"Who's the prick?" I asked through divine sense. The question slipped out before I bothered filtering it. After everything I had gone through recently, my tolerance for arrogant strangers descending from mysterious higher realms was dangerously low. The man radiated the sort of superiority that made cultivators instinctively want to either kneel or punch him, and I had never been particularly talented at the kneeling part.
But was imdiately yelled at by Tonfa via divine Sense, "Don't ever call him that! This man is soone sent from sowhere… higher up."
The sheer panic in Tonfa's response caught more off guard than the stranger himself. Elder Tonfa was not weak. More importantly, he wasn't the sort to lose composure easily. Yet his divine sense practically snapped at with enough urgency to make realize just how serious this was.
Around us, unconscious cultivators still littered portions of the hall, victims of nothing more than that man speaking too loudly, and suddenly Tonfa's reaction seed a lot less exaggerated.
"Higher up?"
"Yes, Higher up," the man replied.
That made frown imdiately. My eyes narrowed as I looked directly at him now, trying to figure out how he responded to sothing that was never spoken aloud. Divine sense communication wasn't ordinary sound. It was direct transmission of thought and intent between cultivators.
"How did you do that? Spy on our divine sense conversation…" I said. Irritation mixed with genuine caution now. Eavesdropping on divine sense wasn't sothing normal cultivators did casually.
"For so strange reason…" the man approached , "Why can't I listen on to yours, I can hear Tonfa all right, but yours is… muffled, which is strange for soone as weak as you."
As he drew closer, the pressure around him beca more obvious. It wasn't rely strength. I had t powerful cultivators before. Suns. Yang stage monsters. This felt different. More refined. More absolute. Like standing near sothing that existed under a different set of rules.
Yes he was still nowhere near the Enforcer, but he had a strange presence to him. Almost… and I hate to say it. Divine.
Yet despite that overwhelming presence, there was confusion in his expression now, subtle but unmistakable. The fact he couldn't fully read my divine sense clearly bothered him.
I wasn't about to explain that my soul had apparently beco tangled with heavens, poison, enforcers, and whatever else fate decided to shove into my path recently.
"Let's cut the bullshit, why are you here? Do I know you, do you know ?" I asked. There was no point circling around the matter while he stood there looking down at like a suspicious insect.
"No, as a matter of fact I don't even want to acquaint myself with sothing like you. But, the Tang Clan requested your presence. After all, you're… different."
The slight pause before the last word made my skin crawl more than the insult did. Different. Cultivators never used that word casually. Especially not people from realms supposedly "higher up."
I turned to Tonfa, "Tang clan? What's that?"
Tonfa looked deeply uncomfortable being dragged into this conversation at all. "I don't fully know… like I said, they co from higher up…"
That answer clarified absolutely nothing while sohow making things feel more dangerous.
"But," the man said, "You're too weak, the trip would kill you. Grow stronger then co find ," he said as he threw a small jade.
The jade spun once through the air before I caught it instinctively. The material itself felt unusual imdiately, colder and denser than ordinary communication jade. There were strange inscriptions carved along its inner surface that seed to shift slightly when viewed directly.
"I'll remain here for one year. If you're not at least Yin Stage by then, then forget about all you heard." He said and walked away.
Just like that.
No explanation.
No elaboration.
Only impossible demands dropped onto my head before leaving like he had done a favor rely by speaking to .
The arrogance was honestly impressive.
And what do you an one year? I'm barely at the Heaven Stage right now. I'll need to go up to the sun stage and then Yin stage, brother I might as well not go.
I turned to Tonfa, more confused than before, "Who stuck a pole up that guy's ass?"
"Don't, please," Tonfa sighed, rubbing at his forehead like I was personally trying to shorten his lifespan. "All we know is, they co from a place… that's far from where we are right now. Sowhere with different laws, rules and possibilities."
There was a strange weight behind those words. Different laws. Different possibilities. I thought back to the enforcer ntioning worlds beyond worlds, realities larger than this entire universe. Every ti I climbed another stage of cultivation, the reward seed to be discovering how microscopic my current understanding actually was.
"Figured as much, the higher you go up this cultivation, another world shows up to show you how trash you actually are."
"That's the way of cultivators, you can never reach the peak, still," he said "Let take you to the Dusking Sun."
"Oh, right, that's the reason I'm here, please lead the way."
Tonfa headed up and I followed after. He strangely had a lack of concern for the knocked out cultivators, almost as if sothing like this was usual and cultivators going into mass coma was the norm. Quite interesting.
The upper levels of the Confederation headquarters were quieter than the bustling halls below, though the silence here felt intentional rather than empty. Formation lights glowed softly along the walls.
Guards stationed throughout the corridors lowered their heads respectfully as we passed, though several of them looked at with open curiosity. News clearly traveled fast. Probably faster now after the disaster at Solarous.
Not too much ti later when we reached his eting room I saw the Dusking Sun sitting on one of the chairs, both elbows on his knees and his clasped hands cradling his chin.
The sight alone imdiately put on edge.
He was never soone who 'thought' or reflected this deeply.
Dusking Sun had always been direct. Loud. Impatient. If sothing annoyed him, he punched it. If sothing worried him, he usually shouted first and worried later. Seeing him sitting there in complete silence, posture tense, gaze lowered in genuine concentration, felt wrong in a way I didn't like.
"What got your gears grinding?" I asked. My attempt at casualness didn't fully hide the caution creeping into my voice.
"Shen Bao, good, you're here, we'll need to go." He said as he stood up.
No greeting.
No insult.
No pointless comntary.
That alone made the atmosphere heavier.
"Wow, I just had to deal with so serious shit earlier, where do you want to go? I need to understand what's going on."
The Dusking Sun looked at for a long mont before answering. There was hesitation there. Real hesitation.
That worried more than if he had started screaming.
"I think… I think he's back…" the Dusking Sun said.
"Back? Who is back? What are we talking about?" I asked. My mind imdiately started cycling through possibilities, none of them pleasant.
"Shi… Shi Situ is back."
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