At the Azure Cloud Sect's headquarters, within the Ascension Academy.
Yu Shixian had not left all noon. Though he was occupied with countless affairs and had not personally gone to Dragon Tooth Mountain to witness the contest, he was just as concerned about the news from there.
When the result arrived at midday, he finally revealed a gratified smile.
"Excellent! Truly a pillar of our sect!"
"Sect Master, now that the Rong Household has yielded, they presumably won't say anything more about the title. We've also delivered a warning to the lineages and powerful aristocratic clans within tens of thousands of miles. Can we begin implementing that plan?" a Tenth Transformation expert who looked like a steward asked upon hearing Yu Shixian's praise.
This man was a hall-master-level steward of the Administrative Affairs Institute, responsible for public opinion and the dissemination of news.
The sect could not cultivate Fang Qianyuan into the Righteous Path's Top Young Expert without the cooperation of people like him.
"That plan?" Yu Shixian had been following this matter all along, and naturally understood what that plan meant.
"Precisely-the Summit-Climbing Plan!" the master of the Public Opinion Hall said.
"This plan was devised to complement our efforts to nurture him back then. Once Young Master Fang reached the Tenth Transformation, he would continually challenge powerful opponents, slay fiends and vanquish demons, and build his reputation. Once he had accumulated enough, he would leap like a carp and ascend to the summit!"
"Simply put, we would begin openly proclaiming this title, shifting from offense to defense!"
"In the past, Young Master Fang's cultivation was insufficient, and his reputation was not yet widely known. Implementing this plan would inevitably have drawn criticism. Now, though criticism will remain, we can guarantee a groundswell of public opinion and fan the