Forty Millenniums of Cultivation

”That’s right, although our battle profession, the ’firearm cultivators,’ was created only after the creation of firearms, we can be dated way before that. We can even be dated back to the ancient cultivators’ era of forty millenniums ago.”

”Our ’gun fighting technique’ cultivation is also succeeded from the most orthodox ’Sword Controlling Technique’ of the ancient cultivators’ era!”

As he mentioned the origin of gun fighting techniques, Ma Jiao’s face flushed as he straightened up his spine and spoke.

”We firearm cultivators are also one of the traditional successors of the ancient sword immortals, just like Fellow Student Zhao Tianchong. There isn’t any difference; it’s just that what we inherited is different. That’s all!”

Zhao Tianchong coldly snorted. Apparently, he didn’t agree with Ma Jiao’s argument.

However, it was a long-standing controversy in the world of cultivation. Both sides blowing their own trumpet, yet after a couple millenniums, nothing had been cleared. He, too, was disinclined to argue with Ma Jiao.

Whereas the more Li Yao came to hear, the more confused he became.

Firearms, they were pieces of long-range magical equipment that gradually emerged during the late Great Dark Age; they were pieces of equipment that fired bullets with the help of spiritual energy explosions from the crystals, thereby allowing ordinary people, who lacked the strength, to have enough battle force to put up a fight.

Therefore, many cultivators using firearms were deemed weak.

But how was this related to the ancient sword immortals of forty millenniums ago?

Noticing the perplexed look on his face, Ma Jiao slightly smiled and continued:

”Fellow Student Li Yao, I don’t know if you have read some of the ancient records in which the ancient sword immortals of forty millenniums ago had a powerful magical equipment called the ’Sword Pill.’ It was usually ingested where it was spiritually refined, and at the most crucial moment, as long as they opened their mouth or snuffled through their nose the sword pill would fly out, whereupon it would transform into a sword aura, which would draw a long rainbow as it took the heads of anyone within a range of 500kms, as easily as picking one’s own pocket?”

Li Yao nodded, ”I believe I have.”

With Ou Yezi’s powerful memory, how could he not know of a ”sword pill” like most common magical equipment of the ancient cultivation world?

For ancient cultivators, the flying sword may be one of their most commonly used magical equipment.

However, the ‘flying sword’ was not just one kind of magical equipment at all, but two.

The first type of flying sword looked just like any ordinary long sword; it had an edge, a cross-guard, a hilt, a scabbard, and a blade which was engraved with spirit array glyphs, protected by a mystic glow shining with colors and light, and could unleash thousands upon thousands of magical powers.

This kind of flying sword, on one side, could be used as a means of transportation, allowing the cultivators to step on and ride it; it was nothing to travel 500 kilometers in a day.

On another side, it could also be used as a divine weapon to fight in close quarters; occasionally, it could also be thrown to attack a relatively close enemy.

However, if the enemy was 500 meters away, it was inappropriate to use this kind of flying sword to attack.

First, this kind of flying sword was quite heavy, and it didn’t have a sufficient streamlined body, making its flying trajectory very unstable. Also, the speed at which it could be thrown wasn’t too high.

If a cultivator was riding the blade and controlling it, it was still alright; however, once there was no one to control it, it could very easily stall and spiral down its path, missing the target and quite possibly tumbling to the ground.

Second, if the distance was too far, there would be too many variables. Such as, if the enemy was powerful or had some kind of magical equipment to attract or absorb the flying sword, the flying sword would be taken away suddenly and quite possibly fired back down its path; wouldn’t that be quite embarrassing?

In anecdotal records of Hundred Smelting Clan, Li Yao had also seen a very funny story.

According to which, there was a sword immortal during the ancient era who racked up hardships and used multitudes of heaven and earth treasures to meticulously refine a flying sword. When he fought with an enemy, he shot the flying sword, and sure enough, it was shockingly powerful; with one shot he pierced the enemy in the chest, at his heart.

Unexpectedly, the enemy happened to be ruthless. Upon realizing he was going to die, he clutched the sword’s hilt with both hands forcefully, making it impossible for the sword immortal to retrieve the flying sword with his telepathic thoughts, and the enemy before dying blew himself up and ruined most of the flying sword.

Meanwhile, the sword immortal was soon to be surrounded by a large crowd of experts from the enemy’s side.

If a divine sword like that was in his hand, the sword immortal could naturally unleash a superb sword technique, and even if he could not win he, at any rate, could still ride the sword and escape into the sky.

However, his hands were empty and even if he wished to escape, he could not. Finally, the sword immortal was surrounded and beaten to death; it was truly miserable to the extreme.

Then, there was a sword immortal who had spent a mountain load of wealth to refine a flying sword, and when he hunted a spirit beast with it the sword, instead of striking the vital point, pierced the rear end of the spirit beast, where it was stuck between the muscles and bones, deadly.

Whereupon, the spirit beast, in a lot of pain, ”wailed” as it ran away with the priceless flying sword; it ran and ran...

Precisely because of numerous tragedies like this, cultivators slowly discovered during combat that if they wanted to hurt someone by controlling something, there was really no need to use a flying sword as such a large piece of equipment; in fact, there was no need to have crossguard or hilt, and even the edge of the sword wasn’t necessary at all.

Under the heavens, among the various magical powers, there was nothing indestructible, even with all the firmness and hardness any man could achieve; only with speed could one be invincible. When speed is taken to the extreme, even a hair could kill a person. So was there any need for a sharp edge?

Because of this the second type of flying sword, the sword pill, came into existence!

Generally it was just the size of a Longan[1], easy to refine and convenient to carry; furthermore, because it was small in size, it was relatively easy to manipulate with telepathic thoughts. Usually, it was ingested, where it would be refined, and when encountering an enemy, it could be shot in the air where it would be transformed into three-inch sword aura, which could be manipulated using telepathic thoughts and fired, killing the enemy.

Any ordinary sword cultivator could launch the sword pill a couple kilometers; whereas it was a cinch for a first-grade sword immortal to have an attack range of a few dozen kilometers.

In this way, while an enemy was in close-range, the sword cultivator could use the flying sword to fight; while an enemy was in long-range, the sword cultivator could use a sword pill to greet them. It would be alright even if the sword pill missed or was received by the enemy, for the cost of refining was very low. Each sword immortal could carry a few of them and conveniently fire one.

Li Yao was struck with a thought as if he discovered something.

Ma Jiao smiled, ”It seems you already understand; the sword controlling technique was precisely the ability to manipulate the sword pills by the ancient sword immortals. We ’firearm cultivators’ inherited this very ability of the sword immortals. For ordinary people and an amateur gunman like yourself, bullets are just bullets, nothing more and nothing less, but for us firearm cultivators, the bullets are sword pills!”

Realization suddenly dawned upon Li Yao, he could not help but gasp in astonishment.

In the anecdotes of the Hundred Smelting Clan, he had once read of some powerful sword immortals who could manipulate hundreds of sword pills with one deep breath, forming a sword array that emanated with endless sword auras and could strangle the enemy ruthlessly.

How could the firearm cultivators like Ma Jiao not fire over hundreds of bullets in one deep breath?

Although they could not necessarily fire with power as strong as the ancient sword immortals, if these bullets were sword pills, then it was indeed a terrifying profession!

Upon noticing Li Yao’s expressions, Ma Jiao felt prouder and slightly pondered as he muttered to himself, ”This is just basic stuff; there is nothing secret about it. If Li Yao had researched before hand, he could have very easily found this from any channel. Telling him about it would not pose any harm; on the contrary, we could have a better relationship. After all, there will be many opportunities for cooperation in the future.”

Ma Jiao stretched out three fingers and spoke, ”Obviously, powerful firearms cultivators at the Building Foundation Stage and above had the ability to control thousands upon thousands of bullets, these special sword pills; as for the firearms cultivators who had just stepped into the Refinement Stage, they mainly cultivate three kinds of abilities.”

”First is the shooting technique.”

”The shooting technique of cultivators is not the kind of ’three points in one line, breathing evenly’[2] like a conventional shooting technique, but rather to study how to control the point of impact; so it is about controlling the point of impact of over hundreds of bullets at one point.”

Ma Jiao looked around before he dragged a completely mutilated and torn up corpse of a Black Armored Saber Mantis from nearby and spoke, ”Fellow Student Li Yao, this Black Armored Saber Mantis was shot by you, and as you can see, its whole body is broken into pieces; your points of impact are scattered in a very large area. The bullet did not strike at one place at all.”

Following that, he once again dragged a corpse of a Black Armored Saber Mantis over: ”This is the Black Armored Saber Mantis shot by me; as you can see, the points of impact are gathered at one location. All the bullets are basically at the same place.”

Li Yao carefully inspected the difference between the two corpses and lightly nodded his head.

Ma Jiao said:

”Rather than hurting ten fingers, it is better to cut one finger off. Although the fire power of the Six Barrel Rotary Cannon is fierce, you are unable to control its points of impact. Every bullet’s point of impact is different from the other; it is the equivalent of letting the demon beast bear the destructive force evenly throughout its body, and naturally, the local destructive force can not be increased.”

”Whereas we, firearm cultivators, try to control the placement of bullets to ensure that every bullet impacts the locality of the entrance wound. In this way, the injuries will continue to add up, and the destructive force will be concentrated at one point; the power will be greatly enhanced as well.”

”Maybe a moment ago you thought Fellow Student Bei Jingjing had fired a headshot with the pistol, but it was, in fact, not one shot but five shots instantaneously. Her speed was so fast that it sounded like one shot, and all the bullets instantly struck the same point. Not to mention the Black Armored Saber Mantises, she would have had the chance to even headshot the Gold Armored Saber Mantis!”

”The Building Foundation Stage and above, those truly powerful firearms cultivators are even able to fire hundreds of bullets instantaneously, and all the bullets will pierce through the same entry wound, giving the impression of just one shot and one entry wound.”

”The destructive force it would possess could be imagined!”

Li Yao frowned as he ruminated for a long while before he humbly asked for advice:

”I do understand the reason for concentrating the fire at one point, but the recoil of the firearm is simply too much. Although I am doing all I can to control it, every shot is a spiritual energy explosive shell; as a result, the muzzle will slightly jolt, and the shooting trajectory will slightly deviate.Thus, the resulting points of impact will deviate from the original point of impact. So how do you reduce the recoil?”

Ma Jiao burst into a hearty laughter as he responded:

”The recoil cannot be resolved. With the increase in strength, the firearms cultivator can subsequently use more and more powerful firearms and bullets, and as long as you pursue fire power, it will always have a recoil, and the muzzle will naturally snap back.”

”Our idea is not to control the barrel so that the muzzle will be motionless; this way is too stiff, too rigid.”

”The right thing to do is perceive the degree of deviation of muzzle after every shot and again calculate the shooting trajectory; then carry out minute tuning in the opposite direction, ensuring that the points of impact remain consistent.”

”For instance, if a shot made the muzzle jolt upwards by 0.001 mm, then just press your wrist down bit by bit, so that the muzzle is shifted down by 0.001 mm.”

”Of course, this is just the principle. In combat, there are many things to consider, such as the direction of the wind, the change in distance between you and the enemy, your breathing, heartbeat, and the subtle changes in muscle movements; in short, it is ever-changing and inexhaustibly profound.”

Li Yao pondered for a moment before his eyes went wide:

”You mean to say that for every shot, you calculate the shooting trajectory again?”

Ma Jiao thought before he nodded and answered:

”Although in combat, it is impossible to calculate every shot; theoretically, it is possible. At present, I can calculate the shooting trajectory per 4.7 shots, for which dealing with ordinary demon soldiers is just about enough.”

Li Yao was shocked.

The rate of fire of modern firearms was quite fast; as many as a dozen bullets could be fired per second. That is to say, Ma Jiao can calculate the shooting trajectory once or twice again just every second, and also bear in mind the wind direction, wind speed, and the high-speed movements of the demon beasts.

The amount of calculation he had to do was quite shocking indeed!

However, if he could master this shooting technique, there would be no need for him to calculate once every five shots; even if he could calculate the shooting trajectory once every ten shots, the power of Six Barrel Rotary Cannon would be greatly enhanced.

By then, not to mention middle-rank Demon Soldiers, he would have the chance to blow high-rank Demon Soldiers and even Demon Generals away!

[1] Longan: A fruit from the same family of lychee.

[2] Three points in one line, means to keep the eye, the iron-sight and the target in one line.