Cultivating Disciples to Breakthrough

Following Elder Song getting to work on the situation related to the formation hall and alchemy hall, it didn’t take long before the two were granted approval to begin expanding their headquarters, with the formation hall expanding on the Seventh Star Peak, while the alchemy hall began relocating to the Ninth Star Peak.

At the same time, the elders and disciples who were in charge of taking care of the spiritual herbs on the Ninth Star Peak were also granted a place to stay, as a small pavilion was established for them on top of the Ninth Star Peak. Giving them a more official position in the sect outside of just being a job that would be assigned to anyone willing through the grand mission pavilion, something that the few elders and disciples in love with taking care of spiritual herbs appreciated a lot, as I would also mean that they would be getting more support from the sect in the future.

Not only did this make them feel more appreciated, but it also gave them an opportunity to try and experiment with different growing methods for spiritual herbs and allowed them to deepen their understanding of spiritual herbs.

Although they weren’t alchemist, the few who had decided to permanently settle down and take care of the spiritual herbs on the Ninth Star Peak, had knowledge on the spiritual herbs growing on the Ninth Star Peak far exceeding that of any alchemist in the sect.

Along with the extra resources they got their hands on following the official establishment of a pavilion specially for them, it wouldn’t take long before the quality of the spiritual herbs growing on the Ninth Star Peak increased, together with new and more difficult to grow spiritual herbs beginning to appear as these spiritual herb caretakers became more proficient in taking care of higher quality spiritual herbs.

In the end, as the alchemy hall moved to the Ninth Star Peak and began to establish themselves there, the spiritual herb caretakers were merged together with them and became somewhat similar to a branch of the larger alchemy hall. Allowing disciples and elders another path outside of just alchemy.

Not just that but given the fact that a spiritual herb caretaker would be especially close to spiritual herbs for extended periods of time and take care of them, it also nurtured an affinity towards the Daos related to nature. Making it easier for those spiritual herb caretakers to comprehend Daos like the Dao of Life, Dao of Nature, Dao of Plants.

Outside of the two profession halls starting their expansion and the change for spiritual herb caretakers of the sect, Elder Song also took action to address the problem related to the lack of management elders to help handle the internal affairs of the sect.

First of all, the term of assistant elder, internal management elder or management elder that was used to describe essentially the same thing, an elder in charge of the internal management of the sect, was removed and replaced with the simple deacon title.

Secondly, the strength requirement to become a deacon was removed, with the only requirement being that one would have to at least have been an elder in the past or someone who had been in the sect for at least 200 years.

The requirement of 200 years wasn’t really that high considering that the lifespan of those in the Foundation Establishment Realm was around 200 years, with those in the Core Formation Realm reaching 300 to 400 years.

This way, it would give the people who exhausted their potential an opportunity to have a place in the sect, while making sure that it was only those who had been with the sect for an extended period of time and had been properly integrated who could take on the role of deacon.

Given the requirement for joining the Star Shattering Sect in the first place, Elder Song didn’t doubt that most of the disciple should have the ability to reach the Core Formation Realm and thus have a chance to become deacons of the sect in the future if they couldn’t reach the Nascent Soul Realm.

Of course, this was only for now. In the future when the sect became stronger, the requirements to become a deacon of the sect would get higher and more difficult, but at least for now, the current arrangements were suitable and should provide a large number of new deacons to help alleviate the workload off the few dozen elders currently keeping the entire Star Shattering Sect running.

At the same time, Elder Song also began considering what to do about the elder positions of the sect, as even though there hadn’t been any real problems so far, the distinctions between the different elders also needed to be made clear.

The normal sect elder and outer sect elder positions were fine and there wasn’t really a need to change much about them or limit the number of people who could archive these ranks, as it was something that most of the sect disciples were currently aiming for.

The problem came with the Core Elder position and the Grand Elder position.

At the moment, there wasn’t a clear distinction between the two positions, as the requirements for the two ranks were essentially the same. Reach the Domain Lord Realm. The only clear distinction between the two being the fact that the Grand Elder Position could somewhat be considered a legacy position that had been given to two of the most senior people in the sect, thus not really causing any real problems for now, as both Xuan Hao and Shu Yao were well respected by the elders of the sect and none of them really had any problem with them being in this legacy position that existed above them and was on the same level as the sect master in some respects.

But… For the future, there needed to be some changes to this position, as Elder Song had personally seen how other sect’s or powers viewed the position of a grand elder as being someone from the older generation who still lend a hand in the management on the sect. Generally viewed as stronger if not the same level as the sect master.

Although this was the case for Xuan Hao who was far stronger than the sect master according to what he understood, Shu Yao wasn’t and could be considered quite a bit weaker compared to Feng Chen, who had recently undergone a period of rapid growth. Especially considering that Feng Chen was a sword cultivator and could generally be considered stronger than his peers in combat.

”Should I remove Shu Yao down to Core Elder or make a new position?” Muttering this to himself as he frowned while mulling over this problem, Elder Song could ultimately not decide on what to do, as he got up from his seat and began heading towards the sect master’s pavilion.

Intending to find Feng Chen and ask him for help. Hoping that his old friend would be able to have a better idea of how to handle this situation than he himself did.

After all, this would have to go through him anyways, as changing the Grand Elder and Core Elder positions of the sect was of utmost importance as it related to the distribution of power among the top experts of the sect, something that could affect the current core elders who were still not fully used to their new positions and still acted in the same way as when they had been normal elders…

”Why not put a limit on the number of Core Elders and Grand Elders and have them be determined by strength? This way we can keep the Core Elder and Grand Elder position as the pinnacle of the sect’s power, while also giving those elders something to strive towards. Holding a competition for the positions every few years or something along that line.

As for those who want to retire and not continue meddling in the internal affairs of the sect and just focus on cultivation, we can establish an ancestor position like most other powers do and allow to retreat and focus solely on their cultivation or whatever they want to do.

Of course, the requirements for the ancestor position shouldn’t be low and should be kept far above that of normal elders of the sect… And given that most of the sect elders are still young in terms of their strength, I think we should establish something for them to strive towards. Let’s set the requirements for the ancestor position to the Dao Seed Realm.

At the same time, the number of Core Elders should be a hundred, with Grand Elders being ten. This way, it won’t interfere with any of the newly promoted core elders, while also giving those yet to reach the Domain Lord Relam time to try and catch up to secure a core elder position. In the future, the requirements to become a core elder and grand elder will grow naturally together with the strength of the sect.”

”This…”

Listening to Feng Chen’s suggestion on how to deal with the situation, Elder Song froze for a second with a speechless expression on his face before it was overtaken by one filled with joy.

Feng Chen… He seemed to have become far more skilled at managing the sect!