V4C67: Returning to the District of Thugs

“… and so, I am Min Shi, and my otherworldly gift is Wound Refinement. Any wound on my body lets me get stronger in that area, as well as overall, so I just end up… eh… cutting myself… that doesn’t make it sound any better, does it?”

“No, it does not. How old are you mentally?”

“Twenty-two.”

“In that case, let me tell you that you are fucking insane, and that you should stop this immediately!” Wei Yi ordered her, scaring the girl into making herself look as small as possible, “There is no need to constantly brutalise yourself just to become a little stronger! You are going to be driven mad, and it will benefit nobody at all! Look at yourself! You’re young and have plenty of methods to improve in countless ways without needing to repeatedly injure yourself!”

“I… Sorry?”

“You better be! When your body reaches adulthood, if you still think that you need to become stronger, then you can ask me, and I can offer you countless ways that are better than this! Otherwise, calm the fuck down!”

“Yes, dad, I’m sorry, I didn’t mean to upset you…” Min Shi muttered with a great deal of sincerity, with neither person realising what the exchange had turned into.

Sarah, on the other hand, looked at the two of them and frowned.

“… You know what, I’m not going to question this…” the new architect of the Dimensional Domain said, glancing around herself and finding Luo Lia Kun and Fu Zan nodding along with her, “I don’t mean to distract from… that… but could you tell where we might be able to obtain resources and food from? I don’t see any places suitable for acquiring food, water, or even more building materials anywhere near here.”

Wei Yi glanced at Min Shi one last time to make sure that she understood the message, then relaxed and said, “If your otherworldly gift doesn’t have some method of resolving this problem, and, frankly, even if it does, I intend to make use of the power of the four districts in the area to clear a part of Yi City. With the planar beasts displaced and a portion of land opened up for easy travel with clear roads and the like, merchants and allies of the Arbiters and of the four districts will be able to deliver food to you with ease, as well as anything else that you may need.”

“Is that going to be easy? In a magical world like this, aren’t those planar beasts going to be dangerous?”

“Dangerous? Obviously. That being said, the vast majority of planar flora and fauna is below the seventh realm, which means that anyone at my level power, or even just a few people in the sixth realm, could clear out enough beasts and hungry nests – which I seem to come across often – within a week at most. At that point, all that will be needed is someone to build the roads.”

“That might be within my range of abilities, possibly… Some things haven’t been uncovered yet.”

She was referring to the various fields that Wei Yi had also been able to observe which were greyed out, as well as the four arrows at the edges of the screen. It was likely that Sarah would be able to create roads as well as residences, and if she had all of the abilities that should be related to the construction of cities, as she seemed to believe that she did, then having connections between them would obviously be necessary. Perhaps she could even manifest spatial stabilisation or spatial gateway points later on, although she doubted that it would be possible until Wei Yi had access to spatial metal herself. No matter how free the ability to exchange materials was, spatial metal would be incredibly costly and unlikely to be worthwhile.

The only thing that such a function would benefit would be discovering what spatial metal actually looked like. It was still an unfortunate and an inconvenient mystery for all of them.

“I am sure that someone from the Qiang District will be more than happy to assist us regardless of your own abilities, so don’t worry about it. And you, Min Shi, don’t start harming yourself just because you have an otherworldly gift that rewards it. Keep your body and mind safe,” Wei Yi instructed, speaking from her own previous experiences, “And if you ever want to do this to yourself for some other reason, do get some help. I or Yi Shi Ming at Paragon could help you.”

“I’ll keep that in mind, dad. Sorry for worrying you.”

“… No-one is going to point it out?” Sarah muttered, addressing the otherworldly demon beside her.

Fu Zan shrugged, “It’s a bit of a thing with her, so I am certainly not butting in. Also, Wei Yi definitely knows what she is saying, and I think that Min Shi will notice once she calms down a little bit… How much blood do you think she’s lost before Wei Yi healed her?”

“I don’t know. Healing doesn’t clean the blood, though, huh… I expected magic to cover that kind of thing.”

“It isn’t magic, though. You’re from Antania, right?”

“The Great Empire of Antania, yes. Most of our stories have magical healing instantly recover the appearance of the person as well, although that may be due to the blood essentially being put back into the body, or the censor and rating board.”

He couldn’t say much in response to that particular information, as he experienced yet another difference between his world and her own, so he returned to the original topic, “The healing here is based around prompting the body to regenerate, providing the energy that it would otherwise require via planar energy. You can also strengthen the body via cultivation, which you may have heard of if you know anything about Daoism.”

“That… doesn’t really ring a bell. Another eastern thing?”

“Yeah, something like that…” Fu Zan nodded, uncertain whether this was another instance of worldly differences or if she was just not well informed, “I or Aimi Miyu, the woman in Wei Yi’s arms, could teach you about it, but depending on the kinds of magic that you have heard of, it might not be too dissimilar to them.”

“In that case, I will ask you about it later. The matter of us seeming to be from two very different times would also be interesting to discuss, I think,” Sarah said, stepping away from him.

At that point, he really didn’t know what to do, so he simply decided to make some distance between them as well and attempt to understand the matter. A single glance up confirmed to him that Wei Yi had also been paying attention, so he was able to breathe a sigh of relief and allow his mind to drift elsewhere. So long as the Ascendant kept her eye on something, she would remember every little detail, so nothing would be missed.

In fact, she was already aware of the rough situation that the two otherworldly demons had found themselves in. ‘By the looks of it, Sarah is more attentive than Fu Zan had been planning to give her credit for, and she had noticed that there was something odd about their usage of terms between the two of them. It seems that the theory of different worlds in indeed more likely, and it also appears that there can indeed be some rather major differences between the worlds, as the vision of the world that Sarah possesses differs greatly from that of Fu Zan.’

From the images that she could obtain, the year appeared to be the same, but one had buildings that looked to be far beyond anything that Fu Zan’s world could even imagine, if she understood the memories that she did obtain correctly.

That didn’t necessarily mean that they did actually come from different variants of the same time, since Wei Yi was sure that if she had come across someone from the Eastern Continent’s more isolated sects, she might find that they do not believe that the current year was not 1,201,523 but instead 1,605 or something of the sort. Such numbers weren’t all that reliable, but in a more connected world like that of the otherworldly demons, they would still indicate that something significant was different in one world or the other.

Rather than trying to figure that out, though, she was more concerned about the matters of transportation for the otherworldly demons, as well as anyone else that might need to go to and from the Dimensional Domain. It was something that had fallen to the back of her mind as a result of the ease of her own mobility, but without a nearby spatial stabilisation point or a district in the immediate vicinity, it was difficult for most to get to or from the Domain within a reasonable time.

‘That means that I need to either make that route available far more quickly than I would have hoped, or obtain a spatial stabilisation point from somewhere… I don’t think that outright removing it from the Ping District, even if possible, would be wise, so… This place is closest to the Ping District, so that means that I should get to taking over it as soon as possible,’ she concluded, briefly glancing at a mental map to confirm that the location that she had chosen was not only near to the Ping District, but was also positioned well for travel due to the terrain between the district and the Dimensional Domain. With the Ping District under control, it would also ensure that there would be safety in this region even without requiring the otherworldly demons to cultivate.

The whole issue was that the demons couldn’t cultivate without provoking the insanity of the azure light, not to mention their innate desire for power driven by what seemed to be an unfulfilling and dull existence, and so they needed methods of transportation that those in the third realm at most could use.

So far as she could tell, the two viable solutions were to use something like the striders of the desert, as they were rather effective at transportation anyone anywhere so long as they were appropriately kept alive, or the various methods of the Ju District. There, they had so many different methods that did not employ planar energy at all that Wei Yi was nearly certain that the district had to be founded in part with the contribution of otherworldly demons, since no one else should have had this much interest in doing such a thing.

Keeping the otherworldly demons in mind, such a move was actually incredibly wise. It may even be that Kong Shi Meng had wished for their knowledge to be useful to his people.

It just so happened that the Ju District became rather keen to stay away from the rest of the world, so any otherworldly demon that attempted to come to them would either be dissuaded from approaching, or slain upon an attempted entry. As a result, whatever their original purpose had been, the current Ju District and Ju family were limited to sitting behind their walls and preventing anyone from looking in, to the point that they occupied a notable portion of the mountain range between the Chu and Chao Districts, with their district reaching into two of the mountains as if they were just more land on which to construct residences and businesses.

With the wall of mountains on one side, the ability to ward off anyone from the northern territories – which called themselves the Free Tribes of the West, as they were to the west of another faction by the name of the Serpent Tribe that bordered the Chao District – with their overwhelming methods, arrows, traps and ingenious battlefields where even an ordinary person could harm someone in the fifth realm or above, they were incredibly difficult to invade.

As such, she had no intention of attempting something of the sort just yet, and instead wanted to take the Ping District. From there, the Ning and Jiang Districts could also be taken to assist in the defence against the Empire of Dawn, then the Chu and Chen Districts could be taken as well.

Alternatively, via the convenient power of spatial gateways, the Arbiters could head as far south as the Qiang District, which outright bordered Absolute Frost, avoiding the central region and thus preventing the Greats from being encouraged to retaliate. Wherever their Testament was, it was likely to be near the Yi District, since that was the centre of Yi City in far more ways than one might imagine, and so any assaults in direct proximity to the Yi District would be likely to draw their ire before combatting the first generation was plausible.

The Qiang, Ru, Gang and Bao Districts, for example, would also offer some significant advantages to her faction, as the Qiang District had an enormous mine of materials that could be used alongside the cave beneath Paragon, the Ru family had the greatest range and wealth of research of any known faction in Yi City, the Gang District had a significant understanding of tradition and the past, thus potentially enabling them to contribute to opposing the Greats, while the Bao District specialised in obtaining and refining gemstones that could be used by cultivators to oppose enemies of significantly higher realm without needing to personally cultivate. In short, every major district of Yi City was a power to keep in mind, and more allies rarely hurt a cause when they could all agree with one another.

Seeing as the only thing that she currently imposed upon them was the ability to trade and protect themselves, there were unlikely to be too many disagreements on those grounds.

‘Again, thinking a little too far ahead here. The Ju District will be something to consider after the Ping District, which is difficult enough to handle on its own,’ Wei Yi thought, glancing down at the woman that she was still holding, ‘I think I need to move on already, so I suppose that I could help her to find a place to live in this town, even if she doesn’t spend all of her time here.’

To save herself some time, she lifted Miyu with both arms and carried her towards the small cluster of buildings that had appeared upon the terrain that had been flat only a short time ago. The Antanorden woman was rather shocked at first, with the light of the setting sun suddenly replacing the comfy and powerful embrace of the Ascendant, but when she saw where she was being brought to, she understood roughly what was going on even without words.

“Can’t I stay with you?”

“Think of this like choosing a second home. Once travelling to and from the Dimensional Domain is easier, you could choose whether you prefer Paragon or here, and then have a place to stay in whenever you are in the other location,” Wei Yi explained, bringing her to one of the homes, “How about this?”

“… I don’t really mind,” Miyu said, leaning her head on the Ascendant’s shoulder, “I don’t need much…”

“In that case, I’ll not waste your time. Here you go, occupy that house, and I’ll be back after you and your otherworldly compatriots once you have had the opportunity to speak with one another and share your collective knowledge of the world – or worlds – that you have left. I’ll be back in a day or two at most, so don’t get worried until three days pass,” she said, promptly putting Miyu down at the doorway and vanished from the spot before she had even the slightest chance to argue, appearing at the edge of the Dimensional Domain via the Past’s Call.

Wei Yi didn’t bother looking back, since she knew that it would only encourage unnecessary clinginess, and instead looked to the east and reached out her hand, grasping the chains of Law and tapping into the same power that she had made use of to raise the first two attempts at homes.

As she lacked the proper preparation, including the support of the ideas of the people, she didn’t expect this to work out in any positive way, but what she was about to do could prove to have an interesting outcome that could illuminate the potential and limitations of the Command of Law as she was using it currently. With those in mind, she could develop it into something complete and superior, but before then, she’d need to fully understand this usage of Law.

‘Come to think of it, those otherworldly demons have a profession called a lawyer on their worlds. If I was to find one of them, would they take to the power of Law with great ease?’ she pondered for a moment, glancing back at Min Shi and Sarah with her spiritual perception only to find that neither of them seemed to possess the memories that would be relevant to such a profession, ‘Even if I could somehow take their insights from them, or copy them, I would still not do so. Their minds are their own, and trying to steal many of their experiences will only come at a detriment to me. In other words, I would lose myself, even if I stow away the memories like I do with most of those I acquire.’

Sweeping away the distractions, she opened her mouth and said, “Connect!”

This time, she didn’t try to make use of a term that wasn’t a clear instruction or command, as it would obviously reduce the chances of success without the support of others. In the area closest to her, her power of conquering would prevent misunderstanding with the world itself, but closer to the Ping District – which is where she wished to reach to – that would not be able to support her.

As her words seemed to echo throughout the world, a strange phenomenon occurred before her. It was as if the very world folded in on itself, the incredibly distant walls of the Ping District suddenly coming near while not moving at all.

It was a wondrous thing, but she was forced to terminate it the very next moment as she felt a force press down on every single one of her vital organs, grasping them with sufficient strength to obliterate them despite all of the strength that they possessed. Another moment would have instantly destroyed them, so she did not want to risk it, even if she was in the Blood Resuscitation realm of physique cultivation. Despite the name of that realm, there were only so many wounds that it could fully heal, and she would rather avoid testing those limits.

Nevertheless, her attempt still affected the world before her, for she saw that as the world unfolded, a thin yet visible path appeared all the way to the Ping District, where the trees seemed to stay clear, the grass got out of the way, and even a stream of water delved beneath the ground just to avoid interrupting passage.

She was sure that these features weren’t there previously, so the only possibility was that her command was still enforced, albeit to a lesser extent.

‘If it had formed a direct link, would the world itself truly have folded, or would it be equivalent to a spatial gateway?’ she found herself wondering, as the shifting of the world truly had been quite impressive to behold, ‘Not to mention that this is the kind of thing that I can achieve at my current realm. When I get to the seventh realm, might it be possible to fold space fully, or cause such folds with my power of Law without needing to lose my organs as a result… well, that’s not quite how it works, but I will be able to overcome some of the restrictions of the world via my energy, so it might become more feasible.’

Again, that was something to be considered much later, so she didn’t immediately rush to conclusions and instead intended to proceed towards the Ping District to perform some reconnaissance. Before she could get far, she observed that Fu Zan was rushing towards her, so she stopped and turned.

He caught up with her quickly enough, not even losing his breath as a result.

“I just wanted to tell you about two things, since you seemed to just run off… First of all, that set you had wanted me to make, I’m close to completing it.”

“Set… ah, that. I will be very excited to work on it myself, although you really didn’t need to tell me, since I and Yi Shi Ming both watch over the Kong Prison Realm and Paragon all of the time, so we’re aware,” she replied, “You could have begun with that other matter, if you wanted to. So, what is it that you wanted to mention?”

“Do you want me to be staying behind here, or should I rush back to complete the project?”

“I’d recommend you to stay around and get to know people. You can always hasten back whenever necessary, and I can call someone else to assist you.”

“Right… No, actually, what I was more curious about was the matter of our otherworldly gifts. How long would it take for you to be able to do it again? I… don’t think I really need to explain it, but I would really appreciate it…”

“That much is obvious, but there’s a slight delay between possible uses of my method caused by the necessity to recover my energy that is unique to this process. As such, while I would like to take every single otherworldly demon I come across and remove the azure light from them, it is not something that I can currently accomplish. I’m guessing that you’d like to get to cultivate properly soon, so I will get back to you when I can,” she replied, “After that, I will help Min Shi, then Sarah, provided that no other otherworldly demons appear. Feel free to tell them that.”

“Alright, will do… I’ve just always wanted to be a proper cultivator, instead of just sewing things…”

“Fair enough. Again, I’ll handle it the moment that I can,” she confirmed, turning back around, “Now, I have to get going, so please don’t delay me any longer than necessary. The Ping District won’t just sit around once they figure out that something’s going, so, if there’s nothing else, then I’ll come back at a later time.”

He offered no response, so she continued on and swiftly made use of the World’s Echo and her other abilities to quickly travel towards the west, taking advantage of places where her attempt to connect the two places provided the most speed. In those regions where the path had already been clear or otherwise inefficient to take for one reason or another, like where she needed to pass through an incredibly small gap in a tall hill, she used her usual Aerial Platforms and the like to pass over it with far greater efficiency.

With that, the fact that most planar beasts either couldn’t perceive her or were too afraid to approach her, and her limited familiarity with the outskirts of the Ping District, she arrived at her destination before the sun got too close to setting.

Rather than making it all the way to the Ping District, however, she ended up a short while away, for she detected energy that was known to her in the area, prompting further investigation.

It was the energy of the Endless Dark, one that she was familiar with due to her meeting with an assassin from that organisation, eventually resulting in her obtaining the Aeon of the Endless Dark, among other things. She still recalled the person that she had first been forced to name, Fen Zhi, and how she had assisted the woman in breaking through to a stage of the third realm and obtaining the Third Eye elixir.

None of the energy that she was able to detect seemed to belong to the woman as she remember her, whether she was to consider her planar energy or mental energy, but if the Endless Dark was present here, then she might also be in the area.

‘Come to think of it, the spiritual perception that we had been refining was actually our spiritual will, so that safely confirms that it is possible to attain one of the mental energy types without needing to have another set of meridians, but it will not be sufficient to reach the second realm or beyond, since a complete set of meridians is simply necessary to attain it,’ she recalled, hastening into the direction that the energy had travelled, ‘I hope that the process hadn’t gone wrong for her. Merging two types of spiritual will… could end badly.’

Back then, she had a rather lacking understanding of spiritual will, as well as mental energy as a whole, which led to them simply seeking something to refine energy in the hopes that the black side of Fen Zhi’s spiritual will was only some form of impurity or corruption. With her current knowledge, a quick thought allowed her to conclude that there was a high chance of the disparate mental energies present in the two strands of spiritual will to blend together, resulting in unexpected side effects.

Some of them could be rather beneficial, but others had the chance of entirely ruining her mental state and identity, which was naturally not particularly ideal.

‘Hopefully, she hasn’t fallen back under the Endless Dark’s master, and that this person isn’t in the seventh realm or above. With sheer strength, I can overpower the aura of someone in the seventh realm, but when it comes to true combat, I am somewhat below that realm, especially without the aid of the Conqueror’s Eye’s influence,’ she thought to herself, ‘We’ll see, I suppose.’

After a short while, she noticed that there were more traces of energy, as if someone had been fighting in the area, and after a while longer, she finally came across actual signs of battle. Some of the feeble trees that stood in the area had been knocked down and damaged, there were several obvious gashes in the ground, as if they had been cut through by an enormous blade, and one spot seemed to have been dug into, resulting in a two metre deep pit. Judging by the large quantity of planar energy sticking to the walls of the pit, it was unlikely to have come from someone ordinary digging for lost treasure, or something of the sort.

Finally, after a little while longer, she finally met with the fighting forces – or, rather, an assassin dressed in black was thrown right towards her, forcing her to flick a burst of air towards the flying body as to stop it mid-flight.

She hadn’t used much strength, but the sudden cessation of the figure’s flight seemed to cause a shockwave throughout the battlefield, bringing the attention of both sides towards her. On one, a small number of people stood with weapons held with more force than was necessary, with most standing slightly behind one that radiated the energy of the fifth realm.

Meanwhile, the forces on the other side were significantly larger, with their number easily being thrice as large as that of their foes, and at their back stood a figure robes in black, with black energy surrounding him and a black anchor standing behind him, covered in a black core and marks that were partially blackened as well, with only some searing embers marking the fact that they were the symbol of the fifth realm. There were forty-seven of them, and there were channels linking them to the anchor within the core.

At the moment, both of these sides looked towards her, with neither recognising her.

“If you’re not meant to be here, then get the fuck out!” the leading figure in the smaller group, whose voice and body were clearly feminine, shouted to her, her greatsword still raised and pointed towards her foes, “Otherwise, go to one side and hope that I won’t need to fuck you up!”

The other side said nothing, with the attention of a few of them turning to her, so she made her stance known right away, “Either one of you know Fen Zhi?”

Not a moment after she said that name, the woman’s eyes widened.

“… Yi Wei?” she asked, her voice sounding nothing like it had at first, with her very posture and aura changing as the greatsword in her hand lowered a bit, “Is that you?”