Martial Harmony: Will Strikes Back!

"Ha!" shouted Will as he brought down his sword in a smooth downward swing. Ha resisted with a horizontal block but it was a pointless endeavor.

Will's sword was carrying a weight that felt like a mountain.

'This boy, he has finally understood how to use the environment!'

Will stopped the rapid movement and stared his opponent right in the eye. Jingsung Ha felt as if he was submerged in a pool of tar and that he was sinking, despite the fact that he was standing still.

'The Dao of Water; Water Pressure Concept. He has copied me, not bad. This guy is worth taking seriously.'

Will had been wondering why there was water all around him, it was for his to draw power. Will suspected that the atlas columns gave you an environment that both you and your opponent can benefit from in some way.

Will expanded his Soul force into the environment. His Aqua Sense working in overdrive. The Dao of Water was fast and had many applications, but Will only needed one. To put it simply, Will had tapped into the water around him. Instead of trying to forcefully control the water around him, he was slowly feeling it out and resonating the water with his Water Gate. This allowed him to borrow power from the water around him.

Will had gained a good understanding of the Dao and how to apply from Modus after his surprise battle with Ignius back in Miami, before he was Level 50. Now he was level 99 with a yin type constitution, not to mention that the boy had not been slacking around.

One of the reasons why Will had slowed down and entered a power type clash with Jingsung is because he needed to concentrate. What he was doing required him to mentally push himself to the limits. It was like trying to fix a car when all you have learned is theory through textbooks and all you have done for practice is touch a few parts and tools. Thankfully Will had superb tools, and a top class Master! As Will's sword bore down on the Restricted Avatar of the Raindrop Sword Immortal, the former recounted the Words modus had spoken to him a few months ago.

….

"When it comes to martial arts, there are many ways to classify them. One of the classifications is in regard to how one learns a martial art or skill. In general, martial arts can be classified as orthodox or unorthodox. Orthodox martial arts are martial arts with some kind of stance; a Form. How to attack, where to attack, the angle, speed, trajectory, technique, everything is given in detail about how the technique is supposed to be executed. Most martial arts are orthodox, as it is easier to learn when a lot of information is provided. Most of the basic martial arts you use are like this."

"Unorthodox techniques are the opposite. They have no definite form and only contain an essence. Once one captures that essence, they have already learned the basics of the technique. An example of such a technique is your True Strike. It can be performed with any weapon and or body part, so long as one has the essence of the technique and the prerequisites of energy and intent.

"Unlike orthodox techniques, however, there is another requirement to mastering unorthodox techniques. That is Intent. Unorthodox techniques are much harder to learn than orthodox ones, but in return, they are much, much more powerful. Once mastered, they allow the user to completely alter them to the user's needs. This results in every mastered unorthodox technique differing from another. Look."

Modus opened his hands and two blobs of water appeared, floating above the palms. One blob became a cube of water, while the other remained ever-changing, mutating in shape every second.

"The cube represents orthodox martial arts. Orderly, easy to comprehend, straight-forward.

"This other one represents unorthodox techniques. Will, you are an extremely talented in swordsmanship, one might even say you were destined to become as sword immortal, but you are far too focused on your swordsmanship, neglecting your other power..."

The cube disappeared, leaving the blob that was constantly changing shape in the air.

"You can be described as having two skills; the sword and water. You have made quite a bit of progress in your sword arts, or rather to be more specific, your orthodox sword arts, whereas your water arts are lagging behind."

"Before I continue to illustrate this, let me explain the elements: water, fire, wood, earth, and metal. Each of these elements has properties. Water and fire elements have the formless aspect, thus those like you who have water or fire abilities have an advantage when it comes to learning unorthodox techniques. Water puts out fire and rusts metal, water gives life to wood and washes away the earth. Fire burns wood and can melt metal and earth. Wood grows from the earth and gains life from water, it can grow around anything and restrains all with form. Earth gives life to wood and can hold water. Metal can poisonwood, becomes formless under fire, has a kinship to earth, and can also make water impure.

Each of the intents that are derived from the elements come with these traits. These intents are vast and very difficult to master, but their uses are nearly infinite. Look at water: it has an effect on all four other elements! Which means if you play your cards right, with water intent you can be invincible! Well in theory of course...

There are simply far too much Intent within the Dao of water, and you can't possibly master them all, so it is best to focus on one aspect of water. After observing you, and seeing your ability to adapt to any situation, I believe you are perfectly suited to touching upon the Dao of Formlessness!"

Modus stood up and manipulated the water. It floated away from his palm and inserted itself into the ground: within seconds that piece of land had changed from a damp stretch of grassy earth into a long river, filled with multiple bends, stretching into the horizon. A few rocks were even jutting out of the water like spikes.

"Alright young man, enter the water!"

…

"Listen carefully now;

In the past, to cultivate, one needed to be able to feel the World Energy in an environment and take it into one's body. One's own aptitude determined whether one would become a Mage or a Warrior. Some bodies could only produce a Warrior's Qi, whereas, others could only produce a Mage's Mana.

There were three major factors that determined the quality of one's energy. The first was talent, which involved one's elemental affinity. The second was hard work, which depended on the amount of effort one would put in their cultivation. The third and last was the cultivation method one would use.

In that world, all Qi and Mana were made up of at least one of the five

Major Elements. These are earth, fire, wood, water, and metal.

In the past, most beings were born with little to no elemental affinity at all. Some were born with a high affinity to one element. Talented people were born with an affinity towards 2 elements. Prodigies with affinities to 3 or more elements were as rare as unicorns. One could even say they were practically myths.

Cultivation methods were instruction manuals on how to move Mana or Qi around your body in certain paths. In order for one to achieve the desired effect, like in an electric circuit, the more time one moved their energy around one's body in a particular path, the higher the quality of energy one would possess and the greater the capacity one's body had for energy.

This energy moved in blood vessels but was intangible and did not affect bodily functions. It only moved according to one's will.

Although having an affinity to multiple elements had advantages, it could also have disadvantages.

For example, if one's body had a perfect affinity to two elements, one could say he was a once in a lifetime prodigy. After all, it was better for one to have a perfect affinity to two elements than to have an average affinity to three. For affinity affects the speed of one's cultivation. In other words, it was how quickly one absorbed World Energy. You, young man, currently possess a near perfect affinity for water and something the people eons past did not have, The Conquest System!"

At the time, Will was floating on the surface of the river with his eyes closed. He was going downstream, allowing the current to do what it pleased with him.

"The Water Gate within you is already within your grasp... Feel it, bring it out! Imagine yourself as a tiny drop of water, circulating as one of countless within the tumultuous river that we call space."

Martial artists trained for countless years in order to gain control over their entire body. For example, most people were more familiar with the use of one hand than the other. This example continued across the human body as there were many muscles not used at their full potential. Martial Harmony was when a martial artist controlled their entire body perfectly. Ambidexterity, faster reflexes, increased flexibility were only some of the boons of achieving Martial Harmony.

Even Jingsung Ha, The Seventh Scion of Ha and incredibly talented Martial Artist, was barely able to touch this threshold...