Martial Cultivator

Looking back now, the Dean’s disciples indeed included several exceptional figures.

Liu Banbi, who had already become a sword immortal; Wei Xu, who had long stepped into Nepenthe; Xie Nandu, with her nine lifeblood flying swords.

As well as Zhou Gouqi, who had now become a Saint.

The academy might currently be experiencing the greatest era in its history.

But none of this was of concern to the Wei Family.

“Back then, the extermination of the Zhou Family was to ensure that the position of academy dean would not fall into the hands of another. Since you joined the academy and became one of the Dean’s most prized students, with the potential to become the next dean, we had to ensure that you would become the next dean.”

The Wei Family Head spoke calmly, “For this, we took great risks back then to accomplish this.”

Wei Xu’s face was pale, and his lips trembled slightly. He had sensed something amiss, which was why he had returned to the Wei Family ancestral home to seek answers. However, he had not anticipated that, upon entering the ancestral hall, he would uncover the greatest secret of his life.

For a family as prominent as the Wei Family, it was inevitable that there would be darkness and shady dealings. But Wei Xu never imagined that the deeds the Wei Family had carried out far exceeded his expectations.

Poisoning the empress, exterminating the Zhou Family...

No matter how one looked at it, these were not trivial matters.

”He left the Divine Capital alive and went to Wei Prefecture. He didn’t spend the rest of his life muddling through. Instead, he continued investigating things in secret. Unfortunately, he uncovered many details.”

The Wei Family Head spoke calmly, though there was a hint of frustration in his eyes. Over the years, the Wei Family had done many things, all carried out with the utmost secrecy to ensure that no one could trace them back to the family. Yet that single event created a flaw for the Wei Family who had always exercised great caution.

”There’s a saying: ‘Walk by the river often enough, and your shoes will get wet.’”

”But for the Wei Family, this has only happened once in all these years.”

The Wei Family Head sighed with vicissitudes of emotion.

Wei Xu finally returned to his senses and looked at the Wei Family Head, asking, ”Family Head, why did we have to do this? Why resort to such methods...”

”You mean to say that you and Zhou Xianshan could have had a gentleman’s rivalry. But given the circumstances back then, you couldn’t have won Zhou Xianshan, just as you cannot compete with Xie Nandu now.”

The Wei Family Head said calmly, ”You are, without a doubt, one of the Wei Family’s most outstanding descendants, and one of the Great Liang Dynasty’s most remarkable scholars. At any other time, whether in the past or the future, you would have been a shoo-in for successor. But unfortunately, you were born in the present era. Your teacher has been extraordinarily lucky to have such a dazzling bunch of disciples. Though you’re a similarly brilliant gem, you’re not the brightest among them. And that’s something I find both pitiable and tragic on your behalf.”

By all accounts, Wei Xu was perfectly qualified to become the academy dean. He was exceptional enough, but the reason he could not ascend to that position was very simple as well: because there were others more exceptional than him. ṝ

Previously, it was Zhou Gouqi. Later on, it was Xie Nandu.

”The matter has already been done, and not neatly at that. That is my failing.”

The Wei Family Head said, ”A price must be paid for making a mistake.”

”If wiping out the Zhou Family was for the position of academy dean, then why poison Her Majesty the Empress... and even the His Majesty?”

Wei Xu hesitated for a moment, murmuring, ”Aren’t we...”

”Aren’t we subjects of the Great Liang Dynasty?” The Wei Family Head smiled as he looked at Wei Xu. ”Perhaps you wanted to ask if we are loyal to the Deposed Emperor instead?”

Wei Xu remained silent. Back then, when the Deposed Emperor attempted to reclaim his throne, some of his former subjects had approached Wei Xu. At the time, he had wondered if the Wei Family had always been aligned with the Deposed Emperor. He had even been prepared for the Wei Family to seize that night as an opportunity to change the dynasty. But that night passed. The Deposed Emperor died. The Wei Family did nothing.

Wei Xu had breathed a sigh of relief then, perhaps even felt rather fortunate.

”The Great Liang Dynasty has existed for how long? Barely two hundred years. And how long has my Wei Family existed?”

”Long before the former Qi Dynasty, my Wei Family has been established in this world. As the saying goes, a hundred-year dynasty, a thousand-year noble family. My Wei Family has existed far longer than that so-called Divine Capital’s Xie Family. As long as we do not err, it doesn’t matter whether this world is called Great Liang, Great Zhou, or Great Qi, my Wei Family will forever stand firm in this world.”

The Wei Family Head chuckled, ”Since that’s the case, why should we view ourselves as subjects of Great Liang?”

Wei Xu frowned. ”Even if you think that way, such actions are still wrong. What benefit does poisoning His Majesty bring us? Could it be that the Wei Family also wishes to establish a Great Wei?”

The Wei Family Head shook his head.

”Becoming emperor is out of the question. If we became the emperor, we would quickly vanish from this world.”

The Wei Family Head spoke calmly: ”But while we will not be emperors, neither can we allow Chen Che to remain emperor.”

At this point, the Wei Family Head no longer referred to him as His Majesty, instead directly using Chen Che’s name.

”Why?”

Wei Xu had lost count of how many times he had asked this today.

”He’s too strong.”

The Wei Family Head said sincerely: ”He is the strongest person in the history of the Great Liang Dynasty’s emperors. He is even one of the most remarkable rulers of the past several hundred, perhaps even a thousand years. Such a person, even without being the emperor, can strike fear into people. Let alone when he is emperor.”

”In just over a decade since his ascension, he has made the Great Liang Dynasty the strongest it has been in over two centuries. If he doesn’t die, he will only make the Great Liang flourish further. Such a prospect is too frightening.”

Wei Xu murmured, ”But what does that have to do with our Wei Family?”

The Wei Family Head looked at Wei Xu’s eyes and asked, ”How do you write the character Wei?”

Wei Xu who could originally still stand, stumbled backward upon hearing this and collapsed onto a meditation mat.

The Wei Family Head smiled and said, ”After the Deposed Emperor was removed, Chen Che began searching for the greatest traitor of the Great Liang Dynasty. But hasn’t my Wei Family already told the world this?”

Wei Xu could no longer speak.

”Yet, the world’s understanding is still wrong.”

”Commit(委) to being a traitor(鬼), that is Wei(魏).”[As you can see, the surname Wei is a combination of the 2 characters, it’s a wordplay.]

”From our perspective, they are the traitors, the Great Liang is a traitor, and the previous Qi dynasty was also a traitor.”

Commit to being a traitor, that is Wei.

Wei Xu murmured, ”We are traitors, we are traitors...”

Before today, he could never have imagined that the greatest traitor of the Great Liang Dynasty would be him and the Wei Family behind him.

”But why must we be traitors?!”

Wei Xu suddenly stood up, staring at the Wei Family Head before letting out a crazed howl.

”Why... why must we be traitors?”

The Wei Family Head was silent for a moment before speaking softly, ”To the mortal world, we may be traitors, but to the Great Liang, we are not. Because before there was the Great Liang, our Wei Family already existed.”

The Wei Family Head paused and calmly added, ”Why become traitors... because we come from what they call the foreign lands.”

The Wei Family came from the foreign lands.

The Wei Family actually came from the foreign lands.

This millennia-old family was unexpectedly from the foreign lands.

The Wei Family Head looked at Wei Xu and sighed, ”We come from the cultivation world. We were never the same kind of people as them. Before the Great Liang even existed, we were already here. We could have remained in the mountains like our fellow cultivators, cultivating in the mountains. But we bear a mission and a responsibility, so we’ve had to stay in the mortal world, doing these things, being called traitors by them.”

Wei Xu had long become so stunned he could no longer speak.

It was hard to imagine anyone in the Great Liang Dynasty who would not be shocked to hear such a thing.

”Over the long river of years, we’ve done many things, altering the course of countless stories. The weakness of the Qi dynasty’s national strength was thanks to my Wei Family. But... the Great Liang is a strange dynasty.”

”In all these years, I’ve never seen a dynasty where every emperor was free of mediocrity. From the founding emperor of Great Liang, to Emperor Taizong, Emperor Lingzong, and now Chen Che.”

”Not counting that good-for-nothing, the Great Liang’s throne has passed through four generations, and every one of them was a brilliant ruler. This has never happened in history.”

The Wei Family Head retrieved a volume from the bookshelf in front of him and tossed it onto the ground. Wei Xu glanced at it and saw that it chronicled the emperors of various dynasties over the past centuries and even millennia.

”If this continues, the Great Liang will inevitably become an unprecedented dynasty. By then, heaven and earth will be overturned.”

For ages, mortal dynasties have been trampled beneath the feet of those from the foreign lands. They would never allow a day when a mortal dynasty stood equal to them, or even looked down upon them.

For this, they had prepared long ago, the Wei Family was the blade they thrust into the mortal world.

“What exactly have we done?”

Wei Xu looked at the volume and asked.

“It’s very simple. If a brilliant ruler appears, ensure they die young. Their sons can’t possibly also be exceptional. And even if the son is, their grandchild surely won’t be.”

The Wei Family Head spoke calmly, “Even if luck is poor and we have to keep killing, eventually, some mediocre individuals will appear.”

This method has been used by the Wei Family for many years and on many occasions.

It was why the successive emperors of Great Liang all met untimely deaths.

The most critical element of a dynasty was the person who sat on the throne. If the ruler was not an exceptional ruler, then even if the dynasty did not fall into decline, it definitely would not continue to prosper.

“So, all this time, you’ve been poisoning Great Liang’s emperors...”

The emotions in Wei Xu’s eyes were complicated.

“It’s a very simple method, but there will always be accidents. For instance, someone like Chen Che can no longer be killed by poison.”

The Wei Family Head said, ”He possesses a rare talent for cultivation, an extraordinary breadth of spirit, and the strategies of a born emperor. He’s a natural-born monarch. Over these years, the things he set out to accomplish were difficult for us to fully obstruct, no matter how many plans we devised. Instead, it allowed him to gradually catch sight of us.”

”In this war without smoke or fire, we have won many times. But this time, it seems we are about to lose.”

The Wei Family Head spoke calmly, ”He’s a remarkable person.”

This was an exceedingly high praise.

One could say there was no higher evaluation than this.

”Hence, we must kill him.”

The Wei Family Head stepped back a few paces, standing before the ancestral memorial tablets. Exhaling a long breath of turbid air, his gaze gradually grew resolute.