Questioning Heaven, Desiring the Way

Gu Suihan clicked his tongue, then looked straight at Li Rong as he said, “As such, besides having enough Qi, high level spells and resources, the most important thing is to have some techniques.”

Li Rong stared strangely at Gu Suihan. It was his turn to ask quizzically, “Aren’t you just the son of a well-to-do businessman? Why are you so familiar with cultivation?”

“Why don’t you guess?” Gu Suihan smiled faintly. “I’ll tell you about the techniques another time. You haven’t reached the peak of Physical Realm yet, so it’s going to take at least another month for you to start absorbing Qi and awakening your spirit,” said Gu Suihan with absolutely no evidence or logic to back this statement up.

“What the…” Li Rong suddenly realized that he had been played out by Gu Suihan. He should have just not said anything or finished saying everything. What’s with him stopping halfway?!

“You must understand that the most important thing to a cultivator of the Way is his state of mind and foundation. Being in a rush to do anything will certainly result in disaster,” said Gu Suihan in a rather stern voice.

While he wasn’t wrong, Li Rong still felt like Gu Suihan had done this on purpose. But after looking at Gu Suihan’s expression that remained as flat and unexciting as the bottom board of a coffin, Li Rong wasn’t really sure if his guess was right or not.

“I need to go back to tell my father that I’m back,” said Li Rong as he stood up and did not pursue this matter further. “Also, according to the rules, the top three residences within the East Compound belong to the three major factions. Don’t try to go in there and end up getting chased out.”

Li Rong then turned and left, but he still had a puzzled look in his eye. The more time he spent with Gu Suihan, the more he realized how mysterious this fellow was.

“Forget it, I’ll go ask Father. He would know what’s going on.” Li Rong shook his head, then stuck a talisman on himself. His movement suddenly gained speed and he disappeared in a flash.

“Psh.” Gu Suihan looked at the flying dust in the distance where Li Rong had been, and his lips curled into a mysterious smile.

“Since we will eventually have to fall out with one another sooner or later, why should I bother telling you everything?” Gu Suihan started walking towards the most luxurious residential area situated at the innermost part of the East Compound.

“What are you going to do?” Gu Suihan’s bag moved a little as a bright childlike voice spoke from inside. It was the broken knife that Gu Suihan had forcibly removed from the secret realm.

“What am I going to do?” Gu Suihan broke into a smile. “I’m going to teach some people a lesson.”

The knife was a little shocked and asked, “But didn’t that fellow earlier say that you can only challenge someone else after three months?”

There was a glint in Gu Suihan’s eyes when he heard those words. “Three months? That’s for disciples from a lower level who want to challenge those from a higher level. Those have to wait for three months. But you can fight anybody within the same Compound anytime. The only rule here is that you can’t kill anybody randomly.”

“Who are you?” Several young men were talking to one another at the entrance to the residence when one of them spotted Gu Suihan walking in and yelled at him angrily.

“Can’t you read the sign?” Another one glared fiercely at Gu Suihan and pointed to a wooden signboard next to him.

Residence for disciples of the Way Seekers Alliance

Unauthorized persons are not allowed here

“Hoho,” Gu Suihan made a face and broke the sign with a kick in front of their horrified faces. “I give all of you ten seconds. Get out of here. I’m taking this place.”

The high and mighty aura Gu Suihan had since he was a child was fully unleashed in this moment.

“I see that someone’s here to make trouble,” sneered another man with more mature features. “Miss Mo is having a meeting inside right now. If you leave now, we will not pursue this matter. Otherwise, that’s the end of a peaceful life for you.”

Of course, he could sense the confidence in the way Gu Suihan spoke. Anyone who dared to make trouble for the Way Seekers Alliance had to be pretty capable in the first place.

But he wasn’t worried, because the leader of their Alliance was now speaking to the new batch of disciples inside.

Every external disciple of Seven Kill Sect knew that the leaders of the three major factions were internal disciples and were backed by a number of powerful yet mysterious people.

“You have three more seconds.” Gu Suihan merely raised an eyebrow.

“Go and look for Miss Mo, the three of us will try to stall him,” the mature looking one gave the other disciples these instructions in a low and grim voice.

“Tianyu, do we really have to bother being so careful around this boy?” One of them was unhappy that the mature looking one was taking this so seriously. But after he saw the latter staring so intently at him, he swallowed the rest of what he initially intended to say and quickly ran in to look for Miss Mo.

“My friend, how should I address you?” Tianyu looked at Gu Suihan and placed one palm against the other fist.

“No need. We can just fight.” Gu Suihan smiled. “Don’t worry, I’m a new disciple so you don’t have to be worried.”

Tianyu immediately raised an eyebrow at this, but he was also secretly relieved.

“Tianyu, don’t waste your breath on him anymore.” The other young man was getting impatient and gave Gu Suihan a threatening smile. “Just cripple him and throw him out.”

He then patted Tianyu’s shoulder with his left hand while drawing his long sword out of its sheath with his right.

“Meet your maker, punk!”

Gu Suihan scoffed, then the bag he had been carrying all this while suddenly opened. A meter-long sword met the other man’s long sword and slid down the sharp blade, sending sparks flying towards the other man’s sword hilt.

The other man had no choice but to pull back and the initial disdain in his eyes slowly faded. He rotated his wrist left and right, as if he was drawing flowers with his sword, fiercely attacking Gu Suihan’s vital areas like a venomous snake sticking its tongue out repeatedly.

“Not bad,” murmured Gu Suihan to himself. At the same time, he suddenly let go of his sword, took half a step forward, dodged the other man’s sword, and grabbed hold of his own sword again.

There was an ear-piercing swoosh as Gu Suihan’s sword was suddenly unsheathed and reached for the other man’s wrist.

The other young man had no choice but to pull his own sword back to fend off the oncoming blade while he tapped the air with one of the fingers on his left hand. It was clear that he was aiming an attack at Gu Suihan’s dantian, which would essentially make Gu Suihan unable to cultivate.

But Gu Suihan’s sword suddenly turned the other way, dodging the other man’s sword and aimed for the other man’s lower half.

What on earth?! The young man was horrified as he suddenly felt a wind coming towards his lower half and he instinctively stabbed his own sword into the ground.

Dangg! The loud swoosh of Gu Suihan’s sword hit the other man’s sword.

“Why, you!” The young man cursed Gu Suihan inwardly for being so vicious. If he had reacted just half a second too late, he would have lost a leg by now.

“Watch out!” someone exclaimed from behind him.

The young man hurriedly looked up only to see a mirthless smile on Gu Suihan’s handsome face.

Gu Suihan’s sword moved like an apparition as it brought both a frightening murderous aura and the rebound from hitting the other man’s sword, moving towards the young man, and silently sliced through the young man’s shoulder.

The young man felt an unbearable pain in his shoulder and shouted in pain before stumbling backwards.

“What a vicious move!” Tianyu ran forward to help the young man up. When he looked at what was left of the young man’s shoulder, he yelled angrily, “We’re all disciples of the same sect! Why did you have to be so brutal?”

“That’s the end…I’m done for…” The young man’s gaze was lifeless as he stared at his severed arm lying several meters away from him. His face was as white as a sheet.

“Han Qing! Don’t worry, I’ll ask Miss Mo to join your arm back to your shoulder,” Tianyu held back his rage and consoled his friend softly.

But he knew that these were meaningless words of consolation. It wasn’t hard to join the arm back to its owner’s shoulder. The difficult part was joining the broken meridian channel back to the rest of the body’s meridian channels. This could only be done with the help of some rare treasure, which were items that external disciples like themselves would never even come across in their lives.

Even if Miss Mo had any on hand, she wouldn’t bother using it on a low-level disciple in such circumstances.

“What’s happened?” a fairylike voice wafted over from afar.

The familiar voice made Tianyu, and his friends, pause for a moment before a look of relief covered their faces.

“Miss Mo, this young man came here to make trouble for no apparent reason. Han Qing, myself, and the rest tried to persuade him against doing anything rash, but he destroyed our signboard and even sliced off Han Qing’s arm. Miss Mo, please help us!” Tianyu immediately put all the blame on Gu Suihan. He was not that simpleminded after all.

There was a frosty glint in Miss Mo’s watery eyes, but she smiled and said, “My dear junior brother, how has the Way Seekers Alliance offended you? Why did you have to attack a fellow disciple so ferociously?”

Gu Suihan merely smiled as he looked at the beautiful woman before him who seemed angry yet calm at the same time. He flicked the blood on his sword off and responded in a quiet voice, “According to rule number 21 of the sect’s rules, internal disciples are not to interfere in any conflict between external disciples. Besides, nothing in the rules states that this place belongs to the Way Seekers Alliance, right?”

When he heard this rather ridiculous sounding defense, Tianyu couldn’t help but take a step forward and retorted, “But everyone in Seven Kill Sect knows that this area belongs to the Way Seekers Alliance. How dare you —”

“Shut up,” Miss Mo cut him off sternly, then broke into a smile again as she said gently, “That is indeed the rule here. So, I’m not able to do anything about today.”

“Miss Mo…” Han Qing fell into despair. He thought that Miss Mo would avenge him by incapacitating the evil Gu Suihan without needing any reason. He didn’t expect her to react this way.

“Shut up.” After being interrupted by her juniors so many times, Miss Mo became a little irritated with them and her gaze instantly turned icy. “I have my own way of dealing with this matter.”

“Dear junior brother, what is your business here?” Miss Mo’s voice had become more hostile than before. She was clearly running out of patience.

Gu Suihan shrugged and said calmly, “Among the residents of the East Compound, the disciples in the top three residences get the greatest number of Spiritual Stones every month.”

He didn’t say much, but the meaning he implied was clear.

It wasn’t as if there was no infighting within the East Compound. In fact, it was quite the opposite. All three major factions of power were here, so the competition was even stiffer and fiercer. It was hard to understand why the sect allowed such a thing, but there was a difference in status depending on which part of the East Compound you stayed in.

For example, the three residences that Gu Suihan was standing in front of were not only the best in terms of the environment, but they were also given the best treatment. Their monthly supply of resources, such as Spiritual Stones, were around one and half times that of the other residents in the same Compound.

The three factions purposely claimed this area not just because they were fighting for resources, but more to increase their status and prestige in the eyes of the external disciples.

“That’s it?” Miss Mo was a little surprised. She thought that someone from the Nobles Clan or the Four Directions Court had instructed this boy to make trouble here. She didn’t expect the only thing he was after to be these additional Spiritual Stones.

“Then why didn’t you go to the residences of the Four Directions Court or the Nobles Clan first?” Tianyu was still fuming. “Did you think the Way Seekers Alliance disciples are pushovers?”