Time hurried by, and before long, half a year had passed. As the alliance meeting drew near, the atmosphere on Mount Hua grew increasingly lively.
Making a name for oneself had always been the central theme of the jianghu. The lure of fame was especially strong for the young.
To achieve good results in the tournament, the seeded contenders all went into seclusion to prepare. The atmosphere across the mountain took on a completely new look.
With the enthusiasm for cultivation running high, even the disputes between disciples of the Sword and Qi Factions became less frequent, as if their conflicts had vanished overnight.
Li Mu was naturally glad to see this change. Wasn't it wonderful to get along peacefully like this? Why resort to fighting and killing?
But a three-foot-thick layer of ice did not form in a single day. The struggle between the Sword and Qi Factions had a long history, and the interests entangled in it were immense. It could never be resolved with just a few words.
They could join forces against outsiders, but the moment the external pressure disappeared, their internal strife would erupt.
The question was, were there still enemies who could make the Mount Hua Sect tremble with fear and tread on thin ice?
Unfortunately, the answer was no.
The Five Mountains Alliance's greatest enemy, the Demonic Cult, had become embroiled in an internal power struggle ever since the last battle between the orthodox and unorthodox factions.
It had already withdrawn from the northwest. The few branch altars it had left behind were barely holding on and couldn't possibly put pressure on the Mount Hua Sect anytime soon.
Shaolin and Wudang were enemies lurking in the shadows, but the time for drawing swords against them had not yet come.
On the surface, everyone was still "good friends." Most Mount Hua disciples didn't know those two were enemies; even the sect's higher-ups might not have realized that their former allies had now become "competitors."
Aside from those three, even fewer forces in the jianghu could threaten the Mount Hua Sect. The Mount Song Sect, so overbearing in Smiling Proud Wanderer, was still a well-behaved little brother of the Mount Hua Sect at this point, showing not the slightest hint of ambition.
Against this backdrop, even if the sect wanted to use an external enemy to divert its internal conflicts, there was no room to do so. Surely they couldn't start another battle between the orthodox and unorthodox factions?
That would make them complete blockheads.
The martial world might have been divided among four great powers, but in terms of overall strength, the Demonic Cult—which could stand alone against most of the jianghu—was the mightiest force. The Five Mountains Alliance, meanwhile, was at the bottom.
Without the support of the orthodox sects, the Five Mountains Alliance simply didn't have the resources to withstand the Demonic Cult's pressure.
Unlike the orthodox sects, which took ten or twenty years to train a single disciple, the Demonic Cult gathered people from all walks of life. Their quality might not have been great, but they had numbers to spare.
Aside from a small number of elite followers whom the cult trained itself, the rest were desperate outlaws recruited along the way. Their deaths hardly troubled anyone.
If they were truly pushed to the brink, they wouldn't fight you head-on. They would target your sect's businesses and isolated disciples with raids, wearing you down until you were dead.
Unless their own interests were at stake, no one wanted to fight to the death against a band of barefoot men with nothing to lose. That included the Five Mountains Alliance, the vanguard against the Demonic Cult that had been pushed to the front.
So, in most cases, it was the Demonic Cult that started the battles between orthodox and unorthodox factions. Unless they had no other choice, the orthodox sects rarely launched the first attack.
With the Double Ninth Festival approaching, many people of the jianghu had gathered in the Huayin region. Conflicts and disputes followed one after another, and the Mount Hua disciples responsible for keeping order came under immense pressure.
Li Mu had no choice but to emerge from seclusion. Thanks to the perfect compatibility of his cultivation method, his cultivation had advanced another step over the past six months.
He hadn't managed to break through to the first-rate realm, but compared with six months ago, he was already a completely different person. His progress in swordsmanship, especially, had exceeded his expectations.
Not only had his basic swordsmanship reached its peak, but even the Sword Sect's most difficult secret arts, the "Thirteen Styles of Gentle Breeze" and the "Life-Taking Three Immortals Sword," had both reached mastery.
Still, the sword art he liked most was the "Nurturing Self Sword Technique." It might not have stood out among the Mount Hua Sect's many secret arts, but its underlying philosophy was profound!
The person who had woven "noble righteousness" into swordsmanship to create this technique had surely been a genius with exceptionally deep attainments in the art.
Perhaps it was just his imagination, but while practicing the Nurturing Self Sword Technique, Li Mu faintly sensed a trace of "sword intent."
That alone was remarkable. Many people in the jianghu wielded swords, but only a handful could sense sword intent.
Across the vast Mount Hua Sect, only Feng Qingyang had touched that realm. Once he crossed that threshold, a whole new world would open before him.
Given Li Mu's cultivation, he naturally had no chance of truly comprehending sword intent. But even that faint, elusive sensation had greatly benefited his sword training.
Just how much stronger he had become was hard to say. Without a concrete point of comparison, even Li Mu couldn't tell.
He figured it shouldn't be hard to stand out among his peers, but how he would fare against the senior disciples was anyone's guess.
Fighting wasn't just about the level of one's martial arts. Experience in the jianghu mattered just as much.
His fellow disciples were all greenhorns who lacked experience. At most, they had sparred with their fellow disciples, and everyone was more or less on the same level.
The senior disciples were different. As the Mount Hua Sect's backbone, they were often out and about in the jianghu. Who among them didn't have several lives on his hands?
When Li Mu returned to his master's courtyard, it was much livelier than the last time. He counted roughly thirteen senior and junior fellow disciples there.
That wasn't even everyone. As far as Li Mu knew, his master, Zhou Qingyun, had more than thirty disciples. Twenty-seven remained, excluding those who had already kicked the bucket. If nothing unexpected happened, that number would keep growing in the future.
It seemed like a large number, but spread over time, it averaged only three or four disciples admitted under him in each generation.
Taking on disciples was also a responsibility and duty of the sect's elders. Among them, all but the youngest, Feng Qingyang, who had yet to take a disciple, had a whole crowd of disciples, young and old.
With so many disciples in the sect, it was naturally impossible for everyone to take part in the tournament. The presence of outsiders made the requirements even stricter.
Li Mu roughly sensed that the least skilled person present had reached the peak of the third-rate realm, while the strongest had even reached the peak of the second-rate realm.
The strength of his master's branch alone could almost rival the Mount Hua Sect at the beginning of Smiling Proud Wanderer. No wonder Yue Buqun went mad later on.
Geniuses always drew attention. Even though Li Mu had tried his best to keep a low profile, he was the youngest disciple present, and his arrival still drew everyone's eyes.
The jianghu respected the strong.
Two people might both be in the second-rate realm, but a second-rate martial artist in his thirties and one not yet twenty were worlds apart.
The former merely had a chance of breaking through to the first-rate realm. The latter was all but guaranteed to do so, and even had a good chance of advancing further.
Martial arts cultivation had its limits, too. Aside from methods like the "Mount Hua Mental Method," which excelled at preserving health, most martial arts were mastered fastest between the ages of twenty and thirty.
"Greetings, senior brothers!"
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