Volume 5, Chapter 105 – Calling to Account(2-in-1)

Anything involving a primordial human branch tied to sainthood through the flesh was something both Bai Xiang and Xiang Xian took very seriously. After discussing it, the two of them decided there was no need to print out the finger bone’s “full body” for now. They could keep it in its current state first and use the newly grown marrow tissue for a few experiments.

“Catch.”

Before Bai Xiang left, Xiang Xian took out a white porcelain medicine bottle and tossed it to her.

Bai Xiang caught it and pulled the stopper free. At once, she smelled an extremely dense bloody scent tinged with the odor of medicinal ingredients.

That smell alone was enough to analyze what its main ingredient was. Bai Xiang put the stopper back in and asked Xiang Xian, “Really a contribution from ‘Jiuli’?”

Hannah had already mentioned earlier that they were researching pill refinement using Demon God remains as materials. This was most likely their preliminary result, and they were eagerly hurrying to find her to test the medicine.

“This is the ‘Blood God Pill.’ I’ve eaten it myself, and there’s nothing wrong with it.” Xiang Xian nodded. “After taking it, it can greatly stimulate the body and catalyze qi and blood. Even someone in the Origin Realm would feel ‘overstuffed’ from taking one pill a day. Right now, the only person who can truly digest it is you.”

That was pretty good.

Bai Xiang nodded, put away the little bottle, and prepared to try one after going back.

After advancing to the Divine Palace Realm, her cultivation progress had frozen completely. That later burst of minor growth had actually relied on a trick involving her natal Dao sword. Her own cultivation realm and life level truly had not changed in quite a long time.

So this counted as another possible path. If pills refined from Demon God flesh and blood were effective on her, even just a tiny bit, then she could begin trying to construct the theoretical basis for the next stage.

Whether it was a theoretical basis she made up herself, or one borrowed from cultivation novels she had read in her previous life, copied straight from those books, as long as it could be confirmed through soul-vision of the Body-scape experiments to work and to be traversable, then what remained was simply a matter of filling that theoretical framework with energy.

Bai Xiang did not care how other people cultivated, but for her, cultivation was basically just like that.

So she got right to it.

Back at Listening-to-Rain Tower, Bai Xiang went up to the fifth-floor training room and sat down to meditate. She took out one Blood God Pill, swallowed it, and carefully felt the changes in the medicinal force.

It really was extremely violent.

Although Demon Gods had the word “god” in their name, in terms of cultivation realm and life level they were equal to human cultivators who practiced Dao-Void Methods. Both could be called the Saint Realm.

Using the blood of a saint as its material, then mixing in hundreds of rare medicinal ingredients, and using Jade Spirit Mingxin to calculate, continuously exhaust possibilities, and adjust the formula, the pill ultimately produced through that process caused even Bai Xiang to feel heat surging upward the moment she swallowed it. Her body temperature kept rising as the medicinal force was digested.

After sensing it like this for half an hour, Bai Xiang frowned, opened her eyes, and swallowed two more pills.

This time, the heat rising from her abdomen became even more violent. Her qi and blood truly were being catalyzed and stimulated. Countless orifices within her Divine Palace flickered like stars, and beneath the delicate skin on the surface of her body, skin as tender as though it could burst at a touch, many tiny, nearly imperceptible pores trembled and breathed, forming a layer of translucent blood-qi flame around her.

The temperature of that blood-qi flame was terrifyingly high. The moment it appeared, it made the wooden floorboards, corridor pillars, and ceiling around her give off the smell of scorching. Bai Xiang hurriedly shifted up into the sky. Otherwise, the entire Listening-to-Rain Tower might have been burned down by the flames.

The thing would not disperse, so she could only wait in the sky for several more minutes. Only after the qi and blood within her gradually cooled, and the gale-winds extinguished the blood flames on her skin, did she shift back into the training room again, staring blankly at the pills in her hand.

Trying to use this thing for cultivation did not seem realistic.

Her body had already been refined to perfection. She might look slim and delicate, with skin on her body like congealed cream and frost-bright jade, but that was only the “illusion” produced by physical refinement reaching Great Perfection and returning to simplicity. With even a casual exertion of strength, she could mobilize an entire river of orifice-stars within the Divine Palace of her inner body-scape. Any part of her body could strike with perfect force. She had truly reached the point where there was no higher to rise and nothing further to refine.

It was true that the Blood God Pill, once swallowed, could stimulate qi and blood, but the enormous quantity of qi and blood it stirred up was like a headless fly. All it could do was make her temporarily overexcited and hot-blooded. The blood-qi flames it produced could also slightly improve her close-quarters combat ability. Beyond that, it was of no use.

But when it came to close combat, the damage she could inflict by casually drawing Feixiang Heaven was ten times greater than what she could do with her fists and feet.

So what use were these flames supposed to be?

It could only be called tasteless, useless to keep, a pity to discard.

“I knew it wouldn’t be that easy.”

Bai Xiang gave up the idea of using it to level up, put the pills away, and planned to use them later to help Bai Zhuqing break through.

Directly using the medicinal force was a bit too violent, but if Bai Xiang swallowed it herself first, then passed it to Bai Zhuqing in another form, the medicinal force would become much gentler.

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She was not hoping to push Bai Zhuqing into the Divine Palace Realm. That was unrealistic. But at the very least, she had to help her break through into the Origin Realm.

Unlike the outside world, which treated the Golden Core as the benchmark, in Bai Xiang’s eyes, only after touching the Origin Realm could one barely be said to possess the ability to protect oneself.

After cultivating, she was sweaty all over again, so Bai Xiang simply stripped and went to the washroom for a bath.

When she came out and saw the dirty clothes, she had originally intended to throw them all into the basket. But then she remembered someone’s earlier “improper words.”

Her fingers paused. She chose to hook out that wet pair of black silk stockings and hang it separately outside the basket.

After changing clothes, Bai Xiang seemed to sense something below and took the initiative to descend to the second floor. The moment she appeared, she saw a shadowy figure drop down before her and prostrate herself flat on the floor.

“Your inner attendant Jian Three greets Your Majesty.”

The shadow wore a specially made black skintight combat suit with a surface that did not reflect light. From the pose of complete prostration, the high curve of her rear was clearly visible.

So it was actually a woman with a very impressive figure.

“What is it?” Bai Xiang asked.

She knew all about the existence of these inner attendants.

As long as she kept Taishang Response active, she knew what was happening throughout half of Zhennan Base City. It was just that most matters were not worth paying attention to and were automatically judged by Jade Spirit Mingxin as white noise.

“Xuzhou Prefecture, Luezhou Prefecture, Zezhou Prefecture… strange phenomena have appeared across the entire realm,” Jian Three answered immediately, taking a letter from her bosom and presenting it. “The prefectural overseers in every region have already sent people to investigate and submitted written memorials. This is urgent news.”

Bai Xiang took it and glanced through it a few times, not showing the slightest surprise on her face.

The matter was simple. To put it plainly, the primordial return had been artificially accelerated, and anomalous changes had appeared in many places across all of Great Xia.

For example, when Bai Xiang followed the memories of the soul-gu on a killing trail the day before, through mountains, canyons, forests, shorelines, wildernesses, there had been ancient voidfiends appearing in many places. That was the effect of the intensifying fusion.

But what this urgent report described was not limited to demon calamities.

If there was a demon outbreak, then one only had to meet it in battle.

If one could not win, one could run. If one thought escape was impossible, one could call for reinforcements in advance.

With qi-path divine pools blanketing the entire realm, it was impossible that one could not even send out a distress signal.

Rare cases like the revival of a Demon God such as Jiuli were ultimately very few. What truly threatened the well-being of entire regions was the change in terrain during the fusion process.

Take Luezhou, for example. The report clearly stated that from eastern Luezhou to southern Xuzhou, the ground was rising. Overnight, a great river had appeared between them. Its waters linked upstream to the Jing River and seized a river mouth downstream, forcibly creating an outlet to the sea between the two prefectures.

That was no small matter.

A single river could have an enormous impact on an ecosystem. Not to mention how many aquatic demons the riverwater might bring with it, the river itself could alter the climate of surrounding regions.

And those were not the only changes. The report also described the Jing River changing course, torrential rain over barren mountains, flooded basins, and poisonous miasma encircling cities.

Bai Xiang could already foresee that once this chain of changes stabilized, many of Great Xia’s environmental characteristics would be rewritten.

As the saying went, seas become mulberry fields.

Just imagine it: some places had been oceans hundreds of millions of years ago, yet were now mountains and wasteland.

Different lands from different eras were now fusing together again within a single point in time. How violent an impact would that create? And within such natural upheaval, how tiny and powerless would human beings appear?

This too was part of the greater trend. It could not be stopped.

“I understand.” Bai Xiang set down the letter, took out a quarter of a Blood God Pill, and casually tossed it to Jian Three.

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Jian Three froze for a moment. After catching it, she smelled its bloody fragrance and felt her qi and blood stir out of her control from that alone. Realizing it was a fine thing, she hurriedly bowed in thanks.

But… there were no further instructions?

Jian Three knew perfectly well that these “miscellaneous matters” ought really to have been submitted to Bai Zhuqing for review.

But the matter this time was simply too large. According to procedure, anything this serious had to be reported to the emperor first. Otherwise, if blame came later, no branch of the system could bear the responsibility.

She just had not expected that Your Majesty would say nothing at all.

She looked completely unperturbed.

Jian Three knew what was in the letter. On the way here, she had actually been quite uneasy, worrying about how such a major event could possibly be handled.

But now that she had met Bai Xiang and discovered that Bai Xiang did not treat it as a big deal at all, that unease melted away. She merely took this Great Xia empress to be someone with deep strategies already in mind, and someone as insignificant as herself naturally had no need to worry.

In truth, Bai Xiang was not nearly that certain. She was simply waiting for Bai Zhuqing to return.

“Big Sis? You know what’s been happening outside, right?”

As expected, Bai Zhuqing came back very quickly. Seeing Bai Xiang seated in the main hall on the first floor, she removed her shoes as well, walked up, sat across from her, and said with a deeply worried expression, “Voidfiends are easy enough to deal with. Changes in the land are hard to guard against. If this keeps going, some cities won’t even be livable anymore.”

Heaven-and-earth transformations were no joke.

A great many buildings could become dangerous ruins just from losing a load-bearing pillar. How much greater would the impact be when an entire regional plate rose and shook?

The casualties and economic losses would likely be beyond counting.

“Summon the court ministers,” Bai Xiang said.

Bai Zhuqing froze. “Huh?”

Court ministers, in truth, simply meant the ministers of state, those officials responsible for the various directorates and departments, in charge of resource coordination and personnel dispatch.

Bai Zhuqing did not understand what Bai Xiang wanted to do, but she trusted Bai Xiang more than ten thousand percent. If Bai Xiang said it, she would do it.

Those in the Zhennan region who could be counted as court ministers were immediately summoned.

Among them were familiar faces like Zhang Xianzhi and Xu Ling, as well as others Bai Xiang had only met before or heard named.

Eight in total.

All of them obediently came beneath the hall of Listening-to-Rain Tower and knelt toward the seat above.

“We pay our respects to Your Majesty—”

“May Your Majesty’s sacred body be in health?”

“Cut the nonsense.” Bai Xiang interrupted Xu Ling’s greeting, took out the urgent report, and flung it into his face. “Three hours have passed since the anomalies appeared across the various prefectures. You should already know about this.”

Uh… what does that have to do with me?

Xu Ling opened his mouth, both bewildered and afraid.

Time could change many things. As someone without qi-path talent, ten years of toil had already left him with a trace of age. His once-black hair had turned ashen and dry, and his complexion was waxy yellow and none too pretty.

“Lord Xu,” Bai Xiang said again, “I asked around, and I was told that more than seventy percent of the directorates across the various regions chose to stand by and watch when faced with the disaster, doing nothing but frantically send urgent messages here.”

“I wonder what views you have on this phenomenon.”

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This is bad.

Xu Ling finally understood. He realized that the Imperial Court’s reproach was in fact aimed at the faction behind him.

What kind of person was Xu Ling?

He was the prized disciple of Liu Haoran, Master Liu, from back in the day.

Both he and Zhang Xianzhi were actually members of the Liu faction, and the Liu faction was famous for having “supported” the High Emperor during the former dynasty. Even now, over thirty percent of the officials in court and throughout the realm belonged to the Liu faction. In truth, that was the reward they had received back then for choosing the right side.

So here was the question. You had already eaten that reward, already taken power, status, and wealth into your hands. Then why, when the time came for you to turn things over and do your jobs, were you standing by with folded arms?

Bai Xiang’s meaning was very simple. Both Xu Ling and Zhang Xianzhi could understand it. The problem was that neither of them could answer.

The Liu faction’s officials had chosen the most cautious way of handling the disaster because they wanted to avoid blame. The core reason was that not long ago, one of the Liu faction’s students had been punished “for his words.” Whatever the consequences of that might have been, not to mention however many people were secretly dissatisfied, in the end they would still feel that the emperor had a violent temperament, and would be afraid that if they did too much or made a mistake, they themselves would also be punished.

In truth, that could not be the only excuse. Both men knew that such a unified, large-scale convergence of behavior could not possibly have happened without planning. But to say that aloud would be a truly condemnatory accusation. Not only would it amount to betraying their own teacher and faction, it would also place themselves over an open fire.

Oh…

Bai Zhuqing understood now too. She was actually very politically sharp, and instantly saw that Bai Xiang was looking for an angle of attack from which to begin dealing with the Liu faction.

In reality, the Liu faction had to be dealt with even if it had not pulled anything.

They occupied too many positions. Back then, Bai Zhuqing had been unable to move against them because they really did have merit and she could find no excuse. After the founding of the Zhengyuan era, some within the Liu faction had become even more corrupted. If they were not purged, things would become troublesome.

Policies always had to be transmitted to the local level, where local officials would interpret and implement them.

And how local officials interpreted and implemented them would have a tremendous effect on the outcome of those policies.

To be sure, by Big Sis’s previous style, killing anyone who disobeyed, and also killing those who liked “over-implementing” orders, was certainly satisfying. But if these people simply lay flat, never openly singing a different tune, only squeezing out action like toothpaste, moving only when you pressed them, then how could policy possibly be effective?

“Reporting to Your Majesty, on this matter… on this matter, your servant truly does not know.”

Xu Ling’s forehead was covered in sweat, and his rear was sticking up even higher than Jian Three’s.

“Your Majesty,” Zhang Xianzhi also suggested with a stern face, “this matter is suspicious… I advise summoning Teacher Liu here for a face-to-face confrontation.”

He was different from Xu Ling.

Xu Ling was more slippery in office than he was. Saying something like this was basically staking his own head to guarantee that Liu Haoran had not betrayed anyone. Xu Ling did not dare say such a thing. Zhang Xianzhi did.

“We’ll discuss that matter later.”

They had thought Bai Xiang would keep pressing on this issue, but instead she changed topics at once.

“Whether you use your connections to remonstrate with him, or seek a direct confrontation with Master Liu, handle that yourselves, and do it quickly. For now, we are discussing something else.”

“Overseer Bai.” Bai Xiang looked toward Bai Zhuqing.

At work, she always used titles.

She had always been able to keep such things separate.

“Your Majesty.” Bai Zhuqing also understood what was required. She stepped down from the hall platform and gracefully bowed toward Bai Xiang.

On the surface, Bai Xiang was putting a question to her, but in reality, her pair of golden pupils was fixed on Zhang Xianzhi. “I would like to ask Overseer Bai: after the Void Tribulation has ravaged us for ten years, why are there still heaven-and-earth transformations on such a large scale today?”

Damn.

The moment those words were spoken, whether Xu Ling, Zhang Xianzhi, or even the other court ministers kneeling below, everyone felt their hearts jolt.

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It was actually a very simple logic problem.

Heaven-and-earth transformations were not some obscure term. The geographical fusion caused by primordial return had in fact been far more frequent at the beginning of Zhengyuan than it was now, and far more intense than what was described in the urgent report.

But that had basically just been that one wave.

After that period, the fusion had slowed. There had still been changes afterward, yes, but they were mostly minor disturbances, no longer worth listing separately for court deliberation.

But now the changes had intensified again. That meant either natural mutation, or someone was actively pushing it along.

Reason dictated that the latter was far more likely.

At present, the only force capable of causing that kind of push was the Starsea Federation. The prosperity of the Sacred Weapon Clan meant that the Federation had not lost too much industrial technology. On the contrary, it had made breakthroughs on top of its foundation, so the Federation still retained control over both the atmosphere and outer space. As things stood, only the Federation could manage that dense ring of shattered star-ring fragments around the outer edge of the main world’s planet.

Achieving such an effect would be simple. All they had to do was tamper with the star-ring fragments and make them fall.

But the problem was… if this whole affair was being driven from behind by the Federation, then wouldn’t the Liu faction’s crime have to be elevated to “colluding with the enemy and betraying the nation”?

How could that be tolerated!

If Your Majesty truly investigated the matter, could our nine clans still be preserved?

That was the real reason these men were drenched in sweat.

“Your Majesty…” This time even Zhang Xianzhi could not remain steady. He opened his mouth, wanting to explain.

“You don’t need to say these things to me.” Bai Xiang cut him off. “I am only putting forward a possible direction of suspicion. Whether it is true or not still requires verification.”

“If there is no crime, I will not slaughter indiscriminately.”

“But if there is a problem, I will no longer let it pass as lightly as I did before.”

Before… could that degree of severity really count as letting things pass lightly…?

The court ministers below were trembling all over as they listened.

But Zhang Xianzhi let out a quiet breath of relief.

At the very least, he himself had not taken part.

Neither he nor Xu Ling had participated in anything like that. On that point, he could guarantee it with his own head.

As for his teacher…

He frowned slightly.

With prefectural overseers across all those prefectures, and so many directorates all displaying such bizarrely uniform behavior, this matter truly was suspicious in the extreme.

Even if he were the one looking at the matter, he too would suspect that Liu Haoran had notified everyone.

Because basically speaking, within the Liu faction, only Liu Haoran possessed that level of prestige. No one else carried enough weight.

“Dismissed.”

Bai Xiang gave the order, sending everyone away.

She was only looking for an excuse to knock the Liu faction once and lay down foreshadowing for a later purge.

As for now, she needed to find out whether it was the Starsea Federation that was stirring trouble on the side.