Immortal Paladin

I stood in the air, detached as ever, gazing down upon the mountain as it burned. A great temple once sat proudly on its slope, but all that remained now was collapsing stone and priests reduced to drifting ash. Above me hung the conjured image of my Final Adjudication, a vast celestial scale suspended in the heavens, chains whipping down with unerring judgment. Each link found its mark, binding the guilty and tearing their lives from them with impartial precision. The sect’s legacy ended not with dignity, but with smoke and silence.

Da Ji’s voice carried through the fiery wind, calm but laced with disapproval. “Brother, is this wise? This is the thirteenth time we’ve been sidetracked this month.” Her fox eyes glowed faintly in the haze, keen as always, searching me for the slightest crack of hesitation.

On the ridge, Alice sat comfortably atop her bicorn, posture regal despite the flames licking skyward. She tapped a delicate finger against her cheek, expression almost amused. “There is no convincing your brother on this one, Da Ji, and you know that. This wicked sect kidnapped, raped, murdered, and extorted half a dozen villages. They forced innocents to bow before a plague god that wouldn’t even measure to the dirt beneath my nail. This place had to go.” Her voice was smooth, her words carved with disdain, as if the eradication of this temple was not a debate, but a necessity long overdue.

I let their words linger, my eyes fixed on the distant ruins where the chains of judgment had finally gone still. My soul was hollow, but not blind; I knew the difference between convenience and conscience. These excursions were never part of the plan, yet every time, I found myself unable to walk away. What did it matter if I burned another wicked sect? What did it matter if justice flared in places where no one else would bother to look?

I exhaled slowly, the ash thick in my lungs though I felt nothing. “If I had my way, I’d avoid these side quests that keep falling into my lap,” I muttered inwardly. “But I just can’t bring myself to ignore them. At this rate, we’ll be lucky to reach the Empire in a year like I intended.”

To be fair, we’d probably need less than a year to reach the Empire if we just flew in a straight line. The path back to the Empire wasn’t complicated, northward, cross some sect territories, and we’d eventually arrive. But I didn’t think it would be wise to head there directly from New Willow. Even worse, such a path meant brushing dangerously close to the Heavenly Temple’s borders. And no matter how perfectly this mask and set of orange robes disguised me, I didn’t trust my luck enough to slip past their territory without drawing attention.

In fact, I was beginning to suspect my luck had taken a nosedive lately… ahem… yeah, lately. Recently, I felt like I had worse luck than Gu Jie herself, and that was saying something. Maybe it was because I had absorbed her bad luck. Whatever the reason, it was starting to feel like the universe had it out for me.

I sighed, rubbing my temple as the golden chains from the scale above me lashed out, burning through fleeing sinners. Da Ji floated closer, her voice curious but soft. “What’s the problem, brother? I don’t mind getting sidetracked, honestly. We’re doing good, and most of these cleansings only take a few minutes, maybe an hour at most—”

“No, not that,” I cut her off, shaking my head. “And please, don’t call it cleansing.”

As for why I sighed, it had something to do with my Ghost Soul.

Through the tether that linked me to my Ghost Soul, I’d seen the truth of what happened in New Willow. Gu Jie had annihilated a raid single-handedly with the Ghost Soul’s help, then gone on to level a threat against an entire kingdom. All of this chaos could have been avoided if my Ghost Soul just sat at his desk, filled out paperwork, and acted like a proper steward instead of a pyromaniac with wings.

And yet… I couldn’t completely deny the merit in what he’d done. His strategy worked. New Willow now had both military prestige and diplomatic leverage. The problem was, I knew exactly why he did it: just so he could wrap things up quickly and run off to play again. Such a weird soul.

I chuckled under my breath and muttered, “I’m definitely going to snitch on little ghostie to Alice.”

“Excuse me?” asked Alice, catching my words.

“Don’t mind me.”

I’m going to snitch when we returned to New Willow to maximize damage.

The chains from the great scale above me struck again, embedding themselves into the final sinners below, their screams cut short as judgment consumed them in gold.

A few cultivators rushed me, their auras sharp with Fourth Realm cultivation. Brave, but pointless. Da Ji exhaled, and with that single breath their bodies ruptured into dust and frost, scattering before they ever reached me. Beneath, an older man at the Fifth Realm, gaunt and trembling, raised his fist and shouted, his voice hoarse with both rage and despair.

“I swear you to death!” he cried.

I looked down at him, the golden chains from my spell still lashing across the mountain. Calmly, I asked, “Why should I grant you and your sect mercy?”

His face twisted, tears streaking down as he broke into laughter, hysterical and bitter. “Because you can only be so arrogant… because you have power! Without it, you’d be nothing, no different from me!”

Alice, still perched atop her bicorn, gave a dry laugh. “You know, David, it’s a bad habit of yours to talk to them like they’re your equals. They’re sinners in your eyes, filth to be cleansed. Punish them and be done with it. Don’t waste your time listening to their begging and crying. In the end, all of it is just noise.”

I tilted my head, remarking, “Well, I do believe in second chances. Redemption, even.” My voice lowered, almost thoughtful. “That was the only reason I didn’t throw hands with Nongmin. As for Ru Qiu… honestly, I don’t know what to do with him. I’d love nothing more than to take the easy way out, but Gu Jie said she’d handle him. Now, he’s her responsibility.”

The old man below laughed like a lunatic, eyes bloodshot. “You’re done for! The Plague God has finished his seclusion! He’s coming out of his cave… do you feel that? That’s your reckoning!”

The words were punctuated by a foul stench that seeped from the depths of the mountain temple, thick enough to choke the air. A powerful aura rose with it, unmistakably Seventh Realm, oppressive and vile.

Then the side of the mountain exploded outward in a violent burst of qi. A black figure shot into the sky, fleeing rapidly atop a snake that writhed and carried him away.

Da Ji clutched her stomach, her shoulders shaking as she tried to hold it in, but laughter broke through anyway. “Is… is he running?”

I raised my hand and cast Heavenly Punishment. The once clear sky twisted, sunlight swallowed by sudden storm clouds. Slowly, the heavens split apart, and a gigantic golden sword emerged, its edge gleaming with merciless judgment. With a single, unrelenting descent, it struck the fleeing so-called “Plague God.”

The impact detonated the air itself, unleashing a pillar of light that engulfed both man and serpent. Their screams were lost in the blinding brilliance, and when it faded, there was nothing left, just scorched air and silence.

Below, the old cultivator who had cursed me earlier gawked upward, slack-jawed in disbelief. The terror broke him, and he spun to flee. I raised a finger, summoning Holy Smite. A silver halo bloomed above his head, and countless silver arrows rained down. They tore into his body, ripping him into a bloody mist that dispersed before it could even touch the ground.

The golden scale above me shimmered, then broke apart into tiny motes of light that scattered into the wind. The wicked sect was gone, their temple reduced to ash and ruin, their screams nothing more than echoes devoured by judgment. Not a single soul remained.

“Are we done?” Alice asked lazily, brushing back her hair as if she had been watching a play instead of a massacre.

“We are done,” I replied.

Da Ji shifted into her beastly form, her fur glowing faintly under the dissipating storm as she crouched low. I settled onto her back, letting her carry me aloft as her powerful legs kicked against the air, vaulting us into the clouds. Alice followed close behind, her bicorn galloping effortlessly through the sky.

Just as the last remnants of fire and smoke vanished behind us, the tether of my Hell Soul stirred. Ye Yong’s voice slipped into my mind, calm but edged with excitement. “We’ve found a solid lead on Lu Gao and Yuen Fu…”

I frowned. “Go on.”

Ye Yong’s report sharpened as she continued, her words painting a trail of activities the two had left behind from strange movements, whispered deals, odd connections forming like cracks across the land. And then came the part that made me double-take.

“There is a third among them… someone reportedly impersonating you.”

I rubbed my temple and asked Ye Yong for more details about this so-called impostor. Her voice came steady but clipped, as if she were reading from a dossier. “I’m staring at a wanted poster of the man right now. His likeness is… identical to yours. He wears purple robes, goes by the name “Unholy Taint,” and is notorious for harassing women.”

I face-palmed so hard my mask rattled. “Jue Bu… of course it’s you. I was hoping you’d be off somewhere else doing your own brand of nonsense, but no, of course you’d be running around with Lu Gao and Yuen Fu.” A strange mixture of irritation and relief swirled in me. At least the bastard was alive. At least he survived. Good for him, bad for me.

Ye Yong continued, and the more she said, the deeper I sank into despair. “The impostor has ruined the purity of several young women by peeking under their skirts, groping them, calling them obscene names, and even smashing their prized artifacts. Because of this, your bounty has inflated… enormously.”

I groaned. “You’ve got to be kidding me.”

“No. If anyone kills you now, they’ll be rewarded with treasures from all three world powers, enough spirit stones to form a mountain, and a high position in any faction they choose.”

I sighed long and hard, leaning back against Da Ji’s fur as she soared. “Wonderful. Just perfect. I should be celebrating that Lu Gao and Yuen Fu are alive and well, and that they even have a so-called bodyguard in Jue Bu who’s practically immortal. But no… of course this happens.”

There was a pause, and then Ye Yong’s voice shifted, sharper now. “Our latest intel says… The trio has been sighted moving in the shadows of a provincial capital and staging a rebellion. At least, that’s what we heard.”

I blinked. My mind stalled. “What the fuck?”

Ye Yong’s tone grew more incredulous the longer she continued. “According to witnesses, the trio has been masquerading as “heroes of justice,” liberating villages under the banner of rebellion. They’ve apparently declared themselves the “Holy Trinity of Freedom.””

I pinched the bridge of my nose. “Please tell me you’re joking. Holy Trinity of Freedom? Really? Who came up with that, Lu Gao?”

“No,” Ye Yong replied grimly. “Reports say it was Jue Bu. He stood on a rooftop, pointed at the sky, and proclaimed it in the middle of a rainstorm. The crowd… cheered.”

I wanted to scream. Instead, I buried my face into Da Ji’s fur. She gave a snort of amusement beneath me, clearly enjoying my suffering as she eavesdropped with quintessence. Alice, flying alongside us on her bicorn, remarked dryly, “Your disciples are becoming more… colorful by the day, David.”

I groaned, “Colorful? Try catastrophic.”

But Ye Yong wasn’t finished. “They’ve been recruiting. Rumors were that dozens of cultivators had joined their so-called movement, swayed by Jue Bu’s speeches about ‘justice, wine, and women.’ Yuen Fu has been producing pamphlets calling for uprising, and Lu Gao… well, he’s been dueling local sect leaders, defeating them, and then telling them to ‘submit to the Trinity.’ The most recent news of their feat was trying to assassinate a lord of a kingdom, only to fail miserably.”

My jaw slackened. “So they’ve actually managed to gather followers? Just how gullible are people out there?” My bet was, there was a misunderstanding somewhere here.

Ye Yong hesitated, then delivered the final blow. “There’s more. The trio apparently stormed a provincial treasury. Instead of looting it, they redistributed the entire wealth to the common folk while shouting your name as their guiding inspiration.”

My entire body went rigid. I didn’t even know how to process that. “Wait. They stole in my name?”

“Yes,” Ye Yong said flatly. “In fact, the last line of their manifesto reads: ‘All glory to our master, the True Sovereign, Da Wei, who guides us in spirit.’”

“...”