Quinlan had no idea what those talismans were, but seeing that Lady Moon just stood idly after she spread them out, he could roughly guess their purpose.
'Those must be some form of detector, ones to find hidden talents such as Yinuo.'
Not even a minute passed and Lady Moon had already opened her eyes before whispering.
"Found one."
Right after, she led Quinlan and Xiyadie down an alley until they met a dirty-looking child beggar. Lady Moon saw the child and smiled, waving her hand to clean the child's body and simultaneously healing all visible wounds.
"Little girl, life must be tough for you. How about joining me in my sect? There, you can at least secure three square meals a day."
"..."
The beggar girl was still taken aback by how her wounds vanished without a trace and how the grime covering her entire body was cleaned in an instant. Still, she knew that all that happened because of the woman before her. Her eyes flickered with hesitation, as if unable to trust Lady Moon completely.
"I... don't want to stay hungry anymore." Finally, after long deliberation, the child agreed. "I want to eat until I'm full!"
Her eyes became resolute, even though tears were threatening to fall on her skinny cheeks. Lady Moon smiled before picking up the girl in her arms.
"Then, come with us for now. We still need to find a few more comrades."
After that, Lady Moon kept on walking through the alleys. One after another, she kept finding women of various ages, ranging from as young as 5 years old to even someone in their thirties.
A large majority of them, if not beggars, were sold by their families to human traffickers. Quinlan lost track of how many hoodlums they had to incapacitate just to achieve their current number.
About an hour before sundown, Lady Moon turned around to look at how large the group had become. There were roughly 40 members now, including herself, so walking around alleys with them in tow was gathering quite a bit of attention already.
All of those gathered were women, without exception. Some of the smaller girls, unable to keep pace with Lady Moon's "walk," were being carried by the older ones. Among them all, only five or six other than Quinlan had something they could call family. Still, they didn't hesitate to tag along without even saying goodbye to their parents.
"I guess this should be enough. Well then, shall we head home?"
As soon as Lady Moon spoke, a complex pattern appeared under everyone's foot. Despite them being in the middle of a dark alley, a bright light flooded the entire space. "Make sure to not step out of the array, alright?"
After a short reminder, she then clapped her hand loudly. As if to respond to her clap, a large double door suddenly appeared right above us. It was red and seemingly made of high-quality wood, with some metallic braces here and there to hold everything in place.
Both sides swung open, and together with it came a powerful suction force. When the gate had fully opened, Lady Moon changed the hand symbol she was using into the sword hand, waving it as if drawing a star in front of her.
"W-Woah!"
"I'm floating..."
"Amazing!"
As she continued making her gestures, everyone within the glowing array began to float. Even Quinlan and Xiyadie were floating without a clue about how it came to happen. Just like that, everyone floated towards the opened door in the sky.
After all of them had completed passing through, the doors of the gate began to close with a loud thud at the end. Like a mirage, it then vanished into thin air, as if there was no gate or anything in the sky just moments before.
Of course, such a scene would be extremely conspicuous. General Mugen was alerted about it and quickly realized what happened.
"It must be another sect doing their selection. Really, I wish they'd at least give us a list of names of those they're taking with them before leaving."
---
When Quinlan opened his eyes, what he saw caused him to gasp in amazement. They were standing on a floating island, roughly a hundred meters in diameter, with dozens of different floating islands nearby!
Each island was connected by a rope bridge. It was a wonder if the islands could drift apart, but seeing that the ropes look old, that doesn't seem to be the case.
"W-Where are we?" one of the smaller children asked with fear, looking at the unfamiliar sight.
Lady Moon stepped ahead of the group before turning around, extending her arms wide as if welcoming everyone.
"This is the Spirit World, a plane higher than your previous one. This is the place where our sect resides," she explained with a smile. "From now on, this place will also be your new home. But before that..."
She eyed everyone who was wearing different clothes. Others wore rags, while some wore expensive-looking Hanfu, specifically Quinlan and Xiyadie. "You should all change clothes first."
Lady Moon snapped her finger, causing everyone to be covered in bright light. After it faded, everyone's attire had already changed. Now, they're all wearing the same design of clothes: a robe covering their bodies with loose sleeves and a flower pattern on the back.
Quinlan noticed that the design was simple and didn't restrict their movements at all. Although their thigh was half exposed, it was a small price to pay for increased mobility.
"Well then, now that you're all in your new uniforms, let's go to the Hall of Beginning. Follow me."
Again, without explaining much, Lady Moon turned around and started to walk through the rope bridge. Almost everyone hesitated to follow behind her immediately; only Quinlan and Xiyadie chased after her back with a trot.
The rope bridge was more rigid than they thought, as it didn't even shake with the wind or their steps. It was like they were walking on solid ground instead. The only problem was how to fight the fear of falling down.
Only Lady Moon, Quinlan, and Xiyadie were walking in the middle of the bridge, while the rest were holding the bridge's support ropes on either side tight, as if afraid that they would fall if they accidentally let go.
The bridge was pretty long, roughly about half a kilometer. When they reached the other end, stepping on solid ground once more, everyone sighed in relief or cheered.
Only Quinlan was looking up toward the tall building at the top of the mountain, the main building of Lady Moon's sect.