Chapter 6: Jiang Family, the Sword, and the Palace

Only then did Jiang Xie reveal a satisfied expression.

The moment he loosened his right hand, Ji Wuyue dropped to the ground.

“Cough, cough.”

She kept coughing, fear still lingering on her face.

But what filled her heart even more was anger. From Jiang Xie’s earlier move, she could tell that his cultivation was no more than the lowest Body Tempering Realm.

If her cultivation had not been sealed, how could it ever have been his turn to strut around so arrogantly? Unfortunately...

There were no such what-ifs.

Ji Wuyue’s eyes were empty, and she had no idea what she should do now.

To be honest, although Jiang Xie was not a bad person, he could not be called an absolutely good one either.

He would not kill without reason, but when it came to achieving certain goals, he was never stingy with methods of torment.

Of course, if the target was already no good to begin with, then all the better. Killing them would simply be killing them.

He knew that although this little girl seemed obedient on the surface, she was definitely still unconvinced inside.

It seemed that he still had a long way to go before she was properly tamed.

What he did not understand was that ever since he had brought her back, the palace had shown no reaction at all.

For a moment, he had even suspected that he had caught the wrong person.

Yet whenever he came into contact with the little girl, he could clearly feel faint strands of a special aura flowing into his body.

Right now, he only wanted to hurry back and see whether the statue inside the palace in his mind had changed at all.

The rest of the journey was dull.

Neither of them spoke again.

Ji Wuyue was like a puppet on strings, allowing Jiang Xie to drag her along.

For Jiang Xie, however, that dullness did not last very long.

In less than the time it took an incense stick to burn, he saw that familiar little courtyard.

This was his residence.

He did not live inside the clan grounds, but had moved to a place in the outskirts not far from the family estate.

The Jiang Family’s sphere of influence was vast.

At least within the Qianyuan Empire, it controlled an entire city.

That city was also known as Jiang City.

The Shengyuan Continent was divided into five regions: Dongzhou, Nanjiang, Beimo, Xisen, and Shengzhou.

Shengzhou lay at the very center of the Shengyuan Continent.

Its territory was vast, its sects numerous, and apart from Xisen, it was the strongest of the five.

Xisen was the most mysterious place of all.

Its territory was also the largest, yet it had the fewest humans.

That was because it was an endless forest, a land where demonic beasts gathered in great numbers.

No one dared venture deep inside, and no one knew what exactly lay within.

Only a single warning had been passed down from generation to generation.

It said:

“In the depths of Xisen lies a place of endless terror. Under no circumstances must anyone enter it, or the human race will face calamity.”

Those words served as a constant warning to all.

Of course, there were always those unafraid of death who wanted to uncover its secrets.

Yet without exception, they all ended up as food in the jaws of demonic beasts.

Because of that, Xisen became even more mysterious in the eyes of the world.

Human activity there was limited to its outer fringes alone.

As for the other regions, Dongzhou was the strongest overall.

Within Dongzhou, the Qianyuan Empire, the Dayan Empire, and the Hongyun Empire stood as three great powers.

Among the three great demonic factions of Dongzhou:

The Jiang Family occupied one city within the Qianyuan Empire.

The Blood Demon Sect occupied two cities within the Hongyun Empire.

The Tiansha Sect occupied three cities within the Dayan Empire.

On the surface, the Jiang Family appeared to be the weakest.

But in truth, that was not the case.

The three demonic factions were evenly matched in strength.

If one really had to say it, the Jiang Family had been rather unfairly branded as a demonic faction.

According to legend, several thousand years ago, the Jiang Family’s ancestors saw a man utterly devoid of conscience, slaughtering innocent commoners at will.

How could the Jiang Family’s ancestors endure such a sight?

He immediately rushed forward, unleashed a flurry of punches and a few whipping kicks, and killed the man with ease.

That single kill, however, led to trouble.

That man turned out to be the son of an elder from a great sect of that time.

The sect immediately issued an order for his death.

Although the Jiang Family’s ancestor was already an expert in the Divine Power Realm back then, he still could not stand against such a towering power.

He could only flee, all the while declaring that he had merely rid the people of evil.

Yet to his surprise, the other side turned the accusation around and slandered him as a cultivator of the demonic path.

When the onlookers who knew nothing of the truth heard this, they naturally chose to believe the words of the powerful sect.

One after another, they began condemning the Jiang Family’s ancestors.

It infuriated him so much that for several decades, he did not dare show himself.

Only after his cultivation broke through did he wipe out that sect in one fell swoop.

In the eyes of outsiders, that only confirmed his identity as someone of the demonic path.

They denounced him endlessly, both in word and in writing.

How could the Jiang Family’s ancestor, with his fiery temper, possibly endure that?

He had rid the people of an evil, yet he was the one branded a fiend of the demonic path?

Meanwhile, those who claimed to be of the righteous path, while doing the very things people of the demonic path would do, could still receive open praise from others?

He immediately turned and left with a sweep of his sleeve, leaving behind a single sentence:

“You cannot tell right from wrong, and you have turned black into white. I am disappointed, truly disappointed. If this is what it means to be on the righteous path, then I want no part of it!”

And so, from that day onward, the Jiang Family became one of the demonic factions...

This was the story Jiang Xie had heard from his father, Jiang Fengliu.

When he had first heard it, he had thought it absurd beyond belief.

Only after experiencing certain things himself did he come to understand.

People in this world did not care what you had actually done. They only believed the surface of what they saw with their own eyes.

Just like the Jiang Family now. Because it had always borne the name of a demonic faction, even if it acted uprightly in the present, no one would regard it as part of the righteous path.

The prejudice in people’s hearts was not something that could be erased in a single day.

After returning to the courtyard, Jiang Xie loosened the iron chain in his hand and said to Ji Wuyue, “For now, you may move about freely.”

With that, Jiang Xie walked into the room.

Ji Wuyue stood there blankly, as though she had not yet recovered from those words.

The moment he entered the room, Jiang Xie said, “Keep an eye on her. Do not let her run.”

There was no one else in the room besides him.

No one knew who exactly he was speaking to.

Yet a faint ripple suddenly appeared in the void.

A soft sword hum rang out.

It seemed to be resisting.

Jiang Xie spoke again. “Do not worry about my safety. Go.”

Another faint hum of the sword came from the void.

That sound was so slight that almost no one could hear it.

Only Jiang Xie could sense it with precision.

After feeling as though something had left the void at his side, the corner of Jiang Xie’s mouth finally curled into a smile.

He slowly walked to the bed and sat down cross-legged.

The moment he closed his eyes, he could see a magnificent palace before him.

It looked close, yet in truth it seemed separated by an endless distance.

The palace was enormous, and its appearance was not much different from the imperial palaces of his previous life.

The only difference was the aura it gave off.

One glance at it was enough to make anyone feel reverence from the depths of their heart.

A pure white radiance also shone around the palace.

It was as though the surroundings were draped in a layer of divine light.

Jiang Xie focused all of his attention on the palace before him.

The next moment, the palace gates slowly opened.

His divine sense also entered the palace.

Looking around, he saw twelve enormous statues standing all around him.

Most of them were gray.

Only one statue was radiating light.

That was the first statue he had activated.

On its chest were carved the two great characters: Undying.

Jiang Xie walked straight toward another statue.

Only upon closer inspection did he realize that the statue had not remained entirely unchanged.

Half of both its feet were already glowing.

Seeing this, Jiang Xie fell into thought.

“So I did not find the wrong person. It is just that the way this statue is activated seems to be different from the first one...”

“It looks like I will have to keep this girl around for a while.”