"Han Feng, you are really starting to get on my nerves." Xia Yuning pressed her finger into his chest. "If you have nothing good to say, just shut up!" The little weasel turned away sheepishly.
"Lei Hong, I am not pushing forward so I wish you the best of luck in here." Liang Yu announced. The few people that received his help thought it would be a good time to leave as well. "The "danger" in this place is not worth a reward that is most likely no longer here."
Hearing that, Lei Hong's nodded in understanding. His clan members were torn in wanting to stay and wanting to leave. But the decision was made for them.
Lei Chu was ordered to lead the clan members out. As well as help the clans and random cultivators they assist so far. Considering they already found some treasure it was not much of a loss for them to leave now.
Liang Yu advised them to leave the area as well but it was ignored like he thought it would be.
Huyan Zhuo and Han Feng were convinced really by Ling Yu to stay. So were the Gu sisters and little Zhuo. Nothing much could be done about that considering. As the others cleared out and Ye Xinghe's group focused on getting the artifacts Liang Yu took the bodies left behind.
'Some is better than none.' Throwing them into the Flame Vortex Core, he pushed the refining process along as he caught up with the leaving party quickly. The information and the qi went straight to his Dragon Martial Dantian to push it along. With the higher up cultivators, it worked pretty quickly in raising it up. 'Ye Yue is almost done so that is good. The rest will go to me and help improve my martial understanding.'
The qi fluctuations were contained as he traveled. The constant use of the Flame Vortex Core had made it more powerful and the process speeds up. As well as let him pick up a few tricks for the future.
*Woosh!* Power qi circled around Liang Yu as they moved once more. A few of them looked back and just assumed it was him removing a seal that kept his cultivation in check. Liang Yu went from the 1sy Heavenly Layer as a Dragon Martial Artist, to the 2nd, the 3rd, and then the 4th in a few hundred paces.
*Badum!* Dragon Martial artist in the group felt a sense of suppression before it vanished. Liang Yu's cultivation then increased further as he pushed into the 5th, followed by the 6th and then the 7th.
Internally his Flame Vortex Core increased almost five times in purity and size. Pure qi drizzled down increasing the power of his Flame Martial Artist Dantian and the Dragon Martial Artist Dantian. Slowly the threshold before stepping into the 8th Heavenly Realm could be felt.
'I will have to use the refinement on myself later. Feels like my body is ready for the next level of the Metal Seed, Fire Body, and Astral Sense. Then there is the other techniques and manuals I picked up from those I just refined.' While they moved, his Astral Sense pushed out further than any of those present could feel. 'I will take the new bodies I gather here and the treasure hidden in that "poison lake" to help push me to the 8th Heavenly Layer.'
With the influx of qi and knowledge, Liang Yu pieced together where the lake was located. The only trouble was that he still couldn't determine how to get to the blasted orchard. Hopefully, Lin Yin ad better luck finding it.
.
Trouble Already-
.
The moment they made it through the first corridor, bodies greeted them. Several cultivators had been killed in a grisly manner. Liang Yu sensed a few coming down another path he never checked before. In a few seconds, he understood why.
'Hidden doors of course!' Turning to those that were carrying injured he shouted quickly. "Whoever did this is still here! Run as fast as you can to escape and stop for no one!" The few cultivators stared a little to long at the bodies and the surroundings in fear. "Damn it!"
*Fwip!* A dagger was thrown from the hall going to kill a cultivator quickly. Laing Yu shot forward and deflected it with a scaled hand. No longer just purely on his physical body made things easier.
"Hurry up and move! I will slow them down!" Liang Yu shouted. Seeing as a few of them spotted the enemy coming from the direction the dagger was thrown, they got their shit togethor and focused on escaping. A few reluctant looks about leaving him to fight by himself but the urgency to survive pushed that away. "Here goes nothing!"
*Swoosh!* A cold chilling wave of energy gathered in Liang Yu's fist. He sent an explosive jab forward combined with the power of his physical body and dragon qi. A mixture of Dragon Aura Explosion and Dragon Aura's Fist was devastating.
Dark blue qi traveled down the corridor like a brutal wave of energy. It pushed against the sides cracking the walls. Small traces of debris turned into powder and was swept away. The members of the Sea Pavilion met the attack head-on with an expected result.
*Splat!* The bodies exploded and smeared the walls. Liang Yu stood mouth agape wide-eyed. The power was almost intoxicating but he reigned it in quickly thanks to the change in Astral Sense.
"The breakthrough is still going on. My energy is still hyped up most likely." He said to himself mostly to help convince himself. After all, if he thought he was unstoppable he would probably get himself killed quickly. "Perfect place to test everything out though!"
Heading down the hall through the blood, Liang Yu broke the wall where the secret passages were and went through.
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Outside-
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At the foot of Mount Beiming, were the forces of Grand Commandant of the Imperial Army Hong Guang who had arrived. Luckily the majority of the people escaped due to Liang Yu's advising them to leave by planting information that the Rebels had a base in the area and the Imperial Family was aware of it.
Fear was a good motivator if done correctly.
The only people left were mostly members of the Rebels. Actual family members that knew nothing of what was going on. They would pay the price unfortunately for the actions of the others in their family and community.
A lieutenant moved up to a monkey face white-haired man. The monkey face was Hong Guang. "Grand Commandant, the people from the area have mostly left. The interrogation of a few leads us to believe that someone knew we were coming to conduct a raid."
"What of the six-thousand troops sent before to clean the area?"
"The majority was wiped out by the Rebels." The Lieutenant paused before he spoke the next words. Fear evident on his face. "Hong Duang survived with a few of his troops and was forced to flee into the forest before getting word back. He made it quite clear that those who attacked him were from the North Lord's mansion dressed as rebels."
"Any word from the North Lord's Mansion that leads this to be true?" Hong Guang was not liking the sound of this at all. It was bad enough that Hong Duang inserted himself into that situation but he even survived to report back that a loyal member of the Imperial Family was a traitor, it was to much to believe. 'But maybe he set up to look like he was a hero by going. Why was he so insistent to go in the first place?'
"The enemy's movements are tricky and unknown. The fact they are strong is undeniable but the accusations were pushed to the side easily." The Lieutenant did not voice what he thought. If the North Lord's Mansion was involved then it made sense they were able to take the force out so easily. Especially using the information from the years of training in the tactics themselves. "Terrain advantage can only help so far Commandant!"
"What a bunch of useless things to die like that!" THe Commandant was annoyed and thought they brought shame to the Imperial Army by losing. Even if it meant they lost to another faction of the Imperial Army. "When we return, bring the corpses to our camp. We will find answers ourselves."
"About that.." The Lieutenant veered away from the old man. ".. there are no bodies. Although they didn't leave behind any corpses, from the clues they left behind and the various traces of evidence, these people should be from the rebel group."
"Rebel group or the North Lord's Mansion, which is it!" It was more a demand than a question. The old Commandant was not liking the way things moved about. "Then that would mean the incident before was to set up for this time!"
"Not necessarily." The Lieutenant answered back unable to keep some things to himself. "Reports from the Drak Moon Family suggest the North Lord Mansion have those involved doing things that some members knew nothing about. Namely, this is mostly driven by the current lord and not his father. "
"Humph! And we should believe the report from them why?"
"The current Patriarch of the Dark Moon family outed the former in direct combat. He killed him one and one taking control of the family and breaking from the Great House above them in one instant. Immediately turned those he found even remotely communicating with the rebels over to the Imperial Family or executed them. The bodies were all burned away reports confirmed from sources say. Before they were killed of course. There are no longer any spies in the family from my understanding."
The old Commandant stopped his horse paying closer attention now.
"Besides making sure some strange laws are followed in the area that the Dark Moon family governs, the crime rate has dropped significantly, the peoples' health and living conditions have increased and demon beasts that have been a nuisance were wiped out. Mostly those of the 4th Heavanaley Realm in the areas about 100 miles outside any town." The lieutenant was unable to hide his smile. "The Dark Moon Family has set the bar high on how noble families should really act."
"The Imperial Family has not acted on this change. Why is that?" The Commandant found it odd the Imperial Family would allow a Noble Family that was not a member of the Great House to gather so much prestige without stepping in to intervene unusual. "Surely something must be in the works."
"There is something." Another Lieutenant said coming over. "The Academy seems to have close ties with the Dark Moon Family. Liang Yu happens to be a student of Vice-Principal Xu. His only student the way things are going. Ye Xinghe, a member of the Azure Feather Family is a student in name only and lost a good bit of protection after he was removed from the Academy thanks to the order of the North Guardian Lord's Mansion. This is odd considering it was rumored he helped save the Lord's daughter Xia Yuning. And rumor suggests a relationship existed between the two. An Xueyun, the other student of the Vice-Principal has not returned due to family reasons."
"Grrr!" The more he heard the more the Commandant became furious. To much was going on involving these few people. The reigns of his horse were gripped tightly as he came to a decision. "This area is under the jurisdiction of the North Guardian Lord's Mansion, yet all of this is going on and he is nowhere in sight or a representative nearby! Send someone to inform the North Guardian Lord and the Imperial Palace to send more troops!"
"About that.." The 2nd Lieutenant informed him of the report he received a few moments ago. "The Northern Barbarians attacked Tianzong City and the North troops were deployed to defend the city. Asking them to come here to help out would be..."
"We can't just leave the rebels to do as they please!" The Commandant raged. "Although we may have traitors, our core army is unharmed! With a hundred fifty thousand troops here, I don't believe that those rebels would still dare to do as they please!"
The soldiers were not out pillaging stood at attention. Some were spies for Liang Yu that Liang Yin arranged. His connection may not reach all across the empire, but it reached far enough to arrange this.
These "sleepers" took a record of the actions going on and would report what members of the Imperial Army had done under their watch. At least 31% were marked to be killed for actions like this.
"I believe this treasure is fake like the reports suggested." The 1st Lieutenant answered. This only caused the Commandant's anger to go higher.
"Lockdown the whole of Mount Beiming! All those Noble Families are not to leave!" THe Commandant's voice echoed through the mountain range. Alerting all of the rebels in the area. As well as the fleeing families who took a break. "Chase them all back into the underground complex and get them to search the treasure! We will know if it is fake or not! Regardless of who it is, if any should dare try to leave or take anything out, kill without mercy!"
As the Imperial Army heed the words of the Commandant, several people looked from the shadows listening intently. Members of the Rebels faction, and members of the Heavenly Star Academy with Vice-Principal Xu leading them.