Chapter 450: The Professor’s Elemental Sword
The old man’s smile caused Xiao Lin to be even more confused. It seemed like the professor was instead happy that he had never gone through proper elemental sword aura education?
It seemed to be so. After repeated questioning, he found that Xiao Lin only had a little bit of instruction from the new students. He nodded, muttering, “That’s good, that’s good. He hasn’t been defiled.”
The professor continued to be vague. “Do you know why I called you here?”
“You’re tired.” Xiao Lin looked at the head full of sweat on the old man. As powerful he was, his body did not look like he could take much now, and his moves just now exerted him to this degree.
The professor immediately glared at him, his expression terrifying.
“Ahem, I meant you wanted to teach me alone.” Xiao Lin immediately changed his stance at the change of the expression.
The professor was finally satisfied, his face reverting back to his friendly smile. Xiao Lin was sweating looking at it. He now started to believe that the old man was Song Junlang’s teacher; the two of them had some similarities to some degree.
“I called you over mainly because there are some things that can’t be said in front of others, so we can only talk about it here. Since you’re someone that brat Song Junlang recommended, I can trust you.”
The words caused Xiao Lin to feel a sense of grat.i.tude. He started to feel like getting to know Song Junlang was the luckiest thing that happened to him in Dawn Academy. If things went normally, the next step would be the old man pa.s.sing down some secret techniques hidden from over hundreds of years.
Professor Zhang’s expression was stern. He stood up and took a deep breath, preparing himself before saying, “The academy’s courses are all f*cking pieces of sh*t! Ah no, that would be insulting to sh*t! It’s completely misleading the students! Destroying their futures! Those stubborn fools, we’ll eventually be destroyed by their very hands! Force feeding students like back on Earth is useless, and will just cause their thoughts to stagnate...”
Over the next dozen minutes, Professor Zhang basically continued cursing everyone in the academy from top to bottom.
Xiao Lin was stunned listening to him. It was hard to believe that the friendly, warm and always-smiling professor from a few minutes ago now had such a furious expression.
At the end of it, seeing the old man’s temper not seeming to simmer, Xiao Lin hurriedly brought over the tea that had already cooled down on the table. The professor took it from him, gulping it down in one go. He seemed to be much more relaxed. He seemed to calm down, and he wiped away the tea leaves on the corner of his mouth before sitting down. “Yes, I said a little too much, but at least you understand now. Elemental sword aura requires a broad mind, and not to follow some rigid pattern! You still haven’t been poisoned by the lessons of those b*stards, so you’re lucky!”
Xiao Lin was helpless. He had read the material that Dawn Academy had set, and it was quite holistic. It was not as useless as the professor claimed; it was just that the professor came from a different point of view. Of course, Xiao Lin did not say that out loud, and instead nodded at the professor’s views. “You said I was quite intuitive. Then, how do you think I should train my elemental sword aura?”
The old man dodged the question, instead asking, “Do you want to know how I broke your flame sword technique earlier?”
Xiao Lin was speechless. The old man was asking something that had a clear answer, but Xiao Lin still nodded, showing his curiosity.
“Since you already know the difference between external and internal sword aura, you should already understand that elemental sword aura is an external sword aura, which means it uses external powers to increase your own strength. If you view your own power as fire, then external force is wind. Wind enhances fire, so it’s a supportive relationship. Do you feel like a slave master would be able to integrate with his own slaves perfectly? Would they be able to form a true and earnest supportive relationship?” Professor Zhang asked with a sharp tone.
Xiao Lin already had similar thoughts, and had somewhat grasped it, but he did not manage to fully understand it with his thoughts in disarray.
Professor Zhang was quite satisfied with his expression. The professor stood up after regaining his energy, moving his arm like a conductor full of vigor as he said loudly, “It looks like you’ve understood it! The elements are actually our helpers, friends! Not slaves! Not servants! And yet, now we are, no, all the element users of Planet Norma are committing a major mistake. All we do is command the elements!”
“Do you mean the elements are alive?”
“Do you think plants have lives?”
“Yes,” Xiao Lin answered.
“Then, do you think germs are living things?”
“Yes.” Xiao Lin hesitated before adding, “From a biological standpoint, germs are prokaryotes. They don’t have complete cell structures, nor do they have a clear nucleus, but they have nucleoids and ribosomes...”
“Enough, don’t recite a book to me!” the professor interrupted. “Then, do you not think elements are alive?”
“Even if they are, I don’t think they are any form of higher living being.” Xiao Lin smiled bitterly. Thanks to the basic courses last semester, he had a basic understanding of Planet Norma’s structure. A lot of those courses were translated by Planet Norma’s own natives. When it came to the planet, Xiao Lin did not believe that they would have a deeper understanding than the natives as outsiders.
“Professor, that would be a philosophical question.” Xiao Lin saw that the professor still wished to continue, and interfered, “I think it’s better that we discuss how to increase the power of elemental sword aura.”
If the elements were alive, or if they had higher intelligence, it did not matter to Xiao Lin. He only wanted to master elemental sword aura and hurry to the Bronze rank.
The old man stared, crying out in frustration after a pause. “Follow me! I’ll show you how I broke apart your sword aura earlier!”
Returning to the training hall, the upper-year students were all intensely training. The sound of steel clashing could be heard, as well as the howling sound of wind, piercing sound of thunder, sizzling sounds of burning, and the dull shaking of the ground. It was no wonder that the training hall was so big despite the small number of students. The destruction caused by elemental sword aura training was quite ma.s.sive.
The professor found an empty location, and casually took a steel sword from the weapon rack, waving it in the air a few times. His slow movements caused his swordsmanship to be inaccurate, but that was not the main point, because Xiao Lin quickly felt the flame element start to concentrate on the tip of his blade.
It was a very faint layer of fire, only at the level of a firefly, seemingly able to be extinguished at any time. Xiao Lin worked hard to feel it from meditation. It was just like what he felt earlier; the professor’s elements were very weak, but he felt like something was weird in his head.