expected.
Several times, the blade nearly cut his fingers.
Part of his training uniform had small cuts.
Only noticeable if someone looked closely.
But he kept practicing.
Dagger out.
Dagger in.
Over and over.
Eventually, he tried combining it with Shadow Drift Steps.
Surprisingly, the two techniques worked together fairly well.
The smooth stepping rhythm matched the dagger draw movements.
Li Mingfu grinned.
"If I master both… they'll work perfectly together."
Whenever he grew tired, he cultivated.
When he became bored, he took short naps.
Day after day passed like this.
At some point, he realized something amusing.
"I'm turning into a ninja instead of a cultivator…"
He laughed quietly.
"Maybe I should have transmigrated into a ninja world."
Still, he continued practicing.
Time passed quickly.
Three months flew by.
Soon, the Inner Sect Disciple Competition began.
The competition lasted two weeks.
During that time, Li Mingfu stood near the arena while practicing his dagger draws.
Draw.
Sheathe.
Draw.
Sheathe.
Meanwhile, he watched the battles.
What shocked him most was the sheer number of disciples.
Even though this was only one mountain peak, there were thousands of inner sect disciples.
When he went to see the outer sect competition, the scale was even greater.
Tens of thousands of disciples competed for ranking positions.
Li Mingfu continued practicing his dagger draws while observing.
Many disciples noticed him, but none approached him.
After all, he was an inner sect disciple.
Even though he was a five-year-old child, status mattered greatly.
Every outer sect disciple respectfully greeted him as Senior.
If they were disrespectful and someone reported it to Bone Judgment Peak, the punishment could be severe.
After two weeks, the final winner was announced for the Inner Sect competition.
It was Senior Leng Shuyin.
The same disciple who had given the newcomers their first tour.
Li Mingfu was shocked.
"That nice senior is this strong?!"
Although Leng Shuyin always appeared gentle, his fighting style was terrifying.
He never killed his opponents.
But those who refused to surrender often ended up bedridden for half a year.
Li Mingfu learned a lot from watching the competition.
Several powerful outer sect disciples even replaced weaker inner sect disciples.
The cutoff seemed to be around Qi Refinement Stage Six or Seven, depending on combat experience.
Li Mingfu wasn't worried.
He had already returned to Qi Refinement Stage One.
After the competition, he returned to his room.
Quietly, he whispered.
"Status."
A translucent panel appeared before him.
Name: Li Mingfu
Age: 5
Cultivation: Qi Refinement Level 1 (14 Threads)
Cultivation Technique:
Thousand Thread Qi Weaving Art — Initial (50%)
Martial Techniques:
Shadow Drift Steps — Initial (90%)
Shadowless Daggers — Minor (15%)
Talent:
Heaven-Defying Luck
One of the elders had once explained the mastery stages for techniques.
Initial.
Minor.
Major.
Complete.
Each stage dramatically increased a technique's power and speed.
Advancing required practice and understanding.
But understanding the technique did not matter for Li Mingfu.
All he had to do was keep practicing.
The system showed him increased proficiency as long as he practiced.
Maybe understanding the technique increased the proficiency faster.
But for now, he could only test and find out later.
When Shadowless Daggers reached the Minor stage, a sudden wave of knowledge flooded into Li Mingfu's mind.
His understanding of dagger drawing and blade control had improved instantly.
The system tracking everything gave him a huge confidence boost, and the extra little cheat made him less frustrated at the system.
Now drawing while walking has become much easier.
Running while drawing was still difficult.
But if he ran slowly, the technique worked smoothly.
Some of the newer disciples whispered gossip about him.
They often saw a strange five-year-old practicing dagger draws everywhere.
Li Mingfu didn't care.
This was the cultivation world.
A brutal dog-eat-dog world.
The weak died.
Only the strong survived.
Even during lectures, he practiced quietly.
Draw.
Sheathe.
Silently.
Whenever he made too much noise, the teaching elder would glance at him.
Li Mingfu would then slow down and correct his movements.
The elders never stopped him.
In fact, from their expressions, Li Mingfu suspected they approved of his actions.
They only looked at him when he made mistakes.
Li Mingfu also no longer practiced combining his movement and dagger techniques.
Doing both at once reduced efficiency.
So he trained them separately.
If he had actively focused on cultivation, his Thousand Thread Qi Weaving Art might already have reached the Minor stage and reached Qi Refinement Stage Three.
But Li Mingfu wasn't in a hurry.
Automatic cultivation was practically god-tier.
Why rush something that was already improving by itself?
For now, sharpening his martial techniques was far more important.