I Might As Well Quit This Lousy Wizard Profession

Chapter 120 - 120 112 Black Cat Spiritual Overlay

?Chapter 120: 112 Black Cat Spiritual Overlay Chapter 120: 112 Black Cat Spiritual Overlay Professor Cao’s Skinning Knife Skill could hardly even be called a knife technique.

Hold the knife, thrust it in, pull, and withdraw—just four simple actions, yet the accompanying Breathing Skill was so complex.

“Puff~”
The tip of the knife pierced cleanly into the body of the monster in front of him, expertly striking the midpoint between the sheep body and crocodile legs.

Then, he slowly dragged the knife, allowing the flesh to roll off the blade to either side.

The hide of the Sorcerer Zombie was peculiar, with a unique rubbery texture, like a particularly thick protective sheath.

Underneath the sheath lay strange green mycelium.

“The hide of a Sorcerer Zombie is especially tough, containing a terrifying concentration of Spiritual Energy. To cut through it, one must find its weak point.”

“To break Spiritual Energy with Spiritual Energy, and to break resolve with mental focus—that is the essence of the Skinning Knife Skill.”

“And the Breathing Skill, that is precisely the method for mobilizing all one’s mental focus and leveraging Spiritual Energy.”

With a twist of the wrist, the boning knife glided smoothly along a dark crease between the sheep body and crocodile legs, quickly severing the latter.

Surprised, young proprietor furrowed his brow as he listened to Professor Cao’s explanation and couldn’t help feeling perplexed, “The method you’re teaching completely contradicts the mainstream Witch-hunting Knight approach of focusing primarily on stance. To use the Breathing Skill to drive mental focus—that’s practically more akin to a wizard’s technique.”

Professor Cao nodded, “That’s why I said, perhaps I should find a wizard to be my apprentice—it would be most fitting.”

He looked at Lin An, “Did you understand what I just explained?”

Lin An actually did understand, “So we’re using the rhythm of the Breathing Skill, and it’s about achieving a certain level of harmony with the rhythm of our inner selves?”

Professor Cao’s eyes lit up, “It seems you truly understood. Yes, exactly.”

The young proprietor turned incredulously to Lin An, “What? What? I have no idea what you’re talking about!”

Lin An just shrugged, “When I practice ‘Spirit Cat Spinal Stretching Technique’ to aid in entering the state of the Breathing Skill, I get a similar feeling.”

“Based on my experience practicing during this period…” He looked at Professor Cao, “stance can indeed bring about mental focus, but it must be reflected through the rhythm of the Breathing Skill.”

Professor Cao was visibly pleased.

A thick-backed boning knife in his hand was flipping so swiftly it was gleaming, making one fear a mishap might result in several fingers being lopped off.

“The training stances, as well as the combat techniques of knife skills like the ones I am handling, were the research focus of Witch-hunting Knights of the past, but during the apprenticeship, no one was able to apply them to any effect.”

“This is also why everyone has long depended on inheriting the Furnace Core from their predecessors.”

“Apprenticeship is too weak, too weak! Cultivating the Furnace, too dangerous! Forging the Core, too arduous!”

The knife gleamed, and he suddenly gripped the handle tightly, his large figure taking strong, vigorous steps, his waist and back arching, and his arms taut. A smooth force flowed from his horse stance through to his bulging arm muscles.

The boning knife abruptly stabbed towards the back of the Sorcerer Zombie’s sheep body.

Bang~
With a booming sound, the back of the boning knife appeared to snap in half from the impact of a tremendous force, flying toward the wall and embedding itself into a concrete pillar.

“This is the most powerful strength that can be mastered by a Knight apprentice before the emergence of the Furnace.”

Professor Cao turned around and opened his palm, gesturing for them to look at the boning knife in his hand, the wooden handle was violently fractured, and the spine of the knife had bent and cracked.

He casually tossed aside the broken boning knife, pulled out a pistol from behind him, flipped off the safety, and started hammering the trigger at the Sorcerer Zombie.

The roar of gunfire was deafening as bullets slammed into the body of the Sorcerer Zombie monster and were deflected away, sparking as they ricocheted off the surroundings.

“Damn it! Don’t just shoot in the warehouse!” A bullet nearly grazed Doctor Zhang’s face, and he quickly snatched it out of the air, cursing under his breath.

Lin An was stunned.

Unbelievingly watching this unfold.

“Playing with the kids~” Professor Cao looked helplessly at Doctor Zhang, who was still glaring at him, and with resigned acceptance, put away the gun before once again turning to the astonished Lin An and the young proprietor.

“Utilizing the Breathing Skill to marshal your mental focus and leverage Spiritual Energy, this is a method of casting witchcraft in the ‘Witch-hunting Knight’ way, allowing you to easily slice through creatures that not even bullets can penetrate.”

How terrifying!

“To say something all Witch-hunting Knights around the world dislike, the Witch-hunting Knights originally branched out from wizards, and many of their principles are in fact connected.”

Professor Cao shook his head with a sigh.

“The Furnace refines the seven emotions and six desires, and mental focus is what drives the power of the Furnace Core. These techniques actually originate from ancient wisdom and magical strategies of the wizards.”

“And my approach of using Breathing Skill to mobilize conviction to achieve a spellcasting effect, is nothing more than a reverse engineering of a Witch-hunting Knight’s technique into a Wizard’s spellcasting.”

“The effect is pretty good.” He pulled a bone-picking knife off the wall again, “There’s no need to use much force, just gently—you see, I’m holding this bone-picking knife with two fingers, and I can easily slice through this Sorcerer Zombie creature.”

Pfft~
The knife tip gently pierced, dismembering another crocodile leg.

“Mobilize your conviction, mobilize everything in you. The Sorcerer’s Bloodline within you will provide a fulcrum, allowing you to easily leverage the Spiritual Energy from the Spirit Realm, and provide you with this power.”

“The most interesting part is that these Breathing Skills are a complete set, reverse-engineered from the method of cultivating Furnace. You will gradually understand all of this during your learning process.”

“Then, the heart and sentiment that are additionally nourished by the influence of Spiritual Energy, which are Seven Emotions and Six Desires, will become the foundation of this furnace.”

“Frequent practice and application will determine the quality of your Furnace Core in the end.”

Having said that, Professor Cao tugged on the chains hanging from the Sorcerer Zombie, knocking down the creature with a crocodile leg and a sheep’s body, and pointed at the remaining legs.

“Next, the task for you two is to cut them apart.”

“Dexian…” Professor Cao glanced at the little boss, “If you are not interested in this method of cultivation, you can just leave. It will be sufficient for Lin An to do it.”

The little boss was not willing to give up, “No, I want to try it out!”

That’s fine.

Professor Cao did not refuse, “Mr. Zhang and I are going back to the medical hall. You practice on your own.”

As he was about to leave, he turned back to look at them, “Hold the knife firmly, and more importantly, have a stable heart. Stability is the secret to all knife skills.”

“Similarly, the process of practicing this Skinning Knife Skill is also a process of cultivating the mind, as it forms the foundation of the Condensing Furnace.”

“If you want to lay a solid foundation, you must earnestly practice and ponder at this step.”

“Do not butcher such good skin material into a mess of holes and lopsided cuts.”

Certainly, the little boss had far too many questions.

Witchcraft is the key to a Wizard’s transformation into a Sorcerer Zombie, a fact known to all Witch-hunting Knights, especially those like Mr. Cao from the ‘Jia’ Vein who specialize in making Armor and are well aware of the properties of the skin material.

Naturally, he should also understand that this kind of witchcraft is fraught with risks.

While his words were bold, there was still a trace of fear about actually trying it.

Lin An didn’t think so much. He was very fortunate to have been influenced by the Dullness Potion from Chen Xinmi; this moment happened to be the best chance to try it out.

Moreover…

He had somewhat understood the knowledge that Professor Cao had shared.

If it came to the formal ‘frames’ and ‘combat skills’ of Witch-hunting Knights, he didn’t have much talent, and even now he found the ‘lasher’ of the Thirteen Roping Skills not very impressive.

But when it came to Breathing Skill, especially the kind that mobilizes the conviction in one’s heart, he had many, many ideas.

After all, it was a rhythm.

A rhythm of life.

It’s difficult to explain clearly with words, but he was willing to give it a try.

Gently raising the bone-picking knife in his hand, one hand pressing down on the springy wool, the tip of the knife lightly touched the crease between the sheep’s body and the crocodile leg.

He recalled the rhythm and pace of the Breathing Skill for ‘holding the knife’ and ‘piercing’ as explained by Professor Cao, while also recalling the actions and sensations of his past instinct to scratch at the Dark Gold Statue with the instinct of a ‘black cat’ from the feline family.

How similar this all was!

Lin An felt as if he had once again become that black cat, and although his shape had not changed, the rhythm throughout his body had.

“Pfft~”
The knife tip glided in as if touching a glob of grease, smoothly, effortlessly embedding itself!

“Damn!” The little boss’s eyes widened in disbelief as he watched Lin An, “An, how did you do that?!!!”

Lin An did not speak, only staring blankly at his own hand holding the bone-picking knife.

In the spiritual vision, he could clearly see an ethereal forelimb of a black cat overlapping with his arm.

A sharp claw emerged from the cat’s paw and lightly pierced exactly where the knife had entered the Sorcerer Zombie’s skin.

In that moment, he felt as if he were that black cat.

In that moment, he felt as if he were not that black cat.