‘Well, that went better than I expected… now what?’

After going through the Long Clan, raising his holy energies to a new level, and giving his disciple some pointers, Zhang Dong was back in his secret lair. It was the same room he teleported to when the Soaring Dragon Sect was attacking through which he could look at his territory without being bothered.

While he wanted to do nothing more than to return to his family, he needed to think. What would be the best plan for the coming future that was more uncertain than ever. Zhang Dong wasn’t sure but he needed to make a decision. The other elders could make propositions but in the end, it was him that needed to make the decision. A decision that would dictate if more people would die or not.

‘What options do I have…’

He started to pace back and forth while looking at the monitor screens. On them, there were many sect members running around. The city had been freshly destroyed and the rubble was still being cleared out. The city populace was also still scattered in all directions while some sect members were with them for protection.

‘If those bridges between empires open up, then the common people are at risk…’

The first problem was with the normal people that just wanted to live their lives. Not everyone cared for this war between empires as not everyone was a cultivator. In reality, the majority of people in the world were in the ‘mortal’ category while the ‘immortals’ were a vast minority.

But in a world where one cultivator could without effort eradicate thousands of lives with a wave of their hand, it was obvious who was in charge. What the mortals could do was flee to the outer reaches where the spiritual energy was low and cultivators were sparse.

His sect was in such an area that posed a problem of its own. It was a very well-established sect with many resources and good technology. It would probably be a prime target for any attackers from the other empires.

Luckily the escape mechanism of the sect had not been used yet. They would be able to flee to the designated locations if their formations fell to the attack. Thus some would probably want to remain here and wait it out. The grand formation was powered by the spirit vein under their lands, it was much more powerful than regular formations at a close level to the one that the Long Clan had.

When he looked from the point of the game, the Long Clan flying city was probably the last bastion of defense. From what he knew, the Azure Emperor was sure that even if they lost all of their lands, the flying fortress could not be breached.

They could remain there indefinitely and just wait for the bridges between empires to close. The was war supposed to take about a hundred years but it was not really clear. For him and the other nascent soul masters that could live a thousand years, this was nothing.

Some would probably prefer this turtle tactic. Most of the cultivators just cared about their own lands and sects. If the rest of the empire was eradicated in this war, it didn’t matter at all. After a hundred years they would just repopulate them again with their own branch families like the last time this happened.

It seemed to Zhang Dong that the Long Clan flying city was something to act as a safe point for the system holder. From there they could leave and farm for spirit points in a world filled with battle. Then maybe within those hundred years they would achieve victory and amass enough points to get to the next level.

‘Maybe the longer this war lasts the stronger the enemies will become… something like a horde mode in games, they will just keep coming in waves, some of them bringing bosses that you’re supposed to defeat?’

He could only speculate on the true way that this new phase would play out. If the enemies just came in waves then having a good well-protected fortress would be the best option. But the big question was if this sect that he had created was enough to push back the impending doom or not.

If the spiritual formations fell in the coming onslaught, then he would be responsible for many deaths of his own people. It might have been better to just move their base of operations into the Azure Emperor’s castle.

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‘There is one problem, I don’t think they will just let me move the entire city into their territory…;

While the Azure Emperor treated him like a blood brother, he wasn’t the only one there. Zhang Dong could see them only accepting the innermost sect members without letting him bring over the common people that would be left out in the dust.

The lands that he controlled were also vast, much more than Spirit Spring City. There were various other similar metropolitans with millions of people living there. They were run by small clans that had trouble even producing one core formation master.

He was unaware of the scope of the attackers but how things were now, he believed them to have many cultivators at similar power levels as nascent soul masters. Saint Emperor and Saint Emperors from the Emerald Phoenix empire would probably swarm them. Without nascent soul cultivators to patrol the lands the cities would be in shambles.

‘The sect had improved a lot though… they should have a good chance of defending the lands…’

One good thing that came out of Wang Long’s attack was that he had forced his sect members to progress further. Now his sect probably possessed one of the largest forces in the empire. The number of early-stage nascent soul cultivators they now had was staggering, probably enough to give the big three a run for their money.

‘If I ask the others for their input…’

While looking at the motivated masters already training and improving their newly gained cultivation, he knew what they would want. The people from his sect were born in difficult times, it was an eat or be eaten kind of world. They would probably want to rise up to the challenge and prove themselves, gain experience through battle as well as new resources to go further beyond.

“But there are more important things in this world than blind pride.”

While he knew that his people would dive into the midst of battle the moment he ordered them, he was conflicted in asking. His gaze turned to a certain screen on which he saw two children. They were in the process of a fight which was somewhat surprising.

On one side was Zhang Xiu, her eyebrows were at an angle as she was yanking what looked to be some kind of child-sized doll. On the other side was Zhang Jun whose face was filled with tears. There were no adults in the room; the two were as their mother was away ordering some sect to reposition some furniture.

As their house had crumbled to dust after he revealed the flying fortress built under it, they needed to relocate into a new mansion. One of the elders agreed to relocate elsewhere as they took over one of the larger mansions at the main sect.

This was the first time that Zhang Dong saw his kids interacting without adults being there. It seems that Xiu was in charge as she had no trouble shouting at her brother who was desperately trying to hold onto the doll.

‘Wait that toy… is it?’

A memory from about a year ago rushed into his head. It was a few weeks before he had to go away to fight his favorite tentacle monster. Before he went away, both his kids were already in this world and he had created a certain set of toys.

Being a big nerd back in his old world, he always enjoyed large robots. Thus not knowing what his kids would like he created two small robots, one pink and one blue. One of these robots was now being pulled from both sides by his children, it was the pink one that he had given to his daughter before leaving.

‘Wait… wasn’t the other one here…’

He had almost forgotten all about it as he had lost his entire spatial ring and all the items there. Luckily some of his creations were here, right in this room that he used to get away from it all. In one of the spatial rings here he found it, a half-meter tall toy robot. It had a little blue shield in one hand and a little gun in the other.

While this looked like a toy, it was actually a functional puppet with some armor over it. It could carry out basic commands and even fly around. The little blaster it had in its hand could shoot out a blast of spiritual energy. These blasts would produce a nice light show but would not cause any harm even to a child.

The other one that he gave to his daughter had a more feminine shape and was red. It had a similar armament and function as this one as he hoped that they would order them around to perform battle moves. He hoped to improve on these toys later but as he was in a rush this was all for now.

It brought a smile to his face that the last toy that he made for his daughter was still being used. But as he was reminiscing about the past, he saw on the screen that an accident happened. The toy was made from softer elements and was not really built to resist that much pulling. Soon one of the arms that was being pulled snapped away causing both of the kids to fly in opposite directions.

‘Oh… she looks really mad…’

Xiu was left with a one-armed battle bot toy, while Liu was left with an arm. The older sister’s previously mad face started watering up as well and it seemed that her brother was in for a beating.

While he thought this was a normal reaction from his daughter's side, he wasn’t sure why his son was so clingy too. The toy that he made was not something that was made for him, he still had some attachment to it. At first, he thought that his son didn’t care that much about his father but maybe he was wrong about that.

‘I guess it’s time to act like a father for once…’

He gave out a sigh while his heart rate increased. A whole year had passed since he had to act as a father. Before it was quite easy, his daughter was just a bundle of energy that was quite attached to him.

Now it wouldn’t be so easy, she was much older and he also had a five-year-old son that didn’t know him at all. This might have been the hardest enemy that he would face to this day, being a parent.