Xuanqing Guard

Shen Hao, wanting to help his friend "avenge his shame," called out to stop Hong Chou and Brocade and Silk, who were trying to slip away.

"Don’t go! I’ll play finger-guessing with you two—one punch, one cup. Come on!"

"Huh? Master, we... we’re not good at this game, maybe we can..."

"Hurry up! Quit dawdling!"

After the time it takes for one incense stick to burn, Hong Chou and Brocade and Silk bounced away cheerfully, letting out a burp. They drank a lot of sour soup tonight; delicious as it was, having too much made their bellies bloated. But after heading to the kitchen to help out and move around a bit, it’d go away soon enough.

That left just Shen Hao and Nie Yun, watching the two little troublemakers hop away.

"Seriously? Didn’t you teach them how to play drinking games? How’d you lose this badly?" Nie Yun complained as he chewed on two aniseed beans, clearly disappointed by Shen Hao losing nine out of ten rounds. Not even he failed like this!

"I underestimated them!"

Shen Hao hadn’t thought much of it when Nie Yun was crushed earlier, but now that it was his turn, he realized those two little brats were monsters at this game. Maybe this was their talent? Future queen drinkers or something?

Both of them were a bit prideful—they’d never stoop to cheating with their Cultivation to beat two little girls. The drinking was fine; with their tolerance, losing wasn’t a big deal. Still, they felt pretty stifled inside.

"Not playing finger-guessing with those two Little Fox Girls again—they’re scammers."

"Yeah, yeah, no more playing with them!"

The two exchanged a glance and nodded in silent agreement, each chewing on aniseed beans and clinking their cups together.

"So, what brings you here?" After some idle chatter, Shen Hao finally got to Nie Yun’s real purpose. Strictly speaking, it hadn’t been long since he last saw Nie Yun—just over two months. Was every Sect cultivator this free?

"Free? I was going to go into seclusion right after I got back. If no one had called me out, I’d probably stay shut in till the second half of the year!"

"Oh? You need something from me?"

"Yeah. Two things. First off—I’m out of wine." Nie Yun chuckled, raising the magical gourd at his waist, pulling out the stopper to reveal it was bone dry.

Shen Hao was speechless: "So you’re treating my place like your personal wine cellar now? Fine, I’ll fill you up when you leave. I make five jars a year at most—don’t expect more."

"Hehe, five jars is plenty. As for ordinary Wuliangye, just give me a few dozen jars. I asked Old Hu already, there’s tons in your cellar."

What else could Shen Hao say? He could only nod. With how often Nie called him "Old Hu," there was no way he could hide anything in that wine cellar from Master Nie.

"What else?"

"Since you’re with Xuanqing Guard, you must’ve heard the news from the South, right?"

"The South?"

"The Barbarian Race."

Shen Hao’s brows twitched as he glanced left and right, lowering his voice: "Nie, why are you suddenly asking about this? Doesn’t seem like it’s got much to do with your Sect, right?"

"Heh, not related? It has everything to do with us. Our Sect recruits all over Jingjiu Dynasty—whether from noble families or commoners, everyone’s part of the foundation. Plus, all our Sect’s resources come from this land—how could we just stay out of everything?"

"Can’t argue with that. But forgive my ignorance, I honestly can’t recall your Sect ever playing any part." Shen Hao poured himself another cup. He wasn’t speaking blindly—he’d checked plenty of files about Sects in Xuanqing Guard, but never read about them having any role in the wars of Jingjiu Dynasty.

Nie Yun scoffed and shook his head: "What you see is just what others want you to see. You really think Sects just hoard all those Cultivation Resources and do nothing? What about the disciples’ feelings? The attitude of Jingjiu Dynasty? No Sect could last if they did that."

The implication in Nie Yun’s words grabbed Shen Hao’s attention. He poured Nie a full cup, eager to hear more.

"What’s your take on the strength comparison between the Barbarian Race and Jingjiu Dynasty?" Nie Yun raised his cup with a sly smile at Shen Hao.

"Comparison? Based on what I have, whether it’s war potential or displayed strength, Jingjiu Dynasty is in a totally crushing position. The Barbarians have been battered for years—even with their recent recovery, it’ll just end in defeat again."

But Shen Hao kept quiet about some hidden troubles in the Border Army. He wanted to see Nie Yun’s perspective first.

"Given that, do you think the Barbs are just idiots? Isn’t rising up now just unbelievably stupid?"

"People get blinded by circumstances. Not everyone can endure endless suffering—once they get even a bit of power, of course they’ll get desperate to change things. You can’t even say for sure if that’s stupidity."

Nie Yun neither agreed nor disagreed: "But have you thought about how vast Barbarian Territory is? Not as big as Jingjiu, but still covers thirty or forty percent as much. Since Sects can thrive in Jingjiu, why wouldn’t there also be Sects in Barbarian lands, especially when those regions aren’t all true wilderness?"

"You mean...?"

"Just like I said—the Sects here can’t opt out of everything, so why would Barbarian Sects be any different? In fact, because of the oppression, their Sects may be even more desperate than ordinary Barbarians.

Actually, wars between the Human Race and Barbarians never happened only outside Zhuo Huo Pass. There are lots of things not seen by ordinary people, deliberately hidden by Jingjiu Dynasty, which is why most folks think Sects don’t get involved. But that’s not the truth."

"The Barbarian Sects are strong?" Shen Hao accepted Nie Yun’s point—in fact, thinking back, it did fill in a lot of gaps. Maybe even explained why the Red-eyed Wolf Race was in such a hurry to raise a Royal Court—could Barbarian Sects have been behind the scenes?

"Very strong. More accurately, very strange."

"Strange?"

"Yeah. The Barbarian cultivators have very different approaches from us. The main differences are in Magic. We mostly use Five Elements Techniques, maybe some derivatives, and techniques like Soul Techniques and Talisman arts. Meanwhile, the Barbarians excel at Poison Refining and Corpse Refining, plus Body Forging."

Shen Hao had heard of Poison Refining, but Corpse Refining was new to him. It brought to mind those hopping corpses in movies from the other world.

"Poison Refining is mainly divided into poisonous insects and toxic fog—highly covert and extremely deadly. A powerful Barbarian Cultivator could instantly poison even someone at Primordial Core Realm Perfection like me.

Corpse Refining is more complicated—it’s basically divided from highest to lowest: ’Gold, Silver, Bronze, Iron, Stone’—five types of Evil Corpses. Respectively matching up to ’Ordinary,’ ’Qi Refinement,’ ’Gathering Spirit,’ ’Primordial Pill,’ and ’Profound Sea’ levels. Of course, there are finer distinctions within them.

As for Body Forging, it’s what we call Horizontal Training—mainly to strengthen the body. But Barbarians have natural gifts that make them truly formidable.

Forty years ago, those Barbarian Sects were defeated alongside the Barbarian Race, abandoned their sects, and went into hiding. Now that the Barbarians are rising again, those Sects are secretly preparing to surge back as well.

That’s why the situation with the Southern Barbarians has all the Sects on edge.

Which brings me to why I came—I want your analysis on when our Gui Mountain Cultivation Institute should get involved."