Chapter 274: V4C55: Searching the Luo District

They split up after a brief while. Luo Na needed to take care of matters that the people of the Luo District understood better than an outsider. There were people to be recruited, issues to be dealt with, foes to be defeated and taken out of the picture before they could become a significant problem, and this was something that the talisman master could resolve with the force that she had, and the connections that she had formed.

Wei Yi would have participated in this had she possessed enough understanding of the district’s internal situation, but, unfortunately, all that she had been able to learn about during her last visit was the nature of the Brotherhood of Power. That force was gone now, so it was all useless.

Fortunately, the matter of bringing on allies was usually rather difficult, and not one that made best use of the methods that the Ascendant possessed. The power of Law could be used to convince people to some extent, but it was never sufficient to completely change someone’s mind as proper persuasion would. Thus, she was more than happy to head out of the talisman creation chambers and out into the district, where she then obscured her presence and head out into the busier regions as to locate the threats to their goals.

While there were also a few difficulties to finding people that supported the side of the Great Families without them being expressly one of the Greats, it tended to be much easier to take them out.

There were two groups that she was expecting to deal with: those who were lured over to the wrong side, as she considered it, by promises of various treasures and rewards, and then there were those that had some agreement with the deeper ideas of the Great Families that had yet to be properly shared with her.

The first kind was easy enough to deal with. The offering of any treasure and opportunity sufficient to overwhelm the one that the Greats offered them, or definitive proof that the offering of the Great Families wouldn’t be able to reach them, or even that they would be killed the moment that their usefulness expired. Although they were easy enough to convince while they were calm, once enough people of like mind were collected and then put in a stressful situation, that would change right away, and their collective anxiety would merge into an obedience for the Greats due to their belief that it was their only chance for survival.

Putting aside that this was yet another law of reality – and one that would have been plentiful to advance her Dao of Law by now if the heavens weren’t ignorant of it, as she was more and more sure was the case – that could be resolved by dealing with them quickly enough, and without combat.

It was more cumbersome to resolve the troubles of the second group, that of the loyalists to the Great Family cause. Whatever the reasoning behind it, those people would be keen to lower the power of the world, to prevent the seventh realm from being surpassed, to ensure that knowledge wouldn’t be spread, and they wouldn’t stand down with a mere offering of wealth or a guarantee of their life. Most would still care about their survival, but they would sacrifice far more to ensure that they succeed. Obviously, this made it rather difficult to do anything but fight them.

Had these two been entirely separate, that would have been ideal for her. One could have been slain and removed, the other could have been traded with and convinced not to interfere, and everything would essentially be solved. And yet, things were never that simple in the Planar Continents, not when it concerned such a long-lasting conspiracy as that of the Greats.

Rather than them being separate, it was far more likely that they would be grouped together, working side by side with some of those enticed by wealth or power having no idea that were right next to maniacs. They would think that all of them were bound by some sensible cause or notion, but once things became tough, they would be pushed on by those driven by some insane idea that they must weaken themselves, time and time again, just to guarantee that the world remained in perpetual decline. They would only assist that panic and anxiety of the others by speaking the right words to agitate and scare, and that would obviously not be in her interests.

As such, she wouldn’t just rush out and shred through everyone she found that displeased her in some fashion. That could be left to Luo Na, if she so willed it, although Wei Yi doubted that the talisman master was intending to go down that route.

Instead of simply slaughtering foes, it was better to separate the two with various offers and suggestions, then defeat those that wouldn’t fall for such things and let the rest run off to some other, weaker faction. So long as the strength of half of the district wasn’t funnelled towards a single cohesive group, it really didn’t matter whether they still tried to support the Greats or not, since their actions wouldn’t be of much use.

‘At the moment, it seems that the woman, Jian Hongchao, is playing some part in the faction of Luo Yunzhen. Ideally, I’d take care of the faction leader, but getting to him might make too much of a fuss to let me be accepted by more peaceful means,’ Wei Yi thought as she positioned herself on an Aerial Platform in the air above the western half of the Luo District, ‘All I need to do is find them.’

If there were members of the Great Families in the Luo District, then discovering their multitude of anchors could not only be easy, but incredibly beneficial overall, as it would go towards her pool of anchor points in the Truth of the Universe. Their presence among a larger group would also give her a rather good indication of who was on their side, and who was not. As if there weren’t enough positives about such a situation, getting rid of one of the Greats while they were in the presence of those who had decided to side with them because they believed in their power would make things even better, as it would instantly turn those people to her side.

For that reason, this was an unlikely possibility. Due to the current situation, and the damage she had previously dealt to the Great Luo, she expected the remaining living member of the second generation to be either in Testament, or in some Great Luo Family mansion off to the side of the district.

The Greats did have servants, and if she came across one of them, she would be able to identify them, but, once again, she was not expecting to find one of them in the middle of a large group of powerful cultivators at the core of the faction intent on bringing the Luo District into the hands of the Greats. As she had experienced, the servants of the Greats lacked any ability to cultivate due to the restriction placed upon them in order to permit the Greats to exert their control over their minds, so no servant would be found at such a scene. At most, they’d be delivering letters and leaving right away.

Also, there was a chance that the Great Families would become rather afraid of their servants turning on them with new powers, as she had set a wonderful precedent.

‘They do know of otherworldly demons, but cannot properly perceive otherworldly gifts, so they wouldn’t know that I had faked it with the Truth of the Universe. It’s likely that they think I had some kind of art prepared just for the occasion, so they would be paying a great deal of attention to their other servants just in case.’

While she was in the air, far enough to prevent anyone from casually bumping into her without realising it just by trying to avoid a large crowd through a bit of aerial travel but not so high as to limit the range of her spiritual perception, she searched for the simpler kind of opponent. Those that sided with the faction of Luo Yunzhen, and those that were following the Greats only for some small reward, were guaranteed to be acting in a less subtle way than those with a significant personal investment.

To deal with them, she would simply leave behind a few marks near them, as they were mostly the kind that could be dealt with by Luo Na, as long as she knew who to deal with. For that reason, a set of marks made with energy that would then be buried within doors and walls and visible only to the woman with the warped physique. This would allow her to have a better idea of who to target, while Wei Yi could then focus on those that weren’t as easy to deal with. If she and Luo Na worked together to dispatch the appropriate foes, things would proceed far more quickly, and significantly more smoothly.

‘I can’t find any of the Greats here, but there are some places that appear to be influenced by their kind of techniques. I’ll mark those first, and then find out whether anyone here tries to be all clever and pretend to be convinced only to go away and simply plot against us. That seems to be my expertise…’

 

“… So, while I’m waiting for that person to get out of the wardrobe – not sure what he’s up to, but he seems to be the best lead I have for now – could you explain how that is assisting the creation of the array you mentioned? I can understand part of it, but the four particular beasts don’t make as much sense…” Wei Yi muttered in the Kong Prison Realm.

She looked down on it from above in her mental energy form, effectively standing at the peak of the Endless Monolith at the side of the spatial realm’s spirit.

Since the possibility of discovery and invasion from one of the Great Families, or possibly all of them at once if they considered her enough of a threat, was rising with each day that passed, since they would inevitably figure out that she was making use of a spatial realm for the sake of the instantaneous transportation between the various districts. It was a rather risky thing to do, even if the spatial gateway only had a very small portion of itself within the districts.

All that would be needed was a single seventh realm expert, like one of the first generation, to appear and forcefully command the spatial realm, and they could then enter and invade. This might have been more difficult had they not possessed the physical entity that was the Kong Prison Realm, but since they did have easy access to it, they would be in a significant advantage against someone that was currently only in the fifth realm. Even if Wei Yi was then able to seal it away the moment after any access to the Kong Prison Realm was obtained, a number of the Greats would be able to arrive and endanger the people of Beast’s Rest and Paragon. After that, if one of the first generation made it in, it wouldn’t matter even if the Ascendant sealed away the spatial realm forever, since it wouldn’t be of much use.

If something of that nature occurred, the only thing left behind would be corpses and ruins, and there would be little reason to bother. That would hardly be ideal, and it was made worse by the fact that the first generation would likely have the ability to diminish the effects of her Law of Conversion, simply due to their power over spatial domains.

In order to prevent them from being able to endanger the prison realm, Wei Yi and Yi Shi Ming had decided that while the former was out in the districts, the latter would come up with something.

After a while, it turned out that she had concluded that it was best to work on a large array which would prevent intrusion anywhere but the outside, then fight off foes until someone more capable was able to arrive and resolve matters. It turned out to be something created by Kong Shi Meng himself, and, at an ideal state, would be equivalent to the eighth realm in terms of power, and could even manage this without a further increase in planar energy density.

“The array is based on the stories of his original world, wherein there were four powerful entities that corresponded to the cardinal directions. From his words, the north was guarded by the Black Tortoise, the east was protected by the Azure Dragon, the south was watched over by the White Tiger, and the west was defended by the Vermillion Bird, although he did say that it was a phoenix,” Yi Shi Ming shared while she similarly looked over the spatial realm and onto the countless small ridges and lines that had formed on the outside of the Kong Prison Realm, “The issue is that this is not a array based purely on an arrangement of energy. This requires materials that my son had access to, and replacing them will be rather difficult.”

“What kinds of materials would be needed?”

“The least significant are items of the seventh realm, and I am not even certain that the modern world has names for them. To create something this advanced, I would drain all of the supplies of Paragon and the Kong Prison Realm dry a thousand times.”

“Then, it is bound to be effective, right?” Wei Yi asked, just to be sure, “I wouldn’t want this to be a waste of time for us to decipher all of this only to be disappointed by the eventual power of the array. In other words, is it going to be stronger than two dozen people in the sixth realm without those materials?”

“So long as it is possible to create, then it will not just be a little stronger. It could crush anyone within the sixth realm, regardless of number, with the full power of the array being focused on four points at once. If all of the beasts are driven towards a single point, they are also able to combine into an even more powerful force, although this was something that my son had advised against due to the increase in the instability of the array. Supposedly, although the four entities are not living creatures, they still exude a certain degree of intelligence… And do not get along.”

“A shame. If we force them to make up – one way or another, depending on exactly how humanoid their minds are – would it be possible to negate that?”

Yi Shi Ming shrugged, “I don’t think that is how it works, but my son only got so much use out of it. Perhaps there is something that I have not yet comprehended through the senses of a spatial spirit, or perhaps I will be incapable of discovering the true nature of the array until it is activated. Regardless, it is out best bet no matter whether they can be combined together or not.”

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“Got it. How soon will you be able to transmit some notion of the array to me?”

“It will take a minimum of a week before I am able to comprehend the arrays I had observed my son create to a sufficient degree to provide only the vital information. I will attempt to learn more from this, but I am afraid I have limited talent.”

Wei Yi would have said something, but both of them were fully aware that this was the truth. She was a relatively capable cultivator in life, but she lacked understanding of the great arts, with her focus now being primarily on history and the operation of the Kong Prison Realm. For that reason, while she could attempt to reassure her, it would hardly succeed when the person she was speaking with had countless years of experience and personal understanding, in the same way that Wei Yi was fully aware of her own limits.

Instead, she looked over what was already present of the array, the very vague shape of the array itself that could be perceived by any common soul and tried to understand what it may lead to.

“With the way that the array lines primarily exist on the outside, with very little on the inside, it seems highly feasible to either stack some of these together, or to place a different array on the inside to make up for the weaknesses in the protection of the Four Cardinal Beasts array. Also, the structure seems slightly akin to that of the Restraining Phantoms array, although that is only a slight resemblance…”

“As I thought, a glance and you have more comprehension of this than I…” Yi Shi Ming had a slight smile on her face, even though those insights merely exposed her own incompetence more so than display Wei Yi’s knowledge, “If not for the manner in which my memories have slightly warped as a result of my current state, I would have given every relevant memory to you already… I’ll attempt to figure something out on that front as well, if I can.”

“I have some insights into mental energy, so I will include those fragments in the Ascendant’s Library for you to look through. Keep working on this, and I will head out and continue following that man. I think that he might be going exactly where I need to go as well,” Wei Yi said.

With a quick gesture, she was able to bring her mind out of the prison realm and back into reality, where little time had passed as it had been slowed significantly by the combination of the Kong Prison Realm’s temporal distortion and the fact that their talks had occurred in their mental states. Almost everyone could think faster than they acted, as the body was slow and cumbersome in many ways, and this was especially true for a spatial spirit and a mental energy cultivator in the sixth realm, like Wei Yi was.

 

After marking a number of residences and people with her energy, in a way that she had confirmed would display her intent to Luo Na, the Ascendant had been able to finally locate someone that could lead her towards a significant party in the conflict, and so she decided that she would focus her attention on them until something came out of it.

It did take a while, but with a few more people and locations out of the way, she was finally on her way to wherever that person’s information was going.

Just as her scans through spiritual perception had confirmed when she had been above the western portion of the Luo District, the location of the important members on the side of the Great Families was nearly guaranteed to be to the east, or beneath the ground in that direction. The person that she was currently following, a large man that had come and gone to a number of buildings in which most were having quiet discussions near items that would obscure spiritual perception to some extent and on the topic of supporting the mysterious Great Families, was on his way to that direction with a few documents in hand.

All of the documents were rather interesting, at least when considered based on the glimpses of them that she had been able to obtain before they were put into a binder that completely blocked out her mental energy, so she didn’t doubt that this person was someone important, or that he knew someone that was. It was very likely that he himself wasn’t a core part of the group, seeing as he was only in the fourth realm and didn’t have many intellectual conversations on his way there, but he was related.

Fortunately for her, another clue to his relative insignificance was the fact that there seemed to be no guards escorting him to his destination, and that he was left with no talismans to protect himself. Had he been an integral part of Luo Yunzhen’s plans and group, then he would have been someone with more ability to defend himself, whether it was through internal or external means. It would have also been wise for such a figure to pay more attention to the things around them than he did, since Wei Yi could get quite close to him with him being none the wiser, although she couldn’t entirely rule out the possibility of everything being smarter than she gave it credit for.

Until there was a good reason to presume that he was faking his weakness, inattentiveness, and general incapability, she was not going to make that her primary assumption.

‘Besides, of all the people to have the ability to trick my perception of their spiritual perception, someone that looks to be descended from the Luo and Chen families doesn’t seem to be the most likely candidate,’ she thought while she applied a few more layers of stealth techniques on top of her currently active ones, ‘The Lan or Shi families are far more specialised in that regard.’

Even if the man was able to see her presence, he didn’t make it obvious, and just continued on.

After a while longer, as if he was making sure to take as much time as he possibly could on his journey, giving Wei Yi enough time to go through a few more residences and areas to ensure that she marked as many of them as needed, he finally came to his destination – a large structure at the edge of the eastern dense portion of the district, just before the various buildings reached the point of being more spaced out between one another.

The man coughed as he knocked on the door. The timing seemed coincidental, but considering the reaction from the other side, it was likely to be part of the password to get in. It was clever, but only in terms of ordinary methods.

When it came to planar energy, there were far more things that could be done.

“Have you brought everything that was requested?” the person on the other side of the door asked once she opened it, “That red-haired woman is creeping me out with the way that she looks at everything. It’s like we’re insects beneath her, you know? If she doesn’t get what she wants, she might eat us alive or something… she’d probably start with you, though.”

“Stop calling me fat already, Xu Luo. I get it, I need to stop eating as much, but I can’t! The Mindful Eating Art is too precious!”

‘Oh, that’s what’s going on with his body, then. I was wondering what the strange energy about him was all about… Still, less significant than the confirmation that someone similar to who I am looking for is here,’ Wei Yi noted as she snuck inside with Mortal World’s Echo physique as to avoid risking discovery by using a password that might have been dedicated to each person, not to mention the fact that she was not someone that either the man or the woman would know about.

As such, if she randomly knocked on the door and provided the right password, it would cause a lot of suspicion about her identity, especially with the extreme similarity between her and Jian Hongchao. Luo Na even thought her to be related, which, if true, would not make things better for her at all.

The building looked to have been a kind of hotel at one point, but it was currently devoid of residents and staff, with the only people present being the two that had entered at this moment, and a number of people beneath the first floor that she was not able to perceive fully. Although the foundation of the structure was rather thin, it was full of all kinds of materials and old arrays that had lost their strength some time ago, and thus it did quite a lot to distort her spiritual perception. It was less effective than an intentional method to block her mental energy, but it was still sufficient.

‘Perhaps that is the kind of thing that their divine sense is able to penetrate… The seventh realm is Oblivion Halo, and so the halos generated must be able to focus both mental and planar energy into a stronger form. In that case, the seventh realm of spiritual will, killing intent and killing will cultivation alike should form a similar conduit, that being the Condensed Lens, Raging Focus and Yin-Yang Conduit respectively. In that case, simply having killing will at the sixth realm and planar energy at the fifth won’t be enough to push me through,’ she considered while she found and then proceeded down a set of steps that had been blocked with a number of items of furniture.

Just as usual, the World’s Echo ability proved incredibly useful in bypassing such obstacles, as she did have some power in the district through the Conqueror’s Eye and could thus pass through walls easily.

The staircase was also disused, filled with dust and a number of small webs that formed near the ceiling. It looked as one might expect, however, this was rather undercut by the fact that much of the dust was not truly positioned as it might be normally. Instead, it was spread out nearly on each step, and it had not had the time to properly settle, resulting in it being easy to disturb.

Even if Wei Yi had no clue that there was anyone beneath the ground, she would have still been able to learn that simply from the usage of what was likely to be a talisman to collect dust from the staircase, spread it out and then arrange it on the steps in a vaguely realistic manner. The craft of the talisman itself was certainly impressive, as it achieved a high degree of precision despite the instant and singular nature of most talismans, but it would not have been sufficient for anyone looking for clues to be misled.

Then again, there was a table, wardrobe, cupboard and random pieces of wood in the way, so nobody who wasn’t intending to search deeper would be here in the first place, so perhaps the talisman wasn’t all that useful after all.

After she descended to the first basement floor, she found that it looked even more disused than the first floor, but this was more genuine in all places but the ground, where there was yet another obvious trail of dust all the way to the next set of steps. As with the others, although it was not as blatant as a set of footprints in the grey and white of dust would have been, it still made it incredibly clear that there was something of note to be found at the end of the path.

That was exactly where she went, descending again and again until she finally reached a door to the fifth floor of the basement that did not even attempt to blend in with the surrounding wood and stone.

It was a dense slab of some kind of material that Wei Yi had never come across before, most resembling a kind of black marble despite clearly being metallic to the touch. There was a strange coldness to it, as if it devoured the heat around it constantly, even managing to cool her hand for a moment, as if her absolute yang and yin physique energy didn’t matter in the slightest. While this did stop after a breath, with the door seeming to be unable to absorb any more of her heat despite not warming itself in the slightest, that was still rather concerning. The material also looked to be significantly stronger than the walls around it, and so Wei Yi did not intend to test it.

Why go through the strongest portion of the wall when it was easier to do so elsewhere?

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