Mu Chen and Su Qingyue flew far from the forest area. He had no idea where to even begin his wandering, but Su Qingyue was right there beside him, ready to fill him in on everything.
"This is the eastern territory of the Wang Kingdom. The forest back there was the Eastern Qi Rain Forest," Su Qingyue explained.
"Do sects like yours have ties to kingdom affairs?"
"No," Su Qingyue replied. "Sects stand on their own without being bound to anyone, except to other sects when an alliance has been formed."
"Clans and kingdoms are bound to each other. They are inseparable, like rivers and oceans, each one needing the other."
"So if the Tianyin Sect went to war with another sect, the kingdom would have no power to stop it?" Mu Chen asked.
"They do have some... but they tend to tread carefully."
Mu Chen listened to everything Su Qingyue explained, whether about politics or anything else. He never expected the politics of a xianxia world to be just as complicated as the politics back on Earth.
Could that complexity be something passed down through generations of accumulated understanding from the ancestors?
Su Qingyue and Mu Chen kept flying south, slowly putting more distance between themselves and the area around the Tianyin Sect.
As they flew, Su Qingyue moved on to explaining something else. If the earlier conversation had been about politics, sects, and kingdoms, she now planned to go into more detail about the sects themselves.
"Every sect has its own status, which determines whether it ranks above or below other sects."
"The Yangguan Cultivator Alliance sets those standards."
Mu Chen turned his head and listened. Sects were ranked from low-grade all the way up to divine-grade.
To rise in status, a sect had to fulfill many requirements, such as adding members at certain realms or reaching a set number of disciples.
She told him that the Tianyin Sect was at the Saint-grade level, meaning it had more than five cultivators above the Nascent Soul realm, five Nascent Soul cultivators, fifteen Core Formation cultivators, and twenty thousand disciples.
"The main requirement is always the cultivators' realm, specifically Nascent Soul and above. Core Formation cultivators or disciple count are not the primary factors."
"I understand," Mu Chen said.
Su Qingyue's explanation was fairly complex given all the xianxia terminology, but Mu Chen's mind was sharp enough to follow all of it without much trouble.
"So the two other sects at the ancient ruins the other day were at the same status level as Tianyin?"
"That's right," Su Qingyue replied. "The sect with the red uniforms is the Hongyan Sect. The sect with the dark blue uniforms is the Qingyun Sect."
"Tianyin, Hongyan, and Qingyun. The three pillar sects of the Wang Kingdom."
Talking about sects brought Mu Chen's thoughts back to Si You and Tu Wei. Grandma Si had told him that she and Tu Wei had come from the Hengyue Sect.
They were working to raise the Hengyue Sect's status to Grand-grade, which was exactly why breaking through to Soul Formation mattered so much to both of them.
"About the Hengyue Sect. Do you know anything about them?"
"Yes," Su Qingyue answered. "They are a sect under Tianyin's protection. They also helped with the search for you."
"How do you know about Hengyue?"
"Those two people back there, they were members of the Hengyue Sect. They mentioned they wanted to reach Soul Formation so their sect's status could rise."
Su Qingyue nodded, listening to Mu Chen. "But the rules for rising in status are quite strict. A sect that wants to advance must wait three hundred years."
"If within those three hundred years they maintain the requirements or even surpass them, only then can the sect's status advancement be granted."
Mu Chen was taken aback. Three hundred years was a long time. He had no idea whether Si You and Tu Wei could hold on in their cultivation for that long.
The two of them flew lower and descended through the white clouds. Mu Chen looked down and for the first time, he saw a city.
"A city?" Mu Chen asked.
"Yes," Su Qingyue added. "Baiyin City."
The flying swords landed and returned to Su Qingyue's bag of holding. She was slightly uncomfortable flying low and relying on a flying sword, but since her true cultivation was sealed and now sat only at the Early Core Formation level, Su Qingyue had to carry herself like a Core Formation cultivator.
"So what do you want to do, Mu Chen?" Su Qingyue asked.
"Honestly, I'm not sure. I'm a bit lost. Point me in a direction, Master Su."
"Call me Yue'er. I like it better."
"Alright... Yue'er."
The two of them walked together into the city, where the buildings and architecture were far more beautiful and intricate than anything he had seen in the village before.
Many merchants had their wooden stalls open on both sides of the road, calling out to sell their goods. Su Qingyue walked ahead with Mu Chen following behind.
They weren't the only ones on the city's main road. Plenty of mortals and cultivators moved through it side by side, mixing freely with each other.
From Mu Chen's eyes alone, he could tell the mortals apart from the cultivators just by what they were wearing.
The cultivators dressed in noticeably finer clothes than ordinary mortals.
"Where do they usually go?" Mu Chen asked.
"Cultivators typically come to cities to buy techniques or attend auctions. Some prefer to sit back and drink."
Su Qingyue turned and looked at Mu Chen walking behind her. "You don't have any attack techniques outside of relying on that cauldron. I'll take you to buy a technique scroll."
"I can't just hand you one of mine directly since my technique scrolls are at a high level, and there's no way a Qi Condensation cultivator like you could study them."
Mu Chen nodded. Buying a technique scroll at least gave him a chance to decide what kind of technique he actually wanted to learn.
The two of them arrived at one of the shops, which sold all kinds of supplies including weapons, technique scrolls, and pills.
When Mu Chen looked at the weapon display along the wall, he remembered the fourth Heavenly Refinement mission.
I should pick up a weapon too.
"Welcome, sir, miss. Is there anything I can help you with?" asked the shop owner, a man standing behind the counter.
"Yes. Show us your mortal-grade technique scrolls," Su Qingyue said.
"Of course. We have a wide selection at that level."
The man brought out a large number of technique scrolls, all of them floating in front of him and still bearing the shop's seal. Mu Chen stepped closer and looked over the collection.
"Give him a sword technique..."
"No need, Yue'er. I already know which scroll I want."
Through Mu Chen's eyes, one of the technique scrolls was giving off a faint golden qi glow, while none of the others were. That caught his attention immediately.
Su Qingyue was surprised. Mu Chen reached for the scroll. Its name was the Mountain Shattering Palm Technique.
"Are you sure?" Su Qingyue asked.
"Yes. I also need a rusted mortal-grade weapon. Do you have one?"
"Rusted?" the shop owner asked.
"Yes."
"What would you do with a rusted mortal-grade weapon?" Su Qingyue asked, puzzled.
Mu Chen gave her a wide smile. "I'll tell you later."