V4C75: Yi City’s Network

When she appeared within the Kong Prison Realm, finding that her body was almost solid despite the fact that she did not enter physically, she was not surprised. In her mind, this simply confirmed the previous understanding that fainting of exhaustion and the like would bring her to her mental domain, with some things advancing as a result.

This time, the prison realm did not look larger, nor was her mental energy significantly stronger. So far as she was able to tell, her planar energy was about the same as before, and her other forms of cultivation hadn’t advanced either.

‘No… my bloodline power has leapt all the way up to the ninth stage of Semblance Extraction, meaning that my abilities are now nearly four times as great as they would have been without the passive amplification of the bloodline power,’ she concluded from the vague aura of her bloodline that manifested within the spatial realm, ‘I suppose my unconscious mind would appreciate seeing the last of my five paths reaching the fifth realm, which would, in turn, bring my advantage up even further… Had I not dismissed the heavens already, I would have used them in an exclamatory phrase, but…’

She shifted her location to the gateway of the prison realm and passed through it into Paragon. Her body was stable while in the mental domain, which did include the desert fortress thanks to the range of her spiritual energy. There were few people present at the gateways at this moment, so nobody noticed her as she then continued into the Luo District.

Without any confirmation of what was occurring on the outside, she wouldn’t know the exact outcome of her actions in the Ping District, so she needed to take a look on her own.

Obviously, as she was not conscious, she couldn’t have activated the spatial stabilisation point in the Ping District even if it had endured the supernova without any damage, which she did not think to be likely, and she thus couldn’t simply appear in the district and investigate things on her own, while speaking to the leaders of the other districts to get a better understanding of everything else. What she could do from the Luo District, however, she was able to get a good look at the distant wall and structures of the district of thieves and assassins.

The very edge was fine, although there looked to be far more people gathered near it than would be usual for the district, even with the deaths that it had recently experienced. What was not fine was a point roughly mid-way into the district, and everything past it in a circular radius.

From there onto the middle, and then the same distance out on the other side, there was an enormous crater marked by several more smaller holes, with the most notable being those that clearly carved out the array that had once been present there. Although it was not a deep crater, with the lowest point looking to be no more than three metres into the ground, it had completely wiped out everything that had stood there before.

Somewhere in the middle, there should have been an Ancestral Hall, but all that she could find to resemble its remains was a pile of rubble that was too low in the ground, suggesting the presence of an underground floor or basement of some kind. There were also plenty of other structures there, but all of them, without exception, were turned to rubble and blended into the ground, resulting in terrain that could almost be said to be gravel-like, except with far larger pieces of gravel. In a way, it was as if someone looked too closely at it, leading to the stones being significantly larger than they should have been.

“Hey, who are you and why are you flying around in… wait a minute, you’re that woman!” a voice called out, prompting her to look down at the speaker.

It was an ordinary enough man wearing the uniform of a guard, but he was clearly speaking with some degree of recognition of her appearance if nothing else. Since the fight against the other faction in the Luo District, as well as the announcement that she had made after that, were public enough, some hint of realisation would have been normal, but there was a certain degree of confusion in his voice.

For that reason, she promptly appeared before him and asked, “That woman?”

“Y-Yes, you’re the one that had been brought over here not long ago! You were unconscious!” the guard exclaimed, sounding like she looked to be in a rather bad state.

“Right. Where was I brought?”

“The Luo Ancestral Hall, but-”

His words were not listened to, as the Ascendant returned her mental body to the gateway and brought herself into the Ancestral Hall, browsing for a moment with her spiritual perception before she found the right place, appearing in the appropriate room.

There, she found her body, with Luo Na sitting beside it with a frown.

As soon as she manifested within the room, the Luo Matriarch looked up, and a moment later, she looked to the unconscious body on the bed.

“Wait, that… oh… I think I understand. There was something missing from your body after we had found it, so we had thought it to be something other than your spirit, or your consciousness. Is that what you are right now?” the Matriarch asked with a great degree of calmness, having recognised the situation almost immediately.

“You got that far too quickly. Yes, that should be the case. For some reason, I will always end up in my own mental domain after losing consciousness like this, and I can then leave to other places where my spiritual will holds a great degree of power. With the gateway, this place is included,” Wei Yi replied as she approached the other side of the bed, looking down upon herself, “You know, I don’t want to sound narcissistic, but I look surprisingly great despite having been hit with quite a lot of that black sun’s explosive energy.”

“I wish I could be as sure as you are, but you do look to have endured it well. You even got stronger.”

“That I did. Anyway, I don’t usually get to see my body like this, but that isn’t as important as what had happened over at the Ping District. How much time passed since then, what happened, and is there any intention at all to support it in the effort of rebuilding?”

“We rushed you straight back, covering it up so that nobody got too worried, and that was only yesterday. As for what happened… well, you likely saw it just as well as we had,” Luo Na said, her lightless gaze turning in the direction of the Ping District, “A large portion of the district was obliterated, although there did not seem to be anyone of note that remained within the area. The Patriarchs and I rushed in to confirm what happened to you, and found you lying unconscious but clearly still alive amidst the rubble. While we didn’t know what had happened to you, nor why you had decided to remain within the core as it was containing the explosion of the black sun, we knew that it would be best to bring you away and let you recover in a better place than that. On the topic of rebuilding, however, I am not sure that it would be feasible in any short amount of time.”

“No, it will be. In fact, we need the district to be rebuilt as soon as possible, so if your Luo District has anyone skilled in construction, they will be needed.”

“You’re not giving me much to work with… that being said, it might be possible to collect a few builders and architects. I’d encourage you to seek the Bai District for such a thing, however, as their forces are far more capable at organising large work efforts than we are,” the Luo Matriarch admitted, “The way that the guardians had been divided wasn’t a coincidental disagreement. We like to have diverging opinions, it seems.”

“Again, this is mostly irrelevant. What we need is for all of the districts to come together to assist the Ping District, or else the people that survived will think that we intended to destroy that much of it, and will not appreciate any attempts to ally with them. That, and we need to fix it up as quickly as possible before the Great Families take the chance to do something stupid… Do you think that they will be able to perceive my mention of them even though I am currently in this state?” Wei Yi suddenly asked, glancing back down at herself.

Luo Na rolled her eyes, returning her attention to the body on the bed as well. With her limited vision, she couldn’t see either state of the Ascendant with perfect clarity, nor could she evaluate their beauty, but she had to agree with Wei Yi’s earlier assessment of herself. There were no clear flaws on either the physical or mental part of her, which was the full extent of praise that she could offer.

“I cannot be sure. Is your mind still part of the mental domain you spoke of, or has it left it?”

“It is no longer in the mental domain, so that would mean that they could perceive it, but only if they are looking for any traces of their names and not something more specific like them being spoken by a physical being. If their method of discovering such mentions is anything like a spatial treasure, in that they both require a more complex and limited function in order to be produced with fewer materials and be less costly to use, then it is more likely that they would have taken into account the usual methods of communication between the relevant people of Yi City and had ensured that they would be perceived, but little else,” Wei Yi posited, “In other words, this was a complete waste of time, since I cannot confirm their exact method just yet.”

“You weren’t worried about them to begin with, so that is why it does not matter to you. The people in the southern districts will likely fear to say their names without proper caution.”

“Then that is their fault. The Great Families thrive on that fear, since any organised effort to ensure that they wouldn’t have risen in the first place would have allowed the world to be free of their madness. Since that had not happened, and is not happening, they don’t really have the right to complain,” the Ascendant stated, “Anything else I need to pay attention to?”

“I would advise you to look in the mirror. There may be something that you’ve missed.”

She nodded and promptly vanished from the spot, with her being able to transport herself to any place in the extended mental domain without any effort on her own part. For her, it might actually be better to exist in her mental state most of the time the very moment that Yi City is united and the spatial stabilisation nodes are activated, since she could transport herself to any part of it at any moment, while taking on the majority of appearances that she had ever possessed.

Before then, she wouldn’t even entertain the idea, as sealing herself within the world that she had taken over at the moment would mean that she could never expand. Obviously, there was also the trouble of her limited power while in the mental state, as it was her body that could fully manifest her five energies. Without it, the Ascendant wouldn’t be able to manifest her physique energy, or her bloodline power, or her planar energy, and only her own killing will would be of any use. Even in the defence of her territory, she would be far less powerful than the many potential threats, and that would only be intensified by the awakening of the likes of the Primordial Deities.

The Bai District wasn’t particularly different from what it had been the last time she visited. The layer that covered the district had been partially repaired, although there was still far more sunlight shining down upon the central region than there had been originally.

As she appeared and found the person she was looking for rather quickly, the people present in the central region did not have the chance to notice her and properly perceive her appearance, with the most observant only seeing the glimpse of a crimson-haired figure appearing and disappearing beside the gateway. In theory, she could shift herself directly from one Matriarch’s proximity to the area of another Patriarch, but it was nicer to have a quick look at the district as a whole first.

The Bai Patriarch was back within the Ancestral Hall, sitting in a chair beside a desk filled with all kinds of books focused on group tactics and techniques. Some were old and likely contained much more information than the modern ones did, whereas others were brief and only went into minor detail about the technique that they were focused upon. Despite quite a few of these being far below his level, with a few describing techniques of the second realm and below, he was incredibly focused upon every single one.

“Looking to learn from the simpler methods of the world?” Wei Yi asked, approaching him.

He did not turn around right away, instead finishing the page he was on before glancing back, “You are already up? It seems you have the endurance to match a dragon.”

“Don’t exaggerate. I have yet to reach that level,” she said, as she remembered the scenes from the illusory Fated Dragon Hatchling and just how much the adult dragons were able to endure, physically and mentally, before falling, “That being said, you have failed to answer my question. I don’t often see most Patriarchs doing this kind of thing openly.”

“Neither am I. The doors were closed.”

“That they were.”

“… You’re appearing as some kind of phantom or spirit, aren’t you? We all found that there was something different about you when we recovered your body, but we weren’t able to comprehend it fully,” the Patriarch said, pointing to his books, “These techniques contain similar descriptions.”

“That’s certainly interesting, in two ways. First of all, you are right, but I had not been sure that my mind parted from my body this early. I only found myself awakening a short time ago, and yet it seems that I could have been busy all the while before that. Also, if those books mention it, then does that mean that your group methods have the ability to separate mind and body, then project one out into the world into a state similar to mine?”

“They are able to separate the two aspects of humanity, but none of these explicitly mention projection. However-”

“Integration of a spatial realm with a mental domain can allow that to occur via the amplification and stabilisation of mental phenomena and their externalisation into the outside world via gateways. I understand that much, and I highly doubt that you do not,” she cut him off, since anyone in the seventh realm should have been more than aware that there was a spatial realm permitting the gateways between distant lands, although he likely lacked the knowledge of the exact realm that she occupied, “If there are no particular insights that you have personally gained, I’ll take a look through these as well. Meanwhile, could you send out a few builders or builder squads over to the Ping District?”

“If you wish to rebuild it, then just a few won’t be sufficient.”

“Again, does my current appearance make me look younger or something? There is no reason to say such obvious things. If I am providing instructions like that, then I am likely to be aware of such a thing, and I have likely considered a method with which to overcome the problem.”

“Now that you mention it, you do look different, although I cannot tell what the difference is. I can still feel the aura of your energy, so that wouldn’t be the thing to change my perception of you… in fact, it appears that even I don’t really know why I was seeing you as someone lesser… Perhaps you do look significantly younger,” the Patriarch shrugged, finding little hints regarding this, “You are probably the best to understand this, so I will be able to offer you little in this regard.”

“Indeed. Still, send your builder teams to assist those from the Ping, Chao and Luo Districts, and then I should be up properly by the time that they need someone to clear up the mess,” she said, vanishing from the spot and moving herself to another part of the district. It was a place where there did not appear to be anyone in the immediate proximity, and there happened to be a very good mirror right in front of her, so she naturally took the time to examine her current appearance in order to confirm that there were no blatant flaws within it. If she was somehow showcasing her original self to the world after all of this time, it would be rather awkward.

Fortunately, it did not appear to be the case. Her features were the same as on her physical body, and her clothing was also not different from her present state. The clawed gauntlet on her right hand was slightly different in appearance, her right hand was slightly darker while not being in the full killing will state, and her eyes glistened with all four circles representing the vision states that she could call upon, if necessary, but the rest wasn’t any different.

What she could note quite easily was that her energy wasn’t actually within her body, nor could she fully invoke the power of the Dao in anything more than the conceptual aspect, and it was likely that even though her mental manifestation was able to project the same aura that her physical body would possess at its strongest, it lacked the true power behind that aura. To those that weren’t strong enough to face against her killing will alone, it likely didn’t make much of a difference, but in front of the seventh realm leaders of the districts, that difference was significantly more pronounced and significant. It might even seem like she was an entirely unique person with far less power, far less notability, and one that couldn’t be placed on the same level as they were.

She didn’t know whether this was due to their divine sense or simply their power, but it was something to watch out for in the future.

‘I cannot change that right now, not unless I spend way more effort than necessary to maintain a false flow of energy throughout me that simulates a higher realm of cultivation than my mental self technically possesses, so I’ll just be swift with the Chao Patriarch and then get back to other matters.’

Just as quickly as she had appeared in the Bai District, she was gone, and the Chao District only saw a glimpse of wondrous crimson hair as she entered the district and then moved herself to the Patriarch’s position. A little like his fellow leader in the Bai District, he was found in the Ancestral Hall, but whereas his peer was dedicating himself to studying the phenomenon that occurred to Wei Yi, he was instead focusing on training himself. He made use of a specific space in the hall to exercise his body in a state of greater gravity, punching, kicking, running, stretching and doing everything else that one might be able to think of in order to develop his body.

Even with his age, the Ascendant imagined that this kind of thing might interest the typical woman.

“Patriarch, I see that you are not that distraught. I am glad to see such optimising from the Chao District’s best and brightest,” she said, “Unless you absolutely can’t talk – or even listen – right now, I don’t mind if you keep training.”

“Can talk. What?” he asked, not even bothering to look in her direction. From his focus on his current punching routine, it was clear that he was far too invested in this to simply throw it away the moment that someone chooses to address him, so she found no problems with his minimal reply, nor with the way that he did not appear to be interested in her sudden return after her apparent loss of consciousness in the Ping District.

Then again, even if he had noticed something amiss, like Luo Na and the Bai Patriarch, perhaps he rightly assumed that she would awaken nonetheless.

“I’ll need you to send some competent workers and builders to the Ping District. We need to rebuild it, and if we don’t all come together, the people there might get the wrong idea. Before they find a new leader that they trust, and will thus believe if he or she assures them that the Ascendant’s Arbiters are on their side and did not mean to cause that destruction, it is important to give the right impression.”

“Right. How many?”

“Oh, straight to it? Alright, here’s what I’m thinking…”

Once she was done with that, she returned to the Luo District, appearing on the other side of the bed once more and sitting down with Luo Na to watch over her still body. It was a little strange to just sit alongside herself like this, but Wei Yi had experienced stranger things than this.

“So, while I’m waiting around, why don’t you tell me how things have been for you as of late?”

“What do you mean?”

“I- Wait, I think I’m returning to my body. That was… poorly timed and quite exquisite at the same time, considering that I wanted to get back into the action already, so…” the Ascendant shrugged, standing up as her form became hazy, while her physical body clearly began to stir alongside her movements, “Give a moment to get into myself… not the best word choice, there…”

She hardly had the time to explain before her mental form vanished, and her physical body finally began to transmit all of its sensations to her. All of the pain that had built up from her effort the earlier day rushed to her, quickly prompting her to channel her energy and remove the rest of her injuries.

As she did so, she opened her eyes and sat up in the bed, blinking several times to focus her vision.

“Ahem… Everything looks to be alright. No major internal injuries or anything of the sort. Did I manage to avoid them, or had one of you provided me with something to assist in my recovery?”

“We did not need to provide anything. If not for the destruction we saw in the Ping District, we would have thought that the black sun had barely done anything based on the state of your body. Your robes were repairing themselves, your body was in a near perfect condition, and had you emerged with your consciousness and mind present within you, then we may have assumed that you had the ability to overcome the black sun with ease,” Luo Na said, “I am rather curious about that, although if you do not wish to tell me, I will not be surprised.”

“Curious about me enduring the black sun? That’s a personal method of mine that I will not disclose yet, so you were right to expect that,” Wei Yi said, brushing her hair back and tying it back into the traditional ponytail.

“Very well, then. Will you be going to the Ping District?”

“Of course. If you would like to visit, then wait for the opening of the gateway, which I should be able to do in no more than an hour or two. At that point, you can also send the builders over to assist in the reconstruction, and all of you will get to witness how the district is returned to how it had been physically, while the people get a chance to abandon the way of the assassins and the thieves, and rise to truly be one of the twenty four major districts.”

“Are you sure you are counting that correctly? The Kong District has not been notable for many decades.”

“I’ve been there, and I understand that perfectly. However, that’s not to say that it cannot be lived in and restored to a better state, especially when there are so many things there that could be of use to me and to the new residents of the district. All that we’ll need is to decide which family name they shall have, and, considering some of my own activities, I do have some ideas already,” Wei Yi said.

She was someone with an entirely different surname to the vast majority of Yi City’s population, and there was a certain chance that she would get a few more family members with that surname. If she didn’t get them a district of their own, at the very least, what kind of father would she be to her children? Until she was able to actively participate in their lives as someone other than the leader of a faction they would be born into, she could at the very least provide them with a place to grow up where they would have room to grow and develop without the interference of existing families attempting to pointlessly assert their former dominance.

Meanwhile, the few that still possess the Kong name are unlikely to want their district back, since none of them would have had any history with it directly. At most, they would be aware of what their ancestors had said of it once upon a time, and even that shouldn’t be a positive recounting. For them, it would be far better if the children of another family occupied the fallen district, since they would do far better in the lands that they have moved to since then.

Luo Na couldn’t see much from Wei Yi’s expression, but she had a faint feeling that the Ascendant was thinking about something silly. Despite that, she also felt that she might succeed at whatever it was.

That was simply what the Ascendant did. She entered a stalemate that had mostly existed for a million years, and forcefully turned the tides against the Greats all on her own. Obviously, there were other participants in the War of Ascendancy, but none of the forces had made as great a contribution as she had.

On the evening of that day, Wei Yi stood amidst the rubble, having dug out a particular spot where the terrain remained significantly flatter and higher than at other points. It was obviously the site where the spatial stabilisation point had been placed, and so she removed just enough broken pieces of stone to reveal the point. She was going to clear up more in a little bit, but the presence of the gateway would assist her efforts, so she didn’t want to rush ahead and waste her own energy.

Standing beside the point, she drew upon her cultivation and also willed the rest of her energy to surge out, forcing herself to the brink of her next breakthrough. It took a few moments, and then cosmic light surged out of her body.

The vague manifestations of her Endless Monolith and Subterranean Shell glowed brightly, causing the Ping District to brighten to the level of the morning. Everyone on the outer regions of the district turned towards the centre, finding a familiar dome that was, this time, shrunk significantly, to the point that it actually resembled the core of a cultivator for once.

Thirty-three searing marks were emblazoned within its surface, and right before their eyes, twenty-two more lit up the district, seeming to become small stars on the ground, and made them all look towards the core with the same degree of focus and attention as what they had demonstrated the previous day. That time, it was caused by the forceful invocation of Law to bring attention to the largest and most significant element, but this time, the small yet blinding light overwhelmed all on its own, causing the crowds to gather at the edge of the ruined region.

Standing there, they were able to witness a great gate of two colours forming within the air, connecting to the ground, and manifesting into a large opening within the very world, surrounded by silver and crimson.

As the gateway formed, a sudden pulse of energy exploded out of it, with three distinct lines surging towards the north, the north-east, and the south-east, with all of them going far beyond the perception of those remaining in the district within seconds, although the bright green trail that they left behind remained for nearly an hour. These lines, unbeknownst to anyone but Wei Yi in that area, connected to the gateways of the three districts in which she had opened gateways, and as this connection stabilised, she could sense that there was more to this than some kind of minor indication of a large number of gateways.

This was a network of some kind, one created within Yi City long before she had ever set foot within it.

‘And so, I see the Master of Yi City has once again done more than I imagined. Wonderful.’