6 Martial Pavilion

The elder in charge of the martial arts pavilion was called Duane Stone, he was originally an inner elder, but was promoted to the elder in charge of the pavilion after his numerous merits. Even if it doesn't sound like a high position, the elder in charge of the pavilion actually held a pretty lofty position, he had an abundance of resources and he got a lot of respect, and since he was in charge of the martial arts pavilion, no one wanted to offend him, since it could severely affect one's future. When Edward came to the martial arts pavilion, he cupped his fist and bowed respectfully before Duane, earning him a gentle nod before he proceeded inside.

"Since you are an outer member, you can only go into the first floor of the pavilion, and you can borrow one martial art of each type, so one fist art, one offensive art, one leg art, and one movement art, these will have to be returned within two months!"

Hearing this Edward put it into the back of his head, as he wandered into the martial pavilion. In Edward's eyes, the martial pavilion was like three story library, the first floor contained an abundance of different martial arts, but they were all low-grade, at the second floor, however, there was a lot less of them, but they were all of the mid-grade instead. All the high-grade martial arts were stored in the 3rd floor of the martial arts pavilion, but that was only something elders and core members of the family had access to.

Edward was content with being able to pick some low-grade martial arts right now, he was confident that he would be able to progress to the other floors eventually. Therefore he first decided to check out a movement art. But after checking around for a little bit, Edward only found one single movement art which he thought was really suited for him. The movement art was called Gale Steps, and it was a simplified version of the mid-grade art Cyclone Steps. The reason why Edward thought that this movement art was suited to him was that of the fact that his martial spirit was of the wind element. This was something he had figured out when he had broken through to the 1st rank of the body-tempering realm.

This was because of the green tattoos that were all over its body, they contained the element of wind, and therefore Edward had an affinity towards the element of wind. This was certainly a good thing as it would be easier to comprehend martial arts with the same element as the one you were aligned with, the martial art would also increase in power. After having chosen his movement art, Edward continued to the fist arts. There he spent a lot more time searching for a suitable fist art, as this one was a harder choice since there were more of them that fit him. But in the end, his eyes wandered onto a book with a dark blue cover. This fist art was called the dominating wolf fist, and Edward chose it based on the fact that his martial spirit was a wolf, as well as the fact that the fist art seemed to be one of the best low-grade martial arts this martial pavilion had, almost on par with a mid-grade martial art, but it was hard to comprehend, and was therefore often left alone in a corner somewhere.

Even though Edward had only chosen two of his martial arts so far, he was still immensely satisfied with what he had right now. But he still had his leg arts and sword arts left. Since he had chosen a movement technique based on the element of wind, and because of his martial spirit, he wanted to find more martial arts that were aligned with the wind element, since it would enhance his strength a lot if he used the same power for most of his martial arts.And since he wanted to save the sword art for last, he decided to find a suiting leg art, even though he didn't use kicks often in a fight, it was still a necessity to know leg arts, because there were always a place and time for everything, and leg arts could be immensely useful in some scenarios.

Looking through the leg art section of the pavilion, Edward found a suitable leg art that was called the leg of the tempest, even though he felt that it was a bit exaggerated, he still picked it since he couldn't find anything better that suited him here. And now he only had the sword arts left to pick.

When he came to the sword art section, Edward noticed that it was a lot smaller compared to the other sections, but that was to be expected, as all the other martial arts were necessities, while sword arts was something you chose, some wanted to use blades instead of swords, or knives, or maybe even staffs, but there were still plenty of sword arts, compared to some of those other weapons, since it was still a very common choice of weapon.

After scanning through all of them, Edward found 2 sword arts which he felt was worth picking, but he was a bit torn between which one to pick, one of them was called the sword of wind, which was fairly standard and not the most powerful, but that was only because it was one of the few high-grade arts of the family. On the other hand was one of the strongest low-grade sword arts this pavilion had, the shattering sword, but it was aligned with the earth element, so Edward decided to go with the sword of wind in the end, and so his day at the pavilion came to an end as he checked them out.

When Duane saw the martial arts that Edward picked, he nodded his head as he noticed that this youth in front of him clearly knew what was best for him, and he wasn't like most of the others, who only went for the most powerful martial arts they could find, whether they were aligned with the element or not. But this youth clearly had a martial spirit that was wind-based.

After showing his respects to the elder once more, Edward decided to go back to the yard of his hut once more, to start his training again, but this time it was going to be more intense, as he needed to cultivate as well!

When he arrived at his yard, he started to ponder a little, he wasn't entirely sure what he was going to do first, try and cultivate normally, or enhance his martial spirit. He knew that he would cultivate faster with his martial spirit, but he could guess that it would need a lot of resources to get it to level up if he wanted to do it again, so, therefore, he decided to play it safe at first, then build some strength, and then use that strength to earn some money, so he could level up the martial spirit. If it was still possible to do so of course.

He wanted to start with training up his martial arts since that would also train his body, which was what the body-tempering realm was all about, and he wanted to cultivate during the nights while resting inside of his hut. And so, his crazy training began once more. He started with training the dominating wolf fist, then the gale step, then the leg of the tempest, and then finishing it off with the sword of wind. He trained with this schedule over and over again until the evening came.

Before going inside to cultivate, he had already managed to achieve the beginner achievement in all of the martial arts, the dominating wolf fist was lagging behind a little bit, as it had barely managed to get to the beginner-level, while the wind sword was a bit ahead, almost reaching the low-grade of understanding. After sitting down in the lotus position, he swallowed a body-tempering pill as he started to crazily absorb the qi around him, steadily improving his cultivation. After the night had ended, he had already made it to the middle of the first rank of the body-tempering realm, enhancing his strength even more.

This schedule of his went on for 17 days straight, which is a little over 2 weeks. The reason for this was because Edward had run out of body-tempering pills to use. But his strength had evolved once more. His cultivation had managed to reach the middle of the 2nd rank of the body-tempering realm. While his achievement in his martial arts had reached an entirely new level. All of his martial arts except for the wind sword and dominating wolf fist had reached the high-grade. But most of them had just barely managed to reach it. Edward's dominating wolf fist was at the peak of mid-grade achievement while his wind sword had reached the peak-grade. All Edward needed now was battle experience as well as cultivation resources.

It was time to go out on an adventure!