Volume 5, Chapter 62 – Joining

“Oh… so you want to stay.”

Under the clear morning light, in the main hall of Listening-to-Rain Tower, Bai Xiang once again met Li Huiran and Yu Daoyong.

To be honest, she was a little surprised by this. Taishang Response had indeed detected the two of them, but she had been more on guard against them harboring ill intent than expecting things to go in this direction.

Li Huiran in particular.

Back when he had challenged her to a duel, he had carried himself with extreme arrogance. Now, standing before her, he looked like a fanatical fan meeting his idol.

He had not said anything, but the fervor in his eyes already said everything.

Bai Xiang also understood that Li Huiran’s fervor was not directed at her as a person.

He did not care what she looked like, whether she was beautiful or ugly, male or female.

He was here for the Path of Qi and qi methods.

As long as he could learn the Path of Qi and qi methods from her, and use them to attain the supreme Great Dao, then personal preferences, personal dignity—he could throw all of that away.

This man was a bit of a social Darwinist.

That was how she saw him.

“That is indeed the case,” Yu Daoyong replied to her question. “We considered many things together, and concluded that in the world today, only Your Majesty’s Dao can truly be called the ‘orthodoxy.’ That is why we have come to pledge ourselves to Your Majesty.”

“Orthodoxy.” Bai Xiang rolled the word over in her mind, then slowly shook her head. “From the standpoint of doctrinal legitimacy, Dao-Void Methods are the true orthodoxy.”

“You can’t put it that way!” Yu Daoyong rebutted her with great agitation. “Dao-Void Methods may have held doctrinal legitimacy, but in the past they never bore the responsibilities that came with it!”

“When the sapient beings first created cultivation methods, it was for transcendence, for resisting the limits imposed by fate. That, in truth, was the most original driving force.”

“But as time passed and all things developed, some people’s thinking began to change. They no longer regarded that purest longing as truth. Once they reached a certain station, they started talking about ‘balance.’”

“They spout all kinds of absurdities about ‘repairing the Heavenly Dao through loss, so that surplus grace may remain,’ but in truth they only want to block the path of progress for others so they can monopolize the benefits for themselves!”

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“But qi methods are different.” Yu Daoyong changed tack, and his expression became almost sacred.

“From the very beginning of their creation, qi methods existed to enlighten all living beings. That not only demonstrates the merit of qi methods, it also shows Your Majesty’s breadth of heart, drawing a complete line between you and those hypocrites.”

“…You are very different from the others in the Demon Court.” Bai Xiang gave him a long look.

“Very well.

“From this day onward, Great Xia shall establish a separate Heaven-Monitoring Directorate. Your name is Yu Daoyong, so you shall serve as the first Heaven-Monitoring Envoy.”

“Thank you, Your Majesty.”

Yu Daoyong immediately dropped to one knee with straightforward ease, not putting on any of the airs of a Venerable Saint.

“And you.”

Lifting her eyes toward Li Huiran, Bai Xiang’s own gaze held a trace of teasing.

“It seems Patrol Warden Li and I still have an unfinished duel between us.”

“How does Patrol Warden Li intend to settle it?”

“I have already left the Demon Court,” Li Huiran said, still speaking in that same cold, dry tone.

“I came into this world for one reason only: to seek the true method and the Great Dao.”

“I was drawn in by your power. I want to learn from you.”

That was way too direct…

Even Yu Daoyong, listening from the side, wanted to cover his face.

“So what you mean,” Bai Xiang said, narrowing her eyes, “is that you want to take me as your master?”

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“That’s right!” Li Huiran nodded.

“I already have disciples, and all of them are far below you in cultivation.” Bai Xiang tested him. “If you join my school, you will have to follow the rules and call them senior brothers. Can you accept that?”

“So long as they can beat me.” Li Huiran’s expression shifted slightly, and he added a condition. “If they can beat me, I’ll call them senior brothers.”

In the end, Li Huiran still became Bai Xiang’s disciple.

Only, he was the kind of disciple who was not formally entered into the rolls—not even recorded in the register. He was merely allowed to study and attend lectures alongside the others, and if there was anything he did not understand, he could ask in private afterward.

A status like that meant he did not need to follow too many of the dojo’s rules either. It was meant as an adjustment period, and Bai Xiang also intended to observe him for a while.

“Those two are both Venerable Saints, aren’t they? Aren’t you worried something will go wrong if you keep them within the fold?”

After the two of them left, Xiang Xian popped out from the side and pulled Bai Xiang aside to question her in detail.

A Venerable Saint was still, in truth, within the category of Immortal Venerables, only counted among the very strongest of them. In ordinary terms, one could explain it as “an Immortal Venerable at the peak.”

The corresponding realm on the Path of Qi was the Origin Realm, which was also Xiang Xian’s current realm.

But on the one hand, even with her Origin Realm cultivation, at best she could only hold a Venerable Saint to a draw. On the other hand, this meant facing two of them at once.

If Bai Xiang went deep into the wilderness and those two took the chance to try something, Xiang Xian feared she would not be able to hold things together.

“It’s fine.” Bai Xiang told her not to worry.

“I may not have to go directly into the wilderness.”

“???”

Xiang Xian stared at her, stunned for a moment, completely unable to understand what she meant.

After dismissing her nominal master with a few words, Bai Xiang carried the little white fox she had snatched from the other side and went to Starwater Company to find Bai Maoxu.

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“Sis, you’re here?”

Bai Maoxu was modifying a mechanical arm. Its appearance looked somewhat familiar; it was probably Chen Jing’s left arm.

At the moment, most of the mechanical arm had been taken apart. A number of cables ran from its interior into the machine beside it. Bai Maoxu wore work clothes and a face shield, looking every bit like a hardcore tech nerd as he worked away in earnest.

“The thing I asked you about this morning—do you have an answer yet?”

Bai Xiang asked him.

“You mean the ‘coordinates’…”

Bai Maoxu frowned.

He still had not decided on that matter.

If he understood her correctly, what Bai Xiang called “arrival by coordinates” should be something similar to the “spatial deployment technology” seen in science fiction.

But since it belonged to science fiction, it was obvious that it had not yet been invented to the point of practical use.

The Federation before the first year of Zhengyuan had not possessed that technology either. It was only after the Void Tribulation ravaged the world, and the power of Loss of Order altered certain laws of physics, and humanity also discovered some rare mineral veins and materials in nature with special powers, that “spatial technology” finally began to enter the realm of possibility.

But the limitations were still huge.

At present, the most they could do was use void crystals and certain demon-beast materials to make folded storage tools of some kind. As for transporting living beings, that was absolutely impossible…

“You don’t need to think about that much.” Bai Xiang roughly described her idea to him. “I only need a ‘coordinate’—a coordinate that can trigger that kind of ‘fluctuation.’”

“If that’s all you need, then this becomes very easy.” Bai Maoxu’s tightly furrowed brows instantly relaxed.

“It’s simple.”

“I can finish it tonight.”

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“Very good.” Bai Xiang was extremely satisfied with his efficiency.

“Then where does Sis plan to put the ‘coordinate’?” Bai Maoxu asked again.

“Here.”

Hm?

Bai Maoxu turned his head and saw that Bai Xiang was staring at the mechanical arm lying disassembled on the workbench.

…

At the same time, in Luezhou, a phone call came to Tao Muyun.

“A joint remonstrance?”

“No… ah, I’m already old. I can’t be bothered getting mixed up in something like that…”

“Of course I’m not going. Isn’t that obvious? I’ll just stay right here and wait for news from all of you.”

Beep.

The call ended, and a faint smile appeared on Tao Muyun’s face.

The stable environment inside a university really did make it easy for people’s hearts to rot.

But there was no way he would forget.

When the sword edge falls,

people die.