The Science of Cultivation-Chapter 264: Consolidating Allies

“Very well. Let us be on our way, then.”

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Everyone in their party began to exit the pocket realm except for one person. It was Xiao Dong’s brother, who had stuck together with him to survive during their days as orphans in the village they lived in. However, no one was worried about leaving him alone in the Crucible. They knew about the existence of the artifact spirits and they were more than enough to watch over him.

As they entered the inn’s lobby, they found even more people gathered in the dining area than before. Service had resumed, and they were gossiping over some food or drinks. Waving over at the young innkeeper, the group didn’t stay for long and went outside immediately. Then they summoned their Skyrunners and began heading toward the peak of the sword-shaped mountain.

With over a dozen people, they had to resort to having people stand on the ceiling, but thankfully, the trip was sort.

Despite the mountain’s strange shape, they soon spotted a large, eye-catching structure that sat upon the crossguard of the mountain. Compared to the scale of the mountain, it wasn’t much, but it being as close as they were, it was hard to ignore the classical structure built with pristine white marble.

Landing at what Li Lang thought to be the main entrance, they were quickly greeted by the guards there.

“Halt! What business do you have at the Sword Saint’s estate?”

Their words were sharp, but their tone was relaxed. They didn’t feel much threat from a bunch of early-stage Foundation Establishment cultivators.

“Good morning. We’re here to see our friends from Nightmoon Valley who are staying here,” Li Lang responded as he got off his spot on the driver’s perch. “Please tell Senior Jian Beiyun and Lady Sima Xue that Li Lang is here to see them.”

The two guards exchanged glances before one of them retreated into the large building behind him.

“Wait here,” the remaining guard ordered.

While they waited, Li Lang took the time to appreciate the structure they had built up atop the mountain. It was something that only cultivators could do, as it would be impossible for regular mortal folks to live up here without the ability to fly.

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The cleanly cut white marble was yet another impossible achievement for mortals, with how seamless the structure appeared. There would be no way anyone could transport a building-sized chunk of stone up a mountain without being a cultivator. Li Lang doubted if mortals could even build such an estate on the ground. He believed the quality of it would definitely be a lot worse if they somehow managed to do it.

As Li Lang stood next to the guard and pondered about the building, his students went near the edge instead. They were enjoying the view from such a high altitude and exploring the nature of the mountain itself. While they did so, they merrily chatted about their experiences of participating in the Dark Sea Arena.

“When did you become so proficient with your water and light techniques, Wu San?” Xiao Dong’s voice loudly echoed all the way to where Li Lang was. “You even made those fancy illusions of yours. How do they even work, by the way? Did you find some secret Qi art manual during the short time you were by yourself?”

“If you paid attention during our lessons, you would’ve known about refraction and reflection, and how mirages are formed. If you want to know how it works so much, go ask our teachers during class.”

“But—we rarely go over stuff like that anymore. We are still so behind in martial and Qi arts. We need to focus on—”

“—On what? More useful techniques? The usefulness of something is dependent on the user. As Teacher Li always says, you shouldn’t be so rigid in your thinking and should try to explore different things yourself.”

“Yeah, yeah.”

Eavesdropping on their students as they talked about their experiences, the three young teachers nodded to themselves as they took notes on how they should adjust their study plans.

With a dozen students, they were still capable of personalizing their guidance to each individual.

Hmm, this is probably why all the sects and organizations adopt the Master-Disciple teaching system. It’s important to play to young people’s strengths, and having one teacher handle dozens of students isn’t conducive to that. Should we adopt the same system as well? That will mean our students will have to be mature enough to teach in order to increase our pace of recruitment, though.

As Li Lang deliberated on the structure of his nascent faction, the guard that had gone to inform his friends had finally returned, and he didn’t do so alone.

“Li Lang—and your friends,” Jian Beiyun said as he scanned all of his visitors. “Can’t say I expected you to have brought along so many new acquaintances you made during your time here.”

“Er, yeah. I thought it was going to be just the usual group of three,” Sima Xue added.

“It’s a long story. Do you think we can go somewhere where we can talk privately first?”

“Of course,” the head disciple of Nightmoon Valley immediately replied. However, his gaze didn’t leave Li Lang’s for a good moment, assessing his intentions.

They had previously agreed to pretend the students were strangers in order to keep a low profile, so it was no wonder that Jian Beiyun was confused as to why they had shown up together all of a sudden. With some disciples of the Sword Saint hanging around them, he couldn’t openly question Li Lang, so after some time, he led his visitors further into the grand building.

Wei Ping quickly gathered their students to follow along. As they went through the lobby of the unfamiliar building they went into, they naturally glanced around in curiosity. The interior was just like any other fancy estate found in mortal cities, but the group of cultivators could sense the extraordinary aura coming from the decorations hanging on the wall. Numerous swords were mounted all over the place, each with a small plaque explaining about the artifact weapon's origin.

“All of these were left behind by renowned masters,” one of the students muttered. “How rich do you have to be to use artifacts as decoration?”

Walking through an inner courtyard, the group was soon brought into a spacious wooden hall with nothing there but a few pieces of calligraphy on the walls. On the biggest plaque at the center, the calligraphy painting was one giant word, ‘Sword.’

While some of Li Lang’s students who hadn’t seen the world were confused about what this place was, Li Lang naturally recognized the place as a sword dojo of some sort. He was sure it was either called a sword pavilion or a sword hall.

“I don’t suppose you brought us here to teach us the way of the sword, did you?” Li Lang teased his host.

“Ha, perhaps I will, if that’s what you want. I’m warning you, though. I might get you to fight my Junior Sister here to warm up first. Think carefully before you decide,” Jian Beiyun replied with a smirk.

His words excited Sima Xue. She glanced over at Li Lang with the eyes of a hunter sizing up their prey.

Li Lang swiftly cleared his throat and ignored her gaze.

“Anyway, about what I wanted to talk about. Jian Beiyun, I would like to ask for your organization’s support for a certain endeavor I have in mind for later today.”

The formal tone of asking for Nightmoon Valley’s support and not his personal support got the young head disciple to raise an eyebrow.

“Endeavor? And later? You mean for the meeting the Sword Saint will be hosting?”

“Yes. Oh, and just to confirm, the Sword Saint is alive and so is the Abductress, right?”

“—Yes.”

A quick nod was all Li Lang needed to see. Even without having spectated the battle, he concluded the chances of two Spirit Divide Realm cultivators fighting to the death were not that likely. Only the top geniuses of geniuses reached such heights. Li Lang was confident they each had too many trump cards that the most likely result was a draw, or at least the losing party getting away.

Jian Beiyun stayed silent for several moments, turning away from Li Lang as he strolled back and forth. A good minute passed before he sighed.

“Let’s hear it then. I have a feeling I won’t like what I’m about to hear, but go ahead.”

Hearing this, Li Lang smirked.

It was time for him to convince his first ally to his cause.