“Are you feeling alright? You don’t need to kneel that far down…did she get lost here or something, Sun Shen?”

Zhang Dong whispered the last part into Sun Shen’s ear while looking down at a strange grandma who looked like a witch. After he left the special battle area she had face-planted down on the floor and was prostrating herself before him. His battle with the guardians was one-sided and all but he didn’t think they would react this extremely.

“No Honorable Golden Dragon, this is Leader Qiaolian she is part of our sect…”

“Is that so…”

When looking at the old woman that was performing a dogeza bow before him, he started feeling uncomfortable. It always felt strange for the elders in this world to do it, even though he was a lot more powerful than she was, there was still a big difference in age. The woman looked to be in the twilight years of the nascent soul level.

‘She must be over nine hundred years old…’

“Please stand up Leader Qiaolian, there is no need for this.”

He beckoned her to stand up and luckily the old woman followed his proposition. Before getting to this meeting he got a short briefing from Sun Shen. The names of all the various leaders were known to him and this woman was part of the Astral Lily faction that was known for their foresight techniques.

These would allow people to see a second or so into the future and allow them to react to some attacks. It was somewhat similar to reading the flow of battle but it had some downsides. At first, it might have seemed that knowing for sure what an opponent would do was a big advantage but at the higher levels of power this wasn’t true.

A second was a lot of time for a nascent soul master. If the person with the foresight ability used it and knew that a right punch was coming they could counter it. However, if the opponent was good at reading the flow of battle they could instantly alter the trajectory of the fist.

Using future sight to predict enemy attacks cost a lot of spiritual energy and were usually slower than outright reacting to movements. This didn’t mean that it could be always countered, if a person trained in both foresight and was good at predicting the flow of battle they would make a dangerous opponent for anyone.

“I am truly blessed to have lived long enough to be spoken to by the Immortal of legends!”

“Immortal of legends?”

“Ah yes… Leader Qiaolian is a staunch believer in an old legend that speaks of Immortal rebirth, you can ignore her if you wish.”

“How dare you speak in that way to the Immortal, bow down your heads you old fools!”

The old lady peeked her head up to look at Leader Shen and Leader Zhong. The others looked at her as if she was crazy and Zhang Dong was just trying not to instigate anything. At least the woman belonged to one of the neutral factions so she would probably vote in his favor.

“The Immortal? I think your elder has quite the admiration for me but I’m not quite an Immortal.”

He chuckled a bit to ease the tension between this group of cultivators. Everyone was somewhat looking stressed out after he just popped out of nowhere next to them. It was possible that they could have tried to do something underhanded so he set up a teleportation point on the outside and then used him after winning the bout against the twin guardians.

The two weren’t weak by any means but their power was just slightly above that of a demi-human tribe chief. They would probably be able to win against one but probably one of the combatants would be injured or even die. With this amount of power, they were certainly not capable of taking out an Emperor level threat.

It wasn’t strange that they were weary of his movements now. Just a few moments ago he toyed around with one of the two most powerful experts this sect could offer. While they probably had some secret treasures that could increase their power further, it didn’t mean that those would be enough. Also after witnessing his teleportation capabilities they probably assumed that they were never capable of confining him here in the first place.

This meant that he could have killed any one of their ten leaders and the Patriarch. After witnessing his close-quarters capabilities and how easily he defeated the twin guardians they were scared. They all managed to survive for a good reason, all of them were good at assessing danger and they knew that it would be unreasonable to aggravate Zhang Dong. Leader Zhong in particular was starting to quiet down and inching toward the people from his faction.

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Perhaps in his eyes, three or four of their leaders would be enough to cut him down. The only problem was the bout that took place inside the pseudo-realm. There all of them could see one of the passed-out guardians while the other was popping recovery pills to help with the swollen face. No grand techniques were really used during that combat demonstration, it was just an all-around loss for their side.

“Nonsense, the honored Immortal just doesn’t recognize his legacy yet but if you wish, This servant would be glad to tell the legend.”

“The legend? Sure, I don’t mind listening to your story.”

The others did quiet down but the old woman continued to talk. He wasn’t sure where she was going with this but hearing out an old legend could be helpful. Perhaps it would give him an idea of some kind of hidden treasure trove that would aid him in this war. It could also point him to a weakness of the overseer that he still needed to face in the end even after all of this was over.

“Yes, the honored Golden Dragon is probably tired after his presentation, why don’t we resume our talks tomorrow?”

Sun Shen proposed this notion and the other elders were all for it. This would give them precious time to discuss this one-sided beatdown and even let the guardians recover from the injuries for the next meeting. The man known as the Golden Dragon was not someone that they could disrespect and this also put their relationship with the Azure Emperor into perspective.

If Zhang Dong was this strong then perhaps his older brother was even stronger considering he was still the one on the top of the Empire. What would happen to them if these two decided to team up against them in the future? Now was the chance to foster a good relationship with this new powerhouse of a cultivator. Sun Shen seemed to have realized this sooner than the others and this would give the Moon Lily faction a lot more breathing room as they were already in Zhang Dong’s good graces.

“Yes, I’m sure you have things to discuss but let us not forget about the real enemies that are plaguing your borders. I will aid you if you so wish, so please decide on what you are going to do before it’s too late.”

“We will consider your wise words.”

The Patriarch nodded while all of them flew away. His side consisted of the three leaders from the Moon Lily faction side that were eager to get to know him and the old lady that was just prostrating herself before him. Even though she was of advanced age her mouth continued to move as she spits out long-forgotten fables. This somewhat caused the other two elders to be dejected as they couldn’t introduce themselves to him just yet.

“Let me describe the legend of the Immortal being that walks this earth every hundred thousands of years, it’s a tale passed down from faction leader to faction leader for generations…”

He perked up as she gave him a number that he was familiar with. If this legend told of an immortal that appeared every hundred thousand years then it could be only one thing it was referring to, a system holder. By the things that he saw at the secret ground his predecessor made, he too came at a hundred thousand-year interval.

This old woman painted the legend a bit differently but it was clear that this was what she was talking about. Apparently every so often an immortal would appear, they would show genius-like progress and quickly reach the pinnacle of power. A century of turmoil would follow as they appeared but would be continued by an era of prosperity and peace.

This was probably all hogwash as depending on the character of the system holder they could very well destroy everything around them, just like wang long. The time frames added up though, hundred years of wars with the other empires and then peace after it was all over. With the system aiding these ‘immortals’ it was easy to win even against all odds. The legend then ended with the immortal achieving godhood and ascending to a higher realm.

“So, are you saying that I’m the same Immortal that always appears? Why would an Immortal being need to be reborn every hundred thousand years?”

“Our people have no right to make any assumptions, the deep insights of the immortal are his to contemplate!”

“I see… I guess there are ways of explaining it…”

The other elders looked at Zhang Dong with interest as he didn’t discard the preposterous legend outright. However, this didn’t mean that they actually believed that he was some old monster and an immortal to boot. Explaining the system to them would be meaningless but there were a few alternative techniques that could explain it all.

“Perhaps it's a way of prolonging life by rebirth, even though we call it the immortal realm we don’t really know if a person that reaches that stage can actually live forever!”

“That does make sense.”

Sun Shen nodded as they finally arrived at his personal valley side resort. There he could rest for the day and then go see if they would allow him to take part in their war. Even when they wouldn’t it didn’t mean that he couldn’t delve into their lands by himself. The show of strength wasn’t just to convince them of the dire situation they were in, it was also meant as a warning. Now that they knew that he was more powerful than their best masters, they would be unable to deny his entrance into the East.

‘Still… it will be better if I can join up with their troops instead of wandering these lands alone, I’ll just get lost and sidetracked as always.’

Another awkward day of old people trying to crawl up his ass awaited him. He could tell that Sun Shen had prepared a feast and many other cultivators were already flying here to greet him. This was part of living at the top but he never could get used to the awkward exchanges.