Chapter 102: Zhang Yao, Who Believes in the Light

Once the martial path had been traded to every nation, it immediately became a priority development program and was promoted to the entire populace.

To keep adults from being sly and refusing to buy in while waiting to pry it from their children, all foundational martial arts were issued as compulsory loans. They were calculated per person, with each individual passively taking on a debt of five hundred credit points, all under the lofty slogan of sharing the nation’s burden and bearing hardship together.

When the common people did the math, they cursed at once.

Sharing your mother’s burden.

The state did not lose money at all; it made a huge profit instead.

In the end, it had taken all the credit for righteousness and kindness, and still expected everyone else to say thank you.

But an arm could not twist a thigh, and besides, everyone was looking forward to it. No one wanted to lose at the starting line, so they could only pinch their noses and accept it.

For a time, everyone was immersed in the study of foundational martial arts.

Still, some had started ahead of the pack.

That was the Celestial Empire.

After all, they had grown up on its culture and been steeped in the spirit of martial heroes, so to a greater or lesser extent, they all understood a thing or two.

And the foundational martial path was simple enough.

There were no elemental distinctions, only ordinary Daoist methods for cultivating inner energy: balanced, calm, neither capable of making sudden leaps nor likely to lead one astray into madness. They could also regulate the body and prolong life.

As for other martial techniques, there were many more: fists and kicks, weapons, light-body movement, everything under the sun, with no fewer than a hundred varieties.

Moreover, Zhang Kai had deliberately used the original names of the techniques, forcefully explaining that they were expansions based on Earth’s martial culture, with effects much the same.

For example: Arhat Fist, Eight Trigram Palm, Grass-Top Flight, Mount Hua Swordsmanship, Kunlun Saber Arts, the Yang Family Spear Technique, and so on.

Though these were called ordinary martial techniques, with truly powerful inner energy behind them, their use could still unleash tremendous might. It was, in a sense, a benefit Zhang Kai had given them.

Just a few days later, in the major cities of the Celestial Empire, all sorts of people began appearing who could leap over roofs and vault across walls.

These were people who had taken out loans to buy the pills Zhang Kai provided. Having mastered inner energy and martial techniques, they could not resist coming out to show off.

Most people were full of envy.

Because in the loan plan Zhang Kai had announced, not everyone qualified. Only those with a good credit rating, and especially those with a high one, were eligible.

Those with a credit rating of zero could only watch others grow stronger.

A person’s credit rating was judged comprehensively from their life experience and family background.

Even across the entire planet, fewer than a million people currently qualified for loans, and the highest loan limit was only one hundred thousand credit points.

This was Zhang Kai’s plan: to make Earth Home’s credit score the standard by which future humanity would be measured, forging it into an iron law.

And he intended to infiltrate humanity from every angle, making himself the invisible uncrowned king.

Watching human civilization follow, step by step, the road he had charted, Zhang Kai was very satisfied.

After all his effort, it had not been wasted.

But Earth Home was, in the end, only a platform.

Once humanity became powerful in the future, it would by no means remain bound to a mere platform. So he would need a second step: to build the strongest force in support of that platform.

Only when all the strong of Earth stood on his side would the true tide of history be set.

And for that, he would need the fictional figures he had created.

Those characters were not merely there to fan the flames of the martial path. They had a greater purpose: to become the hidden masterminds of future martial arts, to cultivate countless prodigies, and then brainwash them into becoming his most devoted followers.

Just as martial cultivation was finally beginning to move onto the right track, Zhang Kai felt that the time had come to start his plan.

At once, through Earth Home, he announced two notices.

First, one year later, a selection tournament for human martial elites would be held. Anyone under the age of fifteen could participate. Three hundred people would be chosen to receive the greatest goodwill offered by the Ultraman clan and become the first class of the Human Martial Academy. They would undergo three years of training, with tuition fully waived, and every graduate would be guaranteed to learn one powerful martial technique capable of resisting the other races.

The second notice was the opening of the other-race exchange system.

Any other race could exchange credit points through Earth Home, and those points could then be exchanged for goods.

One of these notices was meant to infiltrate humanity’s future.

The other was meant to infiltrate humanity’s market.

As the saying goes, whoever controls a nation’s economic lifeline controls the nation itself.

Zhang Kai’s strategy was simple: once cultivation entered a period of rapid expansion, the demand for cultivation resources would become an enormous market.

And in secret, he would have human directors shoot endless films and productions that could provide humanity with cultivation resources. All of these would be for human use.

He only had to open his mouth, and humans would run themselves ragged for him, all the while being grateful beyond measure.

It had to be said, Zhang Kai realized that he had grown.

True masters were the ones who stirred the winds and clouds from behind the curtain.

After the announcement was released, humanity was shaken, and everyone was talking about it.

Those with children were naturally delighted. What parent did not hope for their child to succeed? Though the competition would be fierce, everyone felt their own child was a chosen one and would surely rise above the rest.

As for many adults, they began asking why there were no training classes for grown-ups, and that discrimination was unacceptable.

But Zhang Kai refused them coldly.

Adults had already lost the significance of training. If they wanted any achievement, they had to strive for it themselves.

That was the essence of martial cultivation: only in childhood could talent be properly nurtured. Once grown and set in one’s ways, progress became exceedingly difficult. Without great fortune and great opportunity, one could not break through to the highest realm.

Meanwhile, Zhang Kai sneered in secret.

Joking aside, you are all adults now. Can’t you be a little more mature?

You are such easy first-generation crops to harvest. Why wouldn’t I cut you down? All of you should accept your fate, bravely fight the other races, and go into debt for the sake of your descendants.

After all, if you have already survived a mortgage, why would you care about a martial loan?

Regardless of how the outside world felt about it, Zhang Kai, relying on the virtual world base stations that were spread across the globe and still being continuously built, had Bone-Dragon monitor the world in search of suitable inheritors.

His many alternate identities all needed disciples to cultivate. Otherwise, how could those identities become famous as powerful figures? How could they hold up a whole corner of this martial world?

What Zhang Kai had not expected, however, was that the first person Bone-Dragon set its sights on was someone he would never have imagined.

It was noon.

On a hillside, several children were chatting in all seriousness.

“Listen to me. It’s always like this on TV: if you jump off a cliff, you’ll meet an expert who teaches you peerless skills and turns you into a master.”

A little girl was explaining earnestly.

A little boy glanced at the slope, dozens of feet high, and shook his head fearfully. “It’s too high. I’m scared. I can’t do it.”

“No backbone. At this rate, you’ll never become a master. You definitely won’t get into the martial academy for training.” The little girl looked at him with contempt.

“But the village is right below us. We can see everything clearly. What expert would there be? If we jump, we’ll die.”

Another little girl spoke up.

The first little girl said, “Nonsense. It’s not that high. How could you die? Watch me. I’ll jump first. If you’re too scared, just go back that way. When I meet the expert, don’t come begging with envy.”

With that, she turned and leaped straight off the hilltop, without the slightest trace of fear, bold and decisive.

The other children were stunned.

But after jumping, the little girl seemed to panic a little and quickly shut her eyes. Yet she felt no sense of impact when she should have hit the ground. Confused, she opened them and saw an old man with a white beard holding her in his arms.

“You little brat, are you trying to lose your life?” the old man barked.

Instead of being frightened, the little girl was overjoyed. “I met an expert?”

Meet your grandfather.

This damned girl—how had I never realized before that she was this crazy? She actually dared to jump off a hill? Who gave her the courage?

The white-bearded old man was none other than Zhang Kai in disguise, and at this moment he was utterly livid.

After all, this was his own younger sister.

“Who told you that jumping off a hill would make you meet an expert?” Zhang Kai glared at the little girl and demanded at once.

If he found out who it was, damn it, he would seal that person’s Earth Home account on the spot, blacklist them, and make sure they could never again enjoy the benefits he provided for the rest of their life.

Zhang Yao said, quite naturally, “That’s how it always happens in TV shows! Besides, in the movies Ultraman asked us to film, there are stories like this too. We have to believe in the light.”

Zhang Kai was speechless.

Come to think of it, three of the martial-arts dramas he had produced did have scenes where someone jumped off a cliff and either found a treasure manual or encountered a martial master. Could this even poison children now?