A Hard-Won Victory

Then she bowed to Wen Xu with the respect due a disciple. "Ming Jing, an Outer Sect disciple of Yonglu Mountain, greets Little Grandmaster Uncle. Thank you."

...There's really no need to be so formal. Sure enough, no one called him senior brother.

Wen Xu admired her deeply. Even her severing of family ties gave him a new idea. His master had said his relatives were still alive. Perhaps, when the time came, he too would need to... sever those ties.

Cultivation was wonderful. It could even cut blood ties that the mortal world could not. That was wonderful indeed. Wen Xu decided to add another two hours to his daily cultivation when he returned.

With the matter settled, Sect Master Zhao of Cloudglow Sect finally arrived with his eldest disciple.

Sect Master Zhao was a True Lord at the Nascent Soul Middle Stage, and he looked elderly. Clearly, he was over nine hundred years old. A Nascent Soul cultivator could live for a thousand years; only in the final century would a cultivator whose appearance had remained unchanged begin to age.

Of course, not everyone aged. Those who cared more about their looks might take an Appearance-Preserving Pill, but cultivation tested one's state of mind, so most let nature take its course. After living so long, most people cared less about appearances anyway.

Sect Master Zhao was evidently one of them. The eldest disciple beside him had a face like gold paper and unsteady steps; he was clearly badly injured. Even a cultivator with wounds like that ought to be recuperating at his sect, not traveling here. It showed how highly Jiang Baozhu had been valued at Cloudglow Sect.

Cloudglow Sect's eldest senior brother was named He Jieyi. He had a Metal-Fire Spiritual Root and had originally been at