Chapter 93
"Submit to me, and you live."
Lysara nodded hard, that was already a huge concession and she knew it, she turned and started working on her teacher.
Basil pulled his eyes back from the empty air and bowed, then bowed again. "I am willing to serve Ancestor Soren as my Master!"
He was no fool, a door had been opened, he was going through it whether he liked it or not.
Besides, the old man had his own math to do.
He and Lysara were both Palace Masters of the Cold Moon Palace, dozens of elders, hundreds of thousands of disciples.
Dig in his heels, watch Soren lose his temper, and the whole Cold Moon Palace goes into the ground, then what?
Kneel, and he brings every elder and disciple across with him, nobody dies.
One old man bending saved the entire household, nothing to think about.
"At least you know what’s good for you," Soren said.
"Besides, my impression of you isn’t bad."
"Neal is dead."
"The Imperial Palace has no head."
"You’ve got the strength of a Middle-Tier Human Emperor, you’ll take over the Imperial Palace for now and take charge of guiding the human cultivators of the Moonveil Human Domain."
The way to win Basil was trust and heavy responsibility, handing him the human domain checked both boxes.
He was also the last Middle-Tier Human Emperor standing in Moonveil, there was nobody else to hand it to.
"Ancestor Soren, isn’t... isn’t this too hasty?" Basil stammered.
"You truly trust this old man to manage the Moonveil Human Domain?"
Soren gave him a thin smile. "Of course, you’re Lysara’s master and Palace Master of the Cold Moon Palace."
"You’ve run people a long time, and you’re stronger than anyone else here."
"I keep to one principle, do not doubt those you use, and do not use those you doubt."
"You’ve acknowledged me as Master and taken my arrangements, I won’t leave you out in the cold for it."
The old man’s eyes went damp. "Good! Good!"
"This old man will wring out every last fiber of his being!"
"I will not disappoint Ancestor Soren’s trust!"
Something turned over in his chest while he said it.
On the Strategy Encyclopedia, Deep Affection and Righteousness flared bright.
It even set off a chain reaction, for half a breath the light of Absolute Loyalty blazed too, then sank back down.
No miracle, two tiers at once was asking a lot.
Soren wasn’t bothered, Basil was human, expecting him to hit absolute loyalty on the spot, to follow a Demon Ancestor to the death, was daydreaming.
Still an excellent haul.
Lysara looked at her teacher with wet eyes, she’d really believed she’d be executing him today. "Master, you’re so kind to me."
Soren was speachless.
"Kind?"
Exceptionally kind.
That old man was the only family Lysara ever had, seeing him alive and whole left her overflowing with gratitude toward Soren.
"Don’t celebrate yet," Soren said.
"The human race is full of stubborn bones, getting them to kneel alongside you won’t be easy, it’ll take special methods, extraordinary ones, maybe."
"I trust your master, but if he can’t be ruthless when it counts..."
Basil chuckled and cupped his hands. "Rest assured, Ancestor Soren, this old man already has a plan."
He dug into his robes and produced a pill.
"A Mirage Recording Pill."
Soren knew it on sight.
Nobody swallowed one for cultivation or healing, it recorded sight and sound, the better the grade, the longer it held and the rougher the conditions it could handle.
Basil laughed quietly and fed a wisp of spiritual energy into it.
The medicinal power woke up, a projection tens of meters wide unfolded overhead, a screen of light condensed from alchemical energy.
There was Neal, talking to that surviving cluster of human cultivators, there was the Dragon-Piercing Halberd going through every one of them to shut their mouths.
Soren’s eyes narrowed, he caught the old man’s angle immediately.
"Master, when did you set this up?" Lysara asked.
"The moment Neal jumped the Blood Demon Ancestor," Basil said, smooth as oil.
"This old man had a feeling, switching targets meant he wanted to buy Ancestor Soren’s favor and beg for his life, footage like this is rare and precious."
"Neal took Moonveil over after Grant, every major cultivator revered him, he was their pillar of faith, show them what he really was and their Dao hearts fall apart on their own."
True enough, Lysara had only walked away from a lifetime of faith and started taking Soren’s orders after she saw Grant’s real face, after that, bringing her around went faster than anyone expected.
"Once we’re back at the Cold Moon Palace, this old man will have the elders copy what’s in this pill, hundreds of copies, thousands."
"Then we pick disciples we trust and put them into the hands of every major faction and sect."
"And we run the projection on a loop in the busiest quarter of every big city, facts nobody can argue with, let every rogue cultivator get a good look at their proud Great Emperor Neal."
Lysara’s eyes lit up, as expected of Master, he’s thought of everything.
Feeling that gaze brimming with awe, Basil arranged something suitably grave across his wrinkled face, cough, cough.
"Lysara, don’t go thinking your master was sitting on all this wisdom for years, it’s simply that Neal’s conduct made me too angry to think straight, since I stepped under Ancestor Soren’s banner my head has cleared right up!"
Lysara stared at him in silence.
Master, do you actually expect me to swallow that? You’ve had a belly full of dirty tricks this whole time with nowhere to put them.
A thousand years of holding it in, and now you’re finally letting it out.
"Oh, right, right!" Basil was warming to it now.
"This old man has a second Mirage Recording Pill!"
"That one caught Ancestor Soren executing Neal, when the time’s ripe I’ll release it, so the populace feels nothing but gratitude toward Ancestor Soren for scrubbing a hypocrite off the world."
"After that, telling them to submit quietly and follow this old man in serving Ancestor Soren will be a breeze!"
Soren gave him a few words of approval, then his eyes drifted to Caspar, sealed in his sphere of demonic energy and hanging in the air nearby.
"The Human Domain’s yours to handle," he told Basil.
"I’ve got somewhere else to be."