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Translator: Truth
Editor: Dhael Ligerkeys
The next day after he brought the remnants of the Rogue Wanderers’ Club to the Outpost, he consulted their opinion before taking them to the headquarters as the Legate-In-Charge.
After Shui Yuan imprinted them with the Battlefield Imprint in her capacity as the Keeper of the Seal, and the standard ceremonies were performed, they officially became members of the Crimson Blood Sect.
In other words, the Crimson Blood Sect now had five Spirit Creek Realm disciples including Lu Yi.
Ruan Ling Yu was obviously happy with the outcome, and even the stoic Kong Niu wore a bigger-than-normal smile on his face. After all, life as independent cultivators was austere in the best of circumstances. Now, they no longer had to worry about that.
Hua Ci though… Lu Ye could sense that she didn’t care nearly as much about joining a sect, but that was hardly unsurprising. As a Sixth-Order medicine cultivator, there was no Outer Circle sect who wouldn’t accept her with open arms. Medicine cultivators would always be a must-have to major sects.
The reason she still joined the Crimson Blood Sect despite not really feeling it was because of two reasons. One, she wanted to give Ruan Ling Yu and Kong Niu some stability especially after that harrowing incident. Two, it was because of Lu Ye.
Come to think of it, she had considered recruiting Lu Ye into the Rogue Wanderers’ Club by force at the beginning. However, she ultimately decided against it because she was afraid that he belonged to a major faction or something.
Now the Rogue Wanderers’ Club was gone, and she herself had joined the Crimson Blood Sect instead. Life truly was as interesting as it was unpredictable.
All Crimson Blood Sect disciples were paid a monthly salary. All sects provided this basic benefit. When Ruan Ling Yu accepted her very first salary from Shui Yuan, the girl had smiled and smiled and suddenly burst into tears without warning. Yi Yi had to console her for a while before she regained her composure.
On a side note, Lu Ye had expended a great deal of effort to construct a number of Gathering Spirit glyphs in several rooms. It was to improve the trio’s cultivation efficiency. Now that they had joined the Crimson Blood Sect, the salary Shui Yuan paid them should be more than enough to sustain their cultivation in the short term.
When he walked out of the training chamber, he realized that Hua Ci was waiting for him outside. Lu Ye’s handiwork had given Hua Ci quite the shock when she gave the training chamber a go and discovered that it was brimming with World Spiritual Qi. She was starting to understand how Lu Ye was improving so quickly.
“What’s the matter?” He asked.
Hua Ci replied, “The reason you sought me out at Mount Ying is the Battle Royale of the Legates, isn’t it?”
“Who told you that?” Lu Ye exclaimed in surprise. He was going to wait another two days before bringing this up to Hua Ci. He did not expect her to find out the truth herself so quickly.
“Chen Yu’s the one who told me about it. He said you were planning to sift through the independent cultivators and see if there’s anyone suitable who will join you.”
Lu Ye nodded. “That is the plan, yes.”
“Then why didn’t you tell me sooner? Are you worried that I will drag you down?”
“What? No! I just haven’t found the time to do so. So, what is your decision?”
Hua Ci said in a docile voice, “You are the one who saved my life. Do I even have the right to say no? Naturally, I will obey anything you say.”
“Cut it out.” Lu Ye’s skin crawled with goosebumps. “Anyway, tell me your decision when you’re ready. If you’re joining, then you should know that the registration will happen in a couple of days. If not, that is fine too. This is not a mandatory participation.”
“Sure, I’ll go. Why wouldn’t I? If you, a Fifth-Order, aren’t afraid, what do I, a Sixth-Order, have to fear?” Hua Ci replied with a sweet smile on her lips.
Lu Ye nodded and started toward the Sanctum of Providence. However, he didn’t go far before turning back and looking at Hua Ci seriously. “Just so you know, the opposing Legate-In-Charge has at least one Seventh-Order cultivator. There will be danger. Are you sure you want to come?”
“I already told you I’m coming.” She giggled. “Who will bury your corpse if not me?”
Lu Ye snorted before leaving for real this time.
It took him almost no time to arrive at the Sanctum of Providence. After connecting to the Divine Opportunity Column as the Legate-In-Charge, he spent five hundred Contribution to purchase a Blessing.
He immediately sensed something extraordinary going on inside the Divine Opportunity Column. It made clicking sounds while turning from side to side.
Then, the concentration of the surrounding World Spiritual Qi became noticeably thicker.
A Divine Opportunity Column with no Blessing whatsoever naturally increased the concentration of Spiritual Qi in the Outpost by ten percent. A single Blessing would improve that effect by another ten percent. In other words, the Spiritual Qi within the Outpost was twenty percent thicker than it was outside.
Lu Ye tried to purchase another Blessing but did not succeed. It was because he had run out of Contribution Points.
His Legate-In-Charge imprint informed him that he would need one thousand Contribution Points to purchase a second Blessing. He did not know how much the third Blessing would cost, but according to Li Baxian the cost would keep increasing as more Blessings were added. Clearly, improving the Divine Opportunity Column wasn’t something a single cultivator could do. The entire sect had to work together to gather the Contribution Points necessary to improve it.
Besides that, the Legate-In-Charge had the right to make some adjustments to the range of the Blessing such as restricting them to certain areas only. If he wanted to, he could exclude the bazaar and prevent the independent cultivators living there from enjoying the effects of the Blessing at all.
With this Blessing imposed came the opportunity for the Crimson Blood Sect to participate in the Battle Royal. Lu Ye was wondering how he should proceed when he felt the same tingly and sublime sensation whenever the Heavens interacted with mortals. His Battlefield Imprint burned like a brand mark and all of a sudden, a torrent of information surged into his mind.
Now that they had a Blessing, the Crimson Blood Sect was officially qualified to register for participation in the Battle Royale of the Legates. It took Lu Ye some time before he finally figured out how to carry out the registration. A pillar of light descended from the skies, warming his Battlefield Imprint and causing the energy within to churn a little. At the same time, a lot of useful information flooded his mind.
There were still a few days before the Battle Royale of the Legates officially began. During this time, Lu Ye planned to improve his cultivation to the Sixth-Order. He was now only a step away from doing so.
This was the real reason he felt confident enough to participate in the battle royale. He might be less confident as a Fifth-Order cultivator, but a Sixth-Order? That would be a different story.
At the headquarters, Lu Ye and Hua Ci entered a sanctum behind the Summit of Fortitude together.
“You were looking for us, sect master?” Lu Ye greeted while clasping his hands in salute. Hua Ci also performed a disciple’s salutations.
The old man turned around to face them. “Your senior sister told me that you are planning to join the Battle Royale of the Legates, and that you’ve already completed the registration. Is that true?”
“Yes, sect master.”
“It will be a good experience.” The sect master nodded slightly. “It’s been decades since the Crimson Blood Sect has accepted a disciple, and your presence has made the sect so much livelier than it was before. I would like to lend you a hand, but there is only so much an old man like me could do, not to mention that that previous incident nearly killed you.”
Lu Ye hurriedly responded, “As a member of the Crimson Blood Sect, it is only natural that the feuds and favors of the sect will fall on my shoulders. Plus, the reason I survived is thanks to the sect’s reputation, however much it waned. You do not need to trouble yourself with this, sect master.”
The sect master stroked his beard. “I am glad to hear your thoughts, boy.” He then let out a sigh before adding, “Come. There is a place you two should visit.”
He started toward the exit as he said this. Lu Ye and Hua Ci hurriedly followed behind him.
After they left the sanctum, the sect master flapped his sleeves once and summoned a powerful gust of Spiritual Power. It wrapped around Lu Ye and Hua Ci and carried them all into the sky.
A moment later, they landed on the summit of a Spirit Peak. Lu Ye looked around and spotted the Summit of Fortitude just a short distance away from them. It probably meant that this Spirit Peak was still within the boundary of the headquarters.
There was a building on the summit, but it didn’t look like a sanctum, a tower, or anything like he had ever seen, actually. It was pretty unique-looking.
After they arrived outside the entrance of the building, the sect master looked back at them and said, “Wait here.”
He then turned back toward the entrance, straightened his expression, and stepped inside.
Outside the building, Hua Ci elbowed Lu Ye and stared at him inquiringly. However, the young man could only shake his head at her. He had no idea this location even existed, let alone the reasons the sect master had brought them here.
Suddenly, a woman’s voice came from the building, “How dare you show your face around here?”
Lu Ye was surprised. [Someone lives here?]
Suddenly, a powerful gust of wind blew out from inside the building. Even with Lu Ye’s eyesight, he just barely caught a glimpse of a person being thrown out of the entrance and causing a huge bang when they crashed against a large tree.
The wind was so strong that his clothes wouldn’t stop flapping, and his face actually hurt from the contact. When he spun around and narrowed his eyes at the victim, he blanched. It was none other than the sect master himself! Hua Ci and him hurriedly rushed to his side and lifted him back to his feet.
There was a bluish black circle around the sect master’s left eye. It was clear that someone had punched him in the face.
“Sect master, what on—” Lu Ye could not even begin to fathom what was going on here. All he knew was that a woman lived in this building, and she had just kicked the sect master’s ass…
“I’m fine, I’m fine.” The sect master smoothed the wrinkles in front of his shirt before explaining, “An old friend of mine lives here, and as you may have noticed, she’s a little more hot-tempered than most. Don’t worry, I’ll get through to her eventually. Just wait here.”
For some reason, his explanation left Lu Ye and Hua Ci completely speechless. They watched blankly as the old man slowly entered the building once more.
“Get lost! I swear I’ll break your third leg if you dare show your face to me again!”
Another yell, another time the sect master slammed against the same tree and slowly slid to the ground like a cartoon. This time, his right eye was covered in a bluish black circle. At least the fist prints were matching now—not!
“Sect master!” Lu Ye just could not stand and do nothing after seeing this. However, the sect master raised his hand and said again,
“It’s fine. If she wants to vent, then let her vent.”
He rose to his feet and walked toward the building for the third time. He cut such a courageous and dauntless figure that Lu Ye could not help but feel respect toward the man!
It didn’t take long for the woman to start yelling, and Spiritual Power to flood out of the building once more. Both Lu Ye and Hua Ci held their breaths in trepidation as they wondered if the sect master was going to be punched out a third time.
He did not. In fact, the yells and scoldings actually declined over time. Things were happening a little too quickly for Lu Ye to understand, but thankfully he had a temptress to whisper the answer right beside his ear, “I guarantee you that the woman living here is the sect master’s lover.”
“Are you serious?” Lu Ye rolled his eyes at her. “Did you not see the sect master getting his ass kicked twice?”
Hua Ci merely chuckled. “You’re still young. You don’t know women yet.”
“And you do?”
“Duh! I’m a woman! Of course I know women,” She declared while puffing up her chest.
She was right, of course. Lu Ye didn’t even know why he asked such a stupid question in the first place.
A while later, the sect master’s authoritative voice finally came from inside. “Come in.”
Lu Ye and Hua Ci immediately straightened their expressions and returned a respectful response. Then, they filed into the building with Lu Ye in the lead.
Astonishment spread across the young man’s features when he crossed over the threshold and looked around. It was because the building looked small from the outside, but the inside was like a completely different world. He saw wondrous glyphs swimming on all four walls of the buildings like fish.They also appeared and disappeared on occasion.
When he tried to identify the glyphs, he was surprised to find that he did not recognize a single one of them.
They were inside what looked to be a sanctum, and the sect master was standing next to a gorgeous-looking lady. Although she looked like she was in her twenties, her actual age was up for debate. Someone with a keen eye would notice that her eyes were nothing like that of a young woman.
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