Flower Breathing was a breathing style derived from Water Breathing.
Because of this, the two breathing techniques shared many similarities.
Xia Feng focused intently on Tanjiro's moves, studying the parts of Water Breathing that could be borrowed to strengthen Flower Breathing.
For him, Flower Breathing itself wasn't an especially important ability.
Whether it was other breathing techniques or new skills he might draw in the future, many could easily surpass Flower Breathing.
The reason he was doing this was mainly to give Kanao an additional trump card.
Of course, he wasn't letting Tanjiro act as a sparring partner for nothing.
Every time Xia Feng attacked, he deliberately targeted the weak points and imperfect sections of Tanjiro's techniques.
As long as Tanjiro wasn't stupid, he would realize through this sparring where his biggest flaws currently lay.
If those flaws were corrected, Tanjiro's strength would improve by leaps and bounds.
After more than twenty exchanges, Xia Feng deliberately exposed a flaw and allowed Tanjiro to push him back once.
The amount of mercy he showed was about the size of the Pacific Ocean.
"Not bad. In such a short time, you've already managed to push me back."
Tanjiro looked excitedly at his sword, then bowed deeply toward Xia Feng.
"Thank you for your guidance!"
Xia Feng chuckled as he watched Tanjiro.
Although his body was about the same age as Tanjiro's, his mental age was already nearing thirty.
Toward a sincere, polite, and well-behaved kid like Tanjiro, he inevitably developed a sort of fatherly sentiment.
At that moment, Urokodaki's voice sounded.
"Tanjiro, don't get arrogant. Xia Feng was letting you win."
Xia Feng and Tanjiro turned around to see Urokodaki walking out of the house.
The red tengu mask was still covering his face.
Xia Feng suddenly wished he could draw some sort of X-ray vision ability to see what the old man actually looked like beneath the mask.
Then it suddenly hit him.
He was currently carrying a huge fortune.
One Silver Card, one Gold Card, and one Diamond reward.
Why keep them sitting around?
He immediately started with the Silver draw.
[Drawing… Successful!]
[Congratulations! You obtained the Silver Item: "Ignite-Anywhere Lighter."]
[Ignite-Anywhere Lighter: Can ignite flames in any environment, including oxygen-free areas and underwater.]
A lighter appeared in Xia Feng's palm.
He casually stuffed it into the pocket of his coat.
As a good man who neither smoked nor practiced flame-based alchemy, he had no idea what to use it for right now.
Next, he used the Gold draw.
[Drawing… Successful!]
[Congratulations! You obtained the Gold Item: "Storage Space."]
[Storage Space: Creates a personal pocket dimension for storing items. Capacity: 3 cubic meters.]
This reward excited Xia Feng.
Everyone who traveled had the same annoyance—
Luggage.
With portable storage space, that problem disappeared completely.
Finally, he used the Diamond draw.
[Drawing… Successful!]
[Congratulations! You obtained the Diamond Skill: "Intangibility."]
[Intangibility: Temporarily disconnect your body from reality. You become immune to all attacks and can pass through obstacles. Maximum duration: 5 seconds. Cooldown: 1 minute. Consumes stamina.]
Xia Feng's eyes widened.
Intangibility.
That was Obito's ability from Naruto!
Although it couldn't last five full minutes like Obito's, five seconds was already incredibly powerful.
Even one second could decide the outcome of a battle between experts.
Jackpot!
Absolute jackpot!
Even though he hadn't drawn X-ray vision to see Urokodaki's face, Xia Feng was already completely satisfied.
At that moment, Urokodaki walked slowly up to him.
"I watched your sparring just now."
"Besides guiding Tanjiro, you were also trying to study Water Breathing, weren't you?"
Xia Feng nodded.
"Yes."
There was no need to hide something like that.
It wasn't unusual.
Urokodaki said,
"In that case, allow me to demonstrate personally. Consider it a small repayment for those medicinal herbs."
Xia Feng smiled.
"Sounds good."
He casually tossed aside the wooden sword and drew his Nichirin Blade.
Urokodaki also drew his blade and dashed toward Xia Feng!
Just like Tanjiro, he opened with—
Water Breathing – Fourth Form: Striking Tide!
But the power of the wave was on a completely different level compared to Tanjiro's.
Xia Feng's eyes lit up as he met the incoming blade.
Flower Breathing – Sixth Form: Whirling Peach!
The blade swept out streaks of blue light, with glowing petals dancing within the attack.
Water waves and flower petals collided together, filling the entire clearing with swirling sword intent.
Xia Feng didn't use any special abilities.
He relied purely on swordsmanship and breathing techniques to fight Urokodaki.
Although his swordsmanship was Gold-tier, he still lagged behind someone like Urokodaki, who had spent decades mastering the blade.
But that gap was exactly what allowed Xia Feng to absorb experience and improve.
Meanwhile, Urokodaki intentionally revealed key techniques of Water Breathing to him.
Once Xia Feng noticed this, he occasionally activated Bullet Time to carefully analyze Urokodaki's movements.
Since this wasn't a life-or-death battle, Xia Feng gradually began modifying his sword style during the fight.
He recalled the Yoriichi-type training doll he had fought before and began integrating parts of its sword paths into his current techniques.
At first the fusion was awkward.
Urokodaki almost accidentally cut him.
Then Urokodaki realized what Xia Feng was doing and couldn't help but laugh.
This kid was actually using him as a training dummy to experiment with new sword techniques!
During the fight, Xia Feng suddenly called out:
"Tanjiro! Watch my sword carefully. See if you can learn something!"
Tanjiro immediately focused even harder.
Urokodaki found it strange.
Although Xia Feng's swordsmanship was refined, it had been mixed with other techniques, making it hard to identify its origin.
Why insist on having Tanjiro watch?
After a while, Xia Feng felt tired from activating Bullet Time too many times and raised his hand.
"Let's stop here."
This kind of sparring didn't need to continue to the bitter end.
If it did…
With all the strange abilities Xia Feng had, he might not necessarily lose to Urokodaki.
Urokodaki sighed inwardly.
Xia Feng looked about fifteen or sixteen years old.
Ten years from now…
Just how terrifying would he become?
Impossible to imagine.
Seeing that the training had ended, Tanjiro brought water to both of them.
Whether it was Urokodaki or Xia Feng, the combat power they had displayed was beyond anything Tanjiro could imagine.
Especially…
The sword technique Xia Feng had just demonstrated.
It felt strangely familiar.
Almost as if he had seen something like it before…
🌟 The story is already written… waiting to be unleashed.
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