People were standing with their mouths opened wide after the illusory figure of the man disappeared. His massive spiritual pressure was still on their minds. The nascent soul cultivators here were all on top of the food chain, so they knew that the senior that had just appeared wasn’t anyone simple.
The gears in their heads started spinning around, trying to figure out this Wei Hung’s true identity. There weren’t many masters on the continent that were at the great circle of the nascent soul. Just as with core formation, there was a difference with someone at the beginning stages of it and at the end stages when they reached close to 100%.
This man had clearly shown power going beyond the beginning stages, which caused these cultivators that were at most at the late stage to be concerned. While they were thinking, that seniors disciple was floating down, his expression showing confusion.
“Wait… did my master take over my body?” What did he say?”
He looked around between the cultivators there, but wherever he looked the people from the other sects would evade his gaze, too scared to offend someone with that amount of backing.
“Senior Brother, I didn’t know you had such a powerful master, now it all makes sense!”
Feng Liena moved closer, her big eyes were sparkling with admiration while looking up to her sect brother. Huo Qiang wasn’t far behind as he also nodded whit agreement.
“Such power! Such presence! Now that was a true master!”
Zhang Dong glanced at his two friends, his mouth twitched slightly. He knew well that the master that showed up was something he came up as a defensive measure and he wasn’t a real person. How he managed to do it is thanks to the holographic technology he came up with that was slowly spreading through the city along with the cubes that stored spiritual energy.
This was also why he had moved closer to the city where the holographic projector that he previously prepared was. He purposely made his body glow in a blinding light to get everyone’s attention. He then activated the device that had a model of his Wei Hung persona inscribed into it. He could control what he was saying remotely and he used the cubes that stored large amounts of spiritual energy to create the illusion of the man behind him being really strong. From the look on the three main elders faces, it seemed to have worked.
“W-well yes, that’s my master for you! No one can go against him if he makes up his mind!”
Zhang Dong laughed awkwardly while trying to hold a poker face. This little stunt had cost him most of his Qi reserves as he needed to add some juice to make it look realistic.
The cultivators from the three large sects looked at each other with worry. The leaders had to make a decision, would they risk offending some unknown entity to irradicate this upstart sect? Would the risk outweigh the gains? They only faced three enemies and this would probably be the best moment to strike, but the unknown backer was making these three leaders nervous.
“Brother Yang…brother Jie… I think this requires more time to discuss, why don’t we consult with the other elders in our sects…”
Xu Qing was the first one to speak out, he was unwilling to risk his and his sect’s life. Even if the risk was small, they could also gain new allies with these people if they showed mercy.
“Yes, that might be the wise path to take…”
Cheng Yang nodded as he replied.
“Hmph!”
Zhan Jie was the only one that looked maddened by the decision but if the others weren’t willing to risk it, he wouldn’t either.
“Zhang Dong was your name, right fellow Daoist?”
After everything was decided Xu Qing looked to Matt that was clearly the leader from this new sect.
“I hope there won’t be any bad blood between our sects, we will allow you to reside here, but we will be taking the resources from that demonic sect. Don’t think you will have anything against that?”
Zhang Dong nodded, he didn’t really care about the cultivation resources of that sect. He had the cultivation manuals from the secret ground which were far superior to anything these sects could offer. It was enough for them to be able to survive, with time they would rise above the others.
“That is fine, we don’t care about those demonic techniques or their resources. We just wish to establish our sect in peace, I’m sure we can decide on the land distribution at a later date.”
Matt moved his hands behind his back as always, his body was slowly reaching its limit as he was feeling tired. He wanted to end this and end it fast, he could think about everything else after he had rested.
“I see that Daoist Dong is a wise man, yes let us decide on that later.”
The three sect leaders nodded at each other. The siege of the main Dark Palm sect was still ongoing, there were also many large cities spread through this vast land that would be taken over. The help of these nascent soul masters would hasten everything and would lower the death count on their side. They had already spent some time here, so they wanted to resolve everything with haste.
“Yes, let us aid our brothers and sisters with taking down that demonic sect first, we will discuss everything later.”
Everyone nodded and they bade Zhang Dong, Feng Liena, and Huo Qiang farewell. The two kept staring daggers at the invading cultivators all till they were little dots on the horizon.
“Sigh…”
“We should go back, let’s keep the grand formation working, for now. We don’t know if they will have a change of heart after they discuss everything with those so-called ancestral elders of theirs.”
Matt said while gently floating down towards the remaining large structure. The two brand new sect elders agreed and continued after him, somehow everything got resolved with less bloodshed than anticipated. In their hearts, they knew that this wasn’t over though. The three sects would probably keep testing them until they saw a chink in their armor. They needed to get stronger and they needed to do it fast.
With a wave of his finger, Zhang Dong created a little opening in the barrier and gently floated into the defensive formation. His two allies went in right behind him and closed it right after. This formation was intricate enough for it to record the energy signatures of some cultivators. Thanks to that it could be opened and closed without having to fully deactivate it.
The three were greeted with sounds of cheers, everyone was shouting the names of the new sect. The three elders’ names were also called out, Zhang Dong’s was of course the most prominent one. All three of them descended down to the ground as they did the crowd finally managed to calm down.
Everyone looked to their new leader, the man that made it happen. This, of course, caused Matt to sweat bullets internally, he had to yet again act his role and straighten out. Hands behind his back and his posture straight as a sword, unnoticed to most though his hands were trembling slightly. Not because he was nervous but because he had used up almost all of his spiritual energy and was now having a hard time keeping himself on his feet.
‘I can’t show them weakness…’
He wanted to laugh at himself, here he was a big sect leader now, looking out for his face as he was unwilling to show a flaw in front of this crowd of people. His motive was a bit more honorable than this as he wanted to present himself as a powerful leader that doesn’t falter. If his people saw him stumble or throw up, they would probably see him in a worse light which would affect the morale.
‘I can do this…just nod a bit and get this over with…’
He steeled his resolve, a few more minutes should be fine.
“My sect members this battle is over but we still must remain vigilant, the other sects will probably take some time with what remains of the Dark Palm sect.”
“We require more information, we must gather up our forces and bolster our defenses. The grand formation will protect us for now but it’s not the answer to our problem.”
He continued talking rapidly while everyone was listening. His eyebrows quivered as he was close to falling asleep.
“M-my Master had bought us some time, but we don’t know for how long the other sects will remain neutral. They might test us in the future, so I expect you to not cause trouble for your sect but remember to not show weakness. We will hold a meeting with all the senior members, we will discuss everything then.”
Zhang Dong nodded after his quick speech, talking it over more throughout later would be the best option for now. The other’s nodded without saying anything, how could they interrupt or ask questions when a senior elder like him was talking.
“There is still much work to be done, we will not be holding any banquets or victory events, it is still too soon for such things. Now go! there is still much to be done, I must retreat to my chambers to prepare!”
“Yes, Patriarch!”
“Yes, Sect Leader!”
“Yes, Senior!”
People bowed while giving him variously honorable titles, people like Zhang Jin and his two disciples were also there. Right in the front, their eyes were sparkling with so much admiration that he could probably light a football field with it if he could harness that power.
“Master!”
“Dong’er!”
Matt took a step forward while almost falling over, he had to stop himself as the people closest to him walked forward. They started praising him and he even received a firm smack to his back from his grandpa, which almost made him faceplant onto the cold hard floor.
‘Don’t you donger me you old fart, you want me to die?’
He wanted to shake his family member off and his disciples but they surrounded him from all sides. There they were, his two pupils with their mother, then there was gramps that even brought over his two wives. There were some other family members that he wasn’t sure about, by this point he had no idea how many relatives he had. He would even believe if they told him that he was somehow related to Yang Guanyu that they just killed.
“Ah yes, dear grandfather and my two disciples I bet you worked hard, but your master has to…”
Before he could get himself out of it they all moved in closer and started barraging him with praises and questions. They all wanted to congratulate the man that made it all happen why also asking about this elusive Wei Hung that was pulling strings in the background. Before they could continue though, someone interrupted them. It was Feng Liena that stood right in front of the crowd that backed off after seeing the second nascent realm master of the sect.
“Senior Dong is a busy man, we still have preparations to make!”
She covered part of her face with a fan while speaking. The people that were in a circle around Zhang Dong moved apart a bit scared of this new senior elder. They were familiar with their Patriarch but this woman was still unfamiliar to the people close to him. Zhang Dong nodded at Feng Liena.
“Ah yes, I must take care of a few things that can’t wait. Junior sister is right!”
He was finally able to leave, the people didn’t dare to stop him after Feng Liena got involved as it seemed that he had some important things to tend to. He quickly walked towards his bed chambers, the corridor towards it was now empty as every able-bodied person was working.
Just before he could open the door he felt a bout of drowsiness washing over him. His vision got blurry and he felt like he was going to pass out. He buckled under his own weight and had to keep himself on his feet by placing one of his hands on the corridor wall. He slowly inched towards the door, he couldn’t pass out in front of his room he at least had to make it inside where no one could see him.
He tried hard, yet he would not succeed. The battle was over and the tension was gone, his body started giving out as there was no reason to stay conscious. So he fell forward but he didn’t land face down on something hard, instead, he felt like something soft had damped his descent. He couldn’t quite put his finger on it, but he smelled a familiar scent of cherries. Soon everything faded and he passed out unable to hear the voice of the person that had caught him.
“It’s okay Senior Brother, you can rest now…”