"Why not?" Wong Qifu countered.

Xu Ke said with a smile, "I don't think I need Uncle Wu to spend his energy protecting me anymore."

"You should still have Uncle Wu follow you. You'll be safer that way."

He needed to find a job, and now that his cultivation has improved, he basically didn't need Wang Wu's protection.

"This…" Wang Wu hesitated.

He was worried that someone from the six great families might still try to cause trouble.

Seeing this, Xu Ke grinned. "It's fine. With my current skills, I could escape even if you were the one trying to catch me, Uncle Wu."

Upon hearing this, Wang Wu finally stopped insisting. After all, Xu Ke was telling the truth.

"Then it's up to you," Wong Qifu agreed.

Xu Ke nodded, "Alright."

"Have you not considered working for the Wang Family Corporation?" Wong Qifu asked, seeming to see through his intentions.

Evidently, she was well aware of Xu Ke running around these past few days.

"It's no problem. If I really can't find a job, I'll come to the corporation to find you," Xu Ke smiled.

This response should sound much more pleasant than an outright refusal.

But Wong Qifu simply glanced at him. "Spend the ten million first, then we'll talk."

Xu Ke: "Uh…"

"Let's go." Wong Qifu smiled and walked out of the Bamboo Pavilion Residence first.

Although Wang Wu no longer followed Xu Ke, he still acted as his driver one last time, dropping him off back at the urban village.

「Back in the urban village.」

Xu Ke didn't waste any time and immediately began to recall what he knew about Ouyang Shuang from the previous night.

According to my memory, Ouyang Shuang used a palm technique yesterday, but it didn't seem particularly powerful. And based on what Wang Wu told me on the way here, she's famous for her Hidden Weapons. That must mean her True Qi is more of the Soft style.

True Qi is generally divided into two styles: Hard and Soft.

The Hard style, which Wang Wu is a typical practitioner of, is overbearing. Its techniques are grand and open, the very epitome of hardness.

Song Zhong is also a practitioner of the Hard style, but his hardness manifests in his defensive power. If he were to reach the Great Perfection of the Innate Stage, his defense would become despairingly strong.

The Soft style, on the other hand, is practiced by people like Ouyang Shuang and Lin Qinghua. Abilities like concealing one's aura and executing swift movements all rely on Soft-style True Qi. Their attacks are more cunning and catch people completely off guard. This is especially true for Hidden Weapons. Without Soft-style True Qi, it would be impossible to achieve effects that are untraceable and impossible to defend against.

My own True Qi, however, doesn't have any strong characteristics. In other words, while others show traits of either Hard or Soft styles, I'm like a neutral party. I can be soft and agile, or domineering and hard. In other words, I'm a perfect blend of both—I have it all! Soft-style True Qi isn't the problem. The main issue is that old woman's Hidden Weapons will definitely be poisoned. I'll probably need to prepare a medicinal bath to build up my defenses.

After considering for a moment, Xu Ke had a sudden realization.

Since Ouyang Shuang uses Hidden Weapons, it's inevitable that they're poisoned. Who uses Hidden Weapons without poison? That means poison resistance is a problem I need to solve.

But he wasn't worried. His master had once told him that his physical constitution was extremely good—incredibly, abnormally strong.

Having read many web novels, an eager Xu Ke had once asked with sparkling eyes, "What does 'abnormal' mean? Does it mean I have some sort of holy or divine body?"

Master Ren Gu denied the notion of a holy body and gave Xu Ke a smack with his stick. At that, Ren Gu sat up straight and said solemnly, "Your strength lies in being a blank slate."

Xu Ke frowned, "What do you mean?"

"It means you're nothing," Ren Gu stated earnestly.

Xu Ke: "..."

Later, after Ren Gu explained it, Xu Ke finally understood. His "blankness" was just that—a blank slate. He was like a vast, empty sheet of paper, large enough for anyone to doodle or paint on freely. This meant that Xu Ke's potential for growth—his plasticity—was immense.

So, Ren Gu began to temper him.

In the tempering process, Ren Gu used a vast amount of medicinal herbs. He intentionally used potent herbs with overwhelming medicinal power to increase Xu Ke's absorption capacity and raise his tolerance for heavenly materials and earthly treasures.

Herbs are very important for Martial Artists, as they can provide a huge amount of True Qi. Herbs used by Martial Artists for cultivation and body strengthening are generally divided into two types: potent and gentle.

Most Martial Artists choose gentle herbs because their mild medicinal properties are suitable for gradual absorption, which is a slower but safer method. Even Henglian Martial Artists choose gentle herbs. Their training method involves constantly breaking down their bodies and then using these herbs to accelerate recovery, repeating the cycle over and over.

Potent herbs, on the other hand, possess far more powerful medicinal effects. If a Martial Artist's body can't withstand the influx from such a heavenly material, they will suffer a backlash. This is commonly known as "cultivating oneself into ruin."

Ren Gu made Xu Ke use potent herbs so that his "blank" body would grow accustomed to their power. This would allow him to use even more powerful heavenly materials and earthly treasures on Xu Ke later on. This way, Xu Ke's future cultivation speed would increase dramatically. He would be able to directly absorb potent herbs that others couldn't handle. His future was limitless!

To this end, he tempered Xu Ke even more relentlessly, administering herbs day and night. Sometimes, Xu Ke even suspected Ren Gu was just taking out his own frustrations on him.

During this process of using potent medicines, Ren Gu would occasionally administer poison to Xu Ke, using his medical skills to determine the absolute limit of his poison tolerance. Just as Xu Ke was on the brink of death, Ren Gu would save him…

When the revived, breathless Xu Ke could only glare at Ren Gu with resentment, his master would simply explain, "This is to enhance your poison resistance."

After a year of this brutal tempering, Xu Ke's tolerance for medicine and his resistance to poison had reached a shocking level.

Although those days were unbearable to look back on, Xu Ke now felt somewhat grateful. At the very least, he wasn't so afraid of Ouyang Shuang's poisons.

However, I wonder if the Oath of the Medical Path, when it dispersed my power, also stripped away my poison resistance and my ability to withstand potent herbs... My poison resistance might be completely gone. If so, I'll have to use the next four days to test it. By taking poison! I should also prepare some potent herbs for a medicinal bath to help me rapidly increase my strength. I'll start by writing a prescription, he thought, picking up a pen.

「Meanwhile.」

「In a residential district in the center of Tianhai City.」

"I'm going to make a call," said Huang Sheng, who had just returned to the house.

"What for?" Huang Zhenyang asked subconsciously. He was just about to pull Huang Sheng aside to discuss how to deal with Xu Ke and the Wang Family.

"I have a bit of business with the Ye Family," Huang Sheng said with a slight smile.

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