CCCD

Karni arrived at the contribution shop and looked at his current balance. It was now at 4000 contribution points. Gone were the days when he was in debt to the sect.

He saw the technique he wanted. It cost 3000 contribution points. He immediately pressed the 'buy' button and now he was down to 1000 contribution points. Next, the training room area. He rented out a room stepped inside.

Before starting to train, he texted Siduo. "I got the technique today. I might spend a few days in the Tang Sect to study it. Don't fall behind :)" 

… … …

In the palace. Siduo was in the corner with the princess. The two were discussing the training they were doing. They were on a short break right now.

Suddenly, the soul communicator rang. She opened it up and saw Karni's message.

"That fucker. Yun'er. We're resuming training."

… … …

Karni sat on the floor in the room. There was a video showing the usage of Controlling Crane, Capturing Dragon as well as its circulation paths and an analysing tool that could determine if he did it correctly.

After watching the video for the third time, just to make sure he has everything memorised correctly, he stood in a neutral position and first started the circulation of his Mysterious Heaven Method in his arms.

The most basic application of this technique was done through grappling. Distributing the Mysterious Heaven Method in a way that transfers the weight to different parts of one's body. From arms to legs or to the back for example.

He circulated the cultivation technique in a slightly different way than he'd used to and stepped close to the training dummy. The room offered a variety of options for practice; one of the basic options were different versions of training dummies.

The one in front of Karni right now was made of metal. He'd have trouble lifting it even with the use of his soul power. Standing to the side, Controlling Crane, Capturing Dragon started circulating. He grabbed the training dummy and threw it over him with some difficulty.

He heard a voice from the side. "60 percent accuracy." This is how the regular disciples learned when they did not have a teacher to help them. It was a lot of trial and error. Of course, the percentage noted was only the execution of the most basic technique.

He saw a video of himself and immediately noticed the issue. He was using solely his own weight. While not necessarily wrong, it wasn't the best way to use the technique. He was supposed to be using not just his own weight, but the weight of the opponent as well.

He grabbed a new dummy and stepped next to it. For the start, he just pulled on it, letting the dummy's weight fall onto himself. As he circulated Controlling Crane, Capturing Dragon, he twisted both himself and the dummy as he sent the weight of it back onto the dummy and threw it over himself with greater ease than before.

"90 percent accuracy." Karni frowned. He was still missing a crucial part of Controlling Crane, Capturing Dragon.

He attempted it again, but got 90 percent again. He watched a video of himself. Once, twice. He still wasn't sure what he was missing.

He did it again, even using his Purple Demon Eyes and Golden Insight to analyse his own body movement while executing it. As he threw the dummy over himself, something finally clicked. He got 90 percent again, but he realised what he had to do.

He approached the dummy yet again, his eyes focused, but not using Purple Demon Eyes. He wanted to do this by only using the Controlling Crane, Capturing Dragon. To feel the technique as it should be with his body.

He grabbed the dummy and pulled it at him, the weight of the dummy was put onto him. Transferring the weight within him, he grappled the dummy like before, redistributing the weight not only into his own strength, but pushing it back into the dummy as well.

He realised it during the analysis. There was a reason why it was a grappling technique at its core. In his own mind it was to control the weight and capture someone else; to imbalance them, hold them tight with their own weight. That was what it meant to capture a dragon.

As he was throwing the dummy over himself, now that he was also applying the weight back onto the dummy itself, it wasn't just thrown over anymore, it flew through the air and then slid on the floor.

"100 percent accuracy." Karni smiled. Good. He didn't need to long to figure out the basics. That took him about a total of half an hour.

"Now to use Controlling Crane, Capturing Dragon on something heavier." Karni looked at the dummies and chose a heavier one.

It was about becoming efficient at transferring the weight. The better he is, the more he could manipulate the opponent. The computer cannot help him much with this anymore.

He spent the rest of the day simply trying out different weight classes, as well as different shapes that were heavier at unusual places.

He simply meditated in the room for the night to rest up, then went back to understanding this technique. He'll be sleeping here for a while. Just from the first day, he could feel how deep the technique went. It was decently easy to understand, but incredibly challenging to master.

He chose his next practice method. A small part of the wall suddenly extended towards Karni with some force. Nothing too fast, but not slow either. Karni let himself be hit.

He attempted to use its weight and simply redistribute it along his whole body. Karni was attempting to make the force sent onto him useless. It was only the Mysterious Heaven Method that could lead to techniques that had such wondrous effects.

What he was doing was essentially changing the way pressure worked. When one would be attacked by a great amount of force in a small area, it would be extremely painful and dangerous. If that same amount of force would instead be distributed along a larger surface, it would have much less effect. A big enough surface might make the force completely harmless.

This is what Controlling Crane, Capturing Dragon did. It distributed the force of a small surface to the whole body, hence, a larger surface. It manipulated the very physics of the body and forces affecting it.

… … …

Standing in the middle of a room, Karni was topless. His clothes got cloaked in sweat on the second day already. They stank to high heaven. He pressed a single button.

The room became alive. It started moving all around. A ball was shot from the side of the wall. Karni didn't dodge, he intercepted the metal ball with his hands, then led the ball smoothly from his front to his back.

The wall extended on one part, like a pillar, pushing at Karni while multiple air cannons appeared from the side.

He always let himself be hit. He used the force from the air cannons, and distributed the force to his front, meeting with the incoming horizontal pillar.

Multiple heavy balls of metal shot out while he was still wrestling with the pillar. His hands went to work. He sent the ball into the other one, which bounced off into a third one. Karni was proficient in the Hidden Weapon Hundred Separation as well. He simply combined certain aspects of it with Controlling Crane, Capturing Dragon; and wouldn't you know it, the two were fantastically complementary.

After another minute of constant attacks by the rooms, Karni stopped, out of breath. He only limited himself to Tang Sect techniques at that time, all except the Ghost Shadow Perplexing Track. His main job here was to train in Controlling Crane, Capturing Dragon after all. While he was sure the two would work great together, he first had to be proficient enough in both of them. Especially so when one would consider that his Ghost Shadow Perplexing was transformed into a Drunken Ghost Dance.

He was pushing his own limits of reaction and speed of using the Controlling Crane, Capturing Dragon.

"Mm. This is enough of CCCD for now. I'll have to figure out other things through experience." Saying Controlling Crane, Capturing Dragon constantly for a few days straight made Karni's head hurt. No. He didn't actually speak out loud a lot while in isolated training. Just thinking of the full name constantly was making his head hurt. It was a mouthful, so he shortened it to CCCD.

He put on a new, clean set of clothes and left the room. Entering the larger area, he noticed a bit of a commotion.

He saw that a big poster was now on the main announcement board.

"Star Luo's Tang Sect Hall Master, Hu Jie, is coming to check on disciples on Monday, next week. Everyone in the outer sect is invited for a special presentation."

Karni's eyebrows rose. He didn't remember this person as much. The guy probably appeared later in the novel once Tang Wulin was already the sect master, and he didn't remember him to play a major role outside of that single arc.

When he tried to remember, all he could visualise is an extremely fat, but strong person. Being here for so long, he'd forgotten a lot of the finer details of the original story.

He slowly returned back to the hotel room. It was already evening. Siduo should be home by now.

He entered and instead of a hello, he was greeted by a different exclamation. "What's that pungent smell?"

Siduo walked next to him. "Go shower you stinky ass. You smell like a rotten egg."

"Hey now, give me some slack, I was in a room training for five whole days."

"Aha. I don't give a shit, go shower."

"Yeah yeah." Karni turned towards the bathroom, but stopped. "Oh yeah, I saw somethi-"

"Shower Kiki! For fucks sake!"

"Heh. She said fuck." A young voice came from another part of the room.

Siduo huffed and turned to Karni. "See what you did?"

Karni sighed lovingly. "Ay, don't blame me, blame the stink."

"You're right. So please enter the bathroom already! You'lln stink up the room!"

Karni closed the door, he came out after about an hour of showering. He really scrubbed himself clean. He also enjoyed it. Not showering for so long was not comfortable.

Siduo came close to him and smelled him. "Mm. Now that smells good."

Karni pushed her away, a bit embarrassed. "The Sect Master of the Star Luo Branch of the Tang Sect is coming on Monday. Wanna go see?"

Siduo thought about it for a second. "I'll see. I'll ask the princess to give me some time off."

"Alright. Tell me what you decide."

… … …

"Hu Jie is coming to the sect? Let's go!"

"Eh? Yun'er, you're also in the Tang Sect?"

The princess nodded. "Yes, yes. I'll finally meet that 'friend' of yours. I've seen him before, but I never introduced myself."

"Seems like you have a bit of a problem with that."

The princess blushed and avoided Siduo's gaze.

"I'm just teasing. It's in the past, besides, you're a fast learner."

Dai Yun'er approved. "Of course, I'm a genius."

"I meant your tone of voice and politeness, but yeah, sure, you could be considered a genius too."

"Hey!" The princess lunged at Siduo. The two have gotten quite close. Not everybody dared to tease the princess.

… … …

Monday. Karni was waiting in the Tang Sect. Alone. Siduo told him that she couldn't come because of the princess.

The staff was leading the disciples to a large auditorium where everyone could fit. It was circular in shape, with chairs all around it. In the middle of the circular room was a stage, raised up a little, so everyone could see it.

Karni sat down, but paused immediately. Just on the opposite side, he noticed a familiar figure. Bright red hair, hidden cat ears that didn't escape Karni's eyes. Yep. It was Siduo. What was she doing here?

He saw someone next to her. A bit of a hooded figure, with only blonde hair leaving her cape.

Ah. He understood. The princess dragged her into this. Karni's and Siduo's eyes met. She appeared apologetic, while Karni just waved back to acknowledge it. He didn't mind.

Despite Siduo having tamed the princess, it looked like Siduo still hadn't fully calmed her down yet. On the other hand, he wasn't surprised that the princess was in the Tang Sect. She was in it in the original story as well.

Even if he didn't remember that, he wouldn't be surprised. From what he saw, the Tang Sect on this continent had a sort of monopoly on soul masters. Perhaps the quality wasn't on the same level as on Douluo Continent, but if Karni guessed correctly, that would mean that they're also stricter on choosing the inner disciples.

Quantity over quality for outer disciples, while quality over quantity still ruled over inner disciples. From the day he started visiting this place, he hasn't seen a single inner disciple yet.

On the Douluo Continent, one could see some hooded figures that represented the inner disciples every once in a while. The only hooded figure he saw here was the princess, but she didn't look the same. She wore a hood not because she was already in the inner sect, but to hide her identity.

Everyone in the room seemed to be chatty. The room was filled with excitement. It wasn't everyday that the strongest person of the Tang Sect on the continent would perform a personal presentation.

Karni was listening to some conversations to pass the time while they were waiting for Hu Jie to come.

"Of course. I'm excited, but why is this happening? Doesn't the master visit once a year? He already visited once this year, no?"

"Yes. It's a bit weird. Maybe there's a special occasion? Or it might just be the whim of the master?"

Karni was excited. It looked like Karni and Siduo were lucky for being a witness to this event.

The whole room went silent as a single figure appeared in the middle of the room. The person was as wide as he was tall. He looked like a perfect circle in terms of body shape.

The man's tiny eyes disappeared as he smiled. His might was released for a split second to silence the final whispers.

"Greetings, Outer Disciples. I'm Hu Jie, the Smiley Face Douluo. You must be wondering why I'm having this presentation when I've already had one at the beginning of the year. Well this will be an announcement, accompanied with a little surprise at the end."

"Now, I won't be running in circles today. Let's start immediately. We're announcing a little project that's already been present in the Inner Sect. It has finally reached a sufficient breakthrough to be released into wider public knowledge."

On the middle platform appeared a whole mechanical body. It looked like a giant soul tool.

"This is the Human Augmentation Project. The goal of this project is to offer those who have been injured in their line of service with suitable prosthetics for them to function, or even augment."

Karni analysed the whole body. None of them had his research in it. For a second there, he was scared that they would steal his own research without giving him anything in return. It was just too much of a coincidence.

In the next moment he calmed himself. The principle of Tang Sect was that they held righteousness in the highest regard. It was almost cultish to what level they considered righteousness seriously.

While he was analysing the armour, he made eye contact with Hu Jie. It creeped him out.

"What we want to do with this announcement is to invite you to this project of ours. Whether to share your own advancement with us or to learn on your own. It won't only help those who were injured, but even help in further development of Tang Sect specific soul tools."

The master let them absorb all of this information. The room immediately jumped into loud chatter.

The thing that disturbed Karni though, was that the Tang Sect's branch master over there kept on looking at him. He definitely knew about his research.

After about 5 minutes of awkward staring… They kept on staring. Karni wasn't about to lose in a staring contest, not even with a Limit Douluo, he felt like he'd have something to hide if he avoided the gaze. He wasn't sure if he was thinking too much into it, but he definitely felt pressure. He didn't have anything to hide. Hu Jie finally broke contact with a smile and began speaking again.

"Now, now, I'm sure everyone is excited. Like some of you have been guessing, yes there will be benefits to this. For those, you may question the dedicated project leads that will be announced soon. For now, let's get to the fun part of this whole announcement.

The outer disciples immediately had high expectations in their eyes.

"Two of all of you will spar in front of me, I'll be commenting on this in front of everybody. Though this time you won't get any particular teaching outside of that. The reward this time will be 3000 contribution points on the winner. I'll choose two people from those who raise their arms. The winner will also become a part of the project, but if you think you can't contribute, please, do not raise your arm. I do not think I have to warn you of the consequences, should you not have the appropriate expertise."

About a fifth of the people raised their hands. From what Karni could feel from those closeby, most were four ringed soul masters. Among the raised arms was Siduo and the princess.

"But there is a catch. The loser would have to pay the sect 6000 contribution points. Those will go to help us fund the project as well."

The hands immediately started disappearing. There were many people here that were aware that their chance of winning was slim. This would surely be an opportunity for designers and manufacturers, but was it worth the loss of 6000 contribution points? There were very few who remained. Only three.

Karni was the first. An unknown person that seemed quite chubby and tall was the second. Finally the princess also had her arm raised. 

For but a moment. Siduo lowered the princess' arm, as well as her own.

… … …

"Siduo, why? Aren't you confident I can defeat your 'friend'. Instead of lowering my hand, shouldn't you raise your own?"

Siduo shook her head. "If he gets a single good hit on my head, unless I want to reveal my secrets, which I don't want to, he can instantly defeat me. The chances of me being able to dodge all of his lethal hits are small. The bastard is incredibly tricky. Speaking of, princess, you don't stand a chance at all. Your spiritual martial soul will be useless against him."

"Oh?" The princess went into thought. She had very high trust in Siduo. She also knew how prideful this first friend of hers was. Siduo wasn't willing to risk 6000 contribution points, because she was aware that her chances were smaller than Karni's.

The princess let her arm be lowered. She decided to trust her friend. Someday, she'll test this Karni, but not with such guaranteed consequences. After this little talk, she had high expectations.

… … …

And then there were two. Karni looked at the opposing opponent. From what he heard of the surroundings, he was quite well known as well. He could hear of a very weird nickname circulating. The Jumper. Didn't sound that cool, but since it was a nickname, there was definitely something to him.

Of course, there was talk about Karni as well. He was a complete unknown.

"It seems we have our two contestants. I do want to remind the two of you, even if you don't have enough contribution points, you'll still have to pay. You'll go into debt."

The two were surprised. Karni was surprised because he didn't even consider the need to mention this; he was in debt before, so of course he'd go into debt again, should he lose. He was confident in himself exactly because of the abilities Siduo mentioned.

As long as he gets a single hit on someone, they'll be stunned. Siduo was used to it, but even she had to be careful around him. With his new abilities of CCCD and his Shift, the surprise aspect in him increased drastically. He also wanted to test his skills in CCCD. And a punishment on the back of his mind would only push him further.

On the other hand, the other guy was regretting his decision now. It looked like he thought he was being slick. Someone close by mentioned that the man thought that he won't need to pay everything if he lost, since he didn't have the money for it. This was followed by, "That's our Jumper. He jumps to risks like mad."

The twenty something year old had a reputation for his reckless actions. However, as he looked at Karni, his eyes turned intense because of this. Karni felt something familiar from this man. Something he wasn't completely used to. Did this guy have some spatial martial soul like him? Was that where the familiarity came from?

Hopper had a similar name, maybe the guy's nickname came from a similar source. Jumper, as in he jumps through space? That was Karni's best guess. The familiarity might also be because of that.

"Now then, we shall go to the arena, for everyone here, you may watch it from above."

The auditorium started shaking. Widening. New seats came into existence and the centre of it became much larger than before. A visible energy shield came into existence around it.

"If the two contestants would please enter." Hu Jie flew up.

Karni and the Jumper entered.

"You may go all out. I'll personally referee."

With this, the two didn't have to worry about holding back. Someone who was a Hyper Douluo would always be fast enough to protect the people involved in a battle below seven rings.

The two got on opposite sides.

"Now then, begin."

Karni was a bit surprised. No countdown?

The other guy wasn't surprised. He summoned his martial souls. Karni looked at it, while summoning his own. Was that… a panda?

The man turned into a dark green and white panda. Then he jumped. That jump must've been at least 50 metres high. Karni could see the wind manipulation happening.

"Ohhh. The Jumper. Right."