Writing Novels Will Make You Invincible

Chapter 20 : Registration Day

Registration Day

July 9th, early morning.

It was the day before the registration deadline for the Martial Arts Tournament.

Chu Tianxing slowly opened his eyes after meditating all night. His pupils sparkled with vibrant energy and spiritual light.

He'd been cultivating the Xiantian Art for eight days now.

Even though he no longer had any spiritual pills to help him, the Xiantian Art was incredibly powerful. Every time he practiced, Chu Tianxing could vaguely sense the existence of Spiritual Qi. And while he still couldn't guide that energy into his body just yet, his internal energy kept growing purer and deeper each day.

In just eight short days after opening up the Hand's Yang Supreme Large Intestine Meridian and the Hand's Minor Yang Triple Burner Meridian, he'd managed to clear two more meridians, the Hand's Major Yin Lung Meridian and the Foot's Yang Supreme Stomach Meridian.

Plus, the Xiantian Art could unlock human potential to its absolute limits. Combined with the External Refinement Section from the Muscle-Transforming & Bone-Tempering Chapter, Chu Tianxing's physique was getting stronger and stronger. He had even started to go through another growth spurt.

In just a few days, he'd shot up two centimeters.

His originally thin frame was starting to fill out and look more imposing. His shoulders were getting broader, his back wider. Over the past few days, Qin Ling had been giving him some pretty weird looks whenever she saw him.

With the growth of his internal energy comes the growth of his martial arts.

He'd even gotten the hang of the Toad Stylr. When he crouched on the floor mimicking a toad's squatting and croaking, his voice and posture were so realistic it was almost scary.

His downstairs neighbor had even politely approached him once, saying they could understand his hobby of keeping unusual pets, but could he maybe manage his pet a little better? Maybe stop it from croaking like thunder in the middle of the night and disturbing everyone's sleep?

Chu Tianxing expressed his apologies for this and promised he would go back and gag his pet toad’s mouth so it wouldn't make noise at night anymore.

After that, he made sure to only practice the Toad Style during the day when his neighbors were at work.

His martial arts training was going smoothly.

The only disappointment was that he hadn't received any gift packages over the past few days.

But he'd expected this.

He'd gotten one gift package for each when he first made it onto the New Book Rankings, Click Rankings, and Recommendation Rankings.

When he topped those same three rankings and dominated the charts, he'd gotten another gift package from each one.

Those three rankings had given him a total of six gift packages.

On top of that, he'd gotten one more for making it onto the Editor-in-Chief's Recommendation.

All in all, he'd collected gift packages from every single homepage ranking that the Huankong Net website had to offer.

He'd also received one of the two major recommendation ranking gift packages, and now he had only the Top Recommendation Ranking to conquer.

But a couple of days ago, he received a notification from the author dashboard saying that when the rankings updated this afternoon, he'd be featured on the Top Recommendation Rankings to build hype for his upcoming premium release.

"So I should get a Top Recommendation Gift Package today. And after I go premium, if subscriptions take off, there should be plenty more gift packages coming. Like... first time breaking a hundred initial subscriptions, first time breaking a hundred average subscriptions, first time breaking a thousand high subscriptions... Now that I think about it, the subscription-based gift packages are probably going to keep coming like a never-ending stream!"

Chu Tianxing felt happy for a moment, then suddenly blinked as he realized this wasn't exactly something to be proud of—

Damn, I've been a failing author for ten years, living off attendance bonuses and minimum guarantees, and I couldn't even get a hundred people to subscribe to my first paid chapter?

How the hell did I survive those ten years?

Looking back on it now, it all feels like a dream!

Shaking his head and sighing for a moment, Chu Tianxing jumped out of bed and ran through Proud Dragon Repents, Divine Dragon Swings Its Tail, Dragon Appears in the Field, and Dragon Soars the Sky several times. Then he practiced his Finger Flicking Divine Skill for a bit.

He'd successfully opened up the Hand's Major Yin Lung Meridian.

This meridian was paired with the Hand's Yang Supreme Large Intestine Meridian, which ends at the Shaoshang Acupoint on his right thumb.

So now when Chu Tianxing hooked his index finger and thumb together to use the Finger Flicking Divine Skill, his internal force could flow through both the Hand’s Yang Supreme Large Intestine Meridian and the Hand’s Major Yin Lung Meridian, reaching both the Shangyang Acupoint on his index finger and the Shaoshang Acupoint on his thumb, giving his Finger Flicking Divine Skill much more explosive power.

It felt kind of like a sword-drawing technique.

His thumb's Shaoshang Acupoint would gather internal energy like a scabbard building up power, while his index finger's Shangyang Acupoint would release internal energy as the driving force.

With the two combined, the power of the flicked projectile was enhanced by more than double!

Even without a projectile, a flick of his finger could generate a 'finger-wind' that produced a distinct "swooshing" sound.

His only limitation was his cultivation level. The finger wind from his empty finger flicks couldn't travel very far and had no real destructive power.

After practicing martial arts for a while, Chu Tianxing took a refreshing shower, had a nice breakfast, and then left the house.

The tournament registration deadline was July 10th.

Today was July 9th.

Chu Tianxing didn't want to wait until the last minute to register. He planned to get it done today.

He went downstairs, left his apartment complex, and took a taxi straight to the Canghe City Martial Arts Association building.

A few days ago, he'd accompanied Qin Ling here to register, so he was familiar with the process. Once he got there, he went straight to the second floor of the Martial Arts Association building and got a registration form from one of the counters in the main hall.

The contents of the form were not complicated. He just needed to fill in his name, gender, age, occupation, address, and phone number. He didn't even need to fill in his cultivation realm. The tournament didn't group participants by martial arts level, only by age.

Under fourteen years old was the Children’s Division.

Fourteen to eighteen years old was the Youth Division.

Eighteen to thirty years old was the Young Adult Division.

Thirty to fifty years old was the Senior Young Adult Division.

Uh, wait, that seemed a bit off?

Actually, no, it was perfectly fine.

Martial artists under fifty were still considered young adults in this world.

Internal energy can greatly delay aging. It can also maintain youth and beauty and extend lifespan. There are plenty of martial artists in their forties or fifties but looking like in their early thirties due to their profound internal energy,

So, at the martial artists' insistence, martial artists' age categories were very different from those of regular civilians who hadn't developed internal energy.

Martial artists from eighteen to thirty years old were considered young adults.

Martial artists from thirty to fifty years old were considered senior young adults.

The reason why “young adults” had to be split into two groups was that, not counting some exceptionally talented individuals, martial artists at the Inner Force Realm and above generally had deeper cultivation and more seasoned combat experience the older they were.

If veteran Inner Force martial artists in their forties were put in the same age bracket as eighteen or twenty-something youngsters, it would be completely unfair to the kids.

Therefore, the Martial Arts Tournament split the “young adults” into one group and the “senior young adults” into another.

Qin Ling wasn't eighteen yet, so she was in the Youth Division.

Chu Tianxing was half a year older than Qin Ling and had turned eighteen two months ago, so according to the rules, he'd be placed in the Young Adult Division.

An eighteen-year-old kid competing against people in their late twenties was definitely going to be at a disadvantage.

But martial arts were all about making the impossible possible. Age didn't determine everything.

Even one’s cultivation of internal energy did not decide everything.

Otherwise, everyone could just skip the competition entirely, report their ages, and compare how many meridians they'd opened up and the results would be obvious!

The true level of one’s martial arts could only be known after a fight.

Chu Tianxing was armed with ultimate techniques and cheat powers, so even though he'd be competing in the Young Adult Division, he wasn't worried at all.

He was confident that he would perform well and earn admission to a top-tier university in the capital of the Great Ming.

After carefully filling out the registration form and submitting two ID photos, his registration was complete.

Once he was done, Chu Tianxing didn’t linger and was about to head straight home to write.

But just as he reached the stairway, he ran into an acquaintance.

"Chu Tianxing?"

Standing two meters tall with a face full of muscle and looking like a middle-aged man despite actually being only seventeen was his classmate Xiao Hu with his arms crossed over his chest and blocking the stairway. Using his height advantage, he looked down at Chu Tianxing with a look full of disdain.

"What's a martial arts waste like you doing at the Martial Arts Association?"

Chu Tianxing looked at Xiao Hu with a peculiar expression, finding it surprisingly hard to feel any real dislike toward him.

The reason was that in the comment section of his novel, there was a very active die-hard fan with the ID of XiaoHu2215.

Ever since Huang Rong had appeared in the story recently, XiaoHu2215 was showing a tendency to turn into a total fanboy.

Chu Tianxing strongly suspected that this XiaoHu2215 was actually his classmate Xiao Hu.

The reason for this suspicion was because XiaoHu2215 had once said in the comment section that his right fist could strike with 2215 pounds of force.

And during a chat with Qin Ling, she'd mentioned that while Xiao Hu's internal energy cultivation was slightly weaker than hers, he was naturally gifted with incredibly strong bones and muscles. His punches were much so more vicious than hers that he could deliver 1.1 tons of force with one punch.

1.1 tons was pretty close to 2,215 pounds!

Because of this suspicion, even though the Xiao Hu standing in front of him now was acting all arrogant and superior, Chu Tianxing found it genuinely difficult to dislike him when he remembered all the good things his online persona had said in the comment section…