Suddenly, the temperature took a drastic change and before Long Di could take in the changes in the surroundings, a haughty voice came from the front.

“Halt! This is as far as you are allowed to go!”

****

Whoosh!

Lord Whiskers suddenly stopped, bringing about a gust of wind. Long Di was the one who requested him to pull the brakes, since the latter didn’t mind slaughtering anyone who got in his way.

Looking ahead, Long Di saw a group of four demons. Their expressions were extremely haughty and even Long Di had to admit that their faces were beyond punchable.

They all wore robes that were of a bronze colour. There was also a symbol of an iron body being burnt in fire on their chest.

“The Iron Body Forge Sect,” Yaomu Shou said with contempt.

“I-Is that a Shidashi Mao!?” one disciple asked with a shocked expression.

“Hmph! Is that a joke!?” another disciple scoffed. “The Shidashi Mao is a rare magical beast steeped in calamity whilst radiating a bloodlust and killing intent that would suffocate everyone here. Does this furry looking thing remind you of that!?”

Hearing this, Lord Whiskers frowned and his killing intent was about to explode when Long Di tapped his back.

The Shidashi Mao was not a creature that everyone had the displeasure of meeting, but there were key features that made it well known to everyone. That was its untameable nature, its illogical killing intent, and its identity as the ancestor of all cats and the originator of their myths.

With Lord Whiskers suppressing its killing intent, which was one of its defining traits, it wasn’t a surprise that this disciple would doubt it to be the legendary creature. Combine that with the fact that it was allowing a bunch of people to ride on its back when it was supposed to be untameable, they couldn’t connect that to the infamous Shidashi Mao they were warned to never provoke.

Not thinking that this was a magical beast they needed to pay any attention to, their previous arrogance returned in full.

“Why are you still here? Scram!” the disciple from before yelled.

Long Di rose a brow and looked all around and saw that they were travelling along a mountain path.

This path was the only way to go deeper into the mountain, so Long Di decided to speak on this.

“I don’t think you guys own this mountain. So you don’t have the right to stop me from going on my way,” Long Di calmly stated.

The expression of the disciple who spoke up before twisted into one of displeasure when he saw that Long Di dared to speak to him.

“Who the hell does this human think he’s speaking to!?” that disciple roared in anger.

“You,” Long Di responded with a zero change in expression.

Another disciple joined in right after, “Do you know who we are!?”

Long Di took a while to think before he responded, “A raging disappointment?”

Their faces turned to one of shock before rage immediately took over, “You dare to insult disciples of the Iron Body Forge Sect!? I’ll tell you now that Silver Body Lun Qiang has reserved this mountain!”

Long Di stared off into space before he came back to himself commenting, “yeah this conversation is so repetitive and generic that my brain cells actually decreased in number. Lord Whiskers, if you please…”

“Senior apprentice-brother Long Di, please let me,” Jia Yan spoke up. “I’d like to see how I match up against cultivators from one of the ten great sects.”

Long Di turned to Jia Yan and saw the latter staring at him with a serious expression.

After thinking about it for a while, Long Di nodded to indicate he could. “Be careful.”

Jia Yan flashed a rare smile. “I will!”

Jia Yan leapt from the top of Lord Whiskers and faced the disciple that was at the forefront of this small group.

When this disciple saw what he could only describe as a side character from Long Di’s group coming down to face him, his face turned red with rage!

He drew a huge black hammer from his storage ring, “A mere mongrel dares to face off against me!?”

D-Du-Dum!

Nine high-grade cauldrons exploded into being. There were no pearls within them, though, so it was obvious he was only at the peak of the Ninth Duan Cauldron Forging realm.

Jia Yan saw this and took a deep breath before he summoned his cauldron.

Dum!

Before everyone’s shocked gazes, Jia Yan summoned a cauldron. It wasn’t bronze; it wasn’t white, and neither was it red, instead, it was orange.

“A supreme grade cauldron!?” The disciple that was challenged by Jia Yan was surprised that a mongrel could forge a cauldron of this high a class.

Long Di wasn’t expecting this, and he turned his attention to his group for an explanation, the wrinkling of his eyebrows the only indication of his need for an answer.

“Fufufu… are you surprised?” Yaomu Shou chuckled at what she could only summarise as Long Di’s surprised expression.

“Did you have anything to do with this?” Long Di asked her.

With this question, her smile turned ugly, “what does that have to do with anything?”

Long Di stared her down when she asked this, he stared her down and she felt it.

“What?” she finally asked.

His staring intensified to the point where it said, ‘How do you function?’

Long Di then looked at Jia Yan, saying, “I have so much respect for you.”

“Screw you!”

Ignoring the fly buzzing in the background, Long Di nodded at Jia Yan and his opponent, prompting them to continue.

Jia Yan was already used to Long Di and Yaomu Shou’s… relationship, so this was fine for him. However, his opponent saw what Long Di and Yaomu Shou were doing as nothing more than disrespect and him not even being worthy of being taken seriously.

He shivered in anger as his somatic essence began rapidly circulating, “You dare look down on me!?”

Long Di couldn’t care less, and he entered a state of meditation to think of new ways to better his cultivation technique. This only further angered, not just the disciple who was facing Jia Yan, but the others from the Iron Forge Body Sect as well.

Jia Yan drew out his yellow ranked battle-axe, and his heavy aura could be felt by all those present.

When the disciple facing Jia Yan saw and felt this, his jealousy skyrocketed.

Not only did this mongrel have a better cauldron than him, but even his weapon was also at the same rank!

Jia Yan kept his composure and remained polite, “please go easy on me.”

“Go to hell!” The Iron Body Forge Sect’s disciple cursed at Jia Yan and lunged in his direction.

“Cauldron suppression!” Jia Yan’s cauldron shuddered before a crushing pressure radiated out that immediately caused the Iron Body Forge Sect’s disciple’s cauldrons to dim.

The effect was immediate as the somatic essence circulating in his body slowed down, causing his strength to drop a few levels.

“What the…!”

Before he could regain his bearing, his earlier dash brought him impossibly close to Jia Yan and his two-handed axe!

Bam!

The broadside of the axe landed on the face of the Iron Body Forge Sect’s disciple, causing the nose to cave in and the teeth to shatter.

A sour feeling immediately arose in the nose of all the spectators present.

The Iron Body Forge Sect’s disciple flew back at an incredible speed, and Jia Yan dashed after him, not intending to give him any breathing room.

“I’m curious about something,” Shen Ling spoke up, turning to Yaomu Shou.

“Ask,” Yaomu Shou stated as she watched the fight.

“That Jiandan Tai we fought back in that Peach Blossom Sage’s place was a one core martial adept, right?”

Yaomu Shou nodded to admit she was correct.

“But he was from the outer sect of the Iron Body Forge Sect, so then how can he be stronger than actual members of the Iron Body Forge Sect?” she asked.

“Oh,” Yaomu Shou had some knowledge about this. “Well, Jiandan Tai was being nurtured by both the outer sect and from someone within the true Iron Body Forge Sect to join the Silver Body level of the Iron Body Sect. Though he would need to be stronger for that.”

“Silver body level?” Zi Yu asked.

Though she was from a powerful family, the ten great sects were not the kind of existence her family could match up to, so she was curious about their internal structure.

Xiannu Liang just watched the fight in silence with an unreadable expression.

“Yes,” Yaomu Shou confirmed. “The Bronze Body level, Silver Body Level, Gold Body Level, Platinum Body Level, and Iron Body Level are the levels the disciples are separated into within the Iron Body Forge Sect. Based on the colour of their robes, these scrubs are at the Bronze Level within the Iron Body Forge Sect. They are the weakest there, but everywhere else, they are geniuses compared to the normal riff-raff from normal sects.”

“Then Jiandan Tai…” Shen Ling reminded her to keep Yaomu Shou on track.

“Oh right. Someone from the Gold Body Level probably orchestrated the allocation of resources to that brute so they could have a powerful subordinate under them. The higher body levels in that sect can have subordinates under them, and nurturing them from the outer sect also nurtures loyalty… or whatever they call it. Long Di probably peeved somebody off within the Iron Body Forge Sect and didn’t even know it.”

Boom!

Interrupting their conversation was the powerful clash of two weapons!

An axe and a black hammer pushed furiously against each other, eliciting sparks to fly out from the point of impact!

The Iron Body Forge Sect disciple was able to recover from the disadvantage as he fought against Jia Yan.

After all, despite the suppression that Jia Yan levied against him, he was still at a higher level by eight whole cauldrons.

This allowed him to regain even footing, but even then his expression was ugly. In his mind, a mongrel wasn’t even fit to carry his shoes. Yet, here was one fighting mostly evenly against him!

“Younger apprentice-brother Pang Renwu Er seems to be having a bit of trouble,” one of the other disciples said lightly.

“His opponent does have a higher grade cauldron than him,” the other disciple said with a smile, his anger now totally gone from him.

“I wonder if I should lend him a hand?” his partner replied.

“The woes of a senior apprentice-brother are truly endless,” the former disciple stated with a shake of the head.

However, as soon as he took a step forward to intervene, he found a veiled Shen Ling staring at him.

“I would like to request that the senior brother doesn’t intervene in my younger apprentice-brother’s fight please.” Her voice was akin to a melodic whisper on the wind that enraptured the soul.

The disciple who wished to stand up for his younger apprentice-brother forgot all about him. In fact, he forgot himself in that instance.

From the deepest parts of his mind, he wondered to himself, how could he have not noticed such a peerless beauty?

Sure, her face was obscured, but soul-deep, he could feel it. Her features knew no equal. He liked her, nay; he loved her.

The lust took over in an instant, and he grabbed her arm, pulling her toward him.

Yaomu Shou saw this and commented, “Oh sh*t!”

Long Di’s eyes immediately flashed open.