Gu Zhen returned to the academy with his two newly acquired Star skills manuals tucked under his arm.
Just these two books would take him over a month to fully master, so there was no need to buy more star skills books for now.
As for being scammed, that was almost certain.
As for whether he'd been conned at the secondhand market?
Absolutely.
However, he didn't care much about it. First, the loss wasn't significant, and second, he disliked wasting time arguing—it was too troublesome.
Back in his dorm, Gu Zhen took out Star-Breaking Fist and began studying it carefully.
He had never seen a true Grade C skill before, but just from his cursory understanding and intuition, this one didn't come close. The manipulation of star power wasn't sophisticated, nor did it seem complex—it was at most D-rank.
After thoroughly reviewing it, Gu Zhen gained a basic understanding of the entire star skills. However, he estimated that if he followed the methods described, he likely wouldn't be able to perform it.
The content in the first half of the book differed greatly from the second half, as if they weren't written by the same person. It was probably an incomplete copy, with the latter part added by the stall owner or someone else.
If practiced according to the book, the first half could indeed be learned, but the second half was useless
Not that he'd expected any miracles.
Still, Gu Zhen hadn't expected the book to be fully functional. What he valued was the star power condensation method in the first half.
Following the method in the book, he focused his mind, concentrated, and slowly condensed star power as instructed.
To his surprise, the process went much faster than anticipated.
His control over star power was significantly stronger than that of an average star warrior, which Gu Zhen attributed to his superior mental strength.
His control over star power far exceeded that of an average Star Martial Artist. Gu Zhen suspected this was thanks to his powerful mental strength, an edge from his previous life.
Before long, he completed the first step as outlined in the book. Seeing how smoothly the first step went, Gu Zhen didn't continue. Instead, he picked up Iron Piercing Finger and began examining it.
This was a genuine D-rank star skill, but mastering it required persistent, long-term practice and he had no intention of cultivating it directly.
Instead, he wanted to extract its core concepts—combine them with the useful pieces of [Star- Breaking Fist], add in the movement principles from [Instant Step], plus his combat experience from his past life, Gu Zhen aimed to create a brand-new Star skills of his own.
It was just a theory at this point. Whether it would work remained to be seen—but he believed it was worth the attempt.
And this wasn't some reckless whim. He had experience from his previous life, stronger mental strength than most, and a remarkable ability to quickly grasp the components of star skills, giving him a decent chance of success.
Over the next few days, he devoted most of his time to training in Star skills. The rest went to standard cultivation. Even with the help of his newly bought Starforce Enhancement Potions, after four straight nights of training, his starforce sub-level still hadn't increased.
That was due to two factors:
He possessed two star cores, which made advancement harder.
His absorption efficiency for star power was unusually low
Generally speaking, the stronger ones superpowers, the better they could absorb starpower. The weaker the superpower, the slower the absorption.
Take Gu Lingling, for example—his cousin with a Grade B superpower. Her starpower absorption efficiency was probably several times higher than his. By now, she had likely already reached Realm 1, sub-Level 2.
However, great talent wasn't always a blessing. The stronger the superpowers, the higher the chance of contracting a certain disease.
[Star Disease]
This was a disease with no known cure. Once infected, a persons life immediately started counting down. Across the entire Twelve states, no one with star disease had ever lived beyond nine years—even with full support from the Alliance. And that was with the Twelve States Alliance pouring all their resources into treatment. For an ordinary person, they might only live four or five years before succumbing.
The disease usually appeared either during the awakening of a powerful superpowers or within three months afterward. If no signs of the disease appeared within three months of awakening an superpower, it was generally safe to assume one wouldn't contract it.
So far, the lowest recorded superpower grade of someone who developed star disease was Grade C.
With his dual F-rank superpower, a "nobody" like Gu Zhen was destined to have no connection to this "genius disease"
Over these four days, while he hadn't advanced his star power level, his self-created star technique had begun to take shape.
He named it Iron Fist—simple and straightforward—combining principles from Star-Breaking Fist, Iron Piercing Finger, and Instant Step.
Its effect was straightforward: by channeling star power, it allowed the star power to erupt in the arm, granting immense strength for a brief moment.
At the same time, star power would protect the fist, making it as hard as steel.
However, the hardening only lasted an instant, so timing was critical. If the two steps weren't perfectly coordinated, the user hand could break from being unable to withstand the immense force.
It was still a prototype because he hadn't tested it in actual combat. Its power was merely his estimation based on practice.
He estimated that Iron Fist was at least a D-rank star skill, as its difficulty and consumption likely didn't reach C-rank. Once he mastered it fully, he planned to sell it for more money.
The skill had good destructive power—but it came at a cost. Each use consumed one-fifth of his total starpower.
And that was with two star cores.
If someone else used it, it would drain nearly half of their starpower in one go.
Using such a costly and tricky star skills in battle could easily lead to failure if not executed carefully.
Because of this, the technique's rating would likely never go higher than Grade D.
Aside from [Iron Fist], Gu Zhen had also fully mastered [Instant Step] to the point where he could now sell it again.
But selling one's personal insights came with a risk. Doing it too frequently placed immense strain on the mind. It could even cause irreversible spiritual and mental damage.
So, while he could sell again, he decided not to do so in the next few days. Typically, a ten-day buffer was needed after selling insights, so he planned to sell again later—and not Instant Step, but Iron Fist.
Instant Step was too low-rank to fetch a good price. A higher-grade skill like Iron Fist would sell for much more.
HE continued practicing Iron Fist and Instant Step in his dorm. With these two skills, he was seventy percent confident he could take first place in tomorrow class competition.
His class wasn't like Class 1, packed with geniuses. His class was full of average students with ordinary superpowers—no one had a Grade B or C superpower.
From what he knew, the strongest superpower in the class was a D-rank transformation-type superpower, Earth Dragon Lizard, and there was only one D-rank superpower in total.
The rest were E-rank and F-rank superpowers, all fairly ordinary, with no particularly special ones.
The special ones had all been recruited into Class 1—there was no way they'd be left in Class 7.
He didn't count himself. If he had an E-rank special-type superpowers, getting into Class 1 would've been a sure thing. Unfortunately, he didn't.