495: Chapter 488: Innate Sword Bone 495: Chapter 488: Innate Sword Bone Over the Sports Square, talent detection continued.
The scroll in Zhang Yushan’s hands was known as the Sword Map.
Contained within the Sword Map was a hint of divine charm from the Supreme Treasure of the Sword Tomb, passed down through the Ten Thousand Sword Sect.
Those with talent, upon seeing the Sword Map, needed only to give it a few more glances to resonate with the wisp of divine charm it contained.
To tell the truth, the Immortal Cultivation Dharma Methods passed down by the Ten Thousand Sword Sect actually had no age limitations.
However, those who were older tended to be too immersed in the mundane distractions of the world, with thoughts too scattered.
Such people had almost no chance of being recognized by the Sword Tomb and resonating with the Sword Map.
On the contrary, younger individuals, with simple minds and naivety akin to a blank slate, were moldable.
Only they might have a certain chance of possessing Immortal Cultivation talent, sensing the divine charm of the Sword Tomb contained within the Sword Map.
Those over sixteen, unless untouched by the secular world, would find their talents wasted, even if they had any.
The Ten Thousand Sword Sect had existed for countless years, and this was a conclusion drawn from their experience.
It was for this reason that Zhang Yushan set the age limit for talent detection between three and sixteen years.
Although slightly disappointed that no talented individual was detected among the first batch of children, he could still accept it.
After all, Immortal Cultivation talent was one in ten thousand, and this first batch was composed of merely twenty or thirty kids.
Each group of children was given no more than a minute for testing.
Quickly, more than an hour passed by.
Over a thousand children had undergone talent detection.
Still coming up empty, without a single Immortal Cultivation seedling discovered, Zhang Yushan finally became restless.
“Let’s pause for a moment.
The children who just finished the test, please don’t leave yet!”
With a grim face, Zhang Yushan collected the Sword Map in front of him and stood up.
After giving a few instructions to Yang Jin and the others, he arbitrarily picked a few children from the recently tested batch and called them over.
“Do you recognize words?
Tell me, what do you know?” He looked at a boy around eleven or twelve years old and asked in a deep voice.
“I could recognize one, two, three, four when I was three, started attending kindergarten at four, and I don’t just recognize Yanhuang characters, I even know English.”
“Usually, I’m either playing games or watching live streams.”
“The girls in there are so pretty, always calling me ‘little brother’ asking me to send them rockets, saying they’ll marry me when I grow up.”
…
At first, the boy was timid and couldn’t quite let loose.
But as he talked about his gaming and live-streaming, he became excited, and his spirits soared.
Before he could finish, Zhang Yushan, with a darkened face, interrupted and asked him to step aside.
Then he called over a few other children and thoroughly interrogated them.
“What the hell, what kind of new world did these kids come from?”
“So young, yet their thoughts are already so scattered.”
“There’s no sign of the innocence they should have, but a bunch of messy things they seem to understand…”
With a face as black as the bottom of a pot, Zhang Yushan started cursing inwardly.
True, Immortal Cultivation talent was one in ten thousand, no doubt about it.
But the city he was currently in came from a new world where its inhabitants had never been tested for talent and had never been through any selection.
Though he didn’t say it out loud, Zhang Yushan always felt that there should be a good chance to find decent Immortal Cultivation seedlings here.
But now, faced with such results, he was at a loss for words, not knowing what to say as even the little children’s minds were tainted…
Seeing this, Yang Jin and the others who came with him looked helpless and exchanged glances.
The more Immortal Cultivation seedlings they found on this mission, the greater their merit would be upon returning to the Sect.
If they couldn’t find a single person with Immortal Cultivation talent, they had no idea how to report back to the Sect!
After all, such a result, regardless of the reasons, would surely prompt the Sect’s higher-ups to criticize them, thinking they had been negligent and insincere in their tasks.
“Uncle Master, do we need to continue with the talent detection?”
After a while of stony silence, a female disciple spoke up tentatively, seeking guidance.
“Let’s continue,” Zhang Yushan said wearily, waving his hand, “Although these children’s thoughts are cluttered, whether or not we can find Immortal Cultivation seedlings among them, it’s important to see things through and complete the task.”
With that, he sighed deeply, sat back down cross-legged, and unfolded the Sword Map once again.
The talent detection went on, but the demeanor of the Ten Thousand Sword Sect members became noticeably more perfunctory than before.
They didn’t even bother arranging the children into a fan shape anymore; Yang Jin and the others simply led them to the open space in front of Zhang Yushan and had them look directly at the Sword Map.
In less than thirty seconds, the testing was complete, Zhang Yushan waved his hand, and let them disperse on their own.
In Liuyuan County, a small town like this, the number of children ages three to sixteen wasn’t large, just around ten to twenty thousand.
After all, at that time, although the country had relaxed its policy to allow for a second child, houses were unaffordable, marriages costly, children—too expensive to raise…
Those with no family wealth found even marrying someone a challenge, let alone having one child or two!
Conducting tests for twenty or thirty children at a time, Zhang Yushan and his colleagues were busily engrossed in their work.
This world still had its cycle of day and night, and before they knew it, the sun was setting, signaling the arrival of evening.
The number of children who had undergone the testing had already surpassed ten thousand.
Regrettably, it was all for naught—no Immortal Cultivation seedlings had been found; not a single one, thus far.
Another group of children was led onto the open ground.
As before, Zhang Yushan opened up the Sword Map and, while these children directed their gaze upon it, he listlessly scanned the children before him.
When his eyes fell upon a simple-looking girl of about three or four years old, his gaze intensified, and he found himself unable to look away.
With the secret technique enhancing his eyes, he could see above the girl’s head at the crown chakra, a sword shadow the size of a small finger, faint and indistinct as if it were about to break through a barrier.
Suppressing the excitement in his heart, he lowered his head and carefully observed the Sword Map in front of him.
It was as if he saw, above the virtual shadow of the Sword Tomb on the Sword Map,
at a certain location, a rusty three-foot long sword quivering incessantly, with threads of purple light blossoming from it.
“This is…
the Purple Mist Sword…”
“Born with a Sword Bone, stirred by the Purple Mist Sword, the Purple Mist Sword that has been in slumber for ten thousand years is about to acknowledge its master and reemerge into the world!”
Overcome with excitement, Zhang Yushan couldn’t contain himself and cried out loud.
As a supreme treasure of the Sect’s heritage, countless Spirit Swords and Immortal Swords were interred within the Sword Tomb.
Any Talent with minor ability, resonating with the Sword Sect, at most could only choose one such sword as their visualization focus for practice.
As for those with unparalleled Talent, they could compel a sword to acknowledge them as master, truly comprehend its essence, and advance rapidly in Cultivation as if blessed by the divine.
To Zhang Yushan’s knowledge, within the Sword Tomb, there were only three true Divine Swords.
And this Purple Mist Sword was indeed one of them.
Through the Sword Map, he checked time and again, confirming that the trembling sword emanating purple light was highly likely to be the Purple Mist Sword.
With a swish, he stood up.
“Little girl, what is your name?
Where are your parents?
Where are they?” Walking up to the wooden little girl, Zhang Yushan crouched down with a kind expression and inquired.
“I…
my surname is Li, and my grandmother has always called me Erya.”
“Grandmother said that my father and mother went to a faraway place.”
“I also want to go to kindergarten and study like the other children.”
“But grandmother is old and can’t earn much from scavenging, so there’s no way she can afford to send me to kindergarten…”
The little girl spoke shyly, her head bowed the whole time.
She might have seemed simple-minded, but her speech was fairly coherent.
“Learning to read and write is a trivial matter.”
“With your aptitude, if you join the Ten Thousand Sword Sect, you will directly become a True Disciple.”
“Where is your grandmother?
Let her come over, I have something to discuss with her!” Listening to the little girl’s story, Zhang Yushan nodded and said.
“Uncle, grandmother is over there!” The little girl looked around and pointed towards the southeast.
She pointed at an old lady with a head of white hair, a slightly hunched form, and an appearance of extreme age, and explained.
Stirred by the Purple Mist Sword, with a natural Sword Bone, what that represented was clear to the few Inner Sect Disciples.
Faces showing envy, they looked at the little girl before them; as soon as her words had fallen, Yang Jin and the female Disciple were the first to dash over and invite the old lady over.
“Can I take my granddaughter and leave now?”
“This child has had a tough life; two years ago, her parents fell off a cliff on their electric scooter…”
With a snake-skin bag in hand, the old lady explained with a fearful expression.
She was registered in a rural household, with no pension, relying only on a meager monthly state-provided elderly subsidy and a little money from scavenging to barely make ends meet.
She knew of welfare, but had never actually seen any.
During this time with money being tight and nowhere to spend it, the recyclables she collected couldn’t be sold at all.
Taking care of her granddaughter without steady meals had been an extremely tough ordeal.
“Elder, your granddaughter has an extraordinary gift; she will directly enter our Ten Thousand Sword Sect.”
“In addition, we will arrange suitable housing for you in a nearby city.”
“If your granddaughter’s identity as a True Disciple is determined, then you just wait to enjoy your fortune.
When the time comes, to hire a throng of servants to attend to you will pose absolutely no issue!”
With a smile on his face as comforting as a gentle spring breeze, Zhang Yushan explained while smiling at the old lady.
The position of a True Disciple in the Ten Thousand Sword Sect was even higher than his role as an Inner Sect deacon.
Naturally, he didn’t mind putting in a good word in front of the little girl’s sole living relative.
“Ah…” After hearing Zhang Yushan’s words, the old lady was left completely stunned on the spot.