In a dark hall with majestic, tall pillars, an ominous figure sat on a chair adorned with the most extravagant materials and designs, fit to be called a divine throne by mortals. He was a man with fierce eyes and an imposing figure, wearing the most elegant of the immortal treasures for clothes. He sat with his hands joined before his mouth with a gloomy look, deep in thought.
*step*
*step*
*step*
Small even steps echoed in the darkness as a maid in simple but elegant black attire, adorned with a symbol depicting a violet throne inside an imposing mountain covered in purple flames, the mark of the Purple Mountain Sect.
As the maid approached the man, more of her facial features were revealed. She was no less than a flawless beauty, but due to the absence of the makeup to complement it, the relatively deep laugh lines and other wrinkles were visible, indicating her middle age.
She stopped respectfully besides the gloomy man and presented the tray of tea she was carrying, with a bow. Now in reactively bright light, a black ribbon was revealed on her face, covering her eyes, indicating that she is blind.
“It’s fine. Leave it on the table,” the man grunted out without shifting his eyes.
“And it’s about time. Make sure the place is clean and leave before the others arrive here,” the man said in a quiet, low voice. But it carried a strange compulsion and was impossible to ignore, even if one wasn’t paying attention.
The woman shuddered slightly, almost imperceptible. She still promptly replied. “As you common lord Immortal.”
She immediately clapped in a pattern and an army of similarly clad maids streamed into the hall to perform their task. They varied from old to young, both men and women, but they had 2 things in common. They were all pleasant to the eye and more prominently, they all wore the same blindfolds, indicating their blindness.
In a matter of minutes, every surface was cleaned and rechecked to perfection and sets of wine and tea tableware were placed before the 4 chairs around the table the gloomy man was seated in. Once done, everyone except for the first woman left promptly. The beautiful woman once again bowed to indicate her completion of the task.
“Do not disturb us further. It’s an important occasion…”
The maid once again tensed up as she held the bow. As if his command didn’t elicit enough of a reaction, the man continued, “Remember the last time someone made the mistake? The punishment will be 10 times worse this time.”
The maid shuddered heavily but managed to maintain her composure and bowed again to show her acknowledgement. Unfortunately, another younger maids let out a muffled sob in the dark.
The man’s face fell at the sound.
“It seems their training was insufficient, correct them. As for your punishment as the one in charge…”
He simply glared at the bowing woman and an invisible force lashed out at her with a crack. She was briefly launched into the air before collapsing 10 feet away. She stood backup without any noise and there was a terrifying, snaking mark running all the way from her left leg to the side of her face, her attire torn open along the path. It was as if an incredibly powerful, invisible whip hit her.
“I ask for the Grand Immortal’s master’s forgiveness.”
*snort*
The maid left without complaint and the gloomy man returned to waiting patiently, with nothing but the tea to accompany him.
It wasn’t long before there was a change in the calm and dark hall. There was a flash of blinding light and a powerful sound as if a cosmic drum was struck that one felt in their very bones. Accompanying that, a part of the floor lit up with flowing glyphs. Moments later, there was a rush of particles of light that jumped up from the circular patterns of the glyphs and immediately fell down, mimicking a splash of water falling back into a calm lake. When the light receded, there was a fierce and wild looking figure wearing clothes made from beast skins with a majority of his upper torso exposed. Showing off tanned mountains of pure muscle. His eyes were lively and fierce like that of an energetic beast.
The moment he arrived, he took large strides towards the table and sat on one of the chairs as he finally greeted the gloomy looking man, who was still in his seat, simply staring at the newcomer.
“Greetings thunder lord! It seems I was early.”
“Zhang Bohai, you’re the same rude bastard as ever. Don’t you know to greet your betters?”
The newcomer simply chuckled but didn’t care to correct his supposed mistake and neither did the other party seem offended at that. Rather, it seemed they were familiar with each other’s attitude and have long come to terms with it.
Soon, there was another flash of light followed by the now familiar event, revealing another man of an average, short build in the corner of the hall. He immediately turned to the original occupant of the hall and presented a greeting with a slight bow.
“I, the Vibrant poison master of the Deep valley palace, greet the Mighty Purple Thunder Lord.”
Unlike the earlier arrival, the newcomer received a standing greeting from the master of the Purple Mountain sect. The greeting was a simple salute with hands without a bow, indicating his superior cultivation and social standing. He gestured to the newcomer towards another chair with a “Please.”
The man with colourful attire, had sharp cunning, snake-like eyes, as if he was trying to justify his title. He took his seat opposite the wild looking man and immediately threw a vicious glare towards him.
“I apologise to the thunder lord for the short delay. Someone played a prank on me at an inappropriate time.”
The gloomy man simply nodded in acknowledgement, while the other casually chuckled and ignored them otherwise.
The man in the centre, with the clearly superior rank, started, “Our secret party has confirmed that they will provide their full support, including the promised rewards, so long as we succeed. They have given their approvals for the grand plan.”
The ever stoic poison master broke his expression at the mention of the secret party, “I sure hope this isn’t a mistake we’re committing by collaborating with them of all people…”
*snort*
“By the Goddess’ filthy balls!! Wei Dushe, are you getting cold feet after coming this far?? You better not back out at the last minute. Remember, no one ever achieved immortality by treading the safe path and there are rewards only within risks.”
“Hmph. I will never go back on my word and you already have it. I’m merely concerned for our sect’s future in case things go wrong. A barbarian muscle brain like you wouldn’t understand.”
“No need for doubt at this point. As long as we stick to the plans, we won’t have to worry about the consequences. The blame will be shifted onto the dead and the dead no longer have a voice.
“It is paramount that we keep it a secret from the Golden Guardian Palace and as long as you 2 keep it between us, no one will find the truth. After all, the Hegemons are busy dealing with their own wounds festering. With that, nobody cares for the truth anyways.
“Speaking of which, both of you better be vigilant not to slip your tongue in the meeting today.”
The replies were immediate in response.
“Ofcourse!”
“You have nothing to worry about.”
A quietness once again descended in the room for the next 5 minutes until it was broken by the familiar event of a teleportation gate opening.
This time, a middle aged average looking man appeared in golden attire with the perfect decorum of a military official. Immediately, all three seated individuals disappeared from their places and appeared in front of the new arrival. This time, even the wild and casual Zhang Bohai followed.
The original occupant bowed very slightly with a greeting, while the other 2 bowed deeper and stayed silent.
“Greetings to the Southern Bulwark of the mighty Golden Guardian Palace.”
The one on the receiving end quickly mirrored the bow as he said, “Please, I’m not worthy enough to be receiving such greetings from the Purple Mountain Lord himself. I’m merely a mid Zifu cultivator, here to represent the Golden Guardian Palace in our collaboration.”
The bowing Poison master quickly showed his deference, “The Southern Bulwark truly lives up to his reputation of being mighty yet humble. I express my admiration on behalf of our Deep Valley palace. Please take a seat.”
Even the third man didn’t dare show his disrespect and expressed his greetings and made some polite talk as they all took their seats.
“Let’s not waste time and get into the details of our main topic of this important meeting.”
The gloomy, Thunder lord simply nodded his head.
“As you wish. I’ve already explained last time what contributions are required from each of the parties for our grand plan to succeed.”
This story originates from Royal Road. Ensure the author gets the support they deserve by reading it there.
That earned nods of acknowledgement from all the others and he continued.
“Now, let me finally reveal the details of the plan.
“The plan to completely and thoroughly exterminate the traitors of the True Sky Immortal Sect and pull out its very roots.”
----------------------------------------
It had been a week since the crucial and pivotal event when Finlay succeeded in making a Harmonizing pill. Initially, his rate of success had been about only a mere 10% and even in that 10%, the number of pills in a batch were less than half of the standard number of 4. But in spite of all that, it was a significant boost to his cultivation speed and efficiency, especially with the beast cores. With the 8 late stage and 10 mid stage cores, he entered the late stage of the Wind attribute, very close to completing his third and the hardest element.
At the same time, he conducted a series of experiments and discovered that using his Qi from all the 5 elements allowed for a much better success rate for his pill making. It also seemed to improve the quality of the pills as well. Unfortunately, while he had an abundant supply of Water, Earth and Wind, he had very limited amounts of Fire and Metal attribute Qi. This meant that he couldn’t both use the 5 element Qi in the making and then again infuse it in the pill to increase its quality. Therefore, he had to come to a compromise that he would be wasteful of the resources and save his 5 element Qi to increase the pill quality when he is cooking them for himself and use it to increase the success rate when he is making them with the intention of selling.
By now, there was less than 5 days to go till the next pill distribution. This would be the 4th time and signified the 3 month mark since he entered the valley. He couldn’t believe that it had only been 3 months since he started his new life of cultivation.
‘It feels longer than the entire year I had spent in this world before this. Well, it had been a lot more eventful compared to that year’s time.’
Having used up all of the beast cores, loaded with poison cores from his hobby hunting–he had never given up on his mission to exterminate the mosquito scourge on behalf of Humanity– and with a dozen Harmonising pills ready to sell, it was time for him to return, so that he didn’t miss the pill distribution event. With the 5 days of extra time, he would take a detour to the Archery zone to see if he could sell the Harmonizing pills for some more wind attribute cores and perhaps hunt a bit on the way
He started early and arrived by the afternoon. There were familiar people coming to greet him as they noticed his return. The good will he earned from the last time seemed to have paid off. Finlay was not going to waste it. He still wasn’t sure about the exact location of the secret meet that would be critical for the completion of his metal attribute. He made some changes to the prices for the arrows. He removed the lower quality herbs that were used for Alchemy practice and were of little use to him currently. He also removed the mid stage wind elemental beast cores and increased the cost paid with the late stage wind cores. He simultaneously discounted the price if paid through fire attribute cores.
Apart from these changes, there was another board added listing the new Harmonizing pills for sale. It had a description of the pil’s effects at the top and then below that, he set a price of 1 Harmonising pill for 1 body transformation pill or a late stage fire attribute beast core. It could also be paid through a good amount of Alchemical ingredients required for the harmonising pills.
That new board instantly attracted a lot of attention, causing a lot of discussion. But nobody seemed to be coming forward to buy any of those pills. Finlay waited patiently, but by the evening, he was growing a bit anxious. He thought the pill was valuable enough that someone should have made the exchange.
‘Perhaps, they are not aware of the pill and its effects. Maybe I should try to explain it a bit better.’
As he was considering how he would go about doing that the next morning, suddenly there was a call.
“Brother Ming! Ah you finally came back.”
Finlay searched for the voice in the crowd and soon someone familiar pushed through. It was the leader of the group who loaned some arrows from Finlay, the last time he set up shop here, Dokgo Xu.
“Ah! It’s brother Xu. Nice to see you again. I hope your injured brother is doing well. “
“Yes he has almost recovered and is doing well thanks to you. You have no idea how glad I’m to see you today.”
After saying that, he came in front of him and suddenly gave a full bow.
“I must apologise for not fulfilling my promise. I did come back with the remaining amount, but due to circumstances, I got delayed and couldn’t make it back in time.”
“Haha, so that’s what this is about. Please brother, it’s fine. You paid me back enough. It could be said to be my own fault for not waiting for you to return.”
“How can that be? A word once promised has to be kept and I’ve failed at that. Please accept this as compensation.”
He took out a bag and handed it over to FInlay. It contained 3 late stage wind cores, a Fire attribute core and several useful herbs. Finlay frowned when he saw that the total value was far beyond what he was owed.
“Brother Xu, this is a bit much. You don’t owe me this much. I can’t accept it all.”
“No, I insist. In return, please forgive me for not fulfilling my promise.”
Finlay tried to pursue the other party a few times to no avail and he eventually relented and accepted the gift. He took out a couple of harmonising pills in return and offered it as a gift of friendship.
“These are…”
“I happened to stumble onto a few Harmonizing pills.” Finlay explained his situation without saying that he was the one who produced them.
“Brother Ming, knowledge is not the biggest issue you have, but believability. These pills are considered very precious and a random new candidate set up a stall in the middle of nowhere for a reasonable price of 1 pill per Body Transformation Pill?? For context, the market area has a few sellers who sell a limited stock of these and they charge an exorbitant amount of money or 3-4 of the Body Transformation pills for 1 of these. Otherwise, they would be a much more popular choice for some of the poorly talented candidates.”
Finlay was enlightened. He had to tell himself that having a local’s guidance, who had lived in the valley for years, saves a lot of trouble.
“Thank you for enlightening me Brother Xu. But now I wonder what do I have to do to make the others believe these are the real deal?”
“Ah, that's simple. You just have to make the first sale and once others see its effects are real, they will naturally come to claim the bargain that it is. Let me help you with that. I will talk to a few friends here and see what I can do.”
“Thank you brother! I appreciate your help!”
Within a few minutes, there were 2 people who exchanged it for a Harmonising pill each. One did so using a Body Transformation pill and another was exchanged for a late stage fire attribute core. The 2 then proceeded to try and cultivate. Not long has passed before one of them rushed to Finlay and brought another pill in joy at the pills being real and of decent quality. Once word got around, Finlay had a lot of customers, some of them trying to use headache inducing tactics to try to swindle some of the pills for cheap. Finlay didn’t have much trouble with his vastly superior cultivation and the support of Dokgo Xu’s group. He was also lucky enough that Dokgo freely provided the details on where exactly the secret meeting was happening.
In total, Finlay sold all of the 10 pills he had for a total of 3 Body transformation pills, 2 fire attribute late stage cores, 2 Wind attribute late stage cores and a large quantity of the Alchemical ingredients required for several batches of the Harmonizing pill. On top of that, he received a gift of 3 late stage wind attribute cores, 1 Fire attribute core and some more Alchemy ingredients. He also sold 15 more arrows for some cash and Alchemy materials. All in all, it was a bountiful harvest and with this, he would easily finish up his wind element tonight. With 3 elements completed, the 4th attribute, fire, would also advance considerably with the 4 available cores and all he would need is something to help with his metal attribute. Hopefully he would find that something at the secret meeting coming up on the 2nd night after pill distribution.
To be continued.
Preview - System Status
Identity :
Finlay
Male
14 yrs old
–
Mortality :
Sura (Mortal)
Job :
None
Titles :
None
Cultivation :
Body Transformation stage level 9 (Water and Earth Dual attribute cultivation)
Stats :
→open←
Skills :
The All seeing eye (Analyse) :
(Grade - E)
Authority granted by the first god of the world, Dinn. You can peer into the secrets of things and beings of this world as long as you know what you’re looking for. (Requires activation conditions)
Inventory space :
(Locked until Foundation Establishment)
Universal Language comprehension (Grade A+);
Mana Blast (Grade F+)
Preview - Stats
Spiritual :
Cultivation Talent :
S+ Grade (Appears as C-)
Divine Sense :
None
Law Comprehension :
S Grade
Physical :
Body Type :
Five Element body (Grade : B+(Aggregate)) (Appears as C-)
Elemental Attunements :
Metal
S- Grade
Five Element Body Type
(Dominant trait)
Earth
A Grade
Wind
C+ Grade
Fire
C- Grade
Water
D Grade
Light/Darkness(Yin/Yang)
D- Grade
Lightning
F+ Grade
Other Talents :
Weapon Talents :
Sword/Bladed type
A+ Grade
Ranged
C+ Grade
Hand to Hand
C Grade
Polearms/Spear
D Grade
Soul based/Mental type
D- Grade
Qi Circuits :
(Arrays, Formations, Magical Restrictions)
B- Grade
Crafting Talent :
C+ Grade
Alchemy Talent :
D+ Grade