My Profession Can Be Upgraded Without Limit

They had saved Mengli and held that border town not out of any chivalrous desire to uphold justice, but because a living princess was worth more than a corpse, and a town with living people was easier to turn into a frontline stronghold than a field of ruins.

Jiang Xuan understood this. The Cultivators of the Southeastern Province understood it. The people of the Mystic Moon Dynasty presumably understood it as well.

But understanding was one thing; what one chose to do was another.

What made Jiang Xuan think these people foolish was that, at this very moment, their wisest course would have been to follow Mengli's example: hide every trace of vigilance and resentment beneath a meek, proper smile, discuss cooperation in the most sincere tone, squeeze every last drop of usable value from the situation, and win one more sliver of hope for the countless subjects behind them who were still waiting with upturned faces.

That was how the weak ought to survive.

Yet the gazes he sensed now clearly did not think that way.

Those resentful young people from another land seemed to believe that hostility and cold stares could display their backbone, that undisguised resistance could proclaim their dignity.

Jiang Xuan felt a little sighing, and a little pity.

Following the most intense of those resentful gazes, he saw a young face—a young general of the Mystic Moon Dynasty. His armor still bore mottled traces of erosion by gray mist, and at his waist hung a longsword whose scabbard had been worn so badly its original color was no longer visible.

Jiang Xuan met his gaze for an instant.

The young man froze slightly, clearly not expecting Jiang Xuan to look at him so suddenly. Yet he did not avert his eyes. Instead, he straightened his