Sword Spirit

Under the watchful gaze of the crowd, Lu Xuan shook his head. His face was apologetic: “Many thanks for elder’s generosity, however, disciple wants to whole-heartedly chase the martial path. Practicing enchantment skills is only for increasing my spirit force.”

“Hey, you’re a bit too ignorant for a person aren’t you?” A sweet-sounding voice came from behind Lu Xuan. It was the young lady who had been standing behind Lu Xuan who was currently looking at Lu Xuan with a face of resentment.

Hearing Lu Xuan’s reasoning, it seemed as if he didn’t put the Enchantment Hall in his eyes. As a person of the Enchantment Hall, naturally she was unhappy.

Hearing this, Lu Xuan turned his head and only then discovered that the “small buns” was standing behind him. Facing her accusations, he immediately revealed an embarrassed look. He also realized that refusing Elder Fan’s invitation in front of these Enchantment Hall elders was indeed a bit incorrect. He hurriedly explained: “Disciple absolutely didn’t have the intention of not putting the Enchantment Hall in my eyes. The skills for enchanting is a very broad and profound path. It is in no way inferior to the martial path, only that disciple’s heart is on the martial path, and only wants to climb to the peak of the martial path. I hope for elders’ forgiveness.”

Hearing Lu Xuan’s words, Elder Fan didn’t show any displeasure, instead he laughed loudly and said: “Kid, the heart of martial dao should be very firm, however, the more you are this way, the more I don’t want to pass over you. Since my face isn’t enough, then I can only get a person with even bigger face to make a move.”

Saying this, Elder Fan picked up the Wild Explosion scroll on the desk and gave it to an elder behind him and said: “Elder Qin, take this Wild Explosion scroll to Hallmaster to look at. Lu Xuan, how about you wait here for a while. Anyways, you also need go through the intermediate level enchanter application. It won’t delay your time.”

Hearing this, Elder Qin took Lu Xuan’s product and left in order to go find the Enchanter Hall’s hall master. As for Elder Fan’s later words, naturally they were directed towards Lu Xuan. His tone was affable, with a very conversational tone, without any standings of an elder speaking to a disciple.

To this, Lu Xuan could only bitterly smile. He had only wanted to enter the Enchanter’s Hall in order to use the Enchanter Hall’s resources to exercise his spiritual force. How did this happen? However, he came up with an idea. Supposing that hall master personally came, he still wouldn’t give up the martial path. In this world, strength was needed for respect. Even if your enchanting skills were better, wouldn’t you still need to rely on others?

In order to not waste Lu Xuan’s time, Elder Fan pointed at a deacon, having him help Lu Xuan grab a middle level enchanter’s robes and identity plate. Whether or not Lu Xuan chose to enter the Enchantment Hall, these were things that needed to be done. It was just that according to normal regulations, one would have to wait until the assessment had completely ended before doing it. Right now Elder Fan was essentially opening a backdoor for Lu Xuan.

Seeing that Lu Xuan had already completed the assessment, that young lady behind him walked forward. Very intimately, she grabbed onto Elder Fan’s arm, stared at Lu Xuan, and unreservedly said, “Grandpa Fan, what’s so good about this kid? Why do you feel the need to add him to our Enchantment Hall. It’s like we’re begging him.”

Her speech hadn’t been particularly concealed, and naturally it was all heard by Lu Xuan. To this, he could only rub his nose a little and pretend he hadn’t heard her. This little girl, didn’t I only look at you for a bit. Two small buns aren’t even much to look at. Did it really warrant this enmity? I wouldn’t even usually care about you.

Elder Fan helplessly chuckled: “You lass, how come you can’t speak properly. The Wild Explosion scroll drawn by Lu Xuan is currently being sent to your dad. In a while, if you’re interested, you can look it over. Then you’ll know, although your talent isn’t bad, it’s dwarfed in front of this person.”

Listening to Elder Fan’s words, Lu Xuan subconsciously looked at that young lady again. It seemed like this young lady was most likely the daughter of the hall master. No wonder her reaction was so exaggerated to his words before.

Discovering that Lu Xuan was looking at her again, this young lady glared back at him, her face full of challenging intent. After that she gave the scroll in her hand to Elder Fan, saying: “I don’t believe he’s all that great. This time, I also drew a Wild Explosion scroll. Grandpa Fan, look at it. See how many points I can score.”

Although she was the hall master’s daughter, and had followed her father in learning enchanting skills since she was young, she had never actually been given the title. This time she had come to properly participate in the enchanter assessment and become an enchanter.

Elder Fan received the young lady’s scroll, slowly spreading it out. Curious, Lu Xuan also nudged over to see what level it was. Lu Xuan’s enchanting level wasn’t as high as these elders, but his vision absolutely wasn’t inferior to any of them. The ancient enchantment technique’s standards in his memory was much higher than the average.

Carefully scanning through it, Lu Xuan discovered that although the young lady’s enchanting skills wasn’t as good as his, it was still better than Xia Chen Xi’s by quite a bit. After all, she had specialized since she was young, and Xia Chen Xi was also minoring in the martial path.

This Wild Explosion rune drawing was straight and narrow. Each primary rune was drawn very orderly, without drifting left or right, its arrangement was very clear. It could be seen that it had taken a lot of practice, and also had received a teacher’s guidance, that there had been a systematic teaching.

However, in terms of detail, it was slightly unsatisfactory. Although it didn’t affect the rune’s overall result, the aesthetics were a bit off, seeming a bit messy. Of course, in Lu Xuan’s eyes, the greatest flawed stroke was still the method of dealing with the potency. This young lady had also chosen to dilute the potency of the savage wolf rather than to leave it pure.

While looking, Elder Fan also pointed out the places that weren’t good enough to the young lady. Although she was a bit unsatisfied, this young lady could only admit that her runes were indeed far from reaching the step of complete perfection. However, she assumed that her being able to reach this kind of step in drawing was already not bad. When drawing runes, one could not take any breaks and needed to finish the drawing in one go. With such tight nerves, where was there room for extra thoughts?

“Compared to last time, your progress can’t be considered little. It seems like you put in a lot of effort in this short time. This time’s Wild Explosion rune, I can barely give you an eight point score.” Elder Fan said.

“Truthfully, excluding the aesthetics factor, it’s not bad. The overall layout doesn’t have any errors. If you could make those ‘?’ character rune change into a ‘?’ character rune and add a ‘?’ character rune in these places, then this Wild Explosion rune’s power should be able to increase again by about 10% or so.”

(TN: It’s hard to say at least for the first one, but it should be guard, turn, and harmonize I think for those three)

Suddenly there was a voice that rang out. Elder Fan and the young lady couldn’t help but turn their heads and saw Lu Xuan talking while also releasing some yuan force, marking out spots on the rune, giving the changes he would make.

Listening to Lu Xuan’s suggestions, this young lady and Elder Fan subconsciously simulated that image in their minds. Expressions of surprise immediately appeared on their face. They discovered that if they changed it as according to Lu Xuan, the Wild Explosion rune’s potency would immediately be released a bit and wouldn’t come back to cause conflict. The power would indeed greatly increase!

“Lu Xuan, a talent like you, if you don’t enter my Enchantment Hall, it’ll be too much of a pity!” Elder Fan couldn’t help but sigh in amazement. Just taking a glance at a rune, he could point out places that could use changing. What sort of strength did this require. Each rune’s structure had gone through repeated tempering and was not easily changeable, and now Lu Xuan didn’t only change it, but with just a bit of information, he improved it.

If Lu Xuan had only drawn the previous rune, it could still be explained as someone else having taught him, but now, in the blink of an eye he could find places to improve. This required quite a bit of personal strength.

Listening to Elder Fan’s praise, Lu Xuan felt a slight cold sweat. He could immediately point out improvement suggestions, but that wasn’t because his talent was really so terrifying but was because the ancient enchantment technique’s ideas had already sunk deep into his mind. Pulling it out was very easy.

However, the goal for his speaking wasn’t for earning Elder Fan’s praise, but was rather a young man’s desire to show off at work. Just now this young lady didn’t put him in his eyes. He wasn’t willing to take that. Men always had an inexplicable behavior when in front of women.

Obviously, Lu Xuan’s move was effective. When that young lady looked at Lu Xuan again, the look of unfriendliness in her eyes disappeared, replaced by a strange look, curiosity, surprise, admiration, all in one, making it very complex.

“Haha, Xia Han, you should be convinced now right? This old man’s 12 points score isn’t just randomly given. Even if your father sees it, he would absolutely agree with my evaluation.” Elder Fan stroked the beard on his chin as he spoke with a smile. Then he suddenly had a thought. This Lu Xuan had suddenly given pointers to Xiao Han. Could it be that he had some intentions towards Xiao Han?

Thinking of this, Elder Fan couldn’t help but carefully look over Lu Xuan twice over. En, he was a talent, and when this old man had been younger, he’d been wilder. Looking over at Xiao Han, she was also a beauty. It was a good match.

“Xiao Han, although Lu Xuan hasn’t learned enchanting skills for long, his talent is extraordinary. You two are both young, you guys can get closer and learn from each other.”

Xiao Han actually nodded her head very submissively. Lu Xuan’s two casual sentences from before had made her suddenly see the light. Indeed she could ask him for directing. Of course, she naturally wouldn’t know what Elder Fan was thinking about.

“Hey, I’m called Chen Xiao Han. How long have you entered the Wind Sword Sect for?” Xiao Han wasn’t bashful and took the first step to greet Lu Xuan.

“Three months, also, I’m called Lu Xuan, not Hey.” Lu Xuan said with a poker face.

“Tch, Lu Xuan, Lu Xuan. Okay. I won’t mind that you were sneaking peeks at me. Are you still holding a grudge? You’re so narrow-minded.”

“I feel like I spoke clearly. When did I sneak a peek at you. While I was looking at you, you just happened to look back.”

“Then if I didn’t look over, wouldn’t have been sneaking peeks at me?”

“… What do you have to peek at. My sword faction’s beauty’s are all over the place, each one with a better body than you. I’d rather peek at them!”

“You! You pervert! Truly shameless!”

Just as Chen Xiao Han’s face blushed due to Lu Xuan’s dirty talk, a side door suddenly opened. Elder Qin who had previously left had returned.

“Lu Xuan, Hallmaster has a request!”