As they fought the numbers of Wu Long’s enemies dropped faster the fewer were remaining.
As their fighting strength dramatically dropped, and the sect ancestor who lost his leg was subsequently wrapped in Spiritual Qi chains and talismans, the rest of the weaker fighters were wiped out. Eventually, the only ones left were the sect master and the man in the now bloody gray robes who stood not far from Wu Long.
“Haa…haa…haa…you will not survive this…haa~”
The man in gray said while heavily breathing, sweat covering him along with his blood.
“Haa…haa…young one…haa…you are strong, but believe me, going against those people is not something we, mere mortals, can do!”
The sect leader also tried to reason with Wu Long at this point. They could clearly see that the final result of the battle was settled long ago, but they stopped only now since there were only two of them left, and it would not even be a battle. The man in gray lost all hope and only said his words to express his bitter resentment and tell Wu Long that he would definitely regret his choice to meddle in the affairs of the people behind him, while the sect master was still hoping to get out of this alive.
There was a massive riot of the whole sect, so most of the elders were trying to contain the situation there, and Wei Lan was steadily holding her ground now that the burden on her lessened. She also gained the upper hand and was now killing off the Grand Elders one by one, while the elders all already fell.
In the midst of all the noise, Wu Long looked expressionlessly at the two before him.
“You should not negotiate with me, but her, I came only as a guest”
Wu Long finally said to the sect leader and the latter widened his eyes. His gaze then fell to Wei Lan, and his final hope was extinguished since she would never agree to spare him. As much connection they had as a master and disciple, she was too decisive, and all the lives he and the others sacrificed would be enough of a reason for her to sentence them to death.
“Was I… wrong?”
He finally said, a light of regret appearing in his eyes while the man in gray humphed with disdain.
“The Dao is formless”
Wu Long replied to him, not agreeing or disagreeing with him. In Wu Long’s eyes were too many rights and wrongs, too many things that depended only on one’s perspective, so at some point, he stopped judging whether someone else was right or wrong, he only judged whether they crossed with his interests and motives or not.
The sect leader looked at Wu Long with confusion, not understanding why he suddenly voiced a part of a famous Daoist axiom.
Wu Long simply waved his hand as talismans went off flying to the sect master who did not resist and allowed them to capture him. The man in gray did not count on being given such grace and stared at Wu Long with a slightly mocking expression, hate deep in his eyes.
“You might have won against me, but you will see…haa~ I’m so unluck-…”
He put all of the resentment into his words and with a slash of Wu Long’s sword, his head parted with his body.
— 𝓫𝓭𝓸𝓋𝓁．𝓬𝓸𝓂
The next events happened without much suspense as Wu Long helped Wei Lan to overpower and similarly detain the remaining Grand Elders. They then both cleaned up the elders and with this, the curtains closed on the ruckus in the Clear River Pavilion.
Wei Lan did not spare any one of the detained, only letting them be executed according to sect rules in the presence of the whole sect and not simply killing them herself.
After that, after a short general meeting, the sect was officially disbanded since they would only invite disaster if they stayed together as a sect while having lost all of their top-level members and elders. Wei Lan was busy handling the disbandment in an organized and orderly fashion since the resources of the sect as well as all valuables had to be distributed between the former sect members.
During this period of time, she did not have the time to think, busying herself with work.
After the fight, Wu Long refined the injuries he sustained with the Chaos Refining Body Tempering Art into the durability of his body and then focused on cultivating the Golden Yang Dragon Body using the Yang attribute medicines he obtained in the Supreme Master Pavilion and purchased from the Soaring Feather Trading Company. Wei Lan also gave him the best ones they had in stock here in the Clear River Pavilion as he mentioned them when she asked if he wanted anything from the sect resources that were about to be distributed. He mainly focused on cultivating his Yang Root and Yang Qi, putting the tempering of the body as a second priority.
He was given one of the small mansions belonging to a Grand Elder next to the one Wei Lan lived in, so he comfortably stayed there, not bothered by the busy work of sect disbandment going on outside.
When the night fell, Wu Long sat down to relax a little after cultivating.
“Haa~ what a shame~…”
He was slightly lamenting the fact that Hua Ziyan did not get to see his fight with the gray-robed man as that would have been very beneficial for her. What she practiced was Spiritual Fist Arts while the man used Spiritual Palm Arts, which were considered part of Spiritual Hand Combat Arts, and closely related to each other. She could eventually even expand to use both fist and palm.
The man in gray robes was decently skilled for someone born in this fractured world and his age, so his way of utilizing the techniques would have been a good example of what to do and what not to do for her.
The trip was deviating from what he imagined it to be, as he did not expect to meet women who would become his or whom he would covet on the way. The delays combined were a lot longer than Wu Long initially planned for the entire trip, so he lamented the fact that he was away from his women.
If he knew beforehand he would have taught them a moving technique and then they could move together. But then again, teaching them efficiently would only be possible with Luo Mingyu, and he did not even meet her before the trip.
Wu Long normally did not consider even years to be long periods, but something seemed to have changed, as even this seemingly short period made him slightly regret the decision to set off alone.
He thought about it for some more time but then shook his head with a rueful smile. Thinking about it now was not going to make anything better, so he went to sleep.
—
On the third day, Wei Lan finally finished her work and the former sect members started to rapidly leave the sect premises,? lest they were caught still being here when the condor-like rogue cultivators and other sects came.
The treasuries, storehouses, and all buildings were now empty of anything of value as the sect was rapidly turning into a deserted one. By the end of this day, the only living souls on the sect grounds would be Wei Lan and Wu Long.
She went to visit Wu Long right after, as she still has not yet gotten a chance to talk to him in peace and properly thank him for everything he has done for her. She was only able to, although sincerely, but still quickly express her gratitude right after the battle and then had to deal with the aftermath since she was the most senior member of the sect left.
‘Yet again, how can I thank him?’
She thought to herself on the way. She still was a little dazed at the fact she was even alive, not to mention that all the culprits were punished and killed. To top it off he thoughtfully left the sect leader and sect ancestors alive, capturing them, so that she and all of the sect members could confront and deal with them properly, thus having some meaningful ending to the sect.
But what could she give him in return that would truly be of value to him?
It was now obvious to her that he was not simply a genius who was very powerful despite his youth and lower cultivation level, but that he was far more mysterious and dangerous.
Formations was a rather esoteric field, and it took a tremendous amount of time to learn it. The level of understanding, skill, and sheer knowledge one had to have to override a grand formation was unimaginable to her.
Such mastery at such a young age was just physically impossible since even if he was the genius of geniuses he would have to have done nothing but reading on and studying formations from day one after his birth and do nothing else, and that would still be not enough.
And yet he also had extremely high combat prowess and skill in the sword, as well as had the time to flirt with women. Wei Lan sighed at that thought, but her mind quickly returned to the important question.
What could such a person possibly want that she could give?