Destiny in Cinders

"That sounds a tad hyperbolic if you ask me." An Jing furrowed his brow in doubt. "A primordial deity of the immortal cultivation path is equivalent to an empyrean of the Soaring Realm for the martial path! Only upper sects have people like them, and only one sect in the whole of Dustdawn has a legacy of an empyrean. They don't even have living ones! Even a heavenly sect like Grand Chen only has a handful of them."

"It's only a possibility," Yvelbane said, not feeling that it had been exaggerating at all. "Anyone who stands a chance of forming a nascent dao embryo is an elite genius. Being able to derive something from the Grand Dao means that they are able to touch the edge of the Primordial Deity Realm. Well... only if they're able to overcome heavenly and human tribulations, that is."

Yvelbane sighed at the mention of that. "Heavenly tribulations are one thing, but the key lies in human tribulations."

"Possibly." An Jing understood what the sword soul was trying to say. If a genius managed to acquire a nascent soul, they should have enough talent to become a primordial deity. However, the karmic baggage that they amassed to reach that point was like the main course one had to finish to reach the Primordial Deity Realm. Most people fainted after taking a single bite. Only a very elite few managed to finish the whole meal and ascend.

In other words, Ming Guangchen's talent and ambition made him a likely candidate for reaching the Pure Yang Realm. But even if he had the potential to reach the Soaring Realm, Grand Chen and the other upper sects wouldn't just sit idly while he tried.

Ming Guangchen had told An Jing about one such case. There was a deific fey at Whitemarsh Mountain in the Taiyuan Region who reached the peak of the Pure Yang Realm. Yet, right as the Deific Fey of Taiyuan was about to undergo the heavenly tribulation, the Pure Yang transcendents of the Grandnight Sect and some of Grand Chen's sentinel kings came knocking, causing the fey to fail the tribulation and perish. This was the nature of human tribulations.

"Given my power, I should be able to handle all opponents of the Fortification Realm aside from peak Fortification geniuses from larger sects like Master." An Jing continued to load up on weapons and ammunition. "However, the troublemakers' martial uncle and other seniors will be coming for me. They are probably Clearing Realm adepts."

It would be much harder to avoid Clearing Realm adepts. The typical tactics he used to elude the demonic cult in the wilderness wouldn't cut it. Back then, the demonic cult struggled to even get a lock on his location, whereas the adepts this time would only have to spread out and search from the center of the city. While An Jing could hide out in Skysource for a bit, he would still struggle to find a way to take care of those adepts.

"How in the world can I deal with them..." He turned to look at the stone-framed mirror as he thought so. "The ability token of a sage should be enough to kill one, but if there are multiple adepts, I need to figure out how to kill or maim all of them at once... Is there even such a way? Those adepts probably have their own ability tokens too. No matter how strong Master is, I doubt it'd really work on them."

An Jing was already planning how he would take his enemies out before they arrived. The more pressure he was under, the more calm he became. "The ones responsible for the death of the mandated official from Skybless probably weren't the Poolsea or Seated Mirage Sects. This isn't beneath the Dustdawn Sects or anything, but they're not foolish enough to kill Grand Chen's officials in broad daylight. That would be open provocation, unless... that was the goal? If so, they must believe they have some kind of backup plan."

All of a sudden, An Jing recalled the waterscreen that Madam Huai left behind. He connected the dots between the Heavenly Demon Cult and the violet-gold maces he used to kill the foreign martialists and furrowed his brow. "Don't tell me the Heavenly Demon Cult is behind this..."

He took out the waterscreen without hesitation. Madam Huai had said that it would stop working once she died. After all, it was an artifact that was bound to her lifearc and soul. An Jing only kept it around as a memento. However, the waterscreen was giving off a soft, blue glow with a hint of silver like the stone-framed mirror.

"Hmmm... Interesting..." There was no way that the person behind the waterscreen wasn't aware of his current situation. Were they waiting in the background for him to finally take the waterscreen out?

An Jing was almost certain that this person was someone he knew. He activated the waterscreen, sending ripples across its surface. Talisman script appeared on the screen before the blurry figure of a woman with white hair appeared. An Jing immediately recognized this person. Who else could this be but Lin Yongye, Lord Inspector of the North of the demonic cult? "Lord Inspector. I knew it was you."

"Seems like you recognize me. I'm guessing your master told you about me," she said with a look of surprise. Chuckling, she continued, "I really didn't think that Sage Mystic Mirror would remember me. How are the violetshine-gold maces by the way? Nifty, aren't they?"

Her tone of voice was rather odd. While An Jing hadn't mingled much with women in both his past and current lives, he had obtained lots of miscellaneous knowledge from all the reading he did. The Lord Inspector of the North's tone carried a genuine hint of surprise, which was odd no matter how he thought about it.

Then again, An Jing made a mental calculation and surmised that the woman and Ming Guangchen were probably from the same generation of cultivators. It was clear that they knew each other quite well from the time they fought in the vicinity of Direlife Manor.

An Jing shook his head and cast aside those unnecessary questions. He said in a deep voice, "Cut the nonsense. Were you the ones who killed Grand Chen's martial-official to ensure that no mandated official is stationed in Keensight?"

"No." The Lord Inspector of the North shook her head, contrary to his expectations. "Instead, one of ours has been killed."

"Huh?" An Jing furrowed his brow in confusion. "One of yours?"

It then occurred to him all of a sudden. I see! If Shu Zheng had been a cultist all along, why wouldn't the adept from Skybless be one too? In fact, the demonic cult should be sending another one of their own to take over Keensight following Shu Zheng's death!

The two sects from Dustdawn probably had the official killed for precisely that reason. They already knew that he was actually a secret demonic cultist. Even if Grand Chen wanted to hold them accountable for it, they could just say they were getting rid of a spy from the Heavenly Demon Cult! They had the perfect pretense! They were only using Keensight as a trial run.

"Stop pretending," the Lord Inspector of the North said lazily, having seen through him. "Little Huai must've told you everything. That's just how she is, that little goody two shoes. There's no way that you weren't aware that Shu Zheng was one of us.

"My initial plan was to gift you a weapon and have an adept with a good temperament to approach you to offer you some resources. It'd be even better if we could give you some martial techniques to establish good relations between us. This way, even if we don't end up cooperating, we wouldn't be on terms bad enough that you wouldn't talk to us. Being able to reach out to you is a good thing. Isn't that the case with your master too? We are all humans at the end of the day. It never hurts to be able to talk when we're going up against heavenly fiends.

"Little did we know that the person we sent got killed right away. I was surprised to learn that too, but it couldn't be helped. All we could do was pray that you're smart enough to figure things out and come to ask us about it without being so prejudiced against us."

"You're right about me being unprejudiced. I will kill those that deserve to be killed, no matter who," An Jing said with a smirk. "How old are you, granny? Why are you talking about Madam Huai as if she's a little girl?"

"It's pointless," she answered with the same listless voice. "Only women of the layfolk who grow old and expire quickly would be enraged by comments about their age. Fat chance trying to get me to reveal my genuine thoughts to you. Then again, Little Huai could've lived much longer if she wanted to. She simply didn't want it for herself."

"I bet she was afraid that you'd devour her," An Jing said ruthlessly.

The Lord Inspector of the North was just as unfazed as before. "Little Huai was already willing to leave her lifearc in my hands long ago. It's a shame that we weren't meant to be. Her lifearc doesn't quite match mine. Also, don't call that 'devouring.' I'm not the Lord Inspector of the West. I don't eat people. All I do is offer bargains. I render them a service in exchange for something I want."

"Sounds the same to me, alright."

"You really have the temper of your master from way back then." Her expression turned solemn. "That's enough. I'll lay out the facts as I know it. The current situation is simple. A few of your master's old nemeses found a chance to hold him back. Some of them are from my divine cult too, but we are not buddies. He's in grave danger. If you want to help him, you should consider joining hands with us."

"There's no need," said a voice from behind An Jing.