Forty Millenniums of Cultivation

“Cough, cough, cough, cough!” Li Yao almost fell back and really fell into the abyss. He coughed so hard that he was looking at Yan Liren in admiration, feeling that the Sword Maniac was more magnificent than ever in the frigid well!

When going crazy, he even dared to take off Lead Eunuch Wang Xi’s pants. It was indeed as expected of the legendary Sword Maniac!

“Make no mistake, Fellow Cultivator Spiritual Vulture,” Yan Liren said, frowning, “I have no interest in whether or not Wang Xi has any unspoken disease.”

“I wasn’t judging,” Li Yao said. “Everybody has their curiosity. It is perfectly normal even if you truly were slightly interested. To be honest, even I want to know Wang Xi’s secrets.”

“But I’m truly not interested.” Emotionlessly, Yan Liren said, “I only meant to infuriate him, rip apart his shell of absentmindedness so that he would launch the most furious, insane, and brutal attack toward me.”

“So, that’s the reason!” Li Yao blushed, feeling that he was not as good as Yan Liren.

The Sword Maniac was obviously a man free from lowly entertainment. He was a real, pure swordsman. Yet, Li Yao was imagining him as being so nasty. It was indeed petty!

Pettiness was fine. Li Yao moved on and asked, “What then? Did you cut his pants?”

“Then, he ran off.”

“Ran off?”

“Yes. Before my sword aura reached him, he fled, holding his legs.”

“So, it is possible that Wang Xi is indeed a natural eunuch. If he was just castrated normally, since he was already a world-famous eunuch, he wouldn’t be acting so weirdly, right?”

“I don’t know. Unless he has a sword growing between his legs, I’m not very interested in the stuff around a man’s groin. If you are interested in that, Fellow Cultivator Spiritual Vulture, you can take off his pants yourself if you find Wang Xi in the future.”

“Well…” Li Yao deeply frowned. He ignored Yan Liren’s last remark and pondered on the peculiarities of Wang Xi.

At first, when he heard Wang Xi’s astonishing theories from Yan Liren, Li Yao’s first reaction was, naturally, that Wang Xi could be a spy of the Imperium of True Human Beings.

But on second thought, his first reaction could have been wrong again.

First of all, the timing was not right.

Although Wang Xi did not become a powerful eunuch until ten years ago, he had been lurking and accumulating his strength for decades. His endeavors included establishing the intelligence and assassination organization ‘Ghost Character’.

Together with his training period deep inside the royal palace, the guy must have lived in the Ancient Sages Sector for more than sixty years.

His background must have been very clear for him to be admitted by the Forbidden City and become a trusted subordinate of the emperor. It was impossible for him to be a mysterious person who jumped out of nowhere.

The spies of the Imperium of True Human Beings might have reached the Ancient Sages Sector sixty to seventy years ago.

Should they have jumped near the Ancient Sages Sector after a super long-distance space jump with unbelievable luck, even if the odds might be one billion, it was still possible for them to appear here.

The real problem was that, if the spies of the Imperium of True Human Beings had reached the Ancient Sages Sector so early, they would have had plenty of time to collect resources, analyze the intelligence, and establish the ‘space gate’ to summon the expedition army of the Imperium!

Then, by the time Li Yao landed on the Ancient Sages Sector, it would not have been such a ‘vintage’ and ‘traditional’ scene that he saw.

Chances were that he would have seen the graceful ancient Cultivators shooting Vulcan Machine Guns and the cavalry of Ghost Qin fighting together with crystal warships.

Since such a thing did not happen, Li Yao could only conclude that, even if the spies of the Imperium of True Human Beings did exist in the Ancient Sages Sector, they should be at a similar phase to him. They were also accumulating their initial resources and intelligence and preparing to establish the space gate.

Secondly, if Wang Xi was truly a spy of the Imperium of True Human Beings, there would have been absolutely no reason for him to discuss so many topics with Yan Liren that would raise suspicion, such as those regarding the world beyond or crawling out of the Ancient Sages Sector.

Li Yao, the ‘ill-intended’ spy of the federation, for one, would never say such things.

“Who is Wang Xi exactly? I’m so curious about him!” Li Yao sighed. For a moment, he even lost interest in practicing the sword arts with Yan Liren.

Right then, long horns echoed below the mountain. Afar and near, colorful, glittering lanterns were ignited on the entire Hundred Blade Mountain. Looked at from a distance, a brilliant dragon seemed to have surfaced from below the ground.

It was the welcome ceremony of the highest scale in the Purple Pole Sword Sect. An honorable guest must have arrived.

Li Yao and Yan Liren looked at each other because they both sensed the anxiety in the welcome ceremony.

Besides, both of them were elders of the Purple Pole Sword Sect, but they had not been informed that any honorable guest was going to visit!

Very soon, ‘Orchid Angel’ Ling Lanyin flew over to the God Shocking Mountain on her flying sword and respectfully asked the two elders to go to the ‘Sword Washing Pavilion’ and have a meeting with Master Righteous One.

After only three months, Qi Zhongdao, who claimed to be the leader of all the Cultivators in the Great Qian Dynasty, arrived at the Purple Pole Sword Sect again.

When Li Yao and Yan Liren stepped into the ‘Sword Washing Pavilion’, the grand meeting hall of the Purple Pole Sword Sect, all the leadership of the Purple Pole Sword Sect—including Dan Fengzi, the head—were making small talk with Qi Zhongdao and his companions.

They had just decided the new distribution of interests during the Dragon Spring Meeting. Naturally, their conversation was not as tense as the previous one.

However, the ambience was certainly not enthusiastic, either. If anything, it was even more depressed than the vibe of the Dragon Spring Meeting.

Narrowing his eyes, Li Yao observed Qi Zhongdao with great interest.

The leader of the Cultivators, who was essentially a moderator of all affairs, was truly a very interesting fellow.

Of ‘Sword Maniac’ Yan Liren, Dan Fengzi, as well as the juniors including Orchid Angel Ling Lanyin, everybody agreed that Qi Zhongdao was a mannered man.

How mannered?

For example, if Qi Zhongdao had borrowed an amount of money from a guy, agreeing to return the principal with the interests at a certain time, yet the guy accidentally slept with Qi Zhongdao’s wife, then, after Qi Zhongdao killed the guy with one attack, when the day to pay the debt came, he would still return the principal sum and the interest to the guy’s tomb, without missing a penny.

Of course, such a thing could never happen, but that was the basic idea of how mannered the Iron Saint was!

During his chitchat with Yan Liren at the Dragon Spring Meeting, Li Yao pointed out the mysteries regarding the ‘fourth sword’ for him and somehow raised the position of both of them in the world of Cultivators.

But on the other hand, it was a slap right to the face of Qi Zhongdao, who was the victor of the match. He essentially dashed upward by stepping on Qi Zhongdao’s face.

Li Yao had thought that Qi Zhongdao would hate his guts and even retaliate.

It could not be helped. It was impossible to rise miraculously in a short time without pissing off anyone. That was a price that he had to pay.

Li Yao had made preparations for Qi Zhongdao’s vengeance, but he did not expect that, although Qi Zhongdao’s face was as gloomy as the bottom of a pot, the guy had remained silent the whole time.

In the end, he had even acted as if nothing had happened and reached an insignificant business deal with the Purple Pole Sword Sect on behalf of the Grand Mystery Sect, which was almost a public concession!

Later, in the secret meetings where the leaders of hundreds of sects were gathered and interests large and small in all fields were divided, Qi Zhongdao’s methods were even greater eye-openers for Li Yao.

The thousands of sects there were essentially a mess with the entangled interests and their grudges old and new.

Qi Zhongdao, however, had a certain skill that allowed him to pick out the clues in the mess. He was able to divide the interests according to the capabilities and the range of activities of the sects while ensuring that most of the sects could accept the arrangement, however reluctantly.

If some of the interests were not divided at all, he could also come up with a suitable dueling arrangement for the two parties. The champions of the two parties, the rules of the duel, and the criterion for victory were all proposed by him, and none of the parties involved disagreed.

What astonished Li Yao the most was that, when it came to ‘Master Spiritual Vulture’, who had just smacked his face hard, he also tried his best to steal a proportion of interests from the sects, including a fairly-good natural paradise and the annual protection fees in the transportation trade, and offer them to Li Yao for free!

At that time, Qi Zhongdao said such things to him.

“Master Spiritual Vulture, since you are able to suppress the three Cultivators in the middle level of the Nascent Soul Stage easily, and you can discuss and fight with a great swordsman like Yan Liren, you are definitely among the most distinguished Nascent Soul Stage Cultivators in the Ancient Sages Sector!

“For such an unparalleled expert such as yourself, even if you do not have appropriate resources, you will certainly plunder them yourself later!

“It is certainly not an issue to plunder them, but you are new here, and you are not familiar with the rules of robbery in the Great Qian Dynasty yet!

“For Cultivators, the rules are our supreme authority. If everybody fights for resources according to the rules, even the tension between the Grand Mystery Sect and the Purple Pole Sword Sect today will still not be a big deal. We will divide the interests exactly according to the rules. After the result is out, we will still be fellow Cultivators, and we can still cooperate with each other.

“However, if somebody does not worship the rules and intends to knock over the entire table, disrupting all the other Cultivators’ lives, they will be public enemies.

“Today, I admire your expertise and offer you the resources that you deserve. They are the ‘rules’ that the Cultivators of the Great Qian Dynasty have given you.

“However, after you accept the items, you will be a member of the Cultivator community of the Great Qian Dynasty.

“I don’t care what you did in the Southland of Sorcerers in the past, but the Great Qian Dynasty has the Great Qian Dynasty’s rules. Even if you are not interested in helping the weak or serving justice, every Nascent Soul Stage Cultivator should be a well-respected senior here. I hope that you cherish your identity. Slaughtering someone’s entire family after a dispute is absolutely forbidden here. Crimes such as killing the innocent and extracting their souls for training are all considered evil and crooked. They are the greatest taboos here!”