When faced with an opportunity that could fundamentally change your life, if you don’t seize it now, then when?

Drinking the strong medicinal decoction every day, his vital energy indeed grew more robust, his complexion regained some rosiness, no longer so frighteningly pale.

Next, Sanlang Brooks had a new idea: he wanted to find a master and learn martial arts!

“Learn martial arts?”

The old steward Uncle Harris stared blankly when he heard the young master’s words, and cautiously asked, “Young master, are you running a fever?”

Ever since the young master fainted and woke up, he seemed like a different person, completely changed.

Sanlang Brooks spoke with conviction: “A gentleman should wear a sword.”

The old steward didn’t understand the lofty principles of sages, but he couldn’t stop the young master’s determination to learn martial arts. Reporting to the madam, Mrs. Brooks pondered briefly and also gave her approval.

In Jing County, there was a martial arts school, its owner known as the “Sick Tiger” Nancy Foster.

A very gentle and strange name—if you hadn’t seen the person, you’d think it was a woman.

Nancy Foster was about forty, of medium build, with fair skin and a short beard. He was actually not a native of Jing County, but had moved there from elsewhere. After settling in the county, he opened a martial arts school, but didn’t give it a name, and the place was remote. Though called a martial arts school, in fact he had only one official disciple—his daughter Yvonne Foster.

The martial arts school was just a rundown courtyard, with a few simple pieces of furniture, three plain broadswords, two long spears—the blades were either rusted or the wooden handles worm-eaten; on the other side stood a few wooden stakes, grandly named: “Plum Blossom Stakes.”

The place was deserted, with no students to teach, so Nancy Foster spent every day drinking in the tavern. He was so fond of alcohol that he came home drunk every day.

He always wore a blue robe so faded it was almost white, and was rarely seen in anything else. The whole person looked disheveled and down-and-out—no matter how you looked at him, he didn’t seem like a martial arts master.

Sanlang Brooks didn’t mind. Joining the martial arts school, he never expected to learn any astonishing skills—he just wanted to try anything that might help, to train his frail body from the basics. After all, just eating and drinking medicine was only treating the symptoms, not the root cause; perhaps martial arts training could bring real improvement.

Unable to find anyone at the school, he had to go to the tavern. Nancy Foster, who was drinking, looked at him in surprise, sizing him up and thinking: Is this Sanlang Brooks crazy? At twenty years old, with a skinny frame not even a hundred pounds, and he wants to learn martial arts?

Or maybe, he just has too much money to burn?

Since there was money to be made, Master Foster certainly wouldn’t turn him away. He nodded in agreement right away, waved his hand, and his first words were: “Pay for the wine first!”

The requirements for joining the school were extremely lax—just a simple ceremony and a payment of silver. For someone like Sanlang Brooks, he couldn’t even be called Nancy Foster’s disciple, just a sponsor paying tuition. As for learning kung fu, it was just going through the motions.

As a newcomer with no martial arts foundation, Nancy Foster first taught Sanlang Brooks the horse stance.

Holding a horse stance was far from as simple as it seemed—there was a lot to it: footing, sinking the waist, chest out, head up… To do the whole set of movements properly was no easy task.

In Nancy Foster’s view, Sanlang Brooks probably wouldn’t last three days before giving up the horse stance, unable to endure the soreness and hardship.

But unexpectedly, for several days in a row, Sanlang Brooks skipped even private school and went to the martial arts school every day. After finishing his daily practice, he would bombard with questions, asking about matters of the martial world.

In front of others, Nancy Foster always boasted of “roaming the martial world for thirty years.” As a martial artist, he had traveled far and wide and was indeed quite knowledgeable. At the very least, he had been to Nanyang Prefecture.

One prefecture, six counties—Jing County was one of them.

Above Nanyang Prefecture was an even broader region—the Xia Yu Dynasty was divided into nine major provinces.

Zhongzhou, Jizhou, Qingzhou, Yangzhou, Mingzhou, Yuzhou, Yongzhou, Liangzhou, Manzhou.

Nanyang Prefecture was located in the Jiangnan region, under Yangzhou.

In short, this world was vast, and the martial world boundless. By comparison, Jing County was just a small pond.

Listening to Nancy Foster’s boastful tales, Sanlang Brooks found them fascinating, like a frog at the bottom of a well hearing about the world, feeling a new sense of wonder at the vastness of the land.

In this ancient world where information was scarce and transportation primitive, even a map was a luxury. People lived here, tucked away in a corner, working at sunrise and resting at sunset—a whole life might be spent in a single nook; the sky above their heads was their entire world.

What Sanlang Brooks found hardest to accept was precisely this—he longed to go out and see the world. If there were mountains beyond the mountains, then he should travel them all.

In fact, excelling in studies and rising through the imperial exams would be an ideal path.

But now, suddenly, there was another choice. Though it seemed shocking and unrealistic, after experiencing even more incredible things, it was much easier to accept.

In fact, Sanlang Brooks faintly felt that what was recorded in the “Haoran Silk Book” seemed tailor-made for him, very suited to his character.

The silk book’s text, with over a thousand concise and profound words, was extremely obscure and deep. After careful study and thought, he realized that sword cultivation was only the elementary level. The deeper content was closely related to calligraphy and literature—that was the true essence. However, many of the words in the latter part of the silk book, though he recognized each character and could read the sentences, he couldn’t understand their meaning when strung together. It was like looking at flowers through a mist—hazy and indistinct.