Chapter 2 - Grand Hatred System[1]
On the school rooftop.
At the moment, it was ten o’clock in morning and all of the students were still in class. The rooftop was empty of any human presence, so Xia Ping took advantage of being kicked out from class and headed up there to find out more about this Grand Hatred System that had suddenly appeared.
“System, come out immediately,” Xia Ping ordered with a thought. “Didn’t you say that I’ve obtained Hatred Points. How many did I get?”
Just a moment ago, he had slightly displayed his insulting prowess from his previous life to test things out. The results were far better than expected. Almost instantaneously, he became the public enemy of the entire class and even managed to infuriate a classmate into crying.
If this still didn’t work, then he would’ve just purely turned into a deplorable person for nothing.
“Master, this time you have obtained one hundred and twenty Hatred Points in total,” a cold systemic voice stated out in his head. “As this is the first time that the System has been activated, Master will receive a milestone reward from the System. Congratulations, Master, on acquiring the mysterious cultivation art, [Pure Yang Everlife Incantation].
“Mysterious cultivation art, [Pure Yang Everlife Incantation]? What is that?” Xia Ping blinked.
The System’s voice remained emotionless, “Please confirm acceptance or declination of the milestone reward.”
“Accept,” Xia Ping accepted instinctively.
Boooom!
In an instant, an enormous amount of information flowed like water into Xia Ping’s head. He felt as if his soul had been pulled into a virtual space.
Inside this space, a white figure sitting in the lotus position appeared. Lines and streaks of gold representing its meridians flashed on its body, clearly displaying the secrets of how the mysterious cultivation method was to be used.
“Seriously?! This [Pure Yang Everlife Incantation] is actually a top-tier martial arts cultivation method? H-how is this possible?” Xia Ping gawked at the sight before him with disbelief.
Even on Yanhuang Star where the martial arts thrived, top-tier cultivation methods were extremely rare. They could only be learned in those top martial arts families or the libraries of the best of universities. If ordinary people wanted to cultivate, they could only use the most basic of breathing cultivation methods given out by the Federation to absorb what little universal spirit energy they could with great difficulty.
The reason the difference was so great was because of the basic breathing method’s low efficiency at absorbing universal spirit energy. It was far inferior to that of a top-tier cultivation method’s efficiency. If the basic breathing method’s efficiency rate was one, then a top-tier cultivation method’s efficiency rate was one hundred, perhaps even a thousand. This difference was an absolute chasm.
If two people with similar talent cultivated these two different cultivation methods, then over time, the gap between them would become bigger and bigger. From this, it was possible to understand just how valuable a top-tier martial arts cultivation method was.
“Putting everything aside, is this cultivation method really true or is it a fake?” Xia Ping couldn’t help but doubt. After all based on this [Pure Yang Everlife Incantation]’s introduction, when he circulated this cultivation method, his body would become like the universe and devour the essence of the sun from the skies. Combining and assimilating this essence into his body, it would burn away his mortal form to create a new eternal and immortal body.
He was scared just thinking about it. The essence of the sun was an extremely horrifying thing. If an ordinary martial arts expert were to absorb even a little, then they would immediately turn into a fire ball and be burned to ashes, leaving no traces behind.
Even for those extremely powerful martial arts masters, they didn’t dare to casually come in contact with the essence of the sun. Yet this cultivation method started off by devouring the essence of the sun to strengthen oneself. Using “fierce” to describe it was an understatement.
If all this was true, then saying that it’s a top-tier cultivation method would be very apt.
While Xia Ping still had his doubts, his resolve remained firm. “This is an opportunity. Whether it’s true or not, I’ll find out once I try. If anything goes wrong, I can just immediately stop cultivating.”
Thinking things through, he sat down into the lotus position and followed the information given to him by the System, and started his cultivation.
Fwoosh!
Having received all of the information from the System beforehand, it was like Xia Ping had practiced this cultivation method thousands of times over, familiar with all its details. Almost instantly, he entered into a state of comprehension, as if his entire body had fused with nature itself, his mind pure and free.
As he cultivated, his body seemed to have turned into a black hole. Sun essence flowed down from the skies like little spheres of fire, all of it flooding into his pores to circulate throughout the pathways in his body.
If somebody else saw what Xia Ping looked like when he was cultivating, then they would’ve definitely been scared half to death. The reason being that the area within ten meters of Xia Ping had actually turned into a black hole. All of the sunlight near this zone would be completely absorbed by him.
Not just light, even the wind had stopped. It was as if time itself had halted in this space.
This session of cultivation lasted for two hours.
Boom!
Xia Ping’s body shook. Opening his mouth, a frightening spiral of air blasted out like an arrow and cleaved the ambient air around it in two. With a “bang”, it blasted into the marble wall surrounding the rooftop.
Crack!
The marble wall had shockingly been pierced through. From the fist-sized hole, a ray of sunlight just barely managed to shine down. If this was on Earth, then that breath would’ve been enough to shoot through a normal human’s body and kill them.
Opening his eyes, golden light started to immediately radiate from them, as if two flames were circling about in his pupils. They flashed brightly for a long time before finally extinguishing.
“Fourth layer of Martial Disciple. This is only the first that I’ve practiced this cultivation method, yet it actually helped me break though a meridian and ascend to the fourth layer. Top-cultivation method really is apt, its too powerful,” Xia Ping sighed.
He diligently and painstakingly cultivated for eighteen years, yet only managed to raise his cultivation base to the third layer of the Martial Disciple rank. However, after cultivating the [Pure Yang Everlife Incantation] for two hours, he was promoted to the fourth layer of Martial Disciple.
This achievement, even throughout his entire class could be counted at the middle-upper levels, leaving the level of the ordinary. From this one could tell just how extraordinary this [Pure Yang Everlife Incantation] was.
Xia Ping stood up, “It doesn’t seem just as simple as breaking through a martial arts rank.” Taking a steady stance, he twisted his waist and threw out a punch. A powerful force rushed out inch by inch, starting from his legs, to his waist, to his arm, and then to his fist.
BAM!
His fist ruthlessly struck the marble wall in front of him. As easily as passing through tofu, a seven to eight centimetres deep imprint appeared on the wall where his fist landed, small pieces of rubble littering down with a slight crash.
“Such powerful bodily strength.” Xia Ping tightened his fists, his emotions surging.
Just a moment ago, he hadn’t used any of his True Qi at all. Yet, solely depending on his bodily strength, he managed to easily punch through a wall without any harm to his fist.
And this was still just his first time cultivating. If in the future when his cultivation base deepened, then how scary would his power be then?! Just this degree alone could already be called super human on Earth.
Of course, compared to those martial arts masters that could shatter the earth with their fists and travel through the air, he was still far, far too weak.
Rumble, rumble.
Several rumbling sounds came from Xia Ping’s stomach. He hadn’t eaten anything this morning and after cultivating for two hours, he really was starting to feel hungry.
“I’ll go to the cafeteria and get some lunch first.” Xia Ping headed down from the rooftop. Right now, it was already noon.
Due to the fact that Skywater City’s minty fifth high school started at seven in the morning and ended at four in the afternoon with nobody allowed to leave during that time, most students chose to eat their lunch in the cafeteria. Of course, some students chose to bring their own lunches to school instead.
Xia Ping soon arrived at the cafeteria. Spending five to six Federation credits, he bought two dishes and some white rice before finding an empty place to start enjoying his meal.
“Xia Ping!” A familiar voice gritted out.
Looking up, Xia Ping followed the direction where the voice came from and saw Yang Wei glaring indignantly at him with clenched teeth.
At the same time, five to six big students stood intimidatingly behind Yang Wei. They seemed as if they were looking for trouble.
Translator Notes:
Grand Hatred System: In Chinese, it’s 超级仇恨系统, which literally means “Super Hatred System”. However, considering how much of a bug and nigh-omnipotent this system is later on, “super” just sounds really mundane in comparison. So I decided to name it “Grand Hatred System” instead.