No one knew exactly what kind of treatment Evan Parker had received from Master, but when Evan Parker returned to his hometown, it was as if he had become a different person. The aggressive aura he had developed in the army, which everyone thought was a deeply ingrained habit, had completely disappeared, replaced by a gentle expression. A warm smile was always on his face, and anyone who saw him would never believe that he was an outstanding soldier who had returned from the battlefield less than a year ago.

In his hometown, there was no one else besides Evan Parker, but on the official road over the mountain, it was still possible to occasionally spot a few figures. For reasons unknown, Evan Parker built a small shed by the roadside. In the hot weather, he sold tea and wild game; in the cold, he would enclose the shed with straw curtains, light a fire inside, and sell some wild game and alcohol. With such a business, and with only Evan Parker himself, his life was actually quite enjoyable. He hunted his own game, sold alcohol, and lived a life with both meat and drink, finding endless joy in it.

Here, no one would care what a small tea-seller by the road did when business was slow, and of course, Evan Parker would never tell anyone what he was up to.

Perhaps, in the eyes of those who paid attention, when there was no business, this little shop owner would sit alone on the mountaintop not far away, staring blankly in one direction, lost in thought. The place he sat and his posture could easily make people think he was simply watching for travelers coming from afar; no one would find anything strange about it.

This small tea shed stood alone by the official road. Passing merchants found it much more convenient to have such a little tea shed in this place far from any village or inn, and some even stayed overnight here. Of course, the owner was not present, and there was nothing in this simple shed worth stealing.

No one knew that this gentle-faced, amiable young man was actually a top-level expert. Or rather, he had once been a top-level expert in the military. As for his current strength, apart from himself, no one could possibly guess.

If anyone who knew Evan Parker were here, they would certainly find it strange. In the past, Evan Parker was among the most diligent in the army, resting almost half as much as a normal person. Aside from combat missions and certain daily necessities, he spent nearly all his time training. But now, even if you followed him all day, you would rarely see him practicing.

It seemed that after his injuries healed, Evan Parker had become an ordinary person, with not a trace of the aura cultivated in the army. No one knew what kind of treatment he had received, nor what Edward Carter had discussed with him; the change was truly astonishing.

His peaceful life had not a hint of the martial world, and no one would consider this place a strategic stronghold in the world of martial artists. To be honest, there were no people here, no money, and even those who lived by the sword would rarely come to such a godforsaken place for no reason.

In this tranquil environment, Evan Parker quietly carried out a plan that no one could possibly detect. His daily meditations on the mountaintop were not the idle sitting of an ordinary person, but a silent effort to restore his former strength. However, unlike before, the basic, fast-track techniques popular in the military were no longer his focus.

Instead, he practiced a new technique that he had spent several months improving, based on those old methods. Having once pushed those crude techniques to their limits, he now had much more experience and many lessons learned. With a few simple pointers from Master, the flaws and weaknesses of those techniques became glaringly obvious.

Combining all these experiences and lessons, and most importantly, adapting them to the unique characteristics of his own body, the newly improved technique fit Evan Parker perfectly. Although, in the eyes of the great martial families and sects, such a technique was as crude as could be, for Evan Parker, this was not a problem at all. Any technique, as long as it suited oneself best, was the best—wasn’t it?

What Master said about it possibly affecting his strength now seemed to Evan Parker to be overly modest. This was not just an effect on his strength—nearly ninety percent of his power had been affected, making it almost no different from having his martial arts abolished.

Of course, there was still a difference. After this injury and recovery, Evan Parker’s meridians—especially the main ones that had been injured—now had a resilience that even Master found a bit terrifying. Even a top martial artist would not have such an abnormal level of endurance. In Master’s words, although most of his strength had been lost, ordinary internal attacks, even those at the level of Evan Parker’s former power, would hardly be able to harm those meridians.