Discussion of findings

Bai Yun slowly walked back to where he had hidden the recording jades. He thought through the information he had collected as he was walking. But there were many things didn't make sense.

But when he reached the house, he was flabbergasted by what he saw. The feeling of danger had competently disappeared from the house. Bai Yun figured that the collector must have left.

Bai Yun took out the recording jades from where he had hidden them and then went back to the clan. As he walked, he thought of what he could do from now on considering the situation. Once he reached the clan he went back to the mansion to find old Hai. Without his parents around the only person he could inform and ask for help about this matter was old Hai. He found him in the study looking over some matters of the mansion, as well as some things Bai Yun's father had left for him.

"What's the matter young master? Why did you look for me?" Old Hai asked.

Bai Yun sat down at the table opposite to him and looked at old Hai straight in the eye. Old Hai was surprised and quickly got serious.

Bai Yun then slowly explained everything that happened to old Hai. Old Hai quickly grew concerned when he explained the inferences he had made as well as the anomalies with the situation. Old Hai was concerned and then confused.

"This makes no sense. There is no need to go through all this trouble for such a little amount of hellfire." Old Hai said, taking a look at one of the stones that Bai Yun had brought back.

"You are right. Even after six years you cannot collect much hellfire. What could they possibly be thinking?" Bai Yun thought out loud.

"No it's even more confusing than you think. You may not know as its not public, but the clan sells hellfire. Its not publicly available, but it would not be difficult for people with any connections to easily buy them. Granted, considering the cost the clan charges for hellfire, the amount one could gather is quite small. But it would much easier and far less dangerous to just buy them through the regular channels." Old Hai explained.

This only added to Bai Yun's confusion. The entire process seemed unusually complicated, all to get something at a slightly cheaper cost. Just as Bai Yun started to go into a deep thought, old Hai interjected.

"It doesn't matter. We know the location of the next meeting. We can simply capture the collector and find out more from him."

"Its true." Bai Yun agreed. "We can consider further when we have more information."

"The thing that you need to do now is to simply go and hand in the mission. Once you get the points from the missions, you can use them to strengthen yourself. That should be your primary concern right now. There are people in the clan who handle stuff like this." Old Hai said.

"I wont hand it in. Today I am going to go and say that I failed the mission." Bai Yun said.

"Huh." Old Hai was stunned when he heard it.

Bai Yun smiled when he heard the answer. "From all that you have heard, what do you think is the most terrifying thing about the faction who did this?"

"Isn't it the fact that they have access to hellair. No matter who you are you need a huge power to have a regular access to hellair. We don't know of any source of hellair on the continent. So this group must be quite powerful to secretly get control o something like that."

"Of course not." Bai Yun laughed. "The most terrifying thing about them is the fact that they found the kid who agreed to work for them. If he was the first person they contacted, that means that they were able to observe him long enough that they identified him as someone who would accept their offer. Or else they had approached multiple people and had all the people who refused killed and disposed of, without raising any red flags. Both suggests that they must have infiltrated at least a bit into the clan, and the second option suggest an incredible disregard for life. I don't want anyone to find out that I was the who uncovered the conspiracy. It is far too dangerous to have a group like this focus on me."

Old Hai was stunned when he heard Bai Yun's response. He had not thought this far, and did not consider this situation at all. But once he did so, his back broke out in cold sweat when he thought about the implications.

"What do you want me to do?" Old Hai asked Bai Yun after a moment of thought. Considering that Bai Yun had thought of this and yet shared all of this to him, and not anyone else, he figured that Bai Yun must have a plan.

Bai Yun smiled when he heard old Hai's words. He came here because he needed help from him to keep his name off of the situation.

"The clan should have a covert investigative section right?" Bai Yun asked.

"Yes." Old Hai replied.

"Is there someone in the section who you can trust. Someone who would absolutely not be part of this faction, and also someone who can and will keep our names outside of any official reports."

Old Hai went silent for a moment. He was starting to see what Bai Yun was talking about. He smiled vaguely.

"I can think of one such person. He is a friend of your father's. I will go call him right now." Old Hai replied.

"Why do you need to bring him here." Bai Yun asked.

"That's the kind of person he is. I don't think that he will accept what you are asking of him without meeting him."

Bai Yun frowned for a moment. He considered his options for a moment, then nodded.

"Fine. But you must go now and tell him to get here right now. Also take this map. Its the map to where I hid the kid. Sent someone to pickup him up and smuggle him back here. We need that kid here right now. And tell the person who go that they must not be caught, and no one must see the kid being brought in. In fact it will be better if you sent someone from the covert section. They will be more familiar with this kind of work."

Old Hai nodded. "I'll be back soon." He said. Then he picked up the map, and quickly left.

Bai Yun leaned back on the chair and started thinking once again, to make sure there was nothing he had missed. As he did so, his fingers started to strum on the chair. It was a habit he had picked up from one of the leaders of the alliance back in the grand war.

Nearly an hour had passed from when old Hai set off, when Bai Yun suddenly raised his head reflexively. As he did so, two figures suddenly appeared in his vision. One of them was old Hai, while the other was a pudgy middle aged man he had never seen before. The middle aged man had a very subtle aura, that almost seemed to blend into the surroundings.

"Bai Yun let me introduce you to one of the vice heads of the intelligence division, Bai Shongsui. The outside world knows him as the person in charge of one of Bai clan's auction houses though. His real job is secret. Not many people know of it." Old Hai introduced him.

"Hello senior. Nice to meet you." Bai Yun stood up to offer him a greeting, but he was quickly cut short.

"We can save the introductions for later. I heard about the matter from Bai Hai. Tell me everything you know. We can discuss everything else later."

Bai Yun quickly explained everything he had seen. He also explained all the conjectures he had as well as the problems he found. After he explained, Bai Shongsui went silent for a while.

"Are you really fourteen." Bai Yun was surprised by the first question he raised.

"Huh?".

"I have heard many people give reports before. You don't sound like a newbie. Almost all of the people I ask to give me a message for the first time make some mistakes or leave somethings vague. But you didn't leave anything out. I didn't even have to ask a question. How the hell did you do that."

"I have never given a report before. I just thought things through is all" Bai Yun replied with a smile. It was true. He had listened to an uncountable number of intelligence reports though.

Bai Shongsui sat in silence for a moment. "Why did you ask me to come here?" He jumped into the most important matter.

"I am not sure of how much the faction has infiltrated the clan. So I am going to submit the mission as a failure. So I would be kept out of the mess. But I still want the clan to know of this. And I want the points given as a reward for the mission. It should be given to me untraceably of course."

Bai Shongsui stared at him for a while before he burst into laughter. "You are something else kid. Alright. I'll transfer some points to Bai Hai from a hidden name, and he can transfer it to you. Also I will make sure all of your names are kept out of this. Anything else you want to say kid."

"I have a few suggestions. First of all, it is almost certain that they have surveillance of the kid, so it is certain that you will have to have someone impersonate him and go about his daily activities, so as to not alarm them. Also please send people to find out who the collector and the other people in the recording are. Though don't publicly arrest the ones who appear before you get the collector. Also I think it would be better if you look for them in other major forces too. Also I think it would be better if you assign this case a high priority." Bai Yun quickly told him.

Bai Shongsui smiled when he heard Bai Yun's suggestions. "Very good. You noticed all the important points. Any interest in joining the covert section."

"No." Bai Yun quikcly rejected him. "I am destined to walk a different path."

"Too bad." Bai Shonsui said. He didn't bother to push him any further.

"Wait a second." Old Hai interjected. "I understand the rest, but why should this case have a high priority. As far I know the only thing that they did was steal some hellfire, right?"

"The most dangerous thing isn't strength or motive." Bai Shongsui explained. "The most important thing is that we don't know what they are after. And even more important is that we don't understand their actions. We fear what we don't understand. And mostly for good reason."

Bai Yun nodded upon hearing this. After this they talked for a short while and then Bai Shongsui left.

Od Hai transferred two thousand points to Bai Yun before he left him alone. Once he was done, Bai Yun went to turn down the mission, and then sent a message to Bai Ling-er and then he was done with all the things he needed to do, and was ready for his cultivation retreat.

Bai Yun prepared all the necessary things he would need for a long retreat and went to the gravity chamber.

It was time to improve his body constitution.