Ja'Zaki Ssri had been having a miserable ti within the secret realm.
The weather and scenery was nice and everything, and sure, his cultivation speed was faster here too.
But was that really worth everyone trying to murder you everywhere you went??
Honestly, it was like no one knew how to have decent, kind natured conversation in this place!
But it was alright, because not only was he able to keep his n alive, he was able to get his hands on so good items that would strengthen the might of his dark elves as a whole.
And most importantly…
"There's the exit."
Ja'Zaki lit up at the sight of a large pillar of light in the sky to the east.
This phenona could only an that the long month spent in this shitty place was now over!
Standing next to the dark elf was a young woman who seed to bear quite the resemblance to him.
They had the sa long silver hair, slender fra, and amber eyes that shone like pools of honey.
"Father. I believe that we can reach our destination in under an hour if we abandon our stealth procedures."
"…Perhaps that may be best, Demona. I'm quite anxious to leave this place quickly."
The exit to the outside world would only be open for nine hours before it closed.
And once that happened, any who were still locked inside would be stuck here until the doorway opened once more in another several thousand years.
Ja'Zaki didn't have that kind of ti to waste.
"Let's move."
The dark elves at his back nodded in confirmation and together they bolted toward the treetops.
On average, each of them ran at a 'light' speed of over 220 miles per hour.
Ja'Zaki and his daughter couldn've done double that just walking backwards.
They made their way towards the towering pillar of light and just as his daughter predicted, they reached their destination in an hour on the dot.
The exit pillar was located inside a small clearing deep within the Black Forest; in the midst of a field of corpses.
As this was the only exit, cultivators from all over the secret realm were showing up to leave.
But this also ant that they were running into other groups and factions; who also no doubt had rare treasures on hand that they'd taken from this place.
This was like a strong cultivator's wet dream.
Hordes of enemies for the taking; and with their defeat one could amass even greater fortune and maximize their gains during this trip.
This was also seen as a way to even up sides in the war.
Fallen were attacking humans, human were fighting back against fallen, but there was no clear way to tell which side was losing more n.
Ja'Zaki noticed that there were so groups who were ignoring the pandemonium going on.
They stayed together in tight knit formations and made their way into the exit without allowing their greed to get the better of them.
After observing them for a while, Ja'Zaki began to debate whether or not his n should join in the fray, or just take what they already had and leave.
'Decisions, decisions… Alright then.'
Ja'Zaki unslung a pair of dark daggers from his belt.
His daughter watched him take one step off the tree they were perched on and plumt to the ground below.
Instead of his feet landing on soil, the dark elf sank all the way into the shadow of the tree and disappeared from view.
Demona was about to start counting, but the screaming had already begun.
All across the battlefield, humans were screaming out and dropping like flies one after the other.
At first glance, nothing seed to be wrong with them.
The humans would just fall over dead and a mont later a large gash would open up along their necks.
It was nearly impossible to tell what was going on. That is, unless you were evolved enough.
Higher level cultivators would have been able to see a single shadow moving across the battlefield from one human to another.
It was as if it had a mind of it's own.
A few seconds after the entire ordeal began, it was already over.
Ja'Zaki crawled out of the ground like a demon from hell and wiped his brow of imaginary sweat.
"Whew! What a work out… kidding!"
Demona was unbelievably embarrassed everyti that her secretly businesslike and professional father resud his outwardly flamboyant public persona.
This instance was no different.
"I-It's the Dark One!"
"Lord Ja'Zaki is here to save us!"
"Glory to the Head of the Elven Fallen!"
Ja'Zaki seed not to find too much interest in the praise of his fellow man, and instead focused on calming the group down.
"All of you, don't dawdle here. Take what you can from these bodies and leave. We've all been away from the outside world too long."
More cheers filled the air as the fallen began looting the fresh corpses with impunity.
Once they had a decent amount of treasures, they ran headfirst into the pillar of light and returned to Tayar with a brighter future ahead than before.
"Alright, now should I.. hm?"
Ja'Zaki was about to go grave robbing himself when he noticed a couple of familiar faces heading towards the exit.
He took another step to reappeared in front of two very large, furry beasts- one silver, one black.
Unsurprisingly, the silver fox seed to be the least happy to see him.
"TAIRA!!"
"Move."
"Aww, don't be cold now, good buddy good pal! I haven't seen you in so long! How be you been? Find any good sticks lately?"
The air beca so cold that Ja'Zaki could see his breath.
He warily took a step back and held up both hands in surrender.
"Alright, I see you've picked up so new tricks and you're still just as curmudgeonly as ever… So I assu your ti spent here was fruitful then?"
Taira did not answer, which was about what the dark elf expected.
Since the man wasn't one for conversation, he instead turned to the won.
"Hello, ladies. It is wonderful to see you as well. Even you, Aya."
The werewolf queen flipped off the elf from atop her daughter's back.
"Hi, Mr. Ja'Zaki!" Veril waved cheerfully.
"Ah, so the sweet human girl has survived the dreadfulness of this secret realm. I'm delighted to see that we haven't lost the only good human in the world."
Veril bead with pride like a kid who'd gotten an A on their entire report card.
"But aren't you all missing one from your group? Where's Mrs. Muscles???"
"We sent Aveena ho already." Enyo snickered. "She was feeling a little bit under the weather."
"Ah, right. I forgot you all can do that… So then, why would you co here at all?" Ja'Zaki scratched his head.
"We were looking for sothing…"
Taira's eyes scanned every dead body in the clearing with his piercing red eyes.
When he didn't find it, he turned his attention toward Aya and Aja.
"It seems they aren't here. We could wait for them if you like."
Aya yawned and scratched her abs. "No, that won't be necessary, handso. Our debts can be settled another day."
"I do not mind it either." Aja shrugged. "I am mostly just anxious to return ho as quickly as possible and bathe properly."
Ja'Zaki shook his head pitifully.
"I'm sorry, but that'll have to wait for now. The four of us need to sit down and have a serious conversation about what will co next. Especially concerning the demons…"
Taira could feel the dark elf's eyes on him, but he didn't particularly care in the mont.
For now, he had sothing a bit more important to do than sit in a eting.
Besides, he still hadn't decided whether or not he was even going to accept the Heavenly Demon position yet.
If he was honest, he didn't really want to. But he needed to discuss things with his family in order to see if there were any potential rits to be leveraged before he made a decision.
aning this would all have to wait until Aveena was out of seclusion.
"Later." He dismissed. "Aya will contact you when we are ready to hold a eting."
Ja'Zaki's eyes narrowed.
"Don't be unreasonable, Taira. This isn't a ti for you to go hiding in the middle of nowhere again. We have a very crucial, but delicate position now, and we need to do sothing with it."
"And we will… Later."
Ja'Zaki didn't get to voice anymore complaints because Taira vanished shortly afterwards; taking his wives with him.
Aja and Aya were left behind so that they could search for their own n and travel ho separately.
They listened to the long list of very colorful words that Ja'Zaki used to describe Taira for the next ten minutes or so.
-
The Amarok ho had seen a rather sizeable transformation since Taira had fused it with the Pagoda of Limitless Frost.
Everything about the place just seed to be bigger, and significantly nicer.
Looming in the very back was the Amarok family palace; which now seed to more closely resemble a huge temple.
The facilities for sect mbers were now much more impressive in size, but also functionality as well.
Two buildings face each other on opposite sides of the sect.
The building on the right is living quarters. On the first floor, 'Outer' disciples and children live in respective shared sleeping halls. Each can hold 75 people.
There are individual quarters for n and won, in addition to the bathhouses.
On the second floor, there are private quarters for 'Inner' disciples. Those who are at the sovereign realm or above.
Though instead of them being 'rooms' they are more like this world's version of luxury apartnts…
They co with living rooms, bedrooms, a kitchen, a private seclusion chamber, balconies, and possibly the most important; private bathrooms.
There are only thirty-five of these rooms available, so it is effectively first co, first served.
However, any outer disciple is allowed to challenge any inner disciple for their room and position at any ti. Though the challenges are limited to one a day for the sake of fairness…
This was designed to help keep those at the top sharp and those below hungry.
The left building is a hub with many purposes.
There is a training hall where lessons for the disciples are to be held from early morning to midday five days a week.
At first, Taira and Aveena would teach both inner and outer disciples equally, but the goal was for one of the hands to eventually take on the role of teaching the outer disciples.
In addition to the training hall, there is a public library containing nurous cultivation manuals, and even plain literature. There is no established pecking order as to who may obtain what.
However, Inner sect disciples may submit official requests to the Dai-Shi so that they may be invited into the palace to browse Abbess Setsuka's and Taira's personal collection of manuals and books.
There is also an improved indoor garden, a shiny alchemy lab, a brand new forge, and a quest hall.
Keran thought it may be a good idea to allow cult mbers the option to sell their skills for odd jobs in the city. (Though their identities would be kept a strict secret)
This way, the sect mbers could obtain their own pocket money to spend however they liked.
Even with all of Tayar at war, there was still dreadful amount of internal conflict happening among both sides. Hired swords were extrely valuable in the world.
There were a few more anities and such, but as of now the asanbosam had yet to learn about any of those things.
Because for right now, they were still at the beginning of the stone bridge that leads into the cult walls; trying not to freeze to death.
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