Yun Lei's smiling face greeted Yun Meili as soon as she entered the city gates. He extended his palm forward, asking for her hand but she didn't comply.
"I'm covered in blood." She simply replied. Seeing that she wouldn't willingly give up her hand, Yun Lei had no choice but to take it himself.
He held her by the hand as he led her away from the noisy troops. Yun Wei would be taking care of the aftermath of the battle. They had already done what they needed to do.
Yun Lei had shown himself to be a capable strategist while Yun Meili's might had been put on full display. They had laid the foundation for the future.
The two were led by a servant to a carriage that swiftly began making its way towards the Yun Manor.
Looking down at his hands that still hadn't let go of hers, Yun Meili asked in a small voice, "Were you impressed?"
"Very." He replied with a smile. In fact, he was too impressed.
Yun Lei wanted her to take this opportunity to display her dominance in front of the troops. To that end, he had wished to encourage her a little. However, his encouragement had worked far too well and she had gone above and beyond any of his expectations.
He silently made a mental note to be very careful with the words he spoke to her, lest she got herself killed.
The exhaustion on her face was as clear as the day. To everyone else, she appeared completely fine but he could immediately tell that she had used way too much profound energy.
It was very late by the time the two reached Yun Meili's room. Su Ning, who had been patiently awaiting their return, immediately smelled blood when they entered the room.
"Young Master, Sister Meili?" She inquired. Yun Lei told the maids to help the Princess bathe before moving towards Su Ning.
"Do not be so worried, Ning'er." He placed one of his hands upon her cheek, causing her cloudy eyes to tremble. "A beast tide attacked the town and Meili took part in the battle. She is unharmed."
Su Ning finally relaxed upon hearing his soft words. "You should have stopped her, Young Master. What if something had happened to her?"
"There were several capable people around and the Governor himself was looking over her. Nothing would have happened."
"Why do you smell like blood too?"
"Meili and I rode in the same carriage. Surely, you would not want me to let her come with someone else."
"Of course not!"
"Yes, yes. That's why I came with her. You should sleep now, it's quite late. I'll join you after taking a bath."
Yun Lei helped her lay down on the bed before giving her a peck on the forehead.
The maids unrobed him with practised hands and he joined Yun Meili in the bathtub, much to her dismay.
"There is no need to be embarrassed, dear wife. Have you not seen me naked before?" A playful whisper left Yun Lei's lips as he placed his arm over her shoulders.
"The maids are here." She managed to speak through clenched teeth. Her fair skin had been covered with red clouds as his skin made contact with her.
"They won't look." He let out a chuckle. All the maids had been staring at their own feet.
"That's not the point."
"What is, then?" He gently pulled her closer till her entire body was leaning against him. He tenderly caressed her head as her breathing began to deepen and slow down as she fell fast asleep.
The two soaked in the bath for a few more minutes. The maids helped put some clothes on her and he carried her to bed.
"Sister Meili seems tired." Su Ning spoke.
"Yes, she worked hard today." Yun Lei slipped between the two women before laying down his head on the pillow. He wrapped an arm around each of them before making himself comfortable.
He was quite tired himself and it didn't take long for him to drift to sleep.
His sleep hadn't been very comfortable. In his dreams, he saw visions of an Ether Cloud in ruins, no traces of life left in it. He saw Yun Meili's cold corpse but he couldn't determine how she had died. He saw Su Ning's body in shambles, her head separated from her trunk.
The worst part of it was that he didn't even know if it was just a nightmare or a premonition of the future that was yet to come.
In the past, the fate of the city hardly mattered to him but that was no longer the case. He had Su Ning and Yun Meili to worry about and the safety of the city was very important for their future.
One thing was becoming very clear to him. He needed more strength and he needed it fast.
As soon as he woke up, he quietly slipped out of bed and made his way to the library. It was still dark out but the first rays of the sun were not that far away.
Yun Shu was sitting on a chair in the library courtyard, diligent as ever. After giving him a short nod of greeting, he immediately started making his way to the third floor.
There was a reason he had been able to immediately identify that the Grand Elder was at the third floor of the library, which led him to the deduction that that was where all the books regarding Cultivation and Battle Techniques were stored.
After he had woken up, his physical senses had been sharpened immensely but that wasn't all. He could sense profound energy as well. At first, he thought it would only be useful to determine the location of cultivators but he had soon found out that there was much more to his sense.
It was far more minute than he had first expected and the more he used his senses and got used to it, the more detailed and intricate it became.
Profound energy could be found everywhere around the world. In some places, there was a higher concentration, in some places it was thinner. However, no place in existence could be completely devoid of profound energy. Or such was the conclusion Yun Lei had reached after repeated observation.
However, when he had first entered the library, he had noticed an anomaly. A human-shaped space where he couldn't feel any profound energy existed on the third floor. It didn't take a genius to figure out that there was someone there, hiding their presence by completely retracting their aura into their body.
The third floor was much smaller than the other floors, both in size and the number of books. Only six large bookcases were arranged around a circular table with a few chairs. On one of those chairs, a woman sat cross-legged with her eyes shut.
Appearance-wise, she seemed to be in her late twenties but there were a few details off about her. The wrinkles near her mouth, the calloused hands that couldn't possibly have belonged to a woman who wasn't even 40 and her head full of grey hairs.
"Greetings, Grand Elder." Yun Lei addressed with a bow. Since she had her aura completely retracted, he couldn't tell how strong she was exactly but his instincts were telling him that the woman before him was very dangerous. She made him feel a sense of danger that was a lot more extreme than even the Governor.
She can't possibly be stronger than father-in-law, can she? The thought crossed his mind. After all, his instincts were rarely wrong. It was a very plausible doubt.
"Welcome to this one's domain, Young Master." The woman said, opening her striking blue eyes. The more he looked at her, the more he found her similar to Yun Meili.
Noticing his gaze, the Elder smiled. "My niece takes after me quite heavily, does she not?"
"Rather than the physical similarities, how closely her aura resembles yours was more shocking to me. Grand Elder must have been the one who taught her how to use a sword."
"Truly, Young Master's eyes are even more impressive than I had initially thought." She said with a nod. "It is indeed as you say. Not only is she my niece, she is also my only disciple.
"Traditionally, the head of the family would personally train the heir on the way of the sword. However, as good of a leader he might be, my little brother was never even half the swordsman that I am. I couldn't bear to let her incredible talent go to waste."
"It seems that the Grand Elder's effort has not gone to waste. The way she moves her sword is as elegant and beautiful as it is precise and deadly."
"She has plenty left to learn but her progress is satisfactory." She spoke with a fond smile. "Well then, I will disturb the Young Master from his studies no longer. Feel free to ask me questions if you do not understand something."
"I thank the Grand Elder for her kindness." Yun Lei said with another bow and the woman once again shut her eyes and the smile from her face faded.
He didn't delay any longer. He went to the nearest shelf and started reading.
The very first book he picked up was one of the basic books every cultivator belonging to the Yun Family was given a copy of. There weren't any incredibly important secrets in it, just basic stuff even a cripple would know.
Cultivation was, simply put, absorbing the aura of the heavens and the earth, in other words, profound energy, in order to increase one's strength. Every cultivator's journey began in the Energy Sensing Realm.
While all humans were born with some profound energy in their bodies, only a few were capable of sensing it. Whether or not one was capable of sensing aura was fixed from one's birth. Nothing could change that.
In the Energy Sensing Realm, the cultivator would learn to feel the profound energies surrounding them and take them into their body. The method with which this was accomplished was the so-called Cultivation Arts.
There were all kinds of Arts, all with different properties, advantages and drawbacks. Once someone started cultivating a certain Art, they could not practice another. Not without shattering their cultivation, anyways.
This carried its own risks since once someone was past their optimal age of cultivation, it became a lot harder to make progress.
After a cultivator learnt to sense profound energy, they would use an Art to start absorbing it into their body. Once sufficient energy was gathered, they would attempt to break through to the Body Tempering Realm.
As the name suggested, in this realm, the cultivator would use profound energy to temper their bodies. Profound energy made someone a lot stronger but if their body couldn't properly handle the load required to use it, it would all be meaningless. Thus, the body would be slowly tempered and profound energy would slowly be stored in the muscles of the cultivator.
Once the body is sufficiently tempered, the next step would be to cleanse the blood. After birth, the simple act of living would cause many impurities to accumulate in the body. These impurities would slow down the circulation of the profound energies in the body and thus had to be cleansed. This was the Blood Cleansing Realm.
After the body is tempered and the blood is cleansed, the cultivator would be able to unleash a lot of power. However, they would still be held back by their fragile bones. Thus, their entire skeleton had to be reforged in order to match their newfound power. This was the Bone Forging Realm.
In the entire history of the Kingdom, there were only a handful of Bone Forging Realm Cultivators. Thus, information about them was scarce. Information about the realms that followed was even harder to find.
Yun Family had more information on the matter than most other renowned families because the First Patriarch, the Yun Family Ancestor was said to be a Bone Forging Cultivator. It didn't amount to much, however. It was just some basic information.
To most cultivators, the wall between the Blood Cleansing Realm and the Bone Forging Realm was a wall they could never climb over.