162 Water Snake Sect's Secre

"Well, there's nothing that we can do about the Earth Dust Sect for now." Ed sighed while shaking his head. "I'm going to try and get some sleep. God knows I'll need it."

"Alright." Dupe nodded as he turned to leave. "It'll be suspicious if this clone is seen with you during the war, but I'll try to contact you if I come across any important news."

"Thanks." Ed nodded before he suddenly showed surprise on his face. "I almost forgot." He stood up to stop Dupe from leaving. "Here." He reached into his robe pocket and handed a book over.

Dupe took the book and glanced at it. "God Beast Technique? Is this the technique you obtained for Harmony?"

"Mm." Ed nodded. "Read it and have your clones pass the information forward to the chimeras. It'll be better if they can train in it before I return to America."

"Sure." Dupe agreed as he sat down on the floor and opened the book. It only took him a few minutes to finish memorizing the thin book. After all, espers usually had great memory, and he wasn't practicing the technique but memorizing it. "Interesting." He grinned. "To plan on using a unique body cultivation technique on your own creations. Aren't you a bit arrogant?"

"If it works, it works." Ed shrugged.

Suddenly, a clone stepped out from Dupe's body.

"Hold on!" Ed hurriedly stepped forward and grabbed the God Beast Technique book. "If you're gonna kill yourself, then do it outside for once."

"Ehhh?" Dupe frowned. "How could you say such awful things to your friend? How could you tell me to kill myself outside?!"

"Enough joking." Ed yawned as he walked towards his bed. "I don't feel like cleaning up a corpse nor sleeping near one tonight."

"Tsk." Both Dupes clicked their tongues as they walked out the door. "So picky." They simultaneously nagged while slamming the door shut.

...

The next morning. The early rays of sunlight shone on Ed's face through the window. He lazily sat up while wiping the drool from his face. "Ugh." He groaned as he rubbed his red eyes. 'Today is the day...' He climbed out of bed and stared longingly at it for a moment before heading downstairs.

"Sir." A butler was already waiting for him. "Sect Lord Long has asked for you to meet him at the portal."

"Mm." Ed nodded as he walked out the door. He travelled to a large plaza near the center of the sect. The plaza was nearly deserted, as all of the Fire Dragon Sect members had already been sent through it over the past few days. Hina, Haru, Flair, and Tao had also already passed through the portal, and only Tai remained waiting in front of it.

"Waited just for me?" Ed smirked.

"Mm." Tai nodded seriously, his arms folded behind his back. He turned towards the portal. "I assume you got my message the other day."

"More or less." He nodded in agreement.

"That's good." Tai slightly smiled, though he seemed somewhat depressed. Well, he was about to go to war with his longtime friends, family, and sect members lives on the line after all. It was normal to be a bit down on such a day. Perhaps he had momentarily stayed behind just to clear his head a bit. "You know, Ed. There's a serious problem with people like you and me."

"Oh?" Ed rose an eyebrow. "I'd say there's a lot of problems with us." He joked. "But I'll bite. What do you mean?"

"For better or worse, we're the types that are good at planning, strategizing, and organizing. Things come easy to us, and others follow us because of it." He rose his head slightly in pride. "However, all things in this world come with costs, whether we realize it or not. In our case, it's very easy to develop a false sense of superiority. Keep in mind that others may be just as talented but in other areas."

"Sure." Ed half-heatedly agreed. He had personally never really gone out of his way to look down on others. But on the other hand, he did tend to treat people like pawns in an elaborate game of chess. Hell, his ultimate goal was controlling them while he sat atop the pyramid hierarchy. How could he not consider himself superior within the deepest depths of his mind?

"But that is only a minor problem." Tai sighed while shaking his head. "Our true problem is that the lack of challenge does not prepare us for when we finally are challenged. When someone that has always easily overcame all obstacles finally reaches a wall, it is far too easy to give up. The wall seems unsurmountable, and our confidence breaks. We don't know how to handle it, and so we lose at the only thing we're truly good at. I faced this feeling for the first time when reaching the purple fire origin roadblock in cultivation. Heh." He chuckled. " Superior... Yeah, right."

'Well, I've had plenty of obstacles...' Ed thought to himself. 'But maybe it's different for Tai?' He examined Tai carefully. It seemed he truly was worried about the upcoming war. "Is this about the Earth Dust Sect?" He questioned.

"Mm." Tai nodded. "I received word just last night that they've vanished. This could change the entire course of the war depending on what Di's plans are."

"Well, what would you do in his situation." Ed placed his hands behind his head and lazily yawned as he walked closer towards Tai and the portal.

"Me?" Tai looked down towards the ground. "Di's plans from the war meeting already make the most sense given the circumstances... It makes no sense for Di and his sect to run away now."

"Humph, you really consider yourself my equal with just that?" He scoffed. "I asked you what you would do if you were Di, not what Di would do if he was Di."

"What I would do..." Tai seemed lost as he stared at the portal. "I would side with the Purple Origin Sect and turn the tide of the war... But he obviously isn't doing that. Assuming I was loyal to the Earth Dust Sect and thought the war was lost... then I suppose I'd take my sect and move elsewhere."

Ed frowned. 'That's the best he can come up with?' He shook his head and sighed. "Disappointing. You need to get your head in the game for the upcoming battles. Even if you're not at your peak, you need the personality I saw during our escape from the cage. Otherwise, morale is going to plummet, and things will be lost before you know it."

"You're right." Tai nodded. Suddenly, he lifted his hand high in the air. SMACK! He slapped his own face, leaving a red handprint behind. "Sorry. My head's a bit all over the place lately." He turned to Ed while smiling. "What would you do if you were Di?"

"Harmony's situation is somewhat similar to the Earth Dust Sect's current situation." Ed grinned. "Di could scatter his forces in preparation to rise again. That's what I did, but only when I had no other choice. Before that, I fought and won through the use of strategy. But assuming I didn't think I could win that way, but I still had hope of winning the war through other means, then I suppose I'd invite a foreign actor to back me up."

"A foreign actor?" Tai frowned as he rubbed his chin.

"Well, it's too late to do anything about it now anyways." Ed replied. "Just deal with things as they come." He stepped towards the portal and entered inside, not bothering to wait for Tai. 'If he still can't figure it out with that, then I've grossly overestimated him. The World Hunter Association and Nexus are obviously already involved, but they're in too many places at once. They can't provide an abundance of assistance to any specific area. Not to mention they'll want to conserve their forces as much as possible for the world stage. But other countries? How easy would it be to invite a foreign invasion during a civil war? Japan, Korea, Mongolia, India, and Russia. And those are only the strong countries nearby. Over a dozen smaller countries would be more than happy to grab a piece of the massive pie. The real question is who did Sect Leader Di invite? And if I'm wrong, then I doubt there's anything else he could come up with that would be a bigger threat. Not unless his sect holds some ancient secret like the Purple Origin Sect does.'

...

Stepping out of the portal, Ed was greeted by freezing howling winds. He instinctively activated his silver flames for warmth as he rubbed his arms. 'Ah, I'm really atop Mount Everest this time.' He thought as he looked around. Behind him were seven icy blue portals, each one leading to a different sect. There was also a large mountain behind him, blocking most of the sunlight while casting a shadow overhead. Some smaller mountains were to his east and west. 'Looks like I'm not at the peak.' He thought as he looked ahead. In front of the seven portals were six different armies of cultivators, with the missing seventh army having supposed to been the Earth Dust Sect's men. The cultivators of each army wore armor decorated with cloth the color of their sect's element.

'Even I didn't think there would be this many...' The armies varied in size, with even the smallest having 2,000 cultivators. The Water Snake Sect actually had over 5,000 just by themselves. The Fire Dragon Sect matched them at nearly the same size. They likely would have had quite a few more if they had managed to pull their members out from the Purple Origin Sect. If not for Tai's recently recruited prisoners from America, then they would have fallen significantly behind in numbers today. Altogether, the total armed forces were made up of over 20,000 cultivators. Ed had never seen so many espers in one place before. Hell, even his own elite forces in America had only consisted of a few hundred chimeras and mana-infused humans with mana battery augmentations.

'Come to think of it, I wonder how we're heading to the Fire Dragon Sect... We're about as far from Mount Dongling as you can get, and the wedding starts in just half a day.' He looked around curiously, not seeing any way they could make it in time. It was unlikely the teleportation esper could support so many cultivators going through it at once. Otherwise, why would they bother gathering them all here over several days instead of heading straight to their destination?

Suddenly, Tai stepped out of the portal. He held his head high, appearing every bit like the confident young master he had always been. He smiled and nodded towards Ed as he walked past while waving his fan towards his face.

It seemed the other five sect leaders noticed Tai, as they walked over from their respective armies to greet him.

"Sect Leader Long." Ying of the Water Snake Sect smirked. "You really did surprise me with your amount of forces. It seems you've recruited quite a few foreigners." She glanced towards Tai's army. "I just hope they aren't spies here to stab us in the back. A young man like you might easily be taken advantage of."

"Humph." Tai snorted. "My men are more than trustworthy. If anything, we should be worried about the sect that bases themselves on snakes that hide in grass."

"Now, now." Dongfeng of the Wind Hawk Sect interrupted while smiling. "Let's all try to get along. We're all on the same side here." He turned towards the leader of the Lightning Eel Sect. "Right, brother Xia?"

"Of course!" Xia nodded while giving a slight smile.

"What are we going to do about Di?" Sect Leader Li of the Dark Phoenix Sect asked, concern visible on her face.

"What can we do?" Her sister, Sect Leader Wan of the Light Tiger Sect scoffed,

"Humph." Sect Leader Ying snorted, interrupting the conversation while glaring at Tai. She pointed two fingers at her eyes and then pointed at Tai. "I'll be watching you and your foreigners." She glanced at Ed. "You too. Don't think I'll easily trust an outsider."

"Really?" Ed grinned while crossing his arms. "But I'm quite honest and trustworthy you know? For example, I already placed a spy in all eight sects in China."

The various sect leaders' eyes went wide from shock. They clearly had not expected such an honest answer to a question nobody had even asked.

"YOU!" Sect Leader Ying's hand trembled as she pointed at him. "What's your game, outsider!"

Ed shrugged. "I just figured there was no point in hiding in." He laughed. "I'm sure Nexus has given each of you a complete profile on me by now. There's no way that information wouldn't include anything on Dupe, my right-hand man. Hell, one of you could even be Dupe for all you know."

Ying frowned. Indeed, they all had been informed of Forge and Harmony long ago. Anyone with an ounce of common sense would have considered the possibility of a spy entering their ranks after reading Dupe's profile. His winning combination of laws were easily enough to make him one of the most feared spies in the world, perhaps only falling behind Feather from Nexus. It would be completely shameless to deny knowing these things after it was brought right into the open. "What's your goal?" She asked, caution on her face. "Do you want to sow dissent right before the war starts? Are you working with the enemy?"

"That's the pot calling the kettle black." Ed scoffed. "Who tried to start a fight with Tai as soon as we arrived? If anyone's trying to throw our ranks into chaos, then it appears to be you."

"Nonsense!" She shouted. "I'm the only one with a way of even getting us to Mount Dongling!"

"Then get on with it." He replied. "We're burning daylight and getting nowhere by playing petty politics."

Ying grimaced before harrumphing and turning around. She pulled out a small blue whistle attached to her necklace and blew on it. It seemed to be silent, as no one could hear any sound coming out.

'Just how is she going to get us there in time?' Ed curiously wondered as he watched her closely.

Suddenly, the ground began rumbling and shaking. The snow shifted, sliding downwards.

"AVALANCHE?!" Many solders screamed in panic.

"EARTHQUAKE!!!" Other soldiers shouted while lying themselves flat on the ground.

Ed's eyes widened in shock as he watched what was happening. 'Are we... moving?!'

Suddenly, another quake hit, causing much more snow to slide down the various mountain slopes. Ed was lurched forward by the force, and he had to slam his foot into the ground to catch his balance. 'I haven't felt like that since the last time I crashed my steam scooter...'

Unable to withstand his curiosity, he flew into the sky. As he flew higher and higher, the shape of the mountains become increasingly clearer. The plain he and the men were in was surrounded by mountain peaks on all sides. It was as if a huge chunk of Mount Everest had broken away and flew off on its own. However, there seemed to be nothing driving the mountain beyond a vague sense of mana flowing in certain ways.

'This... This has to be a formation or something.' He thought as he examined the pyramid-shaped mountain. 'But at this size... why wait until now to use it for anything?' It had to be known that just the valley alone comfortably held 20,000 cultivators. The entire object made even nightmares look tiny in comparison. After all, it was a literal floating mountain! Could it not be used to bash the nightmare's heads in and finally return peace to the world? Determined for answers, he eyed Sect Leader Ying. He'd even be willing to force the answers out of her if he had to.