Immortal Ascension Tower

To the higher ups of the cultivation world, Zi clan was instead a minor branch of Northern Continent"s esteemed Zhao Clan, placed as an outpost to keep an eye on the Mysterious Light-Shadow Sect"s happenings. After all, some of the main branch"s Young Masters were disciples there, while the ancestral grounds of Zhao were located too far to be able to respond in the case of an emergency; on a whole other continent, even.

As the publically recognized number one Sect for cultivators in the world, it was as such no wonder that great powers such as the Zhao Clan would want to send their talented younglings to the Mysterious Light-Shadow Sect to study the path of cultivation under the best possible circ.u.mstances.

Therefore, the main branches of Clans and the like would set-up side branches in the vicinity of all major Sects. In the case of Zhao, who were separated by too much of a distance, they were also sure to develop the Zi Clan so that they"d be able to take care of smaller happenings in regards to the Young Masters, only contacting Zhao in the case of major accidents.

Again, the average cultivator wouldn"t possibly know of such things. Needless to say, such behind-the-curtains, under-the-table kinds of things were still known to a select few in the right places, so that things wouldn"t escalate to conflicts involving Continents.

Due to that, even to this day few had dared to clash their swords, even to a now waning Zi Clan: despite them not hiding their weakness to their political opponents, clashing with Zi head on would mean angering the monster that stood behind them.

Zhao was a beast that had been piling up treasures and cultivation resources for millennia on end. Some liked to call the Clan of Zhao the sleeping dragon of Northern Continent, a force that had never shown their full hand.

And after the events of a thousand years ago, n.o.body knows just how much power such a hidden dragon might have ama.s.sed!

That was also one of the reasons that, when a figure staged a scene of slaughter that enveloped the entirety of the clan grounds, the Zi members were astonished before they were terrified: it would only be later that the disbelief would be replaced by horror. Their arrogance as the tail of a dragon in a snake kingdom left them vulnerable to the teeth of one such snake.

As if to make things worse, luck just had it that, roughly two hours before the crack of dawn, the Clan Head and his elite guard corps had actually set off to complete a very important mission. The people living in the large mansion of Zi had even gathered to send them all off with cheers and bright smiles, waving the torches in their arms and wishing them good luck on the expedition.

Not even a few minutes after the group had disappeared into the distance however, a demon had come, knocking at the door with a sly smile.

This person was tiny, young, merely a child. Quite a few people, in fact, would have long since dismissed it as a suicidal attempt to wrong the esteemed Zi Clan as an inexperienced youngster.

Of course, that was before the black clothes had been dyed a bright crimson from the blood of the hundreds of people that he had cut down; even redder was the pavement, rivers of vermillion lifeblood trailing the path of that small figure drenched in scarlet.

That stained pavement had once been littered with corpses. Now though, they had all long since met Blindlight"s fauces, promoting from plant fertilizer into dragon fuel.

It was only a matter of time. Little more than two hours later, Cheng Hao comfortably laid atop the prestigious throne at the top a long set of stairs, within the Zi Clan Mansion"s Main Hall, admiring the dawn break.

And as he lay there, witnessing the grounds bathing in that light, the golden-eyed reborn soul couldn"t help but secretly praise in his mind: this Zi clan sure had quite the sense of style...

After all those halls and buildings were similar to those of the most conspicuous clans he had seen a thousand years ago.

I guess now these would be called vintage, uh? A thousand years is quite a long time after all...

Eventually, Cheng Hao turned his gaze towards the person next to the throne. He was really old. Maybe in his late eighties, perhaps in his early nineties. Currently, he was looking at Cheng Hao with a complex gaze, but eventually that fell to the three severed heads at his feet: one high Superior Stage, one half a step into the Sung Stage, secluded protectors of Zi Clan from a previous generation; both had fallen today, at the hands of a Basic Stage eight-year old. As for the third head laying beside those two, it only had an Advanced Stage cultivation, but her position as the first wife of the Clan Head, had once been looked up to by many.

Today, independently from power or status, they all returned to dust.

The old man was the only survivor out of the ma.s.sacre of the Zi Clan, the only reason being… that this elderly was only the Zi Clan"s groundskeeper, an unwilling slave of ar to the Zi Head.

Thus, Cheng Hao had no direct enmity towards him, nor found it necessary to kill him outright. Especially given the old man had no cultivation, so he didn"t yet pose a treat, and he had spared no effort helping the young child after knowing Cheng Hao"s motive was to eradicate Zi: many hidden rooms had been pointed out, completely weeding out all those that had been hiding in hope of escaping Cheng Hao"s slaughter.

The old man had a head full of long, white hair. His brown eyes were sharp while his straight nose, thick eyebrows and big mouth giving him a somewhat heroic air.

Although his age was nearing the end of his life expectancy, his body was as straight as a spear and his muscles still bulged from beneath his clothes. Even though he didn"t have a cultivation, his frame could still be referred to as that only those who had trained for their whole life could ever hope to compare to: just like Zi Clan cultivators, he used to be a body cultivator too, and one that was well into the Outstanding Mortal Physique, just a little bit further away from the actual peak of the second Tier. Now, with the sealing of his cultivation base, even that had degraded back to just a mere Initial Mortal Physique.

"Young friend, is something the matter?" Seeing the complicated gaze in Cheng Hao"s eyes the old man asked, worried.

The boy"s expression softened after hearing the concern in the man"s voice. They had talked quite a bit in the few hours that had pa.s.sed after the ma.s.sacre and he had come to know the old man"s situation.

Apparently, he was once the owner of this mansion, known as Lu Fang, of Lu Clan. He had a cultivation of the mid Sung stage and was also a local lord in the area. Unfortunately, he had offended the Zi Clan after refusing to marry his only daughter to the Clan"s young master. Thanks to the help from the Zhao Clan, the Zi Clan suppressed his own.

This caused the current situation, where he had lost his cultivation and his whole family was exterminated. All except for his daughter whom got lucky enough to run away. Even his own mansion which had been pa.s.sed down to him generation after generation was taken over by the greedy Zi Clan, and he was further humiliated when they gave him the position of groundskeeper.

Basically, he would have to throw out the trash that the people acc.u.mulated, clean their rooms the courtyards and the training grounds, wash their clothes and all sorts of things not befitting of a former n.o.ble.

He still didn"t know up to today whether his daughter was still alive or not, so when he found out that Cheng Hao also had deep enmity with the Zi clan and wished for revenge, he spared no effort to aid him in his quest.

Just the fact that he brought him to some secret chambers where Zi clan members had hidden, yet had asked for nothing more than for Cheng Hao to kill them all, had caused Cheng Hao to trust in him.

"Nothing. I was just thinking about how your ancestors had good taste when it comes to buildings and rooms. These things, I, Cheng Hao, like them a lot" the child chuckled as he propped himself up, smiling at the old man.

Hearing that, Lu Fang also nodded with enthusiasm "Young Master Hao truly has good taste in architecture! You see, these are palaces built a few hundred years ago, following the same pattern of those ancient buildings that fell from the Sky Rift a thousand years ago!"

So it wasn"t just "similar", it was indeed in the same stile, pondered Cheng Hao. With this so-called Sky-Rift appearing exactly a thousand year ago, it seems the war with Tian unknowingly reached even the farthest reaches of the Planary System.

"Ahh," Once Cheng Hao got his confirmation that they were the same as what he had seen in his past life, he couldn"t help but sigh reminiscently.

"Very well then, let me make an enticing proposal to you!" Finally he stood up and told to the old man beside him, "If you give this palace for me to use, I will help you in gaining back your cultivation. Actually, scratch that, I will also help you in breaking through!" The child smiled knowingly, a hint of of a smile flashing deep into his eyes.

"Ahahah, my sides! Young Master Cheng truly knows how to make jokes..." Hearing those words, the old man laughed at first, taking it as a joke.

After a few moments of awkward silence however, he raised his head and saw boy"s eyes had no hint of being amused and his expression was as serious as it could ever be.

"Young friend... Are you serious?" Lu Fang"s voice trembled in awe but also excitement.

"Do I have any reason to lie to you right now?" A warm smile spread across his face as he spoke with the older man, as if a knowledgeable senior were trying to convince a stubborn junior in believing in his words. "It would have taken much longer to fully clean up this mansion and learn its history if it weren"t for you, Lu Fang. In this time we spoke, albeit short, I believe we have hit off quite well. You call me friend, I would mind if that were in appearance only! I feel like you are more than worth me exerting the slightest effort to help you…"

"Friend…" The old man trembled and bowed to the young man in front of him "Needless to say, if you really can do what you said, I, Lu Fang, will forever remember this debt with you! I"ll be sure to follow you until my bones decay and my organs rot!"

Seeing such an amusing reaction, where he both tried to suppress and hide his excitement to no avail, Cheng Hao couldn"t help chuckling, "Approach me then, stop talking and let me work my magic."

= = = = = = = = = =

Author"s Note

[1] New friend acquired! All according to keikaku (note: keikaku means plan)!

I chose to discard the robe and mask from the original because I realised how childish it was. A certain manga about flesh-eating peeps had me riled up back then.

[2] "Oh? you"re approaching me?"

"I can"t heal your a.s.s if I don"t get closer!"

"..." (to be continued --u003e)

~ Cookie

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