First things first, John and Kai went to turn in their mission results. Two weeks running around meant they could complete a huge number of missions for the sect. Mostly gathering and elimination missions, with some reconnaissance. They didn't bother doing any escort, trade, or envoy missions that Foundation Establishment cultivators had access to. They rewarded more but were significantly more time consuming. John and Kai had focused on quantity rather than quality. Stacking missions like they had wasn't strictly allowed, but that was the benefit of connections. Getting missions that made a relative loop like they had was pretty rare too, it's not like those missions would need to be run again--not for years anyway.
So, it was some luck and political capital to pull off this trick, and they only had one go of it, but that was enough for their purposes. Together they had made just over 3500 contribution points from two dozen missions and a large number of extra resources they turned over as bounty. For Kai, that was sufficient to purchase his desired luxuries and mansion, as well as get started cultivating. For John, he was now completely debt free! Without the extra bounty turn-ins he would still be a couple hundred in the hole, but now he had 800 points to work with! Not to mention he was approaching 50% capacity.
What a reversal of fortune, thankfully he had Kai's friendship to deal with the schemes of the Song family... He would need to pay them back personally as well, with interest! So far he had managed to avoid direct confrontation, but he didn't expect that would last. The rules of the sect were pretty strict, open fighting would not be tolerated so John wasn't really worried about that. Duel challenges were allowed but there was no requirement to accept. John wasn't much for face either, so he felt basically no pressure to accept honor duels. Coming from a life of farming was part of the reason, but also John didn't have much face worth worrying about. Sure he was the leader of the Weird kids but he tolerated his position there out of a sense of duty, not out of pride. The only affront he could not tolerate was the affront to his dignity as a human.
John renewed his focus, the Songs and Disciple Ye could wait. The contribution points were burning a hole in his pocket but he wanted to go back to the Weird compound first and check up on the others. A few of them should have reached Foundation Establishment by now. And he wanted to talk to the Sect Leader through Elder Catherine regarding his Weird garden plans. With a functioning garden, it would be a lot easier for John to push to 100% and begin his transformations.
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The Weird kids are not alright.
Chloe was the first to notice his return, of course. She practically ambushed him, and with John's refined senses after being in the wilds so long, he very nearly attacked her. Her gaze was just that predatory.
It took a while for her to calm down. Apparently she had not found a way to cultivate on her own and was simply going stir crazy the entire time he was gone. John almost suggested she find another partner but the look in here eyes was downright possessive, it was a little bit frightening.
John was now quite tired but he still needed to check on everyone else. Apparently Mark had gone into seclusion a week ago to break through, but no one had seen him since. It shouldn't take so long, John decided to enter Mark's pagoda to check on him even though it was a taboo. Inside, John found Mark sitting perfectly still in the center of his cultivation room--or at least what was left of him. Mark was entirely petrified, from the tips of his hair to his robes, it looked like he had been carved from dolomite by a legendary craftsman.
Sigh
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What the hell happened? John was gone for two weeks and everything was falling apart here. Extending his spiritual senses into the statue, John was surprised to feel the faint movement of qi. So Mark didn't have an accident? It was possible with Weird cultivation techniques that this was simply how Mark needed to advance through Foundation Establishment. Plus, his abilities did revolve around petrification. Still it was a nuisance and John pinched the bridge of his nose at the rising headache. John needed Mark around to keep things steady while he wasn't here. Chloe was less and less reliable these days. John would check up on Benjamin and see if any of the new Weird cultivators showed promise.
Benjamin was not in the compound, John tracked him down at the Outer alchemist hall and Benjamin was quite happy to see him.
"John, you're finally back!" He cheered.
"I am, seems like everything has been a disaster. How has your cultivation progressed, are you near Foundation Establishment?" John wanted to know the important details.
"Er... yeah I am actually, but there's more important things going on!"
"What is it?" No one had seen Mark, assuming he was still trying to break through, what else could be obviously wrong?
"The disciples are acting strange. Really strange!"
John didn't respond verbally, just giving Ben a look.
"Uh, what I mean to say is that a lot of the disciples, regular non-Weird disciples, have started to give off Weird fluctuations. And they act so sluggish and strange, it's hard to describe. You need to go see for yourself."
Normal disciples were getting infected with Weird qi? How was that possible? Most infections were among plants and wild animals. All the Weird disciples had to be purposefully inducted in order to cultivate the strange energy.
"Let me go look."
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John spent some time wandering around the Outer sect to see if he noticed the same thing that Benjamin had noticed. It wasn't obvious at first, simply because there were many thousands of Outer disciples and only a few dozen infected that John noticed, but it was definitely real. Various disciples gave off a slight sense of Weirdness. There was no pattern to it that John could identify, young and old, close to Foundation Establishment or long stagnant, it was indiscriminate.
Ben had described these people as sluggish, but that was not quite right. They were almost zombie-like. Slowly walking around, unblinking, poorly coordinated. John saw several of them bump into other disciples, who shouted at them to watch where they were going, they dropped things, failed to open doors on the first try, spilled food on themselves as it drooped off their chopsticks. It was really unnatural.
What Benjamin hadn't noticed was the slight tinge of the demonic coming off them, hiding just under the Weirdness. If John's senses weren't so sharp he might have missed it too, but it only left him more confused. These people didn't feel like full Weird cultivators, how could they be entering a demonic transformation like Peter had? And if this had been going on for so long, such a transformation should have happened already.
It was considered rude to examine someone in detail with your spiritual sense but John figured it was justifiable in this case. Just to be safe though, he corralled one of the zombie-like cultivators into a quiet alleyway to examine her for any signs of infestation. It was a young woman of around John's age, maybe younger. She was probably brought into the sect around the same time as the second cohort of Weird kids. At least, around the same time as they were undergoing their induction. Also, she was now staring emptily into space and drooling... Right. No need to take too long.
John scanned her pretty quickly and poked around with strands of his qi to find the cause of the Weird qi radiating off of her, with the greater proximity and the scanning it was obvious that something small near the crown of her head was causing the issue. Only issue was, it was clearly hidden underneath the poor woman's hair. It felt a little weird to dig around her scalp like he was looking for lice, but he had come this far and John needed to identify what was causing this.
A few seconds of poking around revealed strange red striations along her scalp, this was the culprit. John couldn't see the whole thing but he had enough to go on that he was ready to try and fry it with his qi, it shouldn't hurt her too much, maybe just a headache. Just as he was gathering his qi strands to make a move, Disciple Ye walked around the corner and spotted him.