“I am glad that you seem to be doing good, but what do you mean by that I am wrong?”
Cai Yin looked at Shen Min first with surprise and after some happiness she expressed confusion.
“How many women do you think we saw in that sect, and what do you think their condition was?”
“…”
The princess looked back at Shen Min and a scene she once saw when Supreme Master Pavilion was receiving thousands of women slaves from the neighboring kingdom stood before her eyes. She tried to protest to her father at that time, but they were powerless to change anything.
“But there must be a way…”
“Your Highness, you are being too naive!”
“Shen Min, don’t be too hard on her. It may seem to you that she is sympathizing with them, but, I meant something a little different when I said that I do not trust her kindness”
Wu Long said, causing both of them to look at him in confusion, and he turned his gaze to Cai Yin.
“You were under the influence of a subtle manipulation technique for more than a decade, even if you managed to free yourself, don’t think lightly of the fact that it was a behavior-altering technique and not direct mind control, if he had another decade, the alteration would have been irreversible”
He explained and a light of recognition appeared in Shen Min’s eyes while Cai Yin felt a chill as she almost fell back into the technique without even noticing it. That moment of clarity freed her, but as she became busy with the politics of the kingdom again her attention was stretched and the accumulated manipulation seeped back into her behavior little by little.
“…Does it mean I will never get rid of Teac…of that man’s influence?”
“No, you just need time, time and focus. But with your talent, as long as you concentrate and cleanse your Soul Sea you should get rid of it relatively fast. I just did not expect you to treat that technique so lightly”
He reassured her, as she exhaled with relief. It was an unimaginably horrifying thought that one’s thoughts and feelings were manipulated so subtly, that they thought it was their genuine thoughts and feelings.
Behavior-altering techniques were some of the most insidious methods used by Soul Cultivators, as such techniques altered one’s personality itself, steering the target in a desirable direction, and not simply manipulating them. Thus the decisions made by the target of the technique under its effects were fundamentally still their own decisions, and would not be considered someone’s commands. They also felt more natural and thus were not easily discoverable. If the technique was used long enough, the personality of the target could be permanently affected.
The weakness of such techniques was that they took a lot longer to have effect and required meticulous and regular very subtle application to the target, who has to not be aware that the technique is being used, it also requires a bare minimum of trust from the target toward the user.
“But regardless of whether you are speaking of your own volition or the technique is causing you to do so, the fact that I am telling you this is not me asking for permission. It is just a courtesy gesture, that will allow your royal family to keep its face. You can either pretend that the royal family was the one that ordered the cleansing of Lust Cultivators and thus be decisive rulers, or oppose and be disgraced when they die anyway since I will not spare them”
Cai Yin looked at Wu Long with a complicated look. He was definitely a blessing to the kingdom and to her personally, as he freed her from mind control and freed the kingdom from the Supreme Master Pavilion. However, what he was doing now was basically giving them an ultimatum, which they could not ignore since they could not oppose him, ‘whose group’ vanquished the Supreme Master Pavilion.
“When are you going to start?”
“Tomorrow, so you will have to persuade the king today. Oh, and let me warn you that the whole capital is now covered by a formation, so none of them will be able to escape”
He replied, as her eyes widened and the people around her looked at him with horror and anger at the same time. This man was absolutely not restraining himself in front of the royal family, imposing his own will, and, unfortunately for them, had the power and ability to do so. 𝒃𝙚𝙤𝙫𝒆𝒍．𝙘𝒐𝙢
She nodded after some time of silence, as she could only agree since he did not leave her any other choice.
“Oh and by the way, may I ask about the origins of this earring?”
Wu Long asked as she was about to turn since there was nothing more to discuss.
“A powerful cultivator once gifted it to our family, since the king at the time, my grandfather, had a… an unpleasant appearance, but it was rarely used since his death so I decided to give it to this young lady here if it could help”
She replied, not looking much regretful about giving away the artifact, as its use was only in disguise and was rarely ever used in the royal family.
Wu Long nodded as his doubts were now cleared.
Ye Ling’s earring came from the sect master, and it was highly likely that this powerful cultivator was the sect master as well, as she used to travel a lot.
The meeting concluded there, and the two returned to the inn for the night.
Wu Long did not let Shen Min leave his side, and he was vigilant against any movements around them. Upon arrival to the capital, once he activated the formation, using talismans he stealthily installed on his first visit to the capital, he noticed a powerful presence, one that could be felt even if there were a lot of people so he could not distinguish any details from the formation.
In the morning, the royal family announced a mass purge of the radical faction, including the royal family members leading it, denouncing them as being corrupted and acting against the interests of the kingdom and its people.
The announcement caused an uproar and was widely discussed on the streets Wu Long and Shen Min passed through to get to the palace. Once there they were greeted and escorted to the palace’s inner square, where hundreds of people in government officials’ clothes and around a dozen people in luxurious robes with royal insignia on them were shackled and held. There was also a ruckus not far as the main leader of the radical faction barricaded in his own side palace and was resisting arrest.
Wu Long nodded with approval for making the right choice at the unhappy-looking king he saw for the first time and the princess who stood beside him. There was also the crown prince, the princess’s older brother who stood with them, who also had a sour face. the royal family’s hand was forced and none of them were happy about it, but they could not do much against people who eradicated the Supreme Master Palace they could do nothing about for decades and even centuries. The least they could do is not borrow his hand in executing them and do it with the hands of the royal executioners to protect the last of their dignity.
Wu Long then turned his steps to the direction of the ruckus and the royal family’s, except for the princess, faces made even uglier expressions.
Cai Yin, in fact, looked much more composed, and even refreshed. It seems she has been focusing on cleansing her Soul Sea from the residual influence of the behavior-altering technique. From the progress she made in such a short time, Wu Long estimated that it would not take her even a month to completely get rid of the manipulation.
He approached the side villa of the prince who led the radical faction and saw an intense confrontation between the royal army and the personal guards of the prince.
He then saw the radical faction leader and a man with a seemingly unremarkable appearance standing behind and to the side of him. Wu Long’s eyes narrowed at the unremarkable man as he also looked at Wu Long.
The man stepped forward, and turned into a blur, appearing before Wu Long in mere moments. About ten people from different directions approached and stood in a large circle around them.
“So, it would seem I finally get to meet the troublemaker”
The man finally broke the silence in which they stared at each other for some time. The conflict between the royal army and the radical faction slowed down and soon stopped. The pressure the man was releasing slowly rose from Qi Condensation to Qi Manifestation, and then higher and higher until it eventually stopped at the 9th level of the Foundation Building Realm, suffocating the people in the surroundings who now looked in this direction in horror. Despite being lower in the realm than the Supreme Master Pavilion ancestor, the pressure he was releasing was several times stronger, and his sharp gaze gave Shen Min chills.
The ten people around also revealed their cultivations at the Revolving Qi Realm.