Tempering Body

Ryu was now sitting in Lotus position and started directing all the spiritual qi toward the muscles in his body.

His body was overexerted from the new workout, so it fully taxed his muscles. He was simply holding himself from falling from exertion.

The spiritual Qi started going towards the muscles. As it touched the muscles, a pain ran from Ryu's full body.

"Ack.."

It puzzled him, opening his eyes while being in pain. He had never experienced this type of pain before. It was like poking the skin with needles.

Roland was looking at Ryu with a smile on his face. He knew what was happening but did not tell Ryu about the consequences of trying to step into the body-strengthening realm.

Ryu looked at Roland. The latter spoke.

"It's normal to feel pain while training your muscles,"

Ryu said nothing and started circulating his spiritual Qi again.

As spiritual Qi touched the muscles again, he felt pain. This time, he was ready.

Ryu was focusing on tempering his right-hand muscles. The pain started increasing as he focused more on spiritual Qi on his right hand.

When a Cultivator enters the body strengthening realm, they feel pain because they are tempering muscles.

Ryu gritted his teeth. While bearing from the pain, he pushes the spiritual Qi into the muscles.

The spiritual Qi entered the taxed muscles. As this happened, a change occurred. The muscles which were rejecting the spiritual qi until now accepted it.

Ryu felt the change and became a little happy. As this happened, the pores of muscles in the hand started getting smaller and smaller.

Seeing this, Ryu frowned. He knew his muscles were being strengthened, but the period of the gap to strengthen them was too short.

Seeing the pores getting shorter and the spiritual Qi in the muscles getting thinner and thinner, he concluded.

'I have to Force the Spiritual Qi inside the muscles!'

The spiritual Qi in Ryu's dantian became rampant and started going towards the Right hand.

There was a hand behind Ryu as he was about to hit the muscles.

"Tapp."

"Ack..."With a slight tap, Ryu was now on the ground.

He looked at his back while opening his eyes.

"What do you think you are doing?" Roland asked in a little angry voice.

"I was cultivating what else!!" Ryu asked, a little confused.

"You were forcing your Qi into your Muscles, weren't you?" Roland said, a little annoyed.

"Yes!!" Ryu answered, a little confused, "Did I do something wrong?"

This time, Roland started glaring at Ryu and then spoke.

"How many times I have told you not to force your cultivation!!"

"Uh..." It clicked with him.

"It can harm your body if you always force it!"! I know you want to learn martial arts, but this is not the way." Roland said, while giving another tap on the back of his head.

"Auch..."

Ryu now understood what he did wrong.

"Sorry, grandpa!! I will remember this from now on." Ryu spoke in a little dejected tone.

Roland saw this and had a wonderful idea. With a little devilish smile on his face, he spoke.

"From now on, if you make a mistake, you get a nice tap from your lovely grandfather!"

"What? " Ryu became baffled as he heard this.

"Gra... grandpa, wouldn't that be too extreme?" He said while stuttering.

"I wasn't asking for your opinion." Roland said and went near the Chest and picked it up. Seeing this, Ryu was shocked.

"Isn't that heavy?" Ryu questioned.

"Yes, it is!!" Roland answered as he walked towards the gigantic tree.

"Then how can you hold it like it's super light??!" he asked with a perplexed look.

Roland turned and showed him his Right hand.

"It's because of this ring."

"Ooh, so it's an artifact too?" he questioned again.

"Yes, this is an artifact that reduces the weight of this chest so anyone can carry it"

Roland answered.

Ryu had many questions, and he wanted as many answers as possible, so he asked,

"Then wouldn't anyone take it, if they have the ring?"

"No, that's not possible!" Roland said, while turning back to the tree.

"Why??"

Roland understood that the little boy had many questions, and he also wanted to answer some of them.

"Because this ring can only work if a Tatsuya wore it."

"So, it doesn't work for anyone else? Only Tatsuya clan people?" Ryu said.

"Yes!"

Hearing this, Ryu started thinking.

'So only a Tatsuya can use the ring and also the chest can be assessed by Tatsuya only!!'

As he was thinking, Roland came down from the tree after putting on the chest. He looked toward the child, who was still thinking. He smiled a little.

Seeing his grandpa coming down, Ryu asked,

"Why did you put the chest back up, though?"

"Because we can't let anyone find out about the chest!!" Roland took a pause and continued,

"You know its contents, and we can only assess it so..."

Roland stopped. Seeing this Ryu said, "So?"

Grandpa looked at the child. Sighing a little, and he spoke.

"They can use us as a hostage to obtain the contents of the chest"

"Hmm? But that's wro.." Ryu paused as he remembered the nature of the world.

Roland looked at him and continued, "Remember to not speak about this to anyone!!"

"Yes, grandpa I won't tell anyone. " Ryu answered and,

'I don't even have friends though, who will I tell?' thought inwardly.

This was true because he had never gone to town on his own accord and always kept his distance from people.

They live in the forest so interaction with anyone other than family is also hard. but Ryu understood his grandpa was not speaking about the current time but the future.

"Ok, are your questions ended for today?" Roland asked, looking a little overwhelmed as he answered so many questions.

"Uh..., I have one more question!" Ryu said hurriedly.

"Yes, what is it?" Roland asked.

After taking a pause, he spoke,

"What is the Tatsuya clan?"

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