The Journey of the Storm Sky Manor

After losing its sect master and strongest presiding ancestor, the Storm Sky Manor, now led by the Supreme Elder, selected the most talented and strongest disciples and left the five cities region with about two hundred members. Although there were many other talented seeds that the sect wished to grow, due to their circumstances, the disciples in the group were either core disciples or ones with connections to influential figures.

Subsequent to leaving the five cities' region, Kate learned more about the sect, like the fact that Storm Sky Manor was a branch of the Heavenly Storm Sect that was based in the central region which had the capital, Lyrillis. She also learnt that their current destination was a sect that was allied with the Heavenly Storm Sect. The sect was called Dragon River Academy and was in a region adjacent to the central region.

Kate wished that she had heard this earlier so that she could have mentioned it in the letter she left for Shui, but with the artifact he would still be able to find her.

"We'll take a break here," announced the dignified old man who held the position of Supreme Elder.

In Storm Sky Manor, the High elder would normally be in charge when the sect master was unavailable, but since they were moving after losing both the sect master and an ancestor, the strongest remaining ancestor took up the role of Supreme Elder and assumed control instead.

They took their break near a river where a cool breeze blew. The weakest of their group was in the Soul Realm so they could keep moving without food for a day, but one could never underestimate what might happen in the wild. The disciples and elders split into their respective groups of four to five, but there was one group that only had one person.

Kate sat by herself and ate a fruit in silence. Since Kasia and her other friends had left the sect, there was no longer anyone who would get close to her despite the tense relationship she had with the High elder's disciple. That disciple stopped bothering her after the spirit nest disaster, even though he glared at her at any chance he got, so she was okay with the status quo. Nonetheless, as the majority of remaining disciples were male she still received many looks because of her beauty and unfortunately, there was someone with the courage to actually talk to her.

"Eating alone again, huh?"

To her displeasure, a thin young man approached with a weak smile. They had the same cultivation and were both core disciples, but she really didn't want to have anything in common with him. This was one of the reasons driving her to complete her breakthrough to the second level of the Earth Realm.

"That's none of your business."

She wanted to swat him like a fly, but this wasn't the time or place to cause a commotion. Usually he would still sit down and keep talking to her, but this time he took a different course of action.

"You're as cold as usual. However, for your sake it would be best if you were a little more 'comfortable' around me."

"Huh? What are you even-"

The moment Kate began to question his intentions, she was handed a blue crystal.

"Look at that before you make your decision."

After leaving that line behind, the young man left to socialize with others. She was glad to see him go away, but the crystal in her hand added a new weight to her chest.

To settle things as quickly as possible, she seeped her spiritual sense into the crystal and hurriedly froze her facial expression to suppress her shock. From the blue crystal she received, she saw the battle that occurred between Nathan and Shui from an third party's perspective.

She didn't like the fact that Shui hid this from her, but she didn't know how to feel when she saw Nathan's death. Sure he had been a troublesome one, but he was still family. However she wasn't shaken that easily. Although she needed time to sort out her feelings, she quickly prioritised the most important question.

"Why? Why did he give this to me?"

Shui was assumed to be dead, so there wasn't much point in holding on to this. And yet, not only did he keep it, he was using it to persuade her. At first she wasn't sure, but if he was aware of the relationships between Kate, Nathan and Shui, then there was one thing she could deduce.

"It's blackmail."

If she didn't cooperate then he would reveal this clip to the High elder and expose her for being close to the killer. To Kate, this was an annoying situation, but she wasn't too nervous. She had faith that things would work out so this was just a trivial event that she needed to take care of.

After their break, the group kept going until they found some caves to stop at for the night. Later that night, Kate and Rio met up secretly, away from the campsite. Rio thought that he had the advantage, but when they faced each other he realised that he was the one feeling more nervous. He wondered if she had something up her sleeve, but there was nothing he could do but hope that things went as planned.

Although Kate wasn't in the best of positions in the sect's power balance, a good portion of the remaining elders and ancestors supported her. Therefore, since he could no longer partner up with Shui, he wanted to latch on to her leg. It was a shameless motive, but Kate didn't care about his reason anyways.

"Here."

She took out the crystal and handed it him before turning around. Rio stood stunned still for a few seconds before hastily stretching his hand out to grab her.

"Wait!"

Naturally Kate avoided him, but she stopped and gave him a sharp glare.

"What is it?" she asked coldly.

"Aren't you going to accept my offer?"

"Hah? Of course not. Didn't I tell you to stop approaching me?"

Kate answered like what she was saying was as clear as day, but Rio looked at her in confusion.

"Don't you care about if I show this to Elder Ratri and expose who killed his disciple?"

"Do whatever you want. I won't stop you."

Kate seemed genuine in her response, but that only jumbled Rio's thoughts even more. He could understand if she had underestimated him and was planning to kill him before anyone sensed anything, but that didn't look to be the case.

'Did she realise that I don't want to reveal it?'

If he presented the evidence, it would be clear that he knew that Shui was the culprit from the start. And while he could manipulate the narrative to say that Shui threatened him to keep quiet, that would be hard to believe considering their respective cultivations. Therefore, there was a risk in damaging his own reputation if he used the memory that was recorded. As he was nearing the end of his rope, Rio asked Kate one more question.

"Maybe you think you won't be affected by this, but aren't you worried about your friends and family? What if the elder leaves our group to get revenge?"

He thought that finally, this question would cause some discomfort to the unflustered girl before him, but his expectations were wrong once more. By a large margin in fact.

Kate chuckled, looked him straight in the eye and said, "He's been through worse disasters than you can imagine. No offense to the elder, but I doubt that he'll be a threat to them as long as he's there."

With that, Kate left, leaving Rio with even more questions.