Chapter 11: Lightning Beast; Blacksmithing?

Xiu Ye closed his eyes, recalling the feeling of how used his soul skill in his spiritual world, he felt the soul power in his body decreased and his physical strength, speed, durability and endurance increased immensely.

He opened his eyes, revealing it to be sparking with blue white electricity. His eyes had also turned silver in color for some reason.

Xiu Ye's body was still surrounded with orange red flames but now, blue white colored lightning started dancing around him and the ground within half a meter diameter. The lightning was also now mixing with his flames, crackling in and out of around them.

He looked down on himself, his right hand gripping the handle of Ryūjin Jakka; scorching orange red flames coated it with blue white lightning, dancing around it like they were snakes. The scabbard was long dissolved into mots of blue light.

Xiu Ye widened his eyes, he didn't realize this earlier but, was he supposed to be this strong? He felt like he could cut apart a mountain! Vaporized the seven seas! Cause catastrophic thunderstorms!

Holy shit. This feels good.

Mang Tian watched in amazement at Xiu Ye, his eyes and aura changing, coated entirely with flames and lightning while holding with a one-handed grip onto the handle of a beautiful one-edged sword; looking like warrior born from fire and lightning.

"So cool!" Mang Tian couldn't help but mutter out in a low tone that Xiu Ye wasn't able to hear.

This was an unexpected sight for him, lightning? How was that possible? Wasn't Xiu Ye's martial soul some type of fire sword? Then, what is the deal with the lightning?

"Is it the result of his spirit soul perhaps?" Mang Tian mumbled as he looked at the floating hammer on Xiu Ye's shoulder, numerous theories running in his head.

He shouldn't be able to absorb a hammer with the lightning element spirit soul with a fire sword martial soul, after all, there was no clear compatibility between them! It shouldn't be possible. The absorbing process should have ended in failure.

Xiu Ye then mentally controlled both the fire and lightning around him to disappear.

The flames and lightning surrounding him suddenly disappeared into thin air, cancelling the soul skill, leaving only Xiu Ye standing with Ryūjin Jakka on hand.

He looked down at the sword, feeling angry at it for a brief moment before shaking it off. He inhaled in a mouthful of air and raised his sword over his head, his eyes closing.

Memories of a time long since passed: of a young man training with only a ordinary sword but with the determination and will that could not easily be burned out, fought years of battles and wars, turned old then taught others how to fight.

These were the memories of Genryūsai Yamamoto.

Unknown to Xiu Ye, he now held Ryūjin Jakka with both hands and started cutting down the air in front of him repeatedly; rising it over his head and slashing down.

Mang Tian, standing by the side, watched his charge moving his sword around in trance with a look of confusion.

What is he doing?

Xiu Ye's movements were sloppy and slow in Mang Tian's eyes, contributed by his cultivation and skill from blacksmithing, he watched with crossed arms as his charge repeatedly raise and swing down his sword at the air.

A few minutes passed and Xiu Ye remained in the same position and doing the same actions.

"Honestly, if you wanted to practiced playing swords kid you should have just gone outside–" Mang Tian's grumble died down quickly as his eyes widened in surprise.

The air around Xiu Ye, it changed.

His form was the same, steady and firm, feet apart. His expression and breathing was both calm as well.

But his swings... It wasn't like what it was a few minutes ago! The sword's blade was steady, there was no shaking from a pair of trembling hands, instead, it was unhesitatingly brought to cut down the air. The wind around had became slightly visible, looking like two waves had clashed against each other, or, an ocean splitting into two.

'Marvelous...' Mang Tian thought as he watched the split momentary visible air slightly pushed his surrounding equipment and materials back.

It further shocked him!

He couldn't feel any soul power being emitted from Xiu Ye's body, so that meant that he had done that with his own upper limbs' strength? Having the air bend itself apart was an easy job for anyone in the world, even toddlers could do it, but having it split and cause strong air pressure? That meant a huge deal of force and strength that no new one-ringed soul masters could do!

'Such great strength.' Mang Tian enviously thought for a moment, thinking of with such abnormal strength, he would have a much easier journey of being a blacksmith.

'Hm? Hold on.' An idea popped inside Mang Tian's head as he looked up to stare at the floating hammer on Xiu Ye's left shoulder.

'Is it possible...' Mang Tian's corner lips upturned into a 'I've got a genius idea' grin.

What Mang Tian didn't know, was Xiu Ye had been subconsciously using soul power to reinforced his two forearms to help him reenact the training Yamamoto had in his memories. He was also more focused on the latter's swings and the sword that he didn't really took mind of the cyan lines appearing on the kid's forearms and face.

The reason why he didn't feel any soul power coming off him was because Xiu Ye had condensed his soul power in his body, preventing any amount of it to leak out. This was due to a requirement of his ability, reinforcement; soul power is poured into a part of his body to be reinforced, reinforcing it to be stronger, and for it to be successful soul power has to be carefully condensed inside the body so to prevent leakage and disrupting the reinforcement being applied. Avoiding the probability of the human part of the body exploding.

'The primary basic sword training, is to swing the sword a hundred times with everything you have! Ha!' Xiu Ye exhaled, cleared his mind, and continued swinging his sword.

The force of his swing grew wild, causing Mang Tian to snapped out of his thoughts.

"Huh?" Xiu Ye opened his eyes, widening, as he paused in place. He felt he couldn't move his arms, no, his sword. He looked up to see a large black hand holding the blade of Ryūjin Jakka.

"Enough, boy. If you want to practice your sword plays, do it outside so there would be no any collateral damages done here. Understand?"

Xiu Ye nodded in understanding and Mang Tian let go of Ryūjin Jakka. The cyan lines on the former's body disappearing into his skin.

"Good. Now Xiu Ye, do you know what blacksmithing is and do you have any interest in it?"

"Eh?"