"You vile Daoist!"
A sudden furious shout broke the deathly silence.
Xue Chongjian's face was livid. Fighting down his fear of a great grandmaster, he pointed his sword at Yuchenzi, his voice trembling with rage. "You are a high adept of the Daoist Order, invested with honors by the court, yet you dare secretly attack an imperial prince. That is disloyalty! As a cultivator of Highest Clarity, you see a Demonic Weapon emerge to bring calamity upon the people, yet instead of suppressing it, you seek to seize it. That is unrighteousness! Disloyal and unrighteous-you are unworthy of cultivating the Dao!"
"Loyalty? Righteousness?"
At his words, Yuchenzi slowly turned her head and looked at Xue Chongjian as though he were an ignorant child.
She gave a soft scoff. "To hear those two words from a descendant of Wu Mei is truly... amusing. What do you mean by 'the people'? Were the four hundred thousand soldiers of the Zhao Kingdom buried alive at the Changping Ancient Battlefield not 'the people'? Were the heaps of bleached bones left by Li Tang's struggle for dominion, from the Late Sui Turmoil until today, not 'the people'?"
"Well..."
Her questions left Xue Chongjian choking on his words. His face flushed crimson, and for a moment he could find no rebuttal.
Of course they were the people.
Then was this Demonic Halberd, formed from their killing intent and the murderous will of their entire lives, not also a part of the people?
"Death extinguishes a man like a lamp! Once his soul returns to the netherworld, that is another matter entirely!"
Xue Chongjian managed to recover his train of thought, but his voice no longer held its earlier force. "Besides... the victor becomes king, the loser a bandit. So it has always been..."
"Well said."
Yuchenzi's