The Empress

"Blue Moon Sect, huh? Never heard of it!" The eldest father spoke as he tried his best to think of a sect by that name.

It's of no use, old man! Even I wouldn't have known if not for Ao's presence in the game. Since he's done nothing at this point, it makes sense that you're not aware of our existence.

"As I said before, it's a really minor sect. I mean, literally! There's just me, my parents, my brother and a servant in there. So, you could monitor all of us at the same time. Don't worry about it." I assured them.

The Weasel bandits went silent altogether. It seemed as if they went through another hard thinking session. "Hmm, that's great and all. But are you fine with showing us your identity just like that? I mean, we're not to be trusted. We're bandits after all!" One of Guo Ning's fathers spoke.

"Ah, don't worry about it. Even if you knew about my identity, there's basically nothing you can do with it." I gave out a chuckle as I spoke.

I'm not kidding. My name has no value in this world, so if you were to roam around leaking my information, it wouldn't do anything.

"You look young, Miss Hua. Do your parents know about your nighttime endeavors?" The oldest father asked me.

I guess it was the dad in him who asked that question to me. I mean, if his son was doing something like I'm doing without their approval, they'd be worried, right?

"Nope. And I would like to keep it that way." I replied.

"Hmm, I can't promise you that, kid! I'm a parent as well. So-" The eldest father was about to say something, however, since I knew the context, I cut him off mid-sentence.

"I understand. You don't have to hide it then. They won't believe in your words anyway." I replied.

"Why? Because we're random outsiders?" He asked back.

"No, because throughout their entire life, they are under the illusion that my Qi center is destroyed and I can't cultivate." I replied.

I mean, it's technically wrong, since that was reality, not an illusion. However, the current one is an illusion, so it wasn't entirely wrong as well. Anyway, if you wanna lie about something, you gotta say some half-truths as well, right? That's what I did just now.

"How is that even possible? They would've found out at some point!" Many of the weasel bandits couldn't believe what they just heard. Some started criticizing my parents for not noticing, which I didn't like. So, I gave them a demonstration instead.

{Goldy, put up the illusion.}

[I know! Been doing it for a long time now.]

"You know, rather than bad-mouthing someone else, try peeking at my Qi center. You'll understand what I mean." I spoke.

Hearing my bold claim, a few stepped up and checked my Qi center and was completely astonished.

"How is this even possible? I mean, is your Qi center really damaged?" One of the weasel bandits asked.

I guess it seemed too real for him. Great! That's pretty great! At least, you won't talk shite about my family now.

"Haha, I can cultivate. You saw me beating up your son, right? Would a person with no cultivation be able to do it? If that was the case, your son would be the weakest in this world." I chuckled.

I don't think the dads took my joke well. They started glaring at me when I made that joke. However, when Guo Ning glared back at them, they stopped doing so.

"Ah, I guess such an intricate illusion would fool people." The eldest father nodded his head as he spoke. Soon enough, the rest of the dads nodded their heads.

"So, how about it? Wanna join our sect now?" I asked.

I mean, there's no way that they'd reject my offer, right? I literally placed everything in the line to get them to my sect. If they're to reject now, I don't know how I'll attract them to the sect.

[Show them your dance or something.]

{Shut up, Goldy!}

The damn dragon is having his fair share of fun with my predicament, huh?

[Well, I'm not the one who made you reveal your identity before them!]

I know! But this was the only way that I could gain their trust.

[Well then. Let's see how that pans out for you.]

I anxiously waited for their reply. They sure took their time to give out an answer. Just do it now, will ya? I told you all about the perks about joining the Blue Moon Sect and even your son has agreed to it. So what's the problem?

"Okay. We'll do it. However, how are you even gonna introduce us to your parents?" One of the weasel bandits asked.

"Ah, that's for me to worry about. Just make sure that you get to Wonsong city by tomorrow—this morning, now that it's past midnight now." I replied.

"But, how are you gonna find us?" Guo Ning turned to me and asked.

"Well, if you all were to occupy the north of Wonsong city, I'll find you. I mean, who's gonna miss you and this number of people, am I right?" I chuckled.

I wasn't kidding. Someone like Guo Ning would capture anyone's attention. So, it wouldn't be that difficult to find him, even if there's a big commotion in the city today.

"Very well. We'd be there by morning. I give you my word!" The eldest father spoke.

Yes!

I got my servant—I mean fellow sect members. Anyway, this is a good start. I'll begin my path to a peaceful life with this.

That day, the bandit group named Weasel bandits ceased to exist.

#

Next morning. Since my wounds were healed up pretty quickly, I didn't have to lie to my parents about tripping in the morning. The costume I wore got bloody, so I had to chuck it away. Although that was the case for my clothes, my mask was a quality product. I just had to wipe the blood away from it and it was good as new.

Anyway, I told my parents about how I need to go shopping for some essentials, to which they quickly agreed. Normally, I would've to beg and plead for them to get their permission, however recently they had been suspicious with their actions.

It wasn't hard to find out about it, though. It was Zhang Wei. He returned from his secluded training. I guess all the experience from the Golden Mountain worked out in his favor. He looks pretty strong.

However, that's the problem. He's someone strong who couldn't hide his presence like the one's from the assassin's sect. Even an idiot could find his presence if he hid like that!

I didn't care if he followed me for now, so I let him do it I mean, if he's having fun with it, why not?

So, I walked towards the place where the wanted posters were shown. I heard that the officials updated the cat burglar's poster. I wanted to check out what kinda bullshite they pulled out this time around.

However, on my way to that place, I heard the newspaper boy shout something about empress saving them or something. However, that made little sense. I mean, I know of just one empress and that would be the one from the imperial court. And as far as I know, she did nothing as significant as saving people's lives. I mean, she was just there. How come she's doing this stuff now?

Curious about this new piece of information, I bought a newspaper from the paperboy. I expected the stoic face of the empress in that paper. However, it wasn't what I expected. What I saw wasn't the empress. It was a rough drawing of a woman wearing an opera mask, gracefully fighting against her opponents.

They called me the empress.

The newspaper clipping detailed on how I faced off against nameless bandits in which one was extremely powerful with relative ease. I mean, if getting bloodied up, bruised and battered is relatively easy in their dictionary, they're not wrong.

Although they built up Guo Ning as a legitimately scary guy in some lines, they made it as if he wasn't a big deal in the lines depicting his defeat to me. For Pete's sake, pick a lane now, will ya?

So, the clippings said that they depicted the battle from the eyes of the two witnesses of this miraculous feat, who have kept their name a secret.

Oh, I know who they are! I mean, the Weasel bandits would never leak such information. I mean, who in their right mind would leak about their loss? And it's two witnesses. Sure, it's those two.

But I don't get it. From what point of view did they think of my fight against Guo Ning as simple stuff? I'll directly ask them someday if I have the bad luck of meeting them again.

Anyway, they named me the empress. I kinda feel happy. Empress. It's got a nice ring to it!

#