At the drinking table, Master Ge swallowed mouthful after mouthful of wine, his face dark with gloom.
A young rogue cultivator of unknown origin had dared to talk back to him. Though he hadn't erupted at the time, Master Ge harbored a silent hatred.
Steward Hu sidled up beside him, offering cautious flattery.
Halfway through his cups, Master Ge suddenly thought of something and cast a sidelong glance at an unopened jar of wine beside him.
"This jar of wine is for that brat?"
"If you want to drink it, just break the seal." Steward Hu cursed inwardly—this jar cost twenty taels of silver—but plastered a fawning smile on his face. "I'll go buy another one later."
"No." Master Ge smiled suddenly. A layer of cyan yuan qi wrapped around his hand as he patted the jar. "This one is perfect."
Steward Hu went pale. "Master Ge, you can't do that!"
Master Ge's smile vanished. He turned to look at the steward, his gaze cold and piercing. "And why not?"
A chill of sweat ran down Steward Hu's spine, but he forced himself to speak. "He's a cultivator, sir. If something really happens to him, none of us will be able to walk away from this."
The State of Yang might be small, but it was still a nation with its own laws.
It was like how Master Ge could beat servant girls all he wanted, but he wouldn't actually kill anyone.
To kill indiscriminately—you either needed a background powerful enough to cover it up easily, or you no longer wanted this comfortable job.
"What are you afraid of? He's just a rogue cultivator of unknown origin. Who's going to investigate?" Master Ge said in dissatisfaction. "Besides, I'm not going to kill him. Just teach him a lesson. So the young ones learn where they stand!"
"Will it really... not result in death?" Steward Hu stammered.
"What would I lie to you for?" Master Ge said, then added in reassurance, "Don't worry, no one will ever find out. The methods of the Greenwood Immortal Sect are not to be trifled with!"
...
In the dark mountain pass, a figure moved swiftly through the shadows.
"This mountain is under the jurisdiction of the Twin Flood Dragon Society. Who goes there?"
A voice suddenly rang out from the darkness.
The Twin Flood Dragon Society was a local sect of the State of Mo, subservient to the Mo court yet possessing a degree of autonomy. Among all the sects in the State of Mo, their strength was not to be underestimated.
They had already entered the Society's outer territory. The voice that had spoken was surely one of their mountain patrol cultivators.
From within the mass of shadows, a reply came: "Disciples of the Clear River County Dao Academy of the State of Zhuang, on official business! We are hunting Bone Path heretics—please grant us passage!"
The voice of the Twin Flood Dragon Society's patrol cultivator fell silent.
In years past, the Society would never have granted such courtesy.
The State of Mo and the State of Zhuang had clashed for years, and Mo had never yielded.
But now...
The Zhuang Emperor had ascended to the Dongzhen realm. With Chancellor Du Ruhui and Grand General Huangfu Duanming—two divine-skilled cultivators—along with a mighty army pressing in on all sides, the State of Zhuang was at the peak of its momentum.
Voices from all corners of Zhuang had begun to demand a status befitting its strength—and war was the most direct path.
The Mo court kept making concessions in state affairs because it didn't want to give Zhuang such a pretext.
Since this was "official business"—disciples of the Dao Academy hunting heretics of the Bone Path—the Twin Flood Dragon Society could well turn a blind eye. The Spirit Stele erected outside Maple City had long been heard by all.
The cultivators of the Clear River County Dao Academy fanned out without surprise. They had already destroyed a small Bone Path outpost that day and chased the last handful of heretics here, determined to earn their full measure of merit.
The hatred between the State of Zhuang and the Bone Path was not a recent affair. More than two hundred years ago, the Bone Path had triggered a catastrophic calamity, during which Founding Emperor Zhuang Chengqian had mobilized the full strength of the nation to annihilate them.
Afterward, the Bone Path had smoldered back to life, but it was always small-scale trouble—right up until last year, when the destruction of the Maple City domain had shaken the entire nation.
But only today did they hold their heads so high, openly hunting criminals on Mo territory.
It was because the nation had grown strong that they could stand with such conviction.
The cultivators of the Clear River County Dao Academy spread into formation, circling and flanking, planning to exterminate the Bone Path heretics right here—they couldn't go deeper, lest it provoke a backlash from the Twin Flood Dragon Society.
For Li Yun, who had issued the orders, merely exploring the Society's outer perimeter was enough.
As the most outstanding cultivator of this generation at the Clear River County Dao Academy, he had indeed been entrusted with this covert mission. Those few Bone Path heretics had been deliberately allowed to flee all the way here.
To maintain secrecy, the other cultivators accompanying him knew nothing of this. They were still basking in the pride of their nation's strength, their hearts burning with hatred over the destruction of their home county's Maple City domain.
Li Yun didn't know how many others shared his secret mission, but he was certain he was not alone.
The State of Zhuang had slumbered for years. Now it had awakened—ravenous, hungry for meat.
Surveying the surrounding states, the State of Yong was certainly the hardest to swallow, and the State of Mo wasn't necessarily easy either. But Zhuang's leadership clearly already had a target.
In the present era, nations rose together and sects dotted the land. The interests of the great powers were tangled in a labyrinth of complexity.
The State of Zhuang and the State of Yong were old enemies—Yong was strong, Zhuang was weak—but behind Zhuang stood the Dao Orthodoxy. With the backing of the Dao Gate, Zhuang had enjoyed enduring national fortune.
Among all the Dao-affiliated nations, the strongest was of course the Dominator of the Central Region, the State of Jing. But more specifically, Jing had the Dao as its foundation, with three branches thriving in parallel. Zhuang, however, belonged to the Yujing Mountain branch...
And so on, and so forth.
In such a complex world landscape, national warfare was no trivial matter. One could never focus only on the present. Those who did not plan for the whole could not plan for a part.
The work Li Yun was doing was but an imperceptible fraction of the long preparation to come.
He would certainly complete the tasks assigned from above, but for Li Yun personally, the extermination of the Bone Path was what he cared about most.
The Maple City domain was his homeland.
In his early years, after the incident at Upright Brush, he had grown accustomed to walking alone. But last year, when they had revisited Upright Brush, he had begun to untie the knot in his heart. He had started trying to accept others—like Jiang Chen, Zhao Yan, Huang Azhan.
And his parents and family...
They were all gone.
They were all gone.
If this feeling had to be given a concrete description, it was the way he had felt when he fled from Upright Brush all those years ago, sobbing and wailing on the open road.
But it was worse than that.
Back then, he had been alone. Now, he was more alone than ever.
Back then, he had been a stray dog. Now...
He felt as though he had become a deserter once again. When disaster struck the Maple City domain, he had hidden himself away in the Clear River County Academy. When his family, friends, fellow disciples, and neighbors needed him, he was not there.
And he never would be again.
This was the State of Mo. The night was deep.
Li Yun had already given the order to slay those fleeing rats, so he slowed his pace. Mere minions—there was no need for him to act personally.
He stopped abruptly, his hand gripping the hilt of his sword.
Everything was silent. Night was naturally quiet.
But it was too quiet.
He could no longer hear the breathing of his fellow disciples. He could no longer feel his own heartbeat.
Even the faint presence of the Twin Flood Dragon Society's patrol cultivators—that subtle warning to outsiders—had vanished.
In the darkness, from the direction Li Yun was staring, a tall and imposing figure emerged, bearing a great ring-cleared saber on his back.
"You people of Zhuang really are a bunch of courting death, aren't you?"
He tossed the head in his hand. It rolled across the ground several times and came to rest so that its eyes met Li Yun's directly.
It was a young woman with delicate features—a junior sister of this year's cohort at the County Dao Academy.
Li Yun looked away from her unseeing eyes, still frozen in that expression of horror, and fixed his gaze on the towering figure that had stepped from the darkness.
The man's aura was savage and violent. Over his face was... a tiger-bone mask.
Le Wen