Destiny in Cinders

She didn’t ask how An Jing learned about the true chi and believed that he wouldn’t lie to her. An Jing offered her the same courtesy and took her at her word.

”It makes sense,” Bai Qinghan said, nodding in thought. ”Recent internal reports from Grand Chen indicate that they’ll be pulling back their forces from the northern frontier. With the celestial armament of King Jing lost since his death, King De is caught up in a huge mess with the many officials at the divine capital. The entire Hanhai Region has lost the celestial armament that protected it, so it’s no wonder why they had to pull back and regroup to more secure positions.

”Naturally, part of it was due to the battle between the Pure Yang transcendents of the Dustdawn Sects and Grand Chen. The empire’s representative lost against Transcendent Rising Light, and with that, both sides agreed to restrict the zone of conflict. That’s also why they decided to retrieve the divine armaments from the settlements around Brokeblade Mountain.”

”I see...” The added information fit into place with what he knew, providing a holistic explanation. With the celestial armament missing, the Hanhai Region was vulnerable to great upheavals, so the empire probably wanted to withdraw the divine armaments while they had a chance. The reason they waited until recently to do it was probably a simple matter of bureaucratic inefficiency. Mobilizing divine armaments was a huge deal, after all, and nobody wanted to be held accountable for it if anything went wrong, choosing to delay it as long as they could.

Though, after the negotiations at Whitemountain Pass between the sentinel kings of Grand Chen and the Dustdawn Sects’ transcendents, things were finally settled. There would be no longer any justification for anyone in the imperial court to attack someone over withdrawing the divine armaments once both sides agreed on how to deal with the northern frontier. Even so, actually withdrawing them took some time, and it just so happened to occur as An Jing reached the vicinity of Riverside some two weeks after he left Keensight.

”I more or less got it.” An Jing breathed a sigh of relief when he untangled the multiple threads of information and sorted them in order. ”I thought it was the start of some grand conspiracy. Turns out it was just proceeding as expected.”

”Just because things are proceeding as expected doesn’t mean there isn’t a grand conspiracy,” Bai Qinghan said with a shake of her head. ”At the very least, the cult’s reports mention undercurrents within Grand Chen. There’s word about hidden agendas behind the withdrawal of divine armaments.”

”Well, there’s always going to be one hidden agenda or two no matter what it is.” He squinted at the wall as if he could see through it straight to the government offices of Riverside. The Bejeweled Traders Guild was also situated nearby. ”This traders guild must be the puppets of some of the empire’s senior officials. They employed a private army and replaced the local authorities and are attempting to pocket public property for themselves. Grand Chen’s authorities gave them this chance. There’s no way they wouldn’t use it to take a few bites of flesh from the behemoth. There might be some who are even more ambitious, but they no longer have anything to do with me.”

An Jing smiled calmly and continued, ”I’m planning to settle my mother down somewhere safe. After I deal with some affairs, I will be taking her to the Brightmirror Sect. I will have nothing to do with Grand Chen after that.”

”Yeah.” Bai Qinghan didn’t agree or disagree. Instead, she had a few other questions. ”But is the Brightmirror Sect really safe? Will Grand Chen really let you take your mother there so easily? She’s the only leverage they have on you.”

An Jing brushed it off and said, ”That’s a problem, alright, but I can solve it. I’ll cross the bridge when I come to it.”

He knew that there were other issues within the Brightmirror Sect, the mole for starters. There was also a chance that someone within was cooperating with heavenly fiends. Dustdawn was a place with no central authority, after all, essentially making it lawless. The disciplinary rules of sects alone weren’t nearly as complete or fair compared to Grand Chen’s legal system.

Speaking of which, An Jing turned to her and asked, ”You came all the way here from Heavenly Will Mountain, right? Little Bai, what’s the home base of the Heavenly Demon Cult like?”

”I also wanted to talk to you about this.” Bai Qinghan exhaled deeply, closed her eyes in thought, before she slowly said, ”Heavenly Will Mountain was something I couldn’t have ever imagined.”

She told him about her life there from start to finish. According to her, the demonic cult’s practices at their home base were not nearly as gruesome or bloody as they had thought. They didn’t ”eat” people as a matter of course.

Heavenly Will Mountain was located at the center of the Cangxie Region. The Heavenly Will Founder himself had personally designated that to be the sect’s ancestral site when he first came to the Northblack Sacrifice Continent. The clouds there were white as jade and stretched on for thousands of li, gently hovering across the sky. The many peaks of the mountain range were connected by bridges of flowing spirit water that quickly transported people from one area to the next with minimal effort.

While cultivators there were strictly speaking members of the demonic cult, all of them were well kempt and well behaved. Most of them barely radiated any savage or bloody air. The few that did gained that air through participating in serious martial battles rather than petty, unhinged vendettas or layfolk massacres. They were no different from typical core successors of major sects.

Being the Profound Yin Goddess, she made Profound Yin Peak her home and had her own group of followers who had been living at Profound Yin Peak early on, waiting for the arrival of their goddess. They constituted part of Bai Qinghan’s power. She could use them to do anything she wanted, whether it was to build up other factions, conquer enemy nations, expand into the wilderness, clear up feys and fiends, anything. There was nothing she wasn’t allowed to do. The only rule in Heavenly Will Mountain was that there were no rules.

Once while she cultivated at her peak, Bai Qinghan saw a Clearing adept who had just returned to make a report start a fight with another adept, likely due to bad mood from an assignment that didn’t go well. The other one, Adept Mountain Dweller, appeared delightful and carefree, but his smile vanished all of a sudden when his mental state of pleasant tranquility was ruined by the adept who had just returned.

”If I don’t beat you up right here and now, I don’t deserve to remain here at Heavenly Will Mountain.” With that said, the two of them dueled each other at the base of Profound Yin Peak. It ended with Adept Mountain Dweller’s overwhelming victory. While the other defeated adept didn’t die, his expression looked as if he was about to experience something far worse than death.

Bai Qinghan paid attention to the losing adept, intent on seeing for herself whether Heavenly Will Mountain was a place as dark as Direlife Manor had been. Yet, things turned out completely different from what she had imagined.

The adept was relieved of all his tasks and responsibilities. While that sounded good at first, it also meant that he lost all of his power and authority overnight. All of his artifacts were taken by the adept who defeated him, and he also lost access to all the amenities that the cult provided, not even allowed to cultivate at terrestrial-vein-rich grounds or his altar. Everyone believed that he had it coming for him.

Yet, he didn’t die. Nothing changed between him and his wife, children, disciples, friends or subordinates. While his relationships might shift in the far future, nothing drastic happened in the immediate present. He still possessed a home to return to and nobody turned against him just because he lost that duel.

However, Bai Qinghan knew that he was already a dead man in the hierarchy of the Heavenly Divine Cult. He had offended someone he had no business offending, going beyond his means and losing everything he possessed as a result.

The only hope he had to take it back was if something changed or if he achieved something worthwhile after hitting rock bottom. He was like a lone sailor who could only redeem himself after finding an uninhabited island, killing all the feys and beasts on it and plunging the flag of the demonic cult to claim it for them. Or, he could also start researching his own martial technique. No matter how shabby or half-finished it was, it would be accepted as long as it carried the slightest hint of a new idea with mildly novel effects. He could also travel to a foreign land alone where the Heavenly Divine Cult’s influence didn’t reach and start from the ground up, setting up a new altar and cult branch there.

There were many ways for him to rise back to prominence, none of them easy, all requiring back-breaking work without relying on anybody else, especially not the cult. He had to use his own power to create something of value and give it back to the cult. Only then would he be accepted back into the fold and given treatment that far exceeded the minor contribution he rendered. Only then could he once more become an adept of the cult and access its resources, protection and legacies.