Today, Adam Carter, right after the grand exercise, came here at the very first opportunity. Relying on his memory of the place, he took both volumes, "Detailed Essentials of Xingyi Six Harmonies" and "True Explanation of the Great Stele-Smashing Hand," into his hands.

Yesterday, his curiosity had been piqued by the sword spirit Emily, making him want to see what mysteries these two martial arts, so highly praised, truly held—

But after only a brief look, Adam Carter frowned. These two sets of boxing techniques seemed quite ordinary; he really couldn’t see anything remarkable about them.

Not only did they fall short of the top-tier martial arts, but even compared to the Dragon-Subduing Tiger-Taming techniques he practiced, there was still a considerable gap—at best, they were third-rate.

However, Emily had also mentioned that perhaps a great calamity of heaven and earth had caused the true transmission of these two boxing arts to be lost.

As for what that great calamity was, and the "seven calamities, eight calamities" that Emily spoke of, Adam Carter was completely in the dark, not understanding at all.

He only knew that the nations of Tianyi had a history of ten thousand years, plagued every year by natural and man-made disasters. But there had never been anything that could be called a great calamity of heaven and earth.

"Seems like that's all there is to it. Never mind! I'll memorize them first. Tonight in my dreams, I'll ask that sword spirit for guidance!"

Settling his thoughts, Adam Carter began to focus on memorizing the contents of the books. He had a talent since childhood: a photographic memory. Any book, he only needed to read once or twice to remember it. Watching others perform boxing or sword techniques, he could also memorize them after just one or two demonstrations, without missing a single detail.

As a child, relying on this skill, Adam Carter would eavesdrop on the schoolteacher’s lessons, gaining a basic understanding of the classics and developing decent literary talent. As he grew older, he secretly learned the essentials of martial arts.

Those instructors always held something back, only teaching wholeheartedly when they encountered generous juniors like David Carter, who were worth investing in.

However, Adam Carter would memorize every move these people demonstrated. He would then study them diligently in private, which led to his current achievements.

Every life-and-death struggle in the streets became nourishment for him, constantly improving his martial arts.

The two martial arts classics totaled over seventeen thousand characters, accompanied by more than a hundred ink illustrations. Adam Carter took only a quarter of an hour to memorize them almost completely. Then, he silently reviewed them in his mind, and only after confirming that he hadn’t missed a single word did he put the books down.

Next, he walked over to the "Heng" section. The Martial Arts Pavilion was divided into eight sections: sword, boxing, palm, leg, saber, spear, miscellaneous, and "Heng" (hardening arts). The bookshelf marked with "Heng" naturally contained all the hardening external techniques.

Emily had once said that, besides the Great Stele-Smashing Hand and Xingyi Six Harmonies, he also needed to practice a hardening external art.

Ideally, he should train in the Golden Bell Shield. If that wasn’t available, any other suitable hardening external art would do.

"Golden Bell Shield? There really isn’t one—"

Glancing over the bookshelf, Adam Carter shook his head slightly. Then he took out all the top-tier hardening external arts and memorized them one by one. Even the Golden Armor Profound Body practiced by Harold Stone was among them.

In fact, he had already read these before, so now he only needed a quick glance to recall them all.

Then Adam Carter's gaze lifted, fixing on the top shelf.

Actually, the Lichen Academy did have the most supreme martial arts. There were two sets in total. One was called "Armor-Piercing Sharp Finger," and the other, found in the "Heng" section, was called "Bull Demon Primordial Tyrant Body." Once mastered, not only would blades and swords find it hard to injure, and magical powers be difficult to approach, but it would also grant the strength of a thousand bulls, overwhelmingly powerful—a technique aimed directly at the Golden Core stage.

However, both of these arts shared the same trait: they were extremely difficult to cultivate. "Armor-Piercing Sharp Finger" required consuming medicinal ingredients worth tens of millions of silver to temper the finger bones.

As for the Bull Demon Primordial Tyrant Body, it was an earth-element external art, cultivated by harnessing the geomagnetic energy of the earth. It required decades of relentless practice just to get started. Talent was irrelevant; only perseverance mattered.

However, if one couldn’t find a suitable geomagnetic vein, even after thirty or forty years, one might not reach the Qi Refining stage, missing the best period for cultivation between the ages of twenty and thirty.

Adam Carter speculated privately that it was probably because the cultivation requirements were so harsh that the Lichen Sect was happy to generously distribute these two supremely powerful external arts to the various academies. After all, in this world, no one could meet the conditions to master them.

In the past two years, Adam Carter had almost gone through the entire Martial Arts Pavilion, but these two arts were the only ones he had never looked at. He thought that since no one in the world could practice them, and they were not easy to learn from, it would be useless for him to read them.

But now, as if compelled by some unseen force, he took this long-sealed martial arts classic from the shelf.

It wasn’t until the book was in his hands that Adam Carter suddenly snapped out of it. After his initial shock, he couldn’t help but laugh at himself.

No harm in memorizing it, he thought. He was genuinely curious to see how Emily would have him master the Bull Demon Primordial Tyrant Body within three months. If he could even get started with this hardening external art, the benefits would be countless—it would be like wearing nine layers of iron armor, and if he added two more layers of armor on top, even a first or second level Qi Refining cultivator wielding the best spiritual weapons would have trouble breaking through his body. He could even resist Daoist spells; things like fire techniques or wind blade techniques would have no hope of harming him.

It wouldn’t affect his agility, yet he would have the immense strength of a bull demon—absolutely ten times more domineering and powerful than Harold Stone!