A Man Like God

'I intentionally took in a useless disciple to escape the obligation of teaching?'

'Am I such a person?'

'Actually, yeah, I am.'

'It never occured to me that my perfect plan would be exposed…'

'People are creating malicious rumors!'

Lingzhou Yue fumed, but her beautiful face remained indifferent as she continued drinking wine.

Xiao Ran looked confident. She would leave this to him then, she thought.

The first person to speak up for her was Yinyue Zhenren.

Yinyue Zhenren's gentle mien turned steely as she spoke without mincing her words. "Even if Junior Sister Lingzhou hasn't appropriately taken in a disciple, she's still a lady. Junior Brother Huangfu, please watch your words."

Huangfu Qun's gaze was heavily laced with nonchalance.

"These aren't my words. The sect disciples said them. It's simple to crush these rumors. There are challenging letters from the Inner Disciples, some of whom are already famous elites. I've kept them at bay for you guys for a full day."

As he spoke, he retrieved a stack of challenging jade slips and tossed them on the long table.

"From tomorrow, these Inner Nucleus Disciples will wait for you in the central mountain's Sword Plain for two hours daily early in the morning. To prove that what you said is true, you will convince them with your actual actions. Let's see if your eloquence is as effective on the elites who weren't selected as Direct Disciples."

Xiao Ran frowned.

"You're asking me, a mortal, to have a cultivation fight with disciples with a profound cultivation base?"

Huangfu Qun answered calmly, "You may not have to. Just as long as they shut up."

Lingzhou Yue felt a headache coming. These were the rules, but which disciple challenge in the past had not ended in a battle?

She began praying in a frenzy for Xiao Ran in her mind. 'Don't agree to it! Don't agree to it! Don't agree to it!'

Without even a twitch, Xiao Ran bent to collect all the jade slips on the table and put them in his pouch.

"Alright."

'What do you mean?!'

Lingzhou Yue was dying to knock some sense into his head!

He had just joined the sect three days ago yet he dared accept a disciple challenge?

The others were silently shocked. They did not know what Xiao Ran's plan was, but their interest in the disciple challenge that would take place tomorrow sure was piqued.

Could this young man have abilities hidden so deep that the Elders could not see them?

True gold feared no fire. Huangfu Qun had more tricks up his sleeves.

"Don't agree in a rush. This is only your first barrier."

"Pray tell, Elder."

Xiao Ran gave him a small nod.

What else could he do? The Commandment Elder was obviously coming for his master. He had to solve this for his master no matter how difficult the plight was.

Huangfu Qun then said, "As the Direct Disciple of this sect's Sword-Wielding Elder and the candidate to become the next Sword-Wielding Elder, sword-wielding comes first for you. Considering that you're still a mortal, I will give you a year to accept the Sword Undertaking Rite. If you can survive the Sword Undertaking Rite and obtain the sect's True Teaching Sword, then you'll be truly considered the sect's Sword-Wielding Disciple!"

Xiao Ran replied, "Of course."

"That's not all. There's a third request," said Huangfu Qun.

At the Sect Leader's table, Bo Yunzi found this too much and cupped a fist at Huangfu Qun before asking, "Isn't Junior Uncle being too strict with Junior Brother Xiao?"

Huangfu Qun shook his head with a sigh and told the truth.

"The Cultivation Alliance requested this."

"What do you mean?"

"Ten days ago, I met Lead Li, Li Wuxie, in Dongfu City. He told me about the Cultivation Alliance's ultimatum to all the independent sects. The Sword-Wielding Elders must complete one of two missions."

"Two missions?"

"First mission: Each Sword-Wielding Elder of a sect is to take in at least 10 Direct Disciples within 10 years and teach the maxim of swordsmanship. A sect only gets five quotas for their disciples, while the other five quotas will be taken care of by the Cultivation Alliance."

"Second mission: If the Sword-Wielding Elder isn't interested in teaching, they have to complete at least 10 Grade-A missions of the Cultivation Alliance each year. Half of the missions will be hunting high-tier Wraiths and few of them will involve investigating and going after demonic cultivation and other stuff."

Everyone was quiet. All of them could see that the Cultivation Alliance was beginning to force themselves into sect affairs. This meant that the Dao-Ending world was declining in acceleration, as one could no longer predict many things with conventional logic…

How was Lingzhou Yue supposed to take this grievance?

'Stupid Cultivation Alliance. I quit! From this day onward, I'm my own person in the Dao-Ending Period!'

However, once she thought about her beautiful master and her adorable disciple, she was reluctant to let go of the sect.

'Do they think I'm a pig?' It was mission impossible for her to take in 10 disciples.

The second mission… Maybe she could do it, especially if some Grade-A missions of the alliance were exciting.

"I'll take Xiao Ran and test out a few interesting missions. It will be cultivation for him as well."

Xiao Ran nodded.

After living for three years in the mortal realm, he totally understood the strategy of the Cultivation Alliance. There would only be hope of survival for the cultivation world if they united in the Dao-Ending Period. Separate worlds would only promise doom.

Obviously, his master's carefree lifestyle was coming to an end, and he was going to be dragged into it as well. 

However, this was an opportunity for Xiao Ran. He could totally take on these tasks on behalf of his master to earn himself some DP.

This was about being devoted to his master, carrying out his obligations to the world, and earning himself DP. What was there not to do?

Huangfu Qun had not expected the master-disciple pair to agree to it so easily. The feeling that the two of them had to share some unspoken secret was nagging at him.

"Since you have no objection to all three points, Bo Yunzi may begin."

The man in question finally breathed in relief.

"Okay."

The Elder meeting that had been postponed to this point in time was finally starting.

Everyone had been absorbed in the grief of their Sect Leader testing Tribulation Transcending earlier. Then, their attention had been attracted by Xiao Ran. Their interest in the following meeting agenda was thus lacking.

However, this meeting was, in fact, very important.

The first thing on the agenda was securing the mountain-guarding array.

Considering the Wraiths could easily invade the place and the Sect Leader could no longer maintain the array himself, they needed to fortify the array points. After a simple discussion, it was decided that Bo Yunzi, Moxia Zhenren, and Huangfu Qun would each take on the responsibility.

Yinyue Zhenren was tasked with preparing medicinal pills for the Sect Leader's Tribulation Transcending, while Lingzhou Yue would either take in disciples or complete the Cultivation Alliance's Grade-A missions.

Then came the second thing on the agenda.

In order to strengthen the trade of sects and towns, the Cultivation Alliance had built a free-trade Immortal City to increase the traffic and demand, so human survival in the Dao-Ending Period would be more convenient and efficient.

The nearest revamped Immortal City to Zongzhi Mountain was Dongfu City, where the Cultivation Alliance was stationed in the Blazing Nation.

Xiao Ran thought that this was like building a Special Administrative Region.

The Cultivation Alliance was trying to organize and unite the cultivation force through this method to strengthen the influence of the organization and dissolve the negative ways of sects, such as isolation, seclusion, and elite-keeping.

Then came the third thing on the agenda.

The Cultivation Alliance had sent out memos to sects, towns, and Wraith Hunters to take note of an extreme heretical organization named Apostle.

This organization had been recently summoning Wraiths in many highly-populated places! The action was condemnable, and those who spotted them had to inform the alliance at once. Sects could send their elites to capture them and send them to the alliance and would be handsomely rewarded for it.

This organization had been summoning Wraiths?

Xiao Ran thought that these were literal traitors.

This reminded him of public opinion manipulators in his past life for some reason. The psychology of fawning over power was revolting!

The Elder meeting ended shortly.

They had discussed three very important things on the agenda, but everyone was only nodding in deep thought without supplying a very constructive opinion.

…

When they returned to the Sword-Wielding Mountain, the wind was warm and the sun was mellow on the winding roots of the pine tree.

Xiao Ran stood still like a wooden block while Lingzhou Yue circled him, scrutinizing her disciple, whom she had only spent two days and one night with, from head to toe.

This time, she did not peek at Xiao Ran's mediocre talent or check his youthful, vigorous body. She was checking out his personality!

'Has this dude been usually acting honest and innocent with me?'

'Is he that bold and clever?'

'Doesn't he have to practice bluffing before the four Elders?'

'The extent he's gone to to stand up for me…'

'Did you grow up infused with filial devotion?!'

Whatever this was, Lingzhou Yue and Xiao Ran were not just master and disciple from now on. They were in the same boat.

Realizing this, she unintentionally went behind Xiao Ran and massaged her precious disciple's shoulders and neck. Her breath was fragrant with wine as she said meaningfully, "You're quite smart, huh!"

Xiao Ran felt his shoulders going limp as a wisp of spiritual energy slowly entered. It felt rather addictive.

His master was giving him a massage? He had never dreamed of it!

Xiao Ran had been truly quite fatigued recently, so he said nothing as he enjoyed this treatment.

Lingzhou Yue probed. "Let's talk about the Sword Undertaking Rite and Grade-A missions later. We'll talk about the disciple challenge tomorrow. How are you planning to shut the elite disciples' mouths?"

Xiao Ran pulled his sword out of the system storage.

"With my precious sword, of course."

With a raise of brows, Lingzhou Yue suddenly felt a little ashamed.

"But I don't have sword techniques that mortals could cultivate to teach you."

"It's fine."

Xiao Ran, who did not mind, said, "This disciple has something I don't understand."

Lingzhou Yue pinched him as though she was feigning a complaint.

"Didn't I tell you not to be too courteous with me and speak your mind freely?"

Xiao Ran then asked directly, "Did Master take me on as a disciple because I lack talent so Master could escape the obligation to teach?"

Lingzhou Yue's hands halted as her palms began to sweat.

Wow, he was not courteous at all!

After racking her brains, she finally found a perfect excuse.

As she took light steps toward Xiao Ran and straightened his collar for him, her amber-like eyes shone like stars in the night sky.

"When I was young, my mother dearest used to say that other than meeting thousands of fairy-like pretty girls in my living years, I'd also meet a man like a god. It's a pity that this godlike man is only raw jade now that needs to be sculpted and polished carefully."

Xiao Ran nodded.

'As if I'd believe you!'