A few days later.
Serenity Peak. Martial World Sharang.
Hour of Shadow Rat. (06:00 PM – 07:00 PM)
As the sun dipped below the horizon, casting a golden hue over the landscape, the Grand Martial Hall in Serenity Peak stood as a beacon of tradition and strength.
Or rather, it used to all that but not at this point. Not really.
A certain someone had put even the Grand Martial Hall in a tough spot.
Aksai Everwood, surrounded by his allies from the renowned martial arts schools he had conquered, stood before the imposing estate.
He remained patient and seated on a chair that had been arranged for him. People around him were saying all kinds of things to make the Grand Martial Hall open its gates willingly.
Unlike what his opponents had done in haste, Aksai chose to make his opponents bend to his demands.
Aksai’s forces encircled the Grand Martial Hall, their banners fluttering in the evening breeze.
Grand Martial was a force to be reckoned with even within Serenity Peak. What if they decided to destroy the copy of the compendium when they were given no way out?
As such, Aksai did not try to mess with it on his own. He sought to create pressure on the psyches of the sect elders and martial artists belonging to the Grand Martial Hall.
He also knew that a direct assault would be met with fierce resistance, so he opted for a siege. A siege was a slow and deliberate pressure tactic. It could not be rushed for quick gains. However, when used correctly, it had an almost 100 percent success rate.
From the School of Flowing Winds to the Lotus Pavilion, each ally was made to lend their martial prowess to Aksai’s cause, their loyalty bought with promises of power and resources.
Under the cover of darkness, Aksai’s forces tightened their grip, cutting off the hall’s supply lines and isolating it from reinforcements. The night echoed with the clang of weapons and the shouts of warriors as skirmishes broke out along the perimeter.
It seemed that even the safe zone within the Devil’s Den was not safe for the mortals and low-level martial artists anymore. The situation in Serenity Peak was as serious as it could ever be.
***
Inside the main hall, the elders of the Grand Martial Hall conferred, their expressions grim with concern.
The sect’s prized Martial Compendium named Golden Sun Codex lay within their possession, and they knew Aksai would stop at nothing to claim it.
“Damn these vultures! Who in the world is this Aksai Everwood? And how do we get rid of him?”
Asked a one-eyed elder in a grim tone. This elder only had his right eye working, while his left eye looked as though it had lost its iris, appearing completely white with only the sclera visible.
“Do you think we haven’t tried? Some of us have been keeping an eye on this person for almost 12 years now. If it were easy to silence him, we would have done so by now. In fact, we’ve tried many times in the past. Those sent to either kill or kidnap him never returned to us.”
Replied a gray-haired woman who appeared to be in her early 40s.
“Aksai Everwood appeared in this city mysteriously. We don’t know much about him apart from the fact that he has some talent in the martial arts.
In fact, he had tried to get into the Grand Martial Hall in the past provided we don’t restrict his freedom and make him do a few things. However, we obviously refused, which then made him hire private tutors from those mediocre martial arts schools.
He was also the one who attempted to bribe the Grand Martial Hall’s branch in Serenity Peak as well as its main branch in an attempt to acquire the sect’s Martial Compendium. We clearly refused.
However, it seems this Devil’s Den situation has allowed him to request the same Martial Compendium differently,” the gray-haired woman sighed as she spoke.
“Oh?” the one-eyed elder looked surprised upon hearing information about Aksai. “What kind of martial arts does he practice?” he asked with curiosity.
“All kinds of martial arts,” the gray-haired woman shook her head. “He is a heretic martial artist who has studied at least five different schools of martial arts that we know of.”
“What?” The one-eyed elder was surprised. “How did he not injure his foundations? And why does he need our Martial Compendium if he is a heretic martial artist?”
“I don’t know for sure,” the gray-eyed woman spoke. “But if my guess is correct, he wants to use our Martial Compendium as a reference to fuse all five of his martial arts and create his own Martial Compendium. Just like what the legendary martial artists of the past had done, creating various Martial Compendiums in the process,” the gray-haired woman replied, her voice and expression solemn.
“What did you say?” spoke an elder who had been trying to keep quiet during the whole meeting.
“Impossible,” spoke the other elderly woman who picked up the report from her table. According to the report, Aksai was only around 30 years old.
“Haha. Maniac. This heretic martial artist is a maniac. I guess practicing martial arts in a heretic way affected his brain. Haha.
I say we give the Martial Compendium to him and watch from the sidelines as he destroys himself in trying to do something impossible,” spoke another elder, clearly amused by what Aksai had supposedly planned to do.
Although martial artists didn’t have exaggerated lifespans like the Spirit cultivators, a 30-year-old martial artist trying to create a Martial Compendium of their own was seen as immature, like an early teenager.
If it were so easy to create a Martial Compendium, every martial artist with some attainments in their respective martial arts would have created a personalized version of it. Then every martial artist dedicated to their path would have attained the Argent Body Realm.
However, the reality was much crueler than theories suggested.
Take the elders of the Grand Martial Hall, for example. Many were given a chance to study the sect’s Martial Compendiums.
Yet, even after studying martial arts for years, they were unable to break into the 2nd body cultivation realm, the Argent Body Realm.
So when the elders of the Grand Martial Hall heard what Aksai could have possibly wanted to do with the Martial Compendium, they had all sorts of reactions except the one that made them look like they believed he could really pull it off.