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Immortal Freeloader 163
🕑 Added 2024-10-05 03:52:01 +0000 UTCOnce I had established a proper spiritual pillar for the Forest Dance, it didn’t mean my work was over. On the contrary, I needed to intensify my task of expanding the enclaves. While I wanted to still keep them hidden, secrecy wasn’t as paramount once I saw that the cultivators chose to retreat against a potential threat relating to ancient martial arts rather than sending their Nascent Soul cultivators.
And, the fact that the only Nascent Soul cultivator I had encountered hid his abilities completely to act like an ordinary old man further reinforced the idea. Then, I had the records of the historical battle between the cultivators and the ancient martial artists, where no cultivator stronger than Foundation Establishment actually joined.
All of this information supported the idea that Nascent Soul cultivators couldn’t act easily.
Of course, without my knowledge of the Nascent Soul alchemy technique, I might have just assumed it to be some kind of preference, but the technique gave me enough clues that, to show the true abilities of their realm, Nascent Soul cultivator had to mobilize Providence.
The lack of a corresponding cultivation technique meant I didn’t know the implications of mobilizing Providence through its cultivation, but I was starting to lean toward it being significant.
Unlike my System, which seemingly had no side effect — at least, that was what I assumed. If not … well, I wasn’t in a position to think about it.
“Of course, just because they don’t want to act, doesn’t mean they can’t,” I reminded myself even as I flew toward the cultivators that I imprisoned, ready to launder the Mutmah technique through one of them. Considering how the situation developed with Janassa, I wasn’t willing to get another cultivator to bond.
However, I wasn’t really afraid of sharing the technique with them. At worst, they would escape.
Getting a better version of the Mutmah Formation technique wasn’t the only reason for my visit. I also needed more rewards sitting in my inventory, ready to be cashed out to prevent the Providence from stunting the growth of the spiritual tree I had created.
However, I didn’t immediately take action. I dropped the fragmented Mutmah technique to the mix, though I made sure not to put the name to not alert them, just tagging it as an ancient formation technique, with a point cost enough to mark it as valuable … but not too valuable.
Unfortunately, the reward was not immediate. The imprisoned cultivators needed some time to pick up the technique before I could extract lessons from them under the guise of pity or insult. At least, once they did, it wouldn’t need too many repeats. They were able to redeem high-quality Foundation Establishment pills and other supporting medicine from the fake mystic land. Combined with the abundant Qi I supplied, their cultivation rose rapidly, meaning much higher multipliers for me.
Even better, since the formations prevented them from fighting each other, insulting and heckling others while studying starting to become the common culture — particularly with my assistance.
A quick visit to the cells resulted in a decent batch of rewards, from lessons in esoteric topics to various materials — the latter I wanted to reinforce the formations against the inevitable retaliation.
“That was the easy part,” I muttered as I once again stepped on my flying ship, this time toward a more dangerous location.
The fake mystic land.
I didn’t exactly know what to find, as the detection formations I had in place had been ruined during the last trick, and considering the density of the cultivators, they weren’t as dense in any case. I expected a greater concentration of cultivators, and I expected them to be arguing about benefits, mostly because I couldn’t feel many cultivators inside.
However, as I approached, I met with an unexpected sight.
A battlefield.
“Alright, that’s more than I expected,” I muttered even as I took thousands of cultivators — mostly Qi Gathering, and led by Foundation Establishment cultivators — into account as I approached, patrolling the area.
However, I didn’t call it a battlefield just because of the number of cultivators. The landscape had shown great signs of destruction, showing that not only there was a battle, but also there was an intense one. I was glad that I had already established many formations to keep me hidden, as it was the only reason I was able to avoid the mess.
While my formation technique lacked the stopping power of the higher rank ones, the sheer expertise I had thanks to Major Integration realm expertise was not something another cultivator even came close to matching.
For the sect cultivators I observed, Major Familiarity was already counted as the mark where they needed to stop working on the technique and move to a more advanced one, while Minor Accomplishment counted as expertise worthy of sect Elders.
At least, that was how it went when it came to Outer Sect Disciples I constantly met. It might have been different for the Inner Sect disciples, but it wasn’t a problem that I needed to deal with yet. Clearly, even with the upgraded mystic land, it was still not worth their time.
So, I used the hidden tunnels I had created to directly arrive at the mystic land, which had even more formations in place that could keep me hidden while I played. From there, I started examining the battlefield.
The first thing I noticed about the battlefield was the very limited presence of mortals. There were some Connate realm martial artists that essentially worked as servants, but their numbers were limited. The real bulk consisted of Qi Gathering cultivators, though even the weakest of them belonged to the late stage.
I examined the battlefield. There were four main camps, each showing the flag of a major sect; Kartpa Valley, Entsa Pavilion, Dragon Peak, and Mutmah Sect. Their numbers were sorted that way, with Kartpa Valley being the most crowded, and Mutmah Sect with the least numbers. Though, even then, Entsa Pavilion and Kartpa Valley had almost an order of magnitude more people.
However, from the way the camps were positioned, it was clear that the numbers didn’t correlate with the numbers. Entsa Pavilion seemed to be already pushed out, with the camp half in ruins. They had only two Golden Core Elders at the camp, and both looked ragged and exhausted. Clearly, they were not in good condition.
I wondered if it had anything to do with the demonic cultivators that seemed to infect the sects. Or, maybe not. Maybe it was something far more common.
That, and worry about Aisnam.
After Entsa, the Muhmah Sect seemed to be the most disadvantaged. Their camp was even further away, their disciples not moving too much away from their formations. However, while their position was disadvantaged, their camp was practically pristine, their expertise in formations keeping them safe from harassment.
The Dragon Peak and Kartpa Valley seemed to be sharing the lead based on their closeness to the fake mystic land, which was a surprise. As, in the battlefield, there was only one Dragon Peak disciple for each Kartpa Valley disciple, and despite that, they were able to hold the line easily.
And, that was without any discernible difference between their cultivation levels.
Dragon Peak’s reputation as the first among equals seemed not to be empty bragging. Their disciples were stronger, faster, and more competent … though I wasn’t sure I liked the bloodlust they showed while fighting.
That couldn’t be good.
“Alright, the plans need to be adjusted,” I muttered. My initial plan was to use the material I picked from the demonic cultivators, leading them to discover the martial arts outpost of the conspirators, hoping to solve two problems at once.
However, the situation was complicated enough without me throwing in additional complications. I decided to depart.
I still made sure to sneak some of the evidence I picked from the demonic cultivators I had picked near the battlefield, making sure they found their way to Entsa Pavilion Elders. Hopefully, it would be enough to alert them to the problem. Unfortunately, that was all I could do at the moment to make sure Aisnam was okay.
Too bad leaving the mortal domains was not an option. Not just because the situation was too complicated here for me to abandon. The memory of the attack from the Treasure Pavilion ship was still clear in my mind, reminding me not to tangle with cultivators without stacking all the advantages I could gather.
Once I placed the evidence, I visited the training camp, only to realize it was completely gone. Admittedly, it wasn’t a big surprise. With the ongoing battle, it was only smart. A quick search of the refugee groups — which doubled as another recruitment drive for Forest Dance — confirmed that their recruitment efforts had ceased as well.
Whether they stopped completely, or hid better, I didn’t know. Unfortunately, I didn’t have the time to explore either.
Not when I needed to root out more than a dozen demonic cultivator bases spread across mortal domain and misty mountains…
