Others rely on talent to master martial arts. Chen Xiaoman relies on having thick skin.
An iron dantian? Meridians like stone? A once-in-a-century useless constitution? No problem. His master says body-tempering doesn't depend on talent, only on whether you can take a beating. Take a hundred blows from a wooden club, skin split and flesh torn, and call it metabolism. Hug a boulder and roll twenty laps, bruised all over, and call it loosening the muscles and invigorating the blood. Stand atop a mountain in the cold wind until you're frozen solid, and call it tempering your body. The whole martial world thinks this master and disciple are lunatics. Then Chen Xiaoman knocks out one genius after another with a single punch, and they finally realize that these body-tempering practitioners might be pretty formidable. But this martial journey that began with taking beatings ultimately leads to the abyss.
