64

After spending a week with Miss Ching, to begin teaching her how to use her newfound powers and craft herself a soul palace modeled after her tea house, Pef said goodbye to his wives, injecting them with a dose of Tyrant qi, of course.

Then, the new Water Tyrant and three Empresses set off on their Roaming, to cleanse the planet of some evil.

The Saint continent was quite pleased at the news, especially the traumatized Guardians, who never imagined reaching Earth or Sky ranks in a single year, or even in an entire lifetime of cultivation.

The old noble houses with their puny Core young masters or Spirit elders were reduced to third hand powers, kept in reign by local garrisons or the occasional Emperor doing a patrol.

Master Wong and his wife Chen were tasked with helping the Sea Guard, and lots of small nobles flocked under Wong's wing for guidance. Pirates became a joke and a rare occurrence, as the neolithic methods they used to cultivate were slow and limited, and only made them into target practice for the Imperial Navy.

With millions of trees cut down for expansion, the agriculture and various crafting jobs had an excess of land and material,

which resulted in more paper or larger ships and houses, villages becoming small towns with huge fences around them.

Sadly, the population was still low and cultivators few, but the citizens were hard at work to fix that, now that women could survive five or even ten childbirths. Penicillin and aspirin and boiled water kept death rates lower. Simple remedies, coupled with enhanced nutrition by GMO Legion maize and using soap ten times a day.

And yet, when Pef and his Empresses arrived at Black Magma continent, they found a different situation entirely.

Of course, the land wasn't black and full of magma, as it wasn't Mordor. It was just a name, like Blue Xi.

But there was a kernel of truth in that name. The people here, had dark hearts.

Pef stared at the town below, divided in three rings. An inner sanctum, with temples and rich mansions, a layer of wooden houses with various craftsmen and taverns, and a large outer layer, full of dilapidated slums and some troops guarding slave camps.

'The City-State of Jovis. Patron deity: Niruan. Accepted cults: Locust and Sangela. Proscribed cults: Volcanic Fire.' the glove explained stating the known facts.

An arena full of yelling consumers could be heard, and the Tyrant focuses his perception of the ongoing spectacle.

A yellow and black striped tiger, with a pair of wings, for some reason, was lazily chasing and eating some neolithic gladiators.

Xie growled audibly, her fist clenching in anger. Ching grabbed her hand before she could rush down to interfere.

"What will you do afterwards, silly woman?" the oracle asked softly.

The women turned towards Pef, but the boy was lost in thought. "Who would put wings on a tiger? They're dangerous enough..."

Aria answered that, with a small chuckle: "Hehe, I did that plenty of times. But it never worked. Poor beasts would never fly..." Miss Ching sighed in a dejected manner. These people were all idiots!

"Come, let's land covertly and ask some questions at some inn. Pef, you cover us in mist!" she demanded in a leader's tone.

The Water Tyrant found himself useful for once, creating a cloud to land the group unseen.

The old tavern was named Beer and Bacon, and was famous for its rice wine and mutton chops. So when fours strangers arrived from the fog and asked for all the bacon and five beers, the owner blinked in confusion.

"Perhaps you mean a jug of wine and four mutton chops?" the man asked politely.

A woman with braided brown hair and a traveler's cloak responded promptly and confirmed the new order, sending her companions to sit at the only free table.

The owner would have warned them that table was reserved, but maybe he could watch a big fight now. He snapped his leather strip, and four slave girls rushed to fill the order.

Perhaps some tables would get broken and replaced again? New furniture would be nice, especially if some newcomers paid for it.

A slave girl with dozens of lash marks on her visible skin placed a dirty clay jug on the wobbly table, then peered curious at the future victims. "Brown, green and purple hair, only your owner is normal, huh?" she commented with some awe.

You rarely saw so many hair colors in a single harem, most owners preferred a single type, so they didn't need to bother learning names. The cute guy must be some rich master.

Miss Ching smiled and nodded. "Yes my dear, our owner is very normal."

Pef took out some wooden cups and gently poured wine for all of them. While doing that, he pouted and complained: "I thought I was a bit special..."

Three pairs of eyes measured him with doubt. The Tyrant hung his head and drank a bit of the wine. It was kinda stale.

He sighed and gulped it anyway. Misery loves company, after all.

Then he just relaxed and waited for a host of whispers and rumours to be collected and organized by his glove.

By now, he was so used to this that barely ever noticed it happening.

It was cheating but he didn't care. Sovereigns could do this anyway, listening for juicy bits of information.

As his rank grew, interfacing with the glove for menial things was becoming natural, weak spots and trajectories being superimposed on his vision, threat levels or qi attacks highlighted a millisecond before they acted.

So when the door was kicked aside and a dozen people busted inside, he wasn't surprised. His senses detected the threat 50 meters away, as the men entered his water domain.

It wasn't a complete and Practiced domain, like Ventu had, but it was enough.

A Sky ranker and some minions, local big shots or perhaps younger masters.

"Who dares sit at my table?" the leading man yelled, using qi to impress the audience with a louder voice. He had a thin goatee and the letter M stitched to his robe.

His flunkies backed him up, staring at the exotic beauties with drooling minds.

"Master Mikey, can I get the green haired one? I never had that color..." a brave underling asked in a pleading voice.

The young master named Mikey turned his nose, disgusted at the emerald curly hair. "Hmpf! Some gaian druid, I think. I would't sully myself in her. But those other two...I will bend them over and...no, first chop off their arms, then bend them over and..."

Pef raised his finger and said softly "Bang!" His soulspike was Tyrant rank and infused with water qi for better hydrostatic resonation.

The tavern became silent, as the man fell to his knees, possibly having a heart attack.

Then the Tyrant eyed the greasy mutton in front of him, with a mix of disgust and duty. "Totally normal. Like a fly on the wall." he noted wisely, and began wolfing it down, crunching through meat and bone with ease.

On the wall, a fly gulped in surprise and made itself smaller.

A pair of silver eyes twinkled in amusement, then glanced at the rest of the scumbags. "Scram! Or we can play doctor, as I castrate you all..." she said politely, then picked up the mutton leg and a bit loudly through the bone.

The green haired beauty blinked at her suitor, and blew him a kiss, a breeze of green qi leaving her full lips and hitting the man in his heart, making the underling spew some blood and drop on his face.

The other men cried in fear and ran out, before the last one did something worse.

Miss Ching sighed and nibbled gently at her meal, already knowing the investigation was doomed. The morons had given up the best advantage, pulling a string in the shadows, until the whole web was unraveled.

Then again, she was an Empress now. Dismantling some cults should be easy for her new powers. And if that failed, she had the perfectly-normal boy to point at a target.