Yuan City Lord

As the three companions worked their way through their own separate trials, things worked much the same as they always did along the road to Yuan City.

"Did you hear that the Young Master Huang Yi is supposed to dethrone his grandfather in Rantori Village?"

"I heard that he was just an emissary of the City Lord." Another villager corrected his friend.

"You know that's just a facade to put the Village Elder into a false sense of security, right?"

The streets of Yuan City shared some discussions on the topic of Rantori Village yet it wasn't the topic that overwhelmed the streets. The village to the North was nothing special when focusing on the larger population of Yuan City.

If one were to listen closely, they would hear the students of the Yuan City Academy training behind their large walls within the north east, or the merchants peddling their wears within the west. All could be seen through the eyes of Zheng Guo from the City Lord's Estate. Though the whole city was indeed buzzing with other gossip, his attention was fully towards the situation in Rantori Village.

"My Lord," a servant from the door to his study knelt to give him news. "There still is no sign of the young Huang Yi on the road to the city yet."

Zheng Guo turned his head slightly from the window. "If all went as planned, the tournament should have ended three months ago." He mused as he turned his attention back to the path leading to the city, even though it was miles away from his estate. Disciple Ranked Cultivators had many different advantages over the normal Student Ranked Cultivators. One was the extended senses one would receive by reaching the ninth star. He could see the lines of people reaching miles back from the city, waiting to get in for their turn at the market, either buying or selling goods. As he scanned the crowd, he didn't see a face that resembled the young boy he had sent to Rantori Village.

"For an existence at the Fifth Star Student Rank at the time, it would take much longer than three months to make the journey back to Yuan City." He raised a hand to dismiss his servant. "We will give him three more months, then send a party to retrieve him."

"Yes, my Lord." The man faded back into the hallway and left the estate.

Zheng Guo growled under his breath in annoyance. "The little brat had better not fail me." He smiled menacingly as he looked back out at the crowd. "It'd be much better if I could send a few Student Ranked Cultivators to cull the herd instead of having to go there myself."

Thinking back to those two bandits he had sent after the children of Li Wen gave him pause. He had given them specific instructions to find them and bring the siblings to his estate for early transfer to Obopin, yet they had not found their way back by the time Huang Yi made his way to him. When the young boy came to him with a story of a young boy that had appeared back in the village with the Li siblings, he knew something must have happened.

No matter how he would get there, he knew what was coming. What Li Xiao was sending to Yuan. The same thing that had happened hundreds of years ago, and hundreds of years before then.

Zheng Guo was still just a young boy when the last purge happened within Yuan. He had been sent back from Obopin with a few of his comrades to massacre the continent. It wasn't much of a fight, since they were all First Star Disciple Ranked Cultivators versus the students that populated all cities and villages.

Li Xiao had allowed him to reach the ninth star of disciple just in case of a mutiny. He owed much to the lord of the realm for his strength. If it hadn't been for the medicinal pills his master had sent him, he might have still been stuck in the early stages of his rank.

Looking out the window, Zheng Guo only saw cattle which would be slaughtered, or sold to other farmers. He didn't want to have to be the one to get his hands bloody if he could help it. With the low cultivation level of the continent, he knew that the purge would offer little to no resistance.

"Huang Ji should be reaching his three hundredth year within the next decade." Zheng Guo said to himself. "Within the next nine and a half years, Obopin will make contact with their new force of Student and Disciple Ranked cultivators." A smile once again appeared on his face. "If I ensure an easy take over, yet enough of a challenge that the Warriors are pleased, they may let me surpass my limitations and join their ranks!" His eyes filled with promises he had heard from those three hundred years ago.

Yuan was only a staging ground for Zheng Guo. He had finally reached the precipice of his power, and now with the next influx of cultivators, he would be taken back to Obopin in order to attain his new position within the Beast Council, becoming a Warrior Ranked Cultivator and living a life of luxury until the next purge happened within Yuan, giving them a new batch of slaves to disperse. He would not let anything go wrong that would halt his ascension to the next realm of the martial dao.

As he thought of the promises of the future, hope continued to build within the continent. A silent hope that resided in three children who gave it their all to gain the power to stand and fight.