Chapter 14: Foreigners

Kong Hou spent a few days in seclusion. After reinforcing her mental state and cultivation, she came out of the cave residence. Wearing the beautiful full-length dress Second Shixiong gave her, she jumped onto the flying sword Sect Master Shibo gave her. Kong Hou was extremely excited. This was her first time flying on a sword alone—it was completely different from being lifted by Master or the shixiong from one place to the next.

Yet when she flew into the sky, she found that the flying sword was not as obedient as she thought. She swayed around the sky for a long time before she managed to get the trick. After she could steadily stand on the flying sword, she looked around sneakily. Then she sighed in relief. Good, no one saw her embarrassing herself.

The other members of the sect on the training grounds tried to make their movements seem more natural to keep Kong Hou from knowing they had watched the entire process. The other members who had Base Building cultivation or above all had smiles. When they had reached Base Building back then, they also excitedly jumped onto the flying swords. They could not control their spirit energy well and caused much laughter. The most tragic ones had fallen and broken their noses, which had only grown back with the aid of the Appearance Returning Pill of Daybreak Cloud Peak Master Qing Yuan.

Supposedly, the most reliable Eldest Shixiong Wu Chuan had been extremely awkward when he first started using flying swords. Over time, watching a member of the sect who just reached Base Building learn how to use flying swords became an unspoken little habit of the sect. But everyone was careful. They would watch but they would not laugh and damage the friendship in the sect.

After contentedly watching the spectacle, they sighed ruefully—so when a pentad spirit base reached Base Building, they were not very steady when they used their flying sword for the first time.

Kong Hou carefully controlled the flying sword so it would not hit the rock walls or buildings. She heard Second Shixiong say that Master had once knocked down a house in the sect. While he had not been expelled from the sect, he had been fined a great amount of his monthly allowance. She didn’t want to get spirit stones deducted like Master, so she was careful.

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“Kong Hou Shimei.” Ling Hui stood on the stone steps and waved at Kong Hou. There were some other apprentices behind her, both male and female, who were dressed grandly.

Kong Hou saw the disciples she had invited had arrived, and jumped off the flying sword to get to them. “Greetings, Shixiong and Shijie.”

“This dress is really beautiful.” Ling Hui took out a bag of dried fruit from the her storage bag and handed it to Kong Hou. “It even has defensive seal scripts—who was so generous?”

“Second Shixiong gave it to me.” Kong Hou opened the paper bag and threw a bayberry into her mouth. “So delicious. Thank you, Ling Hui Shijie.”

“Cheng Yi and Tan Feng are really spoiling you.” Shixiong were good. Ling Hui turned and looked at the two shidi behind her. Not like these two—she had to worry for them.

The two shidi drew back a few steps under the glare and didn’t dare to look at Ling Hui.

Kong Hou pretended not to see the exchange between the apprentices of Daybreak Cloud Peak. “It’s already late. We should descend the mountain early. I brought along a lot of spirit stones this time—eat as much as you want.”

Ling Hui took out her flying sword and threw it into the sky. She jumped onto the sword and said to her two shidi, “Look at other people’s fellow apprentices, and look at you two.”

The two shidi: “…”

In order to avoid the conflict between the three apprentices due to a few spirit stones, Kong Hou hurriedly said, “The shixiong didn’t give me the spirit stones. Master did.”

“Wang Tong Shibo…” Where did he get the spirit stones?

Ling Hui looked at Kong Hou who had jumped onto a flying sword and was extremely close to her. She did not want Little Shimei’s impression of her strong master to be destroyed, and her words turned around in her mouth. “Wang Tong Shibo is very good to you.”

“Yes.” Kong Hou nodded in agreement. “Master is the best to me.”

Ling Hui felt that she knew why Wang Tong Shibo would say that Kong Hou was his last apprentice. If more came, he could not afford to raise them.

The apprentices laughed and chatted as they flew down the mountain on their flying talismans. This was the first time Kong Hou was receiving members of the sect on her own, and it was a novelty. What tea to drink, what pastries to eat, what dish to order. She had asked for everyone’s tastes before having the waiter of the restaurant prepare.

The waiter was a young person not yet twenty. Seeing an adorable young girl with a lily hairstyle speaking to him, other than nodding and saying yes, he couldn’t say one word of refusal.

The shixiong and shijie saw Kong Hou’s seriousness and exchanged looks. They smiled and left Kong Hou to it. After Kong Hou sat back in her chair, a shixiong teased, “Shimei has some deep knowledge about food.”

“What knowledge.” Kong Hou took the tea that Ling Hui handed her and moistened her throat. “In the mortal world, I was an imperial princess…”

The other people seated gasped out loud. A princess of the mortal world would still carry the dragon energy the heavens gave them. This was of benefit to cultivation. They hadn’t expected Shimei to have such an identity as well.

Kong Hou jumped in fright at the gasps of her shixiong and shijie. Kong Hou smiled embarrassedly. “But I wasn’t a princess for many years before our family’s dynasty was overthrown.”

The other people: “…”

Little Shimei’s smile was extraordinary, having seen through reputation and fortune.

“It’s all right if you aren’t a princess. Being a princess is not as good as cultivating.” Ling Hui took out a bag of dried apricots and handed them to Kong Hou. Kong Hou took the dried apricots and suspected that Ling Hui Shijie‘s storage bag was full of snacks.

“Shijie is right.” Another shixiong picked up the topic. “Questing for the path, cultivating for long life—isn’t that more interesting than a mortal’s short few decades?”

Kong Hou nodded. “Yes, mortals cannot fly. Wearing long dresses is only pretty when flying.”

Ling Hui agreed with Kong Hou’s statement. “Yes, floor-length dresses, silk dresses, they will only float when you fly in the air. In order to be beautiful for longer, wear beautiful clothing longer, and eat delicious food for longer, one needs to cultivate.”

The male cultivators sitting at the side maintained their smiles and didn’t dare to talk. After staying for a long time in Splendid Cloud Sect, they knew that if they wanted to live their days well, they should keep their mouths closed when women were speaking.

Any man who decided to be at odds with a woman usually never had a good ending in history.

The restaurant moved quickly, and the fruit and cold plates were soon brought to the table. While Kong Hou and the others did not wear the apprentice uniform of Splendid Cloud Sect, some waiters had seen them before. So when the dishes were served, the restaurant owner gave them two jugs of wine for free.

Everyone was of the same generation and the apprentices of their respective peaks. There were no differences in their status, and they interacted naturally and easily. In the span of drinking a few cups of tea, Kong Hou had heard many stories about the world. Enchanted, she even stopped eating.

“And then, and then?” Kong Hou listened to how beautiful a female apprentice of a certain sect elder was. “Did they fall in love?”

“Not that.” People who gossiped liked audiences like Kong Hou who desired for them to keep talking. But this particular gossiper felt that Kong Hou’s thinking was strange. Why did something have to occur between the master and apprentice? Had he previously said there was any sexual tension between those two?

“This beautiful female apprentice fell in love with a beast trainer, but the beast trainer did not feel any love for her.”

Kong Hou’s eyes were wide. She was already imagining the angst between the beast tamer and the beauty. In the end, they were separated in different places and never met again…

“The female disciple was a forthright person. Seeing the beast trainer indifferent to her, she did not pursue him. But the beast trainer bragged about this and said the beauty of a certain sect was just so and such.” When speaking of this, the shixiong showed slight disdain towards this beast trainer. “The female apprentice heard of this and beat up the beast trainer. The entire world learned of this.”

Kong Hou sighed in relief. Fortunately, it wasn’t the beast trainer humiliating the beautiful female cultivator and the female cultivator still not changing her mind. Then she would die in anger.

“That’s incorrect,” Ling Hui said. “I heard that other than the female cultivator beating the beast trainer, the female cultivator’s master also fought the elders of the beast trainer, saying that their sect’s conduct was poor and they were not worthy of cultivating.”

“So there’s more.” The people present became interested. “Was the fight vicious? Did they cry and beg for mercy?”

Kong Hou was about to continue listening when she heard the sounds of a fight outside the restaurant. She pushed open the window and looked outside.

Beside the restaurant tower was the street. Shops and some local stalls were all on the street. When there was great traffic, many people would sell small things and make a bit of money. It was rare to see intense conflicts.

However, today’s quarrel was loud. Several beautiful female servants carried a soft sedan and were surrounded by tall strong guards. These guards all had Base Building cultivation, each of them was proud, and they seemed to resent there were too many people setting up their shops around them and affecting their ostentation. Two middle-aged men dressed in grey robes were shouting for the hawkers to move aside.

But the people of Harmonious City were usually lazy and hadn’t met such unreasonable cultivators before. Seeing these foreign cultivators being so fierce, they pretended not hear and organized their wares.

The customer shopping turned to look at these foreigners and rolled their eyes. They turned back and continued to bargain with the hawker, “I’m an old customer of yours. Just round down the last digit.”

“Auntie, I really cannot. Seeing you are an old customer, I’m already giving you my lowest price.” The hawker shook his head. He picked around his basket and took out two fruits. “How about I give you two fruits as a bonus.”

The two middle-aged cultivators hadn’t expected that their shouts would be ineffective. They felt slightly embarrassed. At this moment, the person in the sedan sneered, and they trembled in fear. They turned and quickly kicked over the two stalls closest to them. “Ignorant mortals, don’t you know to move aside for a Mind Manifestation Forebear?”

In the cultivation world, cultivators that could reach Core Formation were few, and Mind Manifestation cultivators were even rarer. In order to show respect, people called Mind Manifestation cultivators “Forebear.”

The people of Harmonious City whose stalls were kicked over stilled. Were they being bullied by foreign country bumpkin cultivators?

“In the land of Harmonious City, you cannot be rude.” As everyone paused, several young males and females leapt from the restaurant and appeared in front of these cultivators.

They arrived.

The people of Harmonious City quickly put away what had been kicked over, hid behind walls, windows or doors, and then poked out their heads to watch

It had been very long since Harmonious City had encountered such arrogant and ignorant foreign cultivators. They were slightly excited.