Weapon of Choice

Two men and two women entered a familiar suite, bowed before a certain figure, and sat down on the same sofas that they had rested on over twenty days ago.

Admiral Chen welcomed the four, "It's a pleasure to see you have returned from your mission. I hope your were successful in infiltrating the island and gathering intelligence. Ah, please excuse me, I got ahead of myself. Let me offer you a cup of tea."

Jiang Da, Fan Chao, Ma Bao, and Zhan Xue all looked at the others before Ma Bao's sweet voice answered the admiral, "This might be a break in etiquette, but we would like to offer you tea instead."

Admiral Chen was silent and still for a moment, contemplating the offer before relaxing, "I will take you up on your offer then."

Ma Bao summoned a glass bottle of iced red tea and five tea cups. She skillfully poured for everyone, and delivered the cups to everyone in the room. Admiral Chen was first impressed with the glass bottle Ma Bao had brought out.

"This must be excellent tea to be stored in such a exquisite bottle", Chen commented as he brought the cup to his mouth.

Before taking a drinking, he used several spells to detect poison. When he found nothing, but detected the high levels of Qi in the drink, he became even more cautious.

Ma Bao, guessing his thoughts, laughed, "Admiral Chen, to us it may seem a wondrous bottle, but on Sun & Moon island, it is a common as an tree in the forest. The citizens of the island had learned the method of how to produce glass such as this, and most drinks are stored in bottles like this."

Chen was slightly surprised by such a statement, but he covered his reaction by sipping the tea. The taste of the tea was sweet, and Chen had guessed the brewers had used honey to accomplish this. There was also fruity and tart notes he recognized as the drink started being refined by his body. The purity of the Qi was much higher than he had expected though he felt it was a bit weak. He didn't mind too much because a tea that could satisfy him would over power these lower realm cultivators.

As Admiral Chen continued to drink the tea , Jiang Da summoned a bag to his hand, and placed it on the Admiral's desk.

"This is what was requested", Jiang Da presented the item, "There are a collection of image talismans inside, as well as, several products we purchased to showcase for you."

Admiral Chen grinned, "Are you saying that I will be unable to decipher the contents of the images on my own?"

To Chen's surprise, Jiang Da didn't look nervous at all, "I will have to ask you to excuse my rudeness, Admiral. But whether it's you or even my own Sect master, I believe I will have to explain the contents of the images."

"Then please proceed", Chen invited Jiang Da to start.

Twenty minutes later, Admiral Chen felt like he had aged ten thousand years. After seeing each image, and listening to the explanation of the various objects shown, he began to doubt his choice to become a pirate. After hearing about how the cultivators of the Nanying continent and beastkin of the Shuo continent regularly visited the island, and purchased the products in large quantities for seemingly impossible prices, his mind began to race. His calculations were interrupted again when he heard that the Golden Peony had made contact with the islands overseer, built a branch on the island, and started a transportation service for cultivators on the Nanying continent.

Admiral Chen began to felt a crisis developing, if the Golden Peony expanded their services to the other continents, his pirate fleet would face increasing difficulties. A flying ship could carry thousands of cultivators, and it wouldn't be strange if important people were on board as well. Only some sects, families, and organizations had the assets to build or but a flying ship and keep it flying. If you were a smaller organization and could save money by riding a Golden Peony ship, most would do it.

Chen stopped his current thoughts, and decided to understand a different problem he was having.

"How were you able to enter the island without incident?", Chen asked, "I hate to embarrass myself, but the whole reason I offered this mission was because my best agents were found out and denied entry."

The four cultivators had strange looks on their face, but after a short delay, Jiang Da replied, "We simples stated our names, intentions, and our origins at the entrance."

"If that was the case", Chen impatiently probed, "Then why didn't my people have success?"

Zhan Xue suddenly articulated, "Is it possible they used fake names, origins, or intentions? We also had to place our hand on an artifact when speaking, and I believe that artifact could detect lies."

Admiral Chen took a hard look at Zhan Xue before looking up at the ceiling to ruminate on this theory.

"So you're saying that if I were arrive there and speak the truth, they would allow me entry", Chen question the young man.

"Admiral, while I can't be fully confident, I believe so", Zhan Xue responded, "The security of that island is leagues above any other place I've been. While we were there, the overseer at the entrance captured and suppressed a beastkin, mostly like at the Grand Ancestral or Saint level, with relative ease. I don't believe they are worried about their ability to keep themselves safe."

Admiral Chen eyes grew sharp at Zhan Yue's last statement, Grand Ancestral beastkin were equal to Void Refinement cultivators, and Saint level beastkin were equal to Dao realm cultivators. If this island had this ability, he, a void refinement stage cultivator, didn't stand a chance.

Admiral Chen sent a storage bag to each of the four, "As per the contract, here is the reward. I believe I will visit this place soon, so I will take your words under consideration."

The four cultivators stood up and bowed, Ma Bao said, "Thank you, Admiral Chen. As you can imagine, we have to report this to our sects as well. I hope we get the opportunity to see each other again whenever we return to the island."

Admiral Chen watched as the four left his suite before calling his own men into the room, "Prepare my ship with a fresh crew that's never tried to enter Sun & Moon island. We will set off once the boat is ready."

Houran was in Simspace alone at the moment, working on a side project. The discovery of the Draco empire spying on the island had Huoran change is priorities. Some days the Sages would come to Simspace, and advance their progress on the suit they collaborated on. On other days, the sages would take teams of artisans with them, and go upgrade defensive arrays. In some cases they would add new arrays to help block aggressors and give themselves the advantage.

All this preparation was fine in a large conflict, but Huoran knew a saying in this world, 'Strength trumped all tricks'. He could probably face a hundred thousand soldiers from the Draco empire and not worry, but if the Dragon Emperor was the same level as the cultivator as his supposed 'master', Huoran was uncertain of the outcome. He was working on a project that he hoped he would never have to use, a talisman array with the power that surpassed the strongest nuclear weapon from his previous life. Once he created it, he would hold to it and never use it unless there was no other option. He had originally wanted to create an orbital system that consisted of satellites and weapon platforms, but this project had run into difficulties. It wasn't hard to launch the different spacecraft, and just like the drones, it wouldn't be difficult to inscribe arrays to keep them undetected. The difficulty came from power, the arrays and weapons would need spirit stones to power them, but the satellites and platforms couldn't launch and return every time the stones needed to be replenished because it was a huge waste. Huoran needed to locate a new source of energy that these artifacts could collect while orbiting the planet, and at this time, he had not. So instead he decided to create a weapon powerful enough that it would convince everyone that his 'master' had attain a new realm of power.

This was very tiring work for Huoran because he was working with array formulas and formations that normally were above his ability to inscribe, but thanks to the inscription workstation, he could barely write them. It was a long process as writing the formulas and formations would use most of his Qi, and even though he could drink or eat to refill his Qi, it was still mentally draining after so many hours of work. Houran did find a silver lining during this process, the amount of blood essence, Qi, and soul essence would expand slightly each day. He also noticed that he was approaching his breakthrough to Nascent Soul faster than before. Huoran sat down at his drafting table as he continued to experiment with materials, shapes, formulas, and formations.