After flying for half an hour, the mortal and immortal pair landed on a tall mountain.

In front of them was a large hall with pillars made out of green jade supporting it.

Xing Yi’s landing was less than graceful and he almost fell over in the process. His jaw immediately dropped at how ridiculous lavish the hall was. Where did they get all this jade from?

These immortals were without a doubt very rich. Well, why wouldn’t they be?

With Mo Zhi leading in front and Xing Yi following from behind, they walked inside. As Mo Zhi approached the front desk and began talking to an old man who was sitting behind it, Xing Yi wouldn’t stop gaping at the mystic art and treasures laid throughout the hall.

No. This was beyond stupid. This was ridiculous. Just how?

After a bit of a back and forth between Mo Zhi and the old man sitting behind the desk, Mo Zhi bowed respectfully to the old man and left, walking past him and out of the hall.

“Mortal, come with me,” The old man stood up from the desk and ordered impatiently.

Hearing this, Xing Yi stood at attention and quickly followed him down a hall to the left. They walked down it, into a corridor to the left and until they stood in front of a door completely made out of jade. It wasn’t just this single door either, every single door was made out of jade.

Inserting his palm into a palm-shaped indent on the door, it glowed blue and magically swung open. Inside was a quaint room with a few furnishings, a small bookshelf, a bed and a wooden table with a few chairs around it.

“This will be your room until the stewards decide what to do with you. Now, take this bottle,” The old man said before handing over a white bottle.

Xing Yi took the bottle with a bow and cupped hands and didn’t dare open it in front of him.

“These are food pills. Eat them whenever you start to feel hungry. Don’t eat more than three at once as you might vomit and get severe cramping. Although this room is the worst one inside the entire hall, I am still the one who will have to clean it up. So be warned mortal. Until then.”

The old man showed no interest in talking to him and gave him only the very basics before immediately leaving.

Mortal?

Xing Yi felt as if he was being looked down upon as if he was just an ant by the old man. He didn’t even properly look him in the eye and seemed to just gaze into the distance over his head. It was a weird feeling.

But he forgot about the old man’s attitude and made himself comfortable. There wasn’t anything to do. However, there was a bookshelf at the side of the room but he couldn’t read at all. Regardless, he flipped through all of them, hoping to find pictures to look at but he ended up empty-handed.

He started wandering around the place in circles.

He was in a sect of immortals!

He couldn’t stop thinking about this and looked at everything incredulously. He couldn’t stop the sheer awe he was feeling.

However, at the same time, inside a tall rocky mountain covered in vegetation, with a gate-like structure jutting out the right side of it, was a meeting of the sect’s stewards. These stewards were like administrators and managers of the sect. They didn’t make the big decisions but merely handled small matters like Xing Yi’s case with his Heaven Chosen Medallion.

The hall wasn’t grand nor luxurious like the Guest Hall, but traditional and had an ancient feeling. There was no decoration. The floors, walls, ceilings were all made out of a grey stone, square and rectangular pieces fitting together to form it.

At a long wooden table in the centre of the room were thirty men of varying ages. They wore all wore purple robes, the official colour of the Bloody Path Sect. Standing at attention at the front of the meeting table was Mo Zhi.

“This is the real thing. Without a shred of doubt,” The head steward, Li Guoji, nodded his head in confirmation as he held the medallion in hand.

“Well, are we just going to let him in the sect?” Another Steward asked.

“Yes. We will. Our sect still honours and upholds the Heaven Chosen Medallion even if someone hasn’t done so in the last several hundred years. Are there any objections?”

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Silence descended upon the group until one particularly fat man asked curiously, “Have we confirmed if the mortal boy has spiritual roots or not? Because didn’t he say that he wasn’t part of a clan? Wouldn’t his chances of having spiritual roots be extremely low?”

Li Guoji realised how he had almost overlooked something and asked Mo Zhi, “Mo Zhi, can you bring over the mortal boy to see if he has any spiritual roots?”

“Yes, head steward,” Mo Zhi respectfully bowed before immediately leaving in a ray of blue light into the distance.

In the meantime, Li Guoji distracted himself and the others by talking about other matters.

An hour later, Xing Yi arrived alongside Mo Zhi.

The pair walked up to front end of the table. Xing Yi received many looks from the immortals at the table. He felt a suffocating pressure as their gazes simultaneously landed on him.

“Xing Yi, come over,” Li Guoji goaded Xing Yi over with a friendly voice.

Xing Yi who had just arrived here, quickly complied. He had just been meditating when Mo Zhi had walked inside and told him that they needed to go somewhere. They flew for half an hour and that’s how he ended inside this large hall that was placed at the top of a tall and rocky mountain.

He had no clue how they managed to carve out such a place like this.

Xing Yi walked over to Li Guoji.

“Give me your hand,” He asked.

Xing Yi extended his hand, and the middle-aged man retrieved his forearm with a tight grip. Li Guoji closed his eyes and focused inwards. Seconds passed and that’s when Xing Yi felt an ice-cold liquid seemingly pouring into his body. Xing Yi froze up.

However, Li Guoji quickly left go and the feeling disappeared.

Li Guoji shook his head and said, “He has no spiritual roots.”

What?

Xing Yi didn’t know what was going on but when he heard that he didn’t have what the man had called ‘spiritual roots’, it didn’t seem good for him.

“Then kick him out. We don’t want a mortal in our sect,” A skinny old man with bony fingers immediately demanded.

“No! Give me a moment,” Li Guoji snapped back.

The skinny man exhaled out of his nose aggressively and crossed his arms.

Li Guoji said, “He should still be able to cultivate externally, no?”

However, the skinny old man interjected in opposition.

“This is a sect of internal cultivation. True cultivators. Not fake ones!” The skinny oldman frowned.

“Quiet! I will not have you speaking like this in my meeting!” Li Guoji shouted.

The old man harrumphed.

Silence briefly descended onto them, allowing Li Guoji to regain his calm. It gave him time to think.

Li Guoji stroked his beard as he finally came to a decision after a few moments, “Ok, how about this? You can either live a life of comfort as a noble down in Rising Dragon City. One of my great nephews is the head of the house and will treat you quite well. Or you can join the sect only as an unofficial disciple. You will not receive any benefits from the sect, but you can still operate within it and can access it’s facilities. Choose wisely…”

“Umm…” Xing Yi wondered as he stared up towards the ceiling.

Temptation arose within his heart as he thought about living a life of comfort as a noble. But with where he was now, the temptation was not strong enough and it was very easy for him to choose.

Still, even with how easy it was for him to choose, he had a feeling of uncertainty in his heart as it started beating faster and faster.

Even as what he called an ‘unofficial disciple’, he felt that the benefit of being any sort of disciple would be far better than just being part of a noble family.

“I want to join the sect. Even if I have to be an unofficial disciple,” Xing Yi decided.

“Ok, we have come to a decision,” LI Guoji clasped his hands together.

However, out the corner of his eye, Li Guoji could see the old man with a bitter expression on his face.

He eyed Xing Yi with a deadly look in his eyes.