Watching the Mountain

Chapter 328: Chapter 190: Return

”I’m not worried about Fellow Daoist Qianxue. She’s not one to let herself be taken advantage of. Even having left the Sect, I’m sure she’ll manage just fine.”

Xu Ran nodded slightly. ”I asked if she wanted to join our Sect, but she refused. She said she still has some ordinary disciples with her and plans to find a place to lead them, re-establish the Jade Radiance Immortal Sect, and pass on its legacy.”

Hearing this, Lu Mingchen’s expression relaxed considerably. If she could re-establish the Sect, it meant Luo Qianxue was definitely going to be alright. ”I hope things go smoothly for Fellow Daoist Qianxue.”

He couldn’t help but offer his well wishes.

Li Daoyi, however, lowered his head upon hearing this, his expression complicated as he sighed.

”I can understand Fellow Daoist Qianxue’s choice. If it were me, I would do the same. It’s just... what a pity for her.”

Hearing this, Lu Mingchen asked with a look of confusion, ”Senior Brother, isn’t it a good thing that Fellow Daoist Qianxue can carry on her Sect’s legacy? Why do you call it a pity?”

Li Daoyi turned to look at Lu Mingchen. After a moment of silence, he simply replied, ”Re-establishing a Sect is an arduous task.”

He didn’t explain further.

Xu Ran glanced at Lu Mingchen and sighed internally. ’This grand-disciple of mine is truly too naive. I wonder if that’s a good thing or a bad thing.’

In fact, it wasn’t just Li Daoyi; when Xu Ran heard of Luo Qianxue’s plans, he too felt it was a great pity.

Luo Qianxue was a prodigy on the same level as Li Daoyi. With the backing of a Major Sect, her talent would have allowed her to mature into a powerful expert in no time.

Even as a Loose Cultivator, her talent and intelligence would have enabled her to grow strong quickly.

Given the Jade Radiance Immortal Sect’s current situation, re-establishing it would mean settling in a domain even smaller than Changqing County.

Shallow waters cannot raise a true dragon. With Luo Qianxue’s talent and aptitude, being confined to a single domain would definitely limit her growth.

What’s more, she now had to serve as a sect master, shouldering the burden of its legacy and development. This would be a severe drag on her own growth.

This was why Li Daoyi had looked so sorrowful upon hearing of Luo Qianxue’s decision.

He knew that by making this choice, a peer who had once shared his ambition to dazzle the Cultivation Realm would now fade into obscurity. The world would likely never see her brilliance again.

Perhaps one day, he would hear news of her growing old and dying in some forgotten corner.

She... had embarked on a different path.

A heaven-blessed prodigy who should have lit up an era was now forced to stay in some corner, dimming her own light to ensure her Sect’s legacy would continue.

It was indeed a pity.

And for his martial nephew, Li Daoyi, Luo Qianxue’s fate meant more than just the loss of a peer. More importantly, it meant the loss of a rival, an opponent of his own generation against whom he could contend.

It was a deeply saddening affair.

However, Li Daoyi did not dwell on his sadness over Luo Qianxue’s situation for long. He went to the summit of Celestial Sea Peak and, facing the river of stars in the night sky, raised a cup of Spirit Tea to a single dim star. Then, he silently turned and walked away.

He then threw himself into his own training. Luo Qianxue’s experience was a warning: if he didn’t want to suffer the same fate, his only choice was to cultivate diligently and advance his Cultivation as quickly as possible. Only then would he have the strength to protect his Sect.

His goal had always been very clear: to lead the Profound Pure Sect to unprecedented heights.

To that end, he could not allow his Sect to meet with a disaster like the one that befell the Jade Radiance Immortal Sect.

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For the Jade Radiance Immortal Sect, what was even more tragic was that even their destruction did not spark much discussion.

It wasn’t until more than a month after Luo Qianxue told Xu Ran that fragmented pieces of news trickled from Cyan Cloud County to Changqing County.

Moreover, the focus of the news was the breakthrough to Divinity Transformation via the Flying Immortal Stream; hardly anyone in Cyan Cloud County paid any mind to the Jade Radiance Immortal Sect itself.

After all, a Sect that couldn’t even survive its hundred-year grace period could not earn the recognition of Cyan Cloud County.

The matter of the Flying Immortal Stream’s Divinity Transformation, on the other hand, attracted a great deal of attention.

The Flying Immortal Stream had existed for a long time, but the highest anyone had ever reached with it was the Nascent Soul Stage. The absence of any Divinity Transformation Stage Cultivators had led many to believe that the Nascent Soul Stage was the method’s ultimate limit.

The emergence of the Jade Radiance Ancestor shattered this belief, proving to the Cultivation Realm that the path of the Flying Immortal Stream did not end there.

Thus, the Cultivation Realm grew intensely curious. How had he broken through? Since the Flying Immortal Stream had failed to produce a Divinity Transformation cultivator for so long, there had to be some crucial technique involved in the breakthrough.

As for the insights on breaking through to Divinity Transformation using the Flying Immortal Stream, after Luo Qianxue had previously cut the transmission, she had taken the initiative to send them to Xu Ran as a text message, with no strings attached.

When Xu Ran received the insights from Luo Qianxue, he couldn’t help but picture her mischievous, elfin face.

Then he mused to himself, ’Hardship really does force a person to grow up fast. With Luo Qianxue’s cunning nature, she’s not one to take a loss. In the past, she would have certainly demanded many conditions, possibly even a few prank requests.’

But this time, she hadn’t proposed a single thing.

This proved she had already adapted to her new role as a sect master. She was beginning to think and strategize like the one at the helm of a power.