Chapter 45 There are very few in the world who can defeat Xiao Zhi

"No, no, no, wait a second! Why did I lose again?!"

A long time had passed, and Cabbage was no longer what she used to be.

Her saying she lost again didn't mean she was just stubbornly banging her head against Yu Canghai; she actually possessed quite a bit of gaming talent.

After sacrificing her virginity to death early on, her combat experience quickly improved.

It only took a few deaths to clear the Yu Canghai stage—that "Face-Changing Immortal" was basically her Gyoubu Oniwa.

She picked up the game quickly and had since practiced numerous martial arts, such as the Huashan Sect sword techniques along with the Mount Hua Five Swords from the back mountains.

However, she only dabbled in them superficially, finding them not even a fraction as good as the Evil-Warding Swordplay.

Guided by the chat stream and prompts from the Heavenly Book, she gradually completed the storyline of the Smiling, Proud Wanderer Heavenly Book, alongside quite a few other important side quests from other novels.

This included going to the back mountains of the Quanzhen Sect to save Little Dragon Girl, where, after castrating a certain Daoist, she unexpectedly discovered Wang Chongyang and acquired a copy of the Innate Skill, which was said to be transferable only to those with a predestined affinity—Gu Meng's high-reward mechanism had kicked in.

She had also acquired a few other divine skills, including the renowned Nine Swords of Dugu, which she obtained from Linghu once his favorability rating maxed out.

Linghu would never teach it proactively, but when favorability reached that level, certain matters of principle weren't really principles anymore.

When he joined the sect, he surely must have taken an oath never to associate with scum from the demonic cult, but he hadn't kept it anyway.

Yet, even with the Nine Swords of Dugu in her possession, Cabbage felt it wasn't as useful as the Evil-Warding Swordplay.

As for the other divine arts, only the internal skills were worth practicing. Unfortunately, the requirements for the Innate Skill were too high, and those who had severed their roots found it difficult to even enter the threshold.

She hadn't practiced any saber or staff techniques.

Practicing a close-combat move like fist or palm fighting might provide some utility in battle, but as for weapons, once a character had spent months painstakingly mastering divine-level swordplay from the start, arbitrarily switching to multiple weapon genres would just be a waste of energy.

Only upon reaching the maxed-out Grandmaster level where there was nowhere left to ascend would it make sense to learn a bit of everything and become a master of all trades.

The Evil-Warding Swordplay itself was one of the simplest superior martial arts and the easiest to get the hang of. For players not playing in player-versus-player modes, swordplay with a speed that reached a certain extreme could be toggled with slow-motion options.

This functioned like a difficulty setting in a single-player game; opting for a more realistic mode pursued higher immersion and greater control, but that kind of exchange speed was simply beyond the reach of ordinary people with normal reaction times.

One needed reflexes close to a professional esports player to unleash the full potential of those difficult-to-play weapon styles on the highest difficulty.

In reality, Cabbage's current overall difficulty setting was set to normal.

"Sigh, this Cabbage is just trash."

***

"Even now, with the complete Sunflower Manual from the hidden Southern Shaolin side quest in the expansion, plus the insights and notes left behind by Asia the Invincible, this Sunflower style still isn't considered top-tier among peerless martial arts. Cabbage should just switch to another school; it's still not too late to change."

"She might as well dual-cultivate the Celestial Boy Skill."

"Why not strip away her internal energy now and practice the North-Nether Art instead? She could rapidly push her internal qi to the game's two-century limit."

"No way, I'm sticking to the Evil-Warding Swordplay!"

Cabbage put on a childish pout. She was probably just putting on an act, but it was undeniably cute.

Right now, the enemy standing before her was none other than the Great Wheel King, a master of the Flame Blade.

Master Zhi's catchphrase, "There are very few in this world who can defeat this humble monk," was actually the unvarnished truth within the Demi-Gods and Semi-Devils setting.

As one of the Four Greats of Demi-Gods, once his martial arts reached perfection, very few in that world could steadily defeat him.

However, in this crossover martial arts world, he merely reigned supreme on a small Tibetan server; while few could defeat him in Tibet, if you expanded the scope to the "entire world," the Grandmasters capable of beating him could certainly not be counted on two hands.

Yet, Cabbage was clearly not among them.

When she cleared the final boss of Smiling, Proud Wanderer, Asia the Invincible, she had relied strictly on storyline guides: teaming up with others and capturing Yang Tingyu beforehand. Winning against "Mother Asia" in a fair, blade-to-blade duel was fundamentally impossible.

Whenever Cabbage found herself unable to win, she would start screaming in a flurry.

Back then, after trying solo fights for a long time and getting constantly one-shotted with zero hope in sight, she had hung her head, cried out to her "mother," and immediately gone to capture Yang Tingyu instead.

At that moment, the chat stream was flooded with comments calling her "such a baby of the righteous path" and "utterly shameless."

"Master Zhi's combat power is simply too high, and prior to the Sweeping Monk's storyline, he doesn't have many weak spots. You can't cheese him easily the way you could with Asia the Invincible. Cabbage should just reload her save and stay out of this muddy water at Shaolin Temple."

"Those Six Meridians Divine Swords require immense internal energy to practice. Since Cabbage didn't strip her Evil-Warding energy to switch to the North-Nether Art, her stat values are temporarily insufficient. She should just come back in the next playthrough."

"Yeah, although practicing the Evil-Warding Swordplay early on is a shortcut to quick success, it's still not easy when facing true peerless masters. In fact, it might not even measure up to those who walked the righteous path from the beginning—they might still stand a fighting chance even now."

"I can feel it. You need at least the reaction speed of a professional gamer and the highest simulation setting enabled just to hope to use this stat block to overcome a superior foe and beat Master Zhi. Cabbage should just give up."

Cabbage refused to give up!

"I'm not listening!"

She engaged Master Zhi in combat once more.

True to form, the Dharma King began channeling his Flame Blade.

***

The screen displayed special visual effects made to look far grander than their actual in-game impact. One strike, two strikes, three strikes—sending Cabbage scrambling wildly in all directions.

After reloading a save, the NPC's combat AI would also refresh, meaning he wouldn't instantly display prior familiarity with the Evil-Warding Swordplay; otherwise, Cabbage wouldn't just be scrambling around—she would have been beaten to death by Master Zhi in a matter of seconds.

This was a common occurrence in the game. If ordinary players didn't turn on full automation, playing through a fight a few times against a typical peerless master ensured they wouldn't suffer a crushing defeat, at least not at equal levels.

This was because, after every reload, the NPC faced the player in the exact same manner—at least the opening few moves would roughly remain identical, after which they would dynamically switch strategies based on the subtle nuances of the player's positioning and attacks.

A smart player who died a few times could easily figure out the optimal countermeasure for the opening moves. Seizing the initiative allowed them to snowball the advantage, trapping the enemy in an infinite stun-lock combo. And if all else failed, they could always look up a guide or give up and toggle full or semi-automation.

According to the game's mechanics, a Heavenly Book-reborn protagonist would automatically adjust their opening moves after dying a few times, tailoring them specifically against the NPC that killed them. Armed with memories of rebirth, provided the level gap was within ten levels and the difficulty wasn't set too high, players could repeatedly refresh and clear levels this way.

"Wait, wait, wait! Daddy Zhi!"

Cabbage's wits suddenly sharpened under pressure.

While shrieking at the top of her lungs, her hands didn't slow down at all.

She finally managed to bring out the ultimate version of the Evil-Warding Swordplay she had pieced together through various means, executing a brilliant string of operations.

After all, having fallen under Master Zhi's blade so many times, she had gained at least a modicum of experience.

She continuously utilized the Evil-Warding footwork to maneuver around, preventing the Dharma King from securing a swift victory, though winning herself seemed even more remote.

The ultimate realm of the ultimate Evil-Warding Swordplay she was currently practicing was the concept of "Heaven-Man Transformation" deduced by Asia the Invincible. Combined with the original Sunflower manual, the resulting skill description was overwhelmingly powerful.

However, even Asia the Invincible hadn't managed to master that realm herself, let alone Cabbage, whose proficiency was still nowhere near sufficient.

Even with the protagonist possessing the Heavenly Book, it would still take at least two and a half years of in-game cultivation and numerous storyline milestones to truly master such a peerless martial art.

Therefore, although Cabbage possessed the ultimate version of the Evil-Warding Swordplay, she hadn't actually widened the gap between it and the standard version. Since it wasn't mastered yet, her current strength fell short of Asia the Invincible—whom she had previously defeated—and she was still no match for Master Zhi.

Watching Cabbage on the screen screaming "Daddy," panicking frantically, and letting out more strange cries whenever she was clipped by the wake of a Flame Blade, the streaming chatroom instantly filled with uproarious laughter and joyful banter:

*‘Daddy beating his son’*

*‘The pure gold standard of Master Zhi’*

*‘There are very few in this world who can defeat Master Zhi’*