Slaves and Servants

At the Kong ancestral hall, halfway up Peacock Ridge.

Kong Wenxuan and five companions who had also succeeded in awakening their bloodlines this time followed close behind the patriarch, Kong Changgeng, into the ancestral hall.

Passing through three courtyards, they entered the main hall, where a great many memorial tablets stood on more than a dozen tiers. On the highest tier stood a single tablet, beside which sat a fist-sized stone that shimmered faintly with starlight.

Under the patriarch's guidance, Kong Wenxuan and the others offered incense and performed three kneelings and nine kowtows before the tablets. The patriarch then began to tell the six of them the history of the Kong Lineage.

"Counting back ten generations from mine, to the first Jian generation recorded in the genealogy of our Kong Lineage, there was the founding ancestor, Kong Jianling. He succeeded in setting a star in the Celestial Stars True Spirit Diagram that covered the sky, raising the Lineage's Peacock Bloodline to the ninth-grade True Spirit rank."

"Our Kong Lineage thus became one of the ninth-grade True Spirit Lineages under the Golden Crow Imperial Dynasty, controlling a county spanning a thousand li. It could be called a thousand-li marquis."

"Six generations followed: Jian, Dao, Dun, An, Ding, and Mao. The Lineage grew more prosperous with each passing day. At its height, the genealogy records that it had nearly a thousand first-tier Qi Refining cultivators and as many as thirteen second-tier Foundation Establishment cultivators."

Patriarch Kong Changgeng's face was full of pride as he spoke of the Lineage's rise, but it soon gave way to sorrow as he continued:

"Yet what reaches its peak must decline. At the height of its prosperity, the Lineage failed in its attempt to reach the eighth-grade True Spirit rank. Not only did the Peacock True Spirit Star fall from the Celestial Stars True Spirit Diagram, but the third-generation patriarch also failed to advance to the third-tier Purple Mansion realm. He turned directly into a third-tier Demon Beast and slaughtered his way through the clan, nearly wiping out all its cultivators."

"The next three generations, Xiu, Zhao, and Yi, spent most of their time wandering in hardship, drifting all the way from the imperial dynasty's central region to the Vermilion Bird Domain of the southern region, where we now reside."

"It was not until my generation, the Lineage's tenth, that the Du Household, a ninth-grade True Spirit Lineage possessing the Cuckoo True Spirit Bloodline, took us in here in Cuckoo County. Only then were we able to settle on Peacock Ridge."

In fact, Kong Wenxuan and the others had all studied this history at the clan school, where it had been taught in greater detail, with major events from almost every generation recorded. Yet hearing the patriarch recount it to them here in the ancestral hall gave it greater weight.

The history of the Kong Household could only be traced back to the first Jian generation. The genealogy held no record of what had come before, so even the patriarch did not know.

Finally, he pointed to the stone shimmering with starlight on the highest of the jade tiers holding the memorial tablets, beside the tablet of the founding ancestor, Kong Jianling. Looking at Kong Wenxuan and the others, he said, "This star stone was left behind after the Lineage's Peacock True Spirit Star fell. It is the last remnant of the glory our Kong Household's Peacock Bloodline knew as a ninth-grade True Spirit Bloodline, and powerful proof of it."

"As the new generation of bloodline cultivators who have awakened the Lineage's bloodline, you must take pride in its past glory, strive in your cultivation, and work to restore the Lineage, raising its bloodline once more to the ninth-grade True Spirit rank!"

"Restore the Lineage and raise its bloodline once more to the ninth-grade True Spirit rank!"

The moment the patriarch finished speaking, a plump boy beside Kong Wenxuan raised his voice and shouted, giving Kong Wenxuan and the others quite a start.

The patriarch, however, was clearly very pleased. He smiled at the boy and nodded. "Good! Wenyuan, your ambition is commendable!"

The plump boy also belonged to the Wen generation, the twelfth generation of the Kong Household. His name was Kong Wenyuan.

The generation above the Wen generation, the eleventh generation of the Kong Household, was the Yu generation.

Hearing the patriarch praise Kong Wenyuan, Kong Wenxuan and his other companions naturally caught on. One after another, they raised their voices too, declaring that they would restore the Lineage and raise its bloodline to the ninth-grade True Spirit rank.

Whether or not they could do it, they had to show the right attitude first.

"Good! Good! Good..." Listening to Kong Wenxuan and the others, the patriarch nodded in satisfaction and praised them repeatedly. He then fetched the Kong Clan Genealogy from nearby, entered Kong Wenyuan's and the others' names, and had each of them place a drop of blood on his own newly registered name.

The genealogy, too, had been passed down from their ancestors. Refined when the Lineage was still a ninth-grade True Spirit Lineage, it was a second-tier Spirit Artifact. Only those members of the Lineage who successfully awakened the Peacock Bloodline and became bloodline cultivators could have their names entered in it.

The Kong Clan Genealogy not only recorded several centuries of the Lineage's rise and fall, but also made it possible to determine whether its cultivators were alive or dead by checking their registered names.

Kong Wenxuan saw that, after he placed a drop of blood on his newly registered name, it began to glimmer faintly, showing that his life was safe.

Once the glimmer around a name faded and the name went completely dim, it meant that the cultivator had perished.

The Kong Clan Genealogy was, however, only a second-tier Spirit Artifact. What it could do had already reached its limit, and it was hard for it to possess any more or stronger functions.

After entering their names in the genealogy, Patriarch Kong Changgeng led Kong Wenxuan and the others out of the ancestral hall and down toward the foot of Peacock Ridge, where the Kong clansmen lived together in a village that occupied a considerable area.

At the center of Kong Household Village stood some of the Kong Household's important facilities, including the clan school, the scripture repository, the lecture hall, the storehouse, the affairs hall, the council hall, and the reception hall.

The patriarch now led Kong Wenxuan and the others straight to the reception hall at the center of the village. Inside, several Kong Household cultivators were drinking tea and chatting with a middle-aged cultivator.

The middle-aged cultivator also wore a feathered Dharma robe, though his was grayish white. Rather than looking magnificent, it had a somewhat plain appearance, and a cuckoo was embroidered on it.

"Fellow Daoist Du!" Patriarch Kong Changgeng was the first to bow to the man. Then he gestured toward Kong Wenxuan and the others. "This year, only these six children of our Kong Household succeeded in awakening their bloodlines and overcoming their demonic nature to become bloodline cultivators."

The middle-aged man nodded and stood. "Congratulations, Fellow Daoist Kong. Your Lineage has gained new cultivators."

Then he changed the subject. "In that case, let's not delay. Have them worship the star and enter the register at once."

With that, he formed a hand seal. Brilliant starlight flew from between his brows and gathered in the air into a star that seemed both illusory and real. Within it, the silhouette of a cuckoo could be seen with its wings spread, as though it were about to swoop out. It was the Cuckoo True Spirit.

And this star was undoubtedly a manifestation of the Cuckoo True Spirit Star. The middle-aged man before them was a cultivator of the Du Household, the ninth-grade True Spirit Lineage of Cuckoo County.

Patriarch Kong Changgeng turned to Kong Wenxuan and the others and explained, "To show our gratitude to the Du Household for taking our Kong Household in and letting us live and work in peace and contentment on Peacock Ridge, all cultivators of our Kong Household must worship the Du Household's Cuckoo True Spirit Star, draw its starlight into their bodies, and join the Du Household's outer register."

"Having the starlight of the Cuckoo True Spirit Star in your bodies will benefit your daily cultivation. You'll be able to refine more Spiritual Qi and raise your cultivation faster. Even when you break through to the second-tier Foundation Establishment realm in the future, the suppression of the Cuckoo True Spirit Star will greatly reduce the chance of Demonization and falling."

As Kong Wenxuan listened to the patriarch, his heart could not help sinking a little. However many benefits he listed, the so-called outer register was really a servant register. Drawing the starlight of the Cuckoo True Spirit Star into their bodies and joining the Du Household's outer register meant becoming its servant cultivators, its slaves and servants.

Even though Kong Wenxuan knew this, and believed everyone else understood it too, there was nothing much they could do. Such was reality.

The thousand li encompassing Cuckoo County was the territory of the ninth-grade True Spirit Du Household. The light of the Cuckoo True Spirit Star shone over those thousand li, and the Heaven and Earth Spiritual Qi within them was imbued with the power of its starlight, to say nothing of the land, water sources, resources, spiritual objects, Spirit Plants, and so forth. Under the laws of the Golden Crow Imperial Dynasty, they all belonged to the Du Household.

If the Kong Household wanted to settle and make a living within the thousand li of Cuckoo County, to live and raise descendants there, it had to obey the Du Household's orders.

With these thoughts turning in his mind, Kong Wenxuan bowed alongside his five companions to the projection of the Cuckoo True Spirit Star manifested in the air. He saw a ray of starlight descend from it and enter his body, falling straight into the Qi sea of his Dantian, where it condensed into an even more illusory projection of the Cuckoo True Spirit Star.

The instant the star projection took shape, Kong Wenxuan clearly felt a tremor in his newly awakened Peacock Bloodline. A peacock's cry sounded faintly in his mind, and he could sense wisps of bloodline power being drawn out and sent toward the illusory star projection.

It was drawing out the power of his Peacock Bloodline like a tax.

Kong Wenxuan's heart sank abruptly at this, a shadow falling over it. Just then, a wisp of Five-Colored Divine Light descended straight from his mind into the Qi sea of his Dantian, directly suppressing the projection of the Cuckoo True Spirit Star.

At once, the peacock's cry in his bloodline faded, the tremor in his heart subsided, and the sensation of his bloodline power being drawn away ceased as well.

But Kong Wenxuan's expression shifted slightly, and he could not help raising his head a little to look at the Du Household cultivator, worried that the man might notice the Five-Colored Divine Light suppressing the Cuckoo True Spirit Star's projection.

But the Five-Colored Divine Light's profundity proved far beyond his understanding. The Du Household cultivator standing at the head of the hall and receiving the worship of the Kong Household's children noticed nothing amiss. Instead, he nodded slightly, looking somewhat pleased with himself.

Only then did Kong Wenxuan relax.