Sin Becomes a God

Chapter 45: Mastery

Time ticked by second by second, and the Russian man standing guard outside the herbal bath looked as anxious as a father waiting outside a delivery room for his child to be born. The aluminum tube originally used for Lu Renjia’s breathing was no longer emitting even a wisp of steam, and the sound of his labored breathing—like the pumping of a bellows—had ceased entirely. Seeing that the thermometer attached to the metal plate had soared to seventy degrees, the Russian man immediately panicked. “No… he can’t have actually boiled himself alive… Damn it, you’d better not die…” In a rush, the Russian man grabbed the shovel he’d prepared in advance and, mustering all his strength, began prying at the edge of the welded-shut metal plate. “Damn… If I’d known, I wouldn’t have welded it so tightly… It’s all over now… If this gets investigated, Sloan will definitely make me the scapegoat…” the Russian muttered under his breath. There was a dull “thud.” A blood-red arm burst through the metal plate and reached out; before the Russian’s incredulous eyes, another muscular, blood-red arm followed suit, breaking through the plate as well. What happened next was a sight the Russian would never forget for the rest of his life. “Creak… creak… creak…” Amid the teeth-grinding sound of tearing metal, Lu Renjia—inside the medicinal bath—actually tore the five-centimeter-thick iron plate apart from the inside. Once Lu Renjia had torn a gap in the iron plate large enough for him to squeeze through, he leaped out of the scalding water. “It’s scalding me…” Seeing Lu Renjia—his entire body crimson with blood—leap high out of the pool, the Russian, overcome with emotion, actually had tears glistening in the corners of his eyes. “It worked… It actually worked… I knew it—this miraculous Chinese kid wasn’t going to die that easily… Hahaha… I did it… My theory was right… I’m the first person in the world to artificially create the ‘Assassin’s Heart’… I’m a fucking genius!!!!” Overcome with joy, the Russian shed his usual good-natured facade and roared with reckless abandon. Fortunately, this “medical room” was deep underground, rarely visited by anyone, and the repairman—still in a deep coma after taking Lu Renjia’s overwhelmingly powerful punch—was unconscious. That was why the Russian could afford to be so unrestrained. “Phew…” Exhaling a breath of stale air, Lu Renjia, his eyes tightly closed, let a faint smile curve his lips. Although this time he hadn’t directly cultivated the *Nine Yang Divine Art* to perfection like Zhang Wuji in Jin Yong’s novels, Lu Renjia still felt he’d gained immensely. After all, in the real world, he was merely a late-stage second-tier martial artist,During this journey into the world of *Assassin’s Alliance*, he had first opened the Yang Qiao Meridian and Yin Qiao Meridian under the repairman’s relentless barrage of punches, leaping from the late second-tier to the early first-tier. Now, thanks to the Russian’s wild speculation, he had not only awakened the “Assassin’s Heart” but also opened the Yang Wei Meridian and Yin Wei Meridian, advancing to the mid-first-tier martial artist realm. “No wonder… no wonder Master Xuan Kui said that the gains from traversing the Small Thousand Worlds in one’s physical body are unimaginable! In just a few short days… my strength has already risen from F- to E-rank… I can’t wait to reach a three-star gold-bordered Sin Rank…” Lu Renjia thought to himself. “How is it… how is it… how does it feel? How long can you maintain a heart rate of four hundred beats per minute… tell me quickly…” The Russian’s rapid-fire barrage of questions interrupted Lu Renjia’s daydreaming. With the drum-like pounding of his heartbeat still ringing in his ears, Lu Renjia paused for a moment before replying, “From just now until now… I’ve maintained this state for about six minutes…” “Six minutes? Not bad… not bad… Keep it up. As long as you can hold this state for twenty minutes, you’ll advance from ‘Mastery’ to ‘Application’!” the Russian said excitedly. “Is that so? Doesn’t ‘Mastery’ mean being able to control how to activate the ‘Assassin’s Heart’ at will? Wait… After I activated the ‘Assassin’s Heart,’ I felt that my physical stats only increased slightly…What’s going on here?” Just as Lu Renjia had said, the reason he’d been rated as an E-class powerhouse by the “Evil God System” was primarily because he’d advanced to the mid-tier of the First Class after unblocking the Yin Wei Meridian and Yang Wei Meridian—that’s what earned him that evaluation. On the other hand, the E+-level “Assassin’s Heart” hadn’t added much to Lu Renjia’s physical stats. The Russian rolled his eyes, then immediately pulled out his notebook and a pencil to start taking notes. With his head bowed as he jotted down various data, he said, “Your inherent strength is already that high, so simply activating the ‘Assassin’s Heart’ didn’t add much to your power… But why do we say you need to maintain this state for twenty minutes? You could say… twenty minutes is a watershed moment! Ordinary members of our ‘Brotherhood’ can also activate the ‘Assassin’s Heart,’ but they can only sustain it for ten minutes at most… Don’t underestimate those ten minutes! For an assassin whose physical stats are about ten times that of an ordinary person, how many people can you kill in ten minutes? You should know that better than anyone, right?” Lu Renjia wholeheartedly agreed with the Russian’s words. When he had hunted down that so-called Kamben Ichiro, it took him less than three minutes in total to wipe out all the henchmen he’d brought with him and finally eliminate Kamben Ichiro himself. The Russian, who had been looking down to record data, continued, “Twenty minutes, however, is a whole different story… Although those with the ‘Heart of an Assassin’ are considered one-in-ten-thousand geniuses, and their physical endurance far surpasses that of ordinary people…but they’re still human after all… And since they’re human, their physical endurance has its limits… When the heart beats at a rate of 400 beats per minute, it secretes large amounts of adrenaline…This places considerable strain on the kidneys. Some ordinary members can only sustain this state for three to five minutes; any longer… and it will lead to kidney failure… As for Fox, the Repairman, the Butcher, the Gunsmith… and of course, myself! We can all maintain a heart rate of 400 beats per minute for about thirty minutes…” “Oh… so maintaining this state for twenty minutes is the threshold for advancing from ‘Mastery’ to ‘Application,’ then?” Lu Renjia asked, nodding in understanding. After finishing recording a set of data, the Russian looked at Lu Renjia’s bright red skin and nodded. “You could say that… because to discover your greatest talent, you must maintain a heart rate of 400 beats per minute for at least twenty minutes…If you feel dizzy or nauseous, that means you’ve reached your limit… Just take a deep breath, calm your mind… or splash some cold water on your face… and your heart rate will come down…” “Got it… Time me… Let’s see if I can hold out for twenty minutes…” With that, Lu Renjia sat cross-legged, beginning to feel the strange sensations brought on by his rapidly beating heart. Watching Lu Renjia with his eyes slightly closed, the Russian standing nearby took out his watch to check the time, his gaze filled with tenderness as he looked at Lu Renjia—a feeling much like that of a parent watching their child. “I never expected he’d actually succeed… breaking through the shackles of his bloodline, breaking free from mental constraints… transcending the limits of the human body… I think when he returns to China, he’ll surely become the next leader…” the Russian thought to himself. With a heart rate of four hundred beats per minute, Lu Renjia felt as though everything around him had slowed considerably; he could even hear the faint vibrations caused by the fluttering wings of nocturnal insects. If his first transformation—from a worthless nobody with a combat rating of less than five to a martial artist as strong as an ox—had made him feel as though he’d been reborn, then the awakening of the “Assassin’s Heart” had brought about yet another profound metamorphosis. Since advancing to the mid-tier of the First Class, not a single blade of grass or tree within a fifty-meter radius had escaped Lu Renjia’s notice. Now, in sync with his rapidly beating heart, he could even sense that everything around him seemed to have taken on a vibrant array of colors. He could actually feel that the Russian standing beside him was filled with an inexplicable emotion toward him—a strange sentiment that contained not a trace of hostility, but rather a kind of affection, much like that of an elder toward a younger relative. “Time’s up… You can calm down now and let your heart rate return to normal…” the Russian man said with a smile. Lu Renjia stood up and stretched. Those brief twenty minutes felt like three or five hours to him, now that the “Assassin’s Heart” had been activated. One could only imagine how it must have felt for Fox, the Repairman,the Gunsmith, the Butcher, “The Cross,” and even Sloan—who had advanced the “Assassin’s Heart” to the “Mastery” stage—once the “Assassin’s Heart” was activated, all enemies would seem to move in slow motion, just like in a movie. Killing? It would be nothing more than a piece of cake. “I have to say… your talent exceeds my expectations… To have mastered the ‘Mastery’ stage so perfectly on your very first activation of the ‘Assassin’s Heart’—it took me a full seven years just to reach a twenty-minute duration back then…” the Russian remarked with admiration. Lu Renjia didn’t let the Russian’s praise go to his head, because he knew that all of this was achieved thanks to the “Evil God System.” Before that, he had been nothing more than a third-rate vocational college graduate who couldn’t even afford his rent. Perhaps it was precisely because the more he gained, the stronger his desires became. Unconsciously, Lu Renjia—who in his past life had been a virtuous person for a hundred lifetimes—became even more unwilling to lose everything he had now. “The Battle Chronicles Team Battle… Only by winning that millennial war can I survive… I must survive… and become the strongest!!” Lu Renjia thought to himself. “I’ve made it through twenty minutes. I wonder if you can now tell me how to identify my strongest talent?” Lu Renjia asked. The Russian sighed. He had originally intended to strike a deal with Lu Renjia, asking him to mentor Wesley Gibson, but he never expected Lu Renjia to choose the third method from his notes—one that no one had ever attempted—to obtain the “Heart of the Assassin.” Looking at Lu Renjia’s face, the Russian said slowly, ““You’re like one of my finest creations… Though I can’t reveal this to everyone… I have to say, you’re like my own child… How could I possibly refuse a request from my own child?” Lu Renjia was taken aback. Hadn’t he sensed the Russian’s inexplicable emotions precisely because he was maintaining the “Heart of the Assassin” state? “Um… even though I lacked a father’s love growing up, I don’t want a foreign dad either… otherwise my late mother would be upset…” Lu Renjia couldn’t help but laugh. The Russian didn’t take Lu Renjia’s joke to heart and said earnestly, “It’s simple… Just hold out for twenty minutes. After that, figuring out which of your talents is the strongest is just like when you’re looking for a job and the interviewer asks you to list your strengths…No two people in this world are exactly alike, so when advancing the ‘Assassin’s Heart’ from ‘Mastery’ to ‘Application,’ your strongest talent is, simply put, what you’re best at…Of course, you can also choose to enhance the aspect that deals the most damage—such as strength, speed, or hand-to-hand combat skills… But if you do that, while you’ll gain formidable strength in the short term, you’ll never be able to reach the level of ‘Mastery’ in your lifetime…” “There’s one more thing I want to remind you of… You Chinese martial artists rely on long-term cultivation to build formidable physical strength… So in combat, your endurance is considerably greater than that of us ‘Brotherhood’ members… But once you possess the ‘Assassin’s Heart,’ your fighting style changes…Take me, for example: every time I activate the ‘Assassin’s Heart,’ I limit it to about twenty-five minutes, then rest for ten to fifteen minutes… So in your future battles, you must remember… until you’ve mastered its application, you can only maintain the ‘Assassin’s Heart’ for a maximum of ten to fifteen minutes at a time… then you must rest for an equal amount of time… Otherwise, even if your enemy doesn’t kill you, you’ll die of kidney failure first…”