“Elder, please calm down” - Chuk Cha Pyo intervened. - “I remind you that Tan Ji Tao is a grandmaster alchemist. He therefore has full authority to decide how to use the sect’s treasures in pill-making. In strict accordance with sect rules, all these pills were used solely for the benefit of our best disciples.”
“But Ho Le, come here” - Cheon Chu Han summoned one of the disciples.
Several visitors to the ancient Qi dimension had traveled with me on the Heavenly Ark. As far as I could tell, they were relatives of important figures and had also broken through to the Core Formation Stage, automatically granting them a high level of privilege.
A young man I recognized emerged from the crowd and approached the sect leader, who laid a hand on his shoulder and scanned him.
“I sense powerful dragon energy in his body” - Cheon Chu Han declared. - “So, the dragon energy stone wasn’t wasted.”
The elder who’d been shouting at me fell silent, simply glaring at me. Overall, the atmosphere of this assembly felt rather different from what I’d anticipated.
“Continue” - Cheon Chu Han ordered.
I continued my story: how we’d all cultivated underwater, and because we were actually breathing the lake water, we were absorbing far more Qi into our bodies, allowing most of us to reach the Core Formation Stage. After that, I’d used the “great artifact” to wipe out an enemy squad and save the lives of the disciples on whom we’d spent the pills. Finally, I mentioned that I’d stayed behind in the caves to fulfill Sun Wei Bonk’s wishes and collect as many heads as possible.
“You mentioned treasures you found in the Leaky Caverns” - Cheon Chu Han said with a faint hint of interest.
“Yes, these treasures right here.”
Again, I stretched out my hand and, with a magician’s flourish, produced a big pile of gold and glittering gemstones. However, most of it was random junk. All the truly valuable stuff I’d stashed away in my personal spatial pocket. This time, the heap was ten times bigger than what I’d hauled out from the Forbidden Tomb but nobody sighed enviously. Instead, they just looked at me with… an odd disapproval.
Cheon Chu Han scanned the pile with his Qi and nodded in satisfaction. After all, there were indeed some decent items in there.
“This is an excellent result. What do you want as a reward for your service?” - he asked.
“I’d like techniques that enhance the foundation of cultivation when transitioning to the Foundation Establishment Stage” - I stated my demand.
“You ask too much!” - Cheon Chu Han’s expression hardened, his good mood evaporating.
“What?” - I blurted, taken aback by this unexpected “slap in the face”.
“Such techniques are only available to the disciples of the Royal Palace. They’re not even given to Inner Court disciples. And you’re nothing but an Outer Court upstart. Don’t forget your place in the sect” - Cheon Chu Han explained coldly.
Upon hearing his words, the elders immediately started smiling and nodding in agreement. Oh, so that’s how it is? Well then, from this moment, the sect won’t be getting anything more from me. And I, as response, will make sure to squeeze every last drop of resources out of it, leaving it to starve.
“We’ll give you one-tenth of the recovered treasures, after we’ve assessed their value” - the sect leader pronounced his verdict.
With those words, he unexpectedly leaped from his throne, darted toward me at a speed the eye could hardly follow, and placed his hand on my shoulder, probing my entire body with his Qi. He didn’t merely scan it; he also thrust his “Qi tentacles” into every part of me, checking this and that, leaving traces of his energy behind.
It was a literal “spiritual violation” after which he sniffed contemptuously and returned to his throne. He still didn’t notice the spatial seal on my left arm because it was “covered” by the ghost seal. I had chosen that placement very carefully, and it had paid off.
“That’s all. Leave the palace” - Cheon Chu Han ordered, regarding me with barely concealed disgust and…unease.
The tale has been stolen; if detected on Amazon, report the violation.
I gave him a silent bow and left the hall. A servant promptly appeared and escorted me to the palace exit, then lost any interest in me.
Once I’d oriented myself, I headed toward my home. I needed time to think, to re-evaluate my prospects of staying with this sect, and to plot my revenge against these self-important creeps. But I had barely taken a few steps before my psionics began signaling that some major disaster was about to befall me.
Immediately pushing my perception into overdrive, I scanned the possible future outcomes. In most of them, I ended up dead before I even realized what was happening. But there was one scenario where I made a detour into a forest far from any populated areas and managed to meet my would-be killer and exchange a few words. So, I followed that line of probability, continuing to sift through more variants.
Fifteen minutes later, I arrived at a small clearing deep in the woods, and from behind the bushes emerged… Wang Zhu Tang, the Outer Court overseer.
“Well, here we are” - he said with a predatory grin. - “You didn’t think you could deceive me, did you?”
“Deceive you how?” - I asked, showing not a speck of fear.
“You’re the one who beat up my illegitimate son, Sli Ker!”
“I saved his life” - I retorted.
“Just so you could get my permission to join the expedition to the Spirit Geysers. But the poison still remains in his body, so you must’ve been planning to finish him off later.”
“Huh… well, actually, no. But if you insist, I’ll certainly be glad to. Right now, even” - I said with a nod. - “I will go and kill your son.”
“Go ahead and mock…” - Wang Zhu Tang snarled. - “You know that seal they placed on you allows any full sect member to torture you to death? And I’m an instructor at the Royal Palace. My authority is more than enough to make your demise an unending agony. And no one will ever discover what happened to the ‘genius grandmaster alchemist.’ I’ve set up a barrier here, so nobody can hear your dying screams.”
“Very prudent of you” - I sneered. - “Only you won’t be hearing those screams, either.”
With that, I formed a Qi impulse nearly identical to the one Wang Zhu Tang would attempt to use against me a couple of seconds later. In fact, in both his scenario and mine, the main source of that impulse was the submission seal set against the heart. Under accelerated perception, I reviewed over a thousand future timelines where he activated his seal to trigger my own into “spectacular execution” mode. In those glimpses, I tried out various ways to counter that attack.
Thanks to the information I’d gathered, I now had a decent idea of how this seal worked. In truth, it was fairly primitive. Specifically, the “priority” of the seal was determined by a small portion of it, in which one of the inscribed symbols was activated. And because my body now bore traces of Cheon Chu Han’s Qi, Qi that possessed “administrator rights”, I used that Qi to alter my level of access and immediately issued the command to “execute” Wang Zhu Tang.
I didn’t know how to activate the “instant death” mode because, in the timelines where that type of attack was deployed, I died before I could learn its structure. But the regular “execution” setting was still more than enough to completely seal off the External Court Overseer’s abilities. He collapsed to the ground at once, rolling around and filling the forest with agonized screams. I trusted the effectiveness of his “concealing barrier” but I wasn’t about to test its soundproofing. And so, not a second later, my Skull Crusher accelerated to maximum speed and slammed into my victim’s head.
Wang Zhu Tang was at the eighth level of Core Formation (28) - a power that was off the charts for me. I recalled how, back when I’d struck cultivators at the first and second levels of Core Formation (21, 22) with my club: the first died immediately, while the second was only knocked senseless. This time, my blow did no more than tear away a patch of scalp. But I didn’t stop, unleashing one strike, then another, and another.
After a couple of minutes of ceaseless pounding on his writhing body, I sensed that Wang Zhu Tang was so desperate to die quickly, he actually weakened his own natural defenses. At that moment, Skull Crusher first knocked him unconscious, and then, with the next blow, smashed his skull entirely, splattering his brains.
Heaving a sigh of relief, I scanned the surroundings with my psionics, then activated a Qi blade in my left hand and absorbed all the Qi from the corpse. Just moments ago, I had been dealing with a nearly indestructible object, but once stripped of its Qi, it was just a corpse — something I could tear apart with ease.
I quickly searched the body, pocketed all the “loot” and stowed the remains (including what was left of his head) into a spatial ring, thus destroying the evidence. The bloodstains I simply burned away with a fireball. All that remained was a faint patch of ash indicating that something might have happened here.
After scanning the area once more to confirm there were no witnesses to my handiwork, I dashed off toward the External Court disciples’ camp. From a distance, I scanned the place and recognized the distinct Qi signature belonging to Sli Ker. He was in his room, practically soiling himself with fear. There was a “guard” outside his door, but that person was only at the ninth level of Qi Condensation (09), more like a servant than a real protector. Considering the level of training in the External Court, I was confident he wouldn’t even notice if his charge vanished.
Slipping forward like a thief in the night, I reached the window of Sli Ker’s room. Then I accelerated, hopping inside through a window that had no glass, just a pair of shutters that were currently open. Under the effect of accelerated perception, I glided across the room to my prey and knocked him out with a precise, measured pulse of Qi aimed directly at his brain. Hoisting his limp body, I jumped back through the window and fled into the forest, taking care to avoid detection by the other disciples.