Yun Jhin told his plan, it was a fairly simple one:
"I will be the bait and you will go and take your colleagues out of the cauldron."
Lulu nodded her head at Yun Jhin, the plan was very simple but she would lie if she didn't think about his safety so she asked:
"Are you sure about this? What if they catch you?"
Yun Jhin smiled at her and waved at her indicating that it wouldn't be a problem at all, he already scanned their cultivation bases and most of them were around the 2nd to 3rd stage, the reason the geniuses were caught was that most of them were around the 1st stage with a few over the 2nd and reaching the 3rd.
It would have been better if Lulu would have been the bait but if the natives weren't dumb they would realize her cultivation base was higher than theirs, from the looks of it even though they weren't as dumb as animals they weren't that far from it, however, due to living in the forest their instincts must be extra sharp so they should know they would enter a trap if they followed someone with a higher cultivation base than theirs.
But if it was someone with a lower cultivation base they wouldn't think much about it, they would just think it was someone they missed when they caught the others.
Yun Jhin made himself visible as he let out a little bit of his aura leak, the natives smelled the air like animals would and they started salivating as they spoke in their language:
"There should be another one we missed, I can smell his aura!"
"Yes, this one seems special, like a fat piggy!"
"Should we go and investigate?"
"The others are tied up and boiling, they won't be able to do much."
They nodded at each other as they left in unison leaving the 'geniuses' all alone in the cauldron, Yun Jhin slowly walked away from the camp leading the others by leaking his aura here and there, Lulu jumped towards the cauldron and cut the ropes that kept all of them tied together.
Most of them started crying, as some of them were armless or legless, some of them were just a torso and after they were cut from each other fell in the cauldron and almost drowned in the soup broth, but the others caught them and dragged them out.
Lulu sighed as she looked at their miserable appearance, even though only a few of them got crippled that meant their futures were over, only Sage Realm practitioners could recover their limbs after they were cut off and it would take them quite a bit of internal ki to do that.
Lulu helped all of them away as she looked in the direction that Yun Jhin took the natives, she would first get the people on her side to a safe place before she followed him to help!
Yun Jhin chuckled as he looked at the natives run around in circles around him, it was very easy to play with these dumb natives that worked only on instincts, they were too dumb to realize they have been led away from their 'food'.
Yun Jhin finally made himself fully visible to them making them hoot and holler in happiness, they threw themselves directly at him trying to catch him, they took out a bunch of dark ropes from their grass skirts and attacked him!
Yun Jhin made a few dodges as the native's attempts at catching him were rather poor, his speed was more than double theirs and his skill was also quite above, even though their cultivation base was higher it didn't mean much to Yun Jhin as they weren't trained in an orthodox way, to him who trained in peak cultivation techniques they were country hicks while he was an Emperor.
After waiting for enough time Yun Jhin guessed that Lulu should have saved all of them so there was no reason to play with these people anymore, Yun Jhin made a few handseals as formations surrounded the natives and started crushing them.
The natives hollered and cursed in their language as they tried to get away, but the gravity formation just continued to crush them into the ground, after a short while they all became meat patties on the ground. Yun Jhin devoured their spirits, but they were very lacking in quality even though there were around 20 natives in total, all their souls did was only refine his 5th stage jewel by a quarter, this was very disappointing considering they were all above his cultivation base, but they didn't know any techniques, Yun Jhin wondered how did the others get caught? Were these 'geniuses' really trash?
Before he left he let his little dragon out to eat the meat patties on the ground so he could get some nutrients.
Yun Jhin shook his head as he walked away trying to track the others, after a short while of wondering in the woods he found some marked places, Lulu should have marked them so when he came back he would follow them to their new camp.
After tracking the signs for a short while he finally found the camp, Lulu was ready to set out and come to help him but when she found out he came back alone with no injuries, she was really surprised.
She came forward to him and patted him on the shoulder, looking him up and down then said:
"It seems I have underestimated you again, you sure are a strong guy, did you kill all of them?"
Yun Jhin nodded at her then said:
"You owe me one for this, I will go now..."
Lulu tried to stop him and so did the crowd of geniuses who all walked forward and bowed at the same time while saying in unison:
"We wish to thank you Yun Jhin, you have put forward your life to save ours and we are grateful, please stay with us we want to give you something."
Yun Jhin shook his head and said:
"I have to say one thing to you all, what kind of trash geniuses are you?"
The crowd immediately became sour as they heard Yun Jhin's words, comparing to him they were indeed trash geniuses, they were so many but they got abducted by around 20 natives with their sophisticated cultivation techniques how could they have lost so bad to a bunch of mutated native trash?
The others wanted to defend themselves but a tall genius around the 3rd stage of the King Realm came forward, he missed an arm and his face was still a bit bloody from the torture that he went through and he didn't have time to clean it up till now. He bowed to Yun Jhin again and said:
"I know we are all trash and we didn't deserve your help, this is all I can say for me and my colleagues, however, due to your actions you made quite a few friends in the capital, even though most of our families don't have pure-blooded patriarchs, we are nobility after all, and when you will need help, regarding politics or anything else, you can come to my Luo household."
The others interfered as well, but some people also held grudges because Yun Jhin called them trash, however, even though they were weak they weren't dumb, most of them lived in a politic heavy environment and they recognized Yun Jhin's heavy martial talent, in the end, no matter how many politics were involved, in a world such as theirs, the heavier fist won, not the more eloquent mouth.
Yun Jhin nodded at them but didn't say anything else, he left them behind but Lulu followed him as she said:
"You know, you don't have to go, you can stay with us. Only 6 days are remaining until we can leave and I'm not sure if any other natives will appear, after all, we can't be sure those twenty were the only ones who live in this gigantic demonic forest. There must be a village full of them and we need to protect each other!"
Yun Jhin chuckle turned into a burst of full-blown laughter as he heard her words and then told her with a cold voice:
"Protect each other? Your highness Lulu, do you understand that what you are doing is counterproductive to the actual meaning of this training?"
Lulu shook her head as she said:
"What do you mean I..."
Yun Jhin cut her off as he continued speaking:
"Let me tell you something, Lulu, most of the people here were meant to die, I and you are the only exceptions, most of them are trash, you should have looked at them, I'm pretty sure they are the dead-last talented in their families and they were sent here to become food for the natives, their families wanted to get rid of them in the form of a 'training exercise'. How can you be so blind?"
Lulu's frame shook as she heard his words and then said:
"No you are wrong... you are wrong, I'm supposed to protect them, even though I have been sent here to do other things I can't let my people die in front of me!"
Yun Jhin shook his head, the Empress didn't educate her in such matters as she only trained her rigorously and let her personality develop by herself, Yun Jhin didn't know what kind of experiences she had in her childhood that made her such a protecting fool.
Yun Jhin opened his mouth and said:
"I met countless people like you on my journey from the lower continents, do you know what happened to them?"
Even though her personality was like that, that didn't mean she was dumb, she smiled self depreciatingly as she said:
"They are all dead right?"
Yun Jhin nodded and said:
"Not even their bones remained, in such a world like ours it would be better to stop thinking about the others and think more about yourself, I'm only telling you this because you are the daughter of the Empress, if you were anyone else, I would have just let you die the moment you came to help me fight that old man, do you know why?"
Lulu shook her head then looked at Yun Jhin in the eyes as she said:
"I don't care about your reasons, I know that you are rather detached from life and the well being of others due to the things you went through, I can't force you to change nor I can but you shouldn't force your beliefs in other's throats."
Yun Jhin laughed again as he heard her words and Lulu was suddenly on the ground as a gravity formation popped under her, Yun Jhin walked slowly in front of her as he looked at her from above and said:
"My 'beliefs' you said? These aren't beliefs, this is what you need to survive in this world! You are strong, smart but dumb at the same time, this can only be lead from being inexperienced, I'm only a little bit older than you but what I have gone through shaped me into what I'm today, I can only tell you this, I'm different from you in more ways than one."
She struggled to her knees as she got up forcefully in the gravity formation but Yun Jhin placed a palm on her shoulder which made her fall to her knees again, then he turned off the gravity formation as he walked away, with his back facing her he waved and said:
"We will meet again when we leave the forest, also all I can say was that it was a dumb decision to save these people, you will see when we return to the capital, they will either die due to an accident or poisoned."
Lulu shook her head, she didn't believe in Yun Jhin's words, after all, her mother never taught her anything about politics yet.
Yun Jhin silhouette disappeared in the forest as Lulu returned to the camp, she helped patch up the others and then went hunting some mutated animals.
Yun Jhin did the same as her as he went around killing animals and taking herbs, some of them would be useful for pills in the future.
Time went by quickly as the 30th day passed and they were ready to leave the forest.
Due to the entrance being on the same path, Yun Jhin and Lulu met each other quite early but they didn't talk at all, only Lulu glared once at Yun Jhin then ignored him. The others tried to curry favour with Yun Jhin but he ignored them, they were dead men and women after all.
After a short while of walking, they finally reached the entrance and meet with Kong Luo, the elder and the maid from the Song family. The maid was visibly happy as she didn't see the fatty come out of the forest.
Kong Luo nodded at Yun Jhin, he could see that there was something different about him but he couldn't point what, maybe he unlocked some of his former memories?
The Emperor would be extremely happy if that happened, maybe he would even get his retirement earlier so he could go into closed-door cultivation.
Kong Luo created another flying boat out of ki as the maid and the old man infused it with ki, both the maid and the old man had creases on their foreheads as they counted the returning disciples, they were too many!
But they didn't say anything as they made all of them jump on the boat and return to the capital.
They would take care of them back home then...