After Mira finished cultivating and training Maria, she went back to her room, gave Rhydian a beast corpse, and opened up the Earth-Shattering Fist Manual. Mira was very curious about this Manual. She figured that it had something to do with adding power behind a punch, but didn't know how it planned on doing that. She opened up the Manual and began to read.
"The body of a cultivator is extremely precious. Whether it be strength, life span, or appearances the body is the base for whatever the cultivator wants to do. This is especially so for fighting. Stories are often told of people making ravines with their swords or cutting mountains in half. If a sword is able to make large ravines in the earth and cut apart mountains then why can't your fist shatter whatever it touches? The Earth-Shattering Fist Manual is about using a cultivator's fist to do what weapons do in the hands of a cultivator. When this Art is used to its fullest potential, one will be able to shatter the very earth apart." Mira read this part and got even more excited! Mira wondered how satisfying it would be to crack the earth with just her fist. She then continued to read more on how to use this technique.
"The steps to be able to use this technique are as follows. Gather Qi into one of your fists, the more Qi there is the stronger the punch will be. Use around 30% of the Qi to form a small ball of Qi in between the knuckles of your middle and ring finger. Link the ball of Qi to the rest of the Qi in your fist then punch. When the ball of Qi in between your knuckles make contact, have the ball of Qi reach the point where it's about to explode. When it reaches this point, force the rest of the Qi in your fist into that ball. If done correctly, it will feel like an explosion happened and send shockwaves across whatever you punch. The vibrations from these shockwaves will cause whatever you punch to shatter." Mira finished reading the manual and was extremely eager to try it. Mira was already an excellent Martial Artist and if she learned this technique then she might be able to bring her unarmed combat to a whole new level.
Mira didn't plan on destroying the room so she just decided to go out of the city to practice. Mira brought Rhydian, Maria, and Vulcan out of the city with her as well. Mira wanted to stay out of the city until she learned this technique and didn't want to stop training Maria in martial arts. She also wanted Maria to learn this technique as well. Maria groaned when she heard that she'd be living in the forest for a while along with learning a Fist Art. But she didn't have a say in this as she was just dragged out of the city.
Mira found a spot with a bunch of rocks and boulders around her as this would be a great place to train. Mira then found a nice boulder to practice on and took a stance. She gathered Qi into her right hand. She didn't gather a lot of Qi into her fist as she didn't know what to expect from this. She then formed a ball of Qi in between her knuckles using around 30% of the gathered Qi. She then linked the ball of Qi to the Qi in her fist. This part wasn't that difficult. Mira then punched the boulder. The ball of Qi in between her knuckles collided with the boulder, but the ball exploded soon after as Mira wasn't able to get the timing down to force the rest of the Qi into the ball, causing an explosion to happen. Mira knew that it wouldn't be that easy. She then looked at the boulder and saw that the boulder had exploded, but this wasn't due to the technique that she just used, but just her own strength. Mira found a piece of the rock that had a spherical shape on it along with a web of cracks that spread out from that spherical shape. She figured that was where she punched the boulder.
Mira then went to another boulder and tried doing it again, but found it extremely hard to find the right timing for forcing out the rest of the Qi. Mira continued trying for the next few hours but wasn't able to get the timing right. The timing had to be exact as she could not even be a millisecond off.
Maria was also having similar troubles. Finding the right timing was extremely difficult, but Maria was actually making more progress than Mira. With every try, Maria was able to feel about how far off she was. Sometimes she would force the energy out of her fist too soon and it would feel like a superpowered punch and other times she would force it out too late and wouldn't cause that explosion. Maria was actually trying to feel that minute difference between the two as she got closer and closer to the perfect timing. But after a few hours, she also had no success.
Both Mira and Maria took a break from this as they would continue this tomorrow. They both stayed in this little area in the forest and told Rhydian and Vulcan to kill any magical beasts that come by and warn them if they see any other humans. Mira didn't feel like coming in and out of the city every day to train this technique as she didn't know how long it'll take her. Both of them started to cultivate after they were finished with practicing the Earth-Shattering Fist. They started the next day with Mira sparring with Maria to teach her more about martial arts and unarmed combat. After a couple of hours of this, they then moved onto practicing the Earth-Shattering Fist. After failing to get the timing right for a few hours of practicing, they then moved on to cultivating until the next day. This type of schedule continued for the next month as they continued to practice the Earth-Shattering Fist.
***
After the first week of practicing the Earth-Shattering Fist, Maria finally had a breakthrough and was able to get the timing right. When Maria punched the boulder, she felt the ball of Qi in her fist that was about to explode, fill up with the rest of the Qi in her fist, and cause a large explosion of Qi that caused a shockwave across the boulder as webs of cracks started to form on the boulder. In the next instant, the boulder then exploded into a bunch of tiny pieces as it was completely shattered.
"I-I Did it!! That was awesome!!" Maria yelled as she finally did it. She also didn't expect it to feel so satisfying. She wanted to do this some more as the feeling of shattering that boulder was amazing. Even though she can cause it to explode with her strength, this was entirely different. She didn't even need to punch that hard for this to happen!
Mira looked over at Maria and was amazed by how the rock shattered into a million pieces. Almost like it was turned to dust. Maria then kept using the Earth-Shattering Fist of more boulders as she was able to get the timing right around 30% of the time. Mira also kept practicing this technique until she could get it right.
***
After 2 weeks since they started practicing, several things happened. Maria had a breakthrough to Stage 8 Qi Condensation and felt her power rise to another level. It didn't bring any major changes, but she was excited that she was about to reach the Foundation Realm.
Mira also made a breakthrough in the Earth-Shattering fist as she was able to get the timing correct. Mira couldn't help but smile when she saw the boulder shatter into a million pieces. Mira also felt like the Earth-Shattering Fist was similar to the One-Inch Punch. She then wondered what it would be like to combine the two of them.
She took a stance in front of the boulder as she put her fist about an inch from the boulder. She gathered Qi into her fist, turned part of it into a ball, and connected the two. She then launched her fist towards the boulder with all of her power. The ball of Qi hit the boulder at her max speed and Mira then forced the rest of the Qi into her fist into the ball as an explosion happened on the boulder and sent shockwaves to the rest of the boulder. Cracks spread throughout the entire boulder, but it didn't shatter. Mira then noticed that there was a fist-sized hole in the boulder that was filled with dust. Mira blew away this dust as she saw that this fist-sized hole went all the way through the boulder. Mira's mind was blown as she didn't expect that interaction between the two.
"Hehe." Mira let out a sinister laugh as she thought about using this in battle. Maria overheard this laugh and shivered. She looked over and saw a fist-sized hole all the way through the boulder. Maria was obviously shocked because she had been able to use this technique for a full week now and never once has a boulder appeared like that. Maria also didn't even want to know how Mira did this as she never wanted to do something like that to an opponent, it was just too brutal.
Mira shook the thoughts out of her head and continued practicing; She wanted to be able to master this Earth-Shattering Fist before going back to the city.
***
Another 2 weeks went by as Mira and Maria kept their schedule of sparring in unarmed combat, practicing the Earth-Shattering Fist and Cultivating. They were both now able to get the timing right 100% of the time as Mira engraved that feeling into her very bones.
Mira could also feel that Rhydian was so close to Low-Stage Rank 4 as she fed multiple beast corpses to her every day. Mira was also getting pretty close to Stage 8 Qi Condensation as well. She figured that she still had a few months to go. The Entrance Examination for the Battle Maiden Sect was now only 3 months away. Mira felt that she should be able to reach Stage 8 Qi Condensation by then.
Now that both of them have mastered the Earth-Shattering Fist, the four of them went back to the city. They weren't that far away and were able to make it back with only an hour of running.
Mira went straight to her room and decided to check out the Double-Bladed Scythe Manual. She already knew how to make her scythe Double-Bladed with her ice, but maybe reading this will give her some new insights. She just skipped ahead to the instructions for this but found nothing interesting. If anything, her technique was much better than this. What Mira does to make her scythe double-bladed is coat the spear end of her scythe in her Ice Dao. She then sends her Qi down the pole of the scythe and into the ice. She extends the ice out to form a blade and uses her Qi to sharpen and reinforce the Ice. It was simple and works extremely well with her Dao.
"What a useless manual and a waste of a reward. Oh well. It seems that I only have 2 more things on my list that need to be completed. Me reaching Stage 8 and Rhydian reaching Rank 4. I will also continue sparring with Maria using martial arts and maybe I'll spar with her using weapons as well. I also need to punish Maria for bringing uninvited guests over to me. I think I'll start our unarmed combat sparring with my scythe tomorrow, hehe." Mira thought out loud as she then sat in a lotus position and began cultivating.
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