“You think we’ll have the strength to take it back again from a group of other first rate powers after this campaign? We’ll look like fools for handing things to a fool.”

Sage didn’t want to expose the Purple Mist Sect so directly, but he had plenty of time to think of an alternative and he sighed as if revealing a great secret, “Both of my wives have also become Nascent Souls. I also have a close relationship with Song Lu Tian from the Mount Song Sword Sect, Elder Manji from the Thundercloud Sect, and Ruanfu of the Tiankong Clan. Even if three of them won’t always be present, that is still six Nascent Souls that can be called upon to face difficulties.”

Xie Bian found this bit of news surprising. It was already extremely unusual for the Lang Clan to have a Nascent Soul, let alone three of them. None of the other Branch Clans even had a single Nascent Soul. It wasn’t exactly a rarity, as the Branches had all had Nascent Souls at one time or another, especially considering that was the requirement for the Branch to form in the first place.

If Sage had never captured and interrogated that old bastard, Jinxi Jao, that had also taken over his own descendant’s body, Jinxo Po, he would be ignorant of the secret truths. He would still think that the Lang Clan was merely a simple branch of the Chong Clan and not it’s former ruler. The Chong Clan’s main factions were subordinates of the Lang Clan. After the Lang Clan declined, the Chong factions staged a coup and turned the Lang Clan into their cannon fodder. A few hundred years ago the role that Sage was asking for would have been filled by the Lang Clan without any discussions taking place. Yet, the Lang Clan had already been destroyed in the past and now it suddenly had a Nascent Soul as a backer. Since Sage knew the truth, he placed great importance on the Lang Clan Tomb, so he slanted his argument to sway Xie Bian to choose to move to Lucky Star Province since the Lang Clan would not leave Lionheart Town.

In fact, he didn’t really care if the Lang Clan took over the whole province or not. He merely identified the difficult situation he just explained and came to the conclusion that this could be an opportunity. Who else would the Chong Clan put in charge? Would one of the main factions leave and become an independent Clan? Would they have enough Nascent Souls to control Ten Thousand Wave? Two factions leave the Chong to form a new clan? Wouldn’t that split the clan’s power in half? Once the clan was split apart, wouldn’t they just try to promote the Lang Clan to fill the gap anyways?

Sage’s solution prevented the main factions of the Chong Clan from getting an advantage over the others while also getting rid of the Branch Family that was a little bit too powerful. They could take care of a possible threat while also getting benefits out of it rather than through internal conflict. The main family factions would not be pleased as it means none of them would be the heads of a new clan, but it also meant the balance of power in the Chong Clan would stay the same. Xie Bian was older and far more experienced than Sage, or at least she was for now. He wasn’t sure how old she was, but the Soul Clone was already many thousands of years old, so he felt like he was close to catching up to her in age. On the other hand, he had no idea how much more experience she might have, most of his time on the Inner World was spent in training and research so his actual political, social, and battle experience might be severely lacking in comparison.

Well, even if she’s more experienced, I already defeated that old bastard while she was not confident of doing so for a long time.

Xie Bian went silent for a time and then she nodded her head to Sage, “The Chong Clan will now deliberate over your proposal. Leave us for now.”

With that, Sage was excused from the command tent and he gave them a bow with a clasped fist as a salute. Leaving the tent he brought out the Red Comet and leapt onto it. He shot through the air and flew over to where the Lang Clan’s command tent was. He stored his treasure and walked past the Dragoons and Lang Clansmen on guard duty.

“Little Ting, Little Xing, you both look so impressive with those command tokens and armor.”

Sage looked around the room and then pretended to have made a mistake, “Oops, forgive me Patriarch Yating and General Juxing.”

The two men looked to be the same age as Sage did, but with their father teasing them they still coughed awkwardly and sent a glare at their own children and grandchildren. Nobody in the tent dared to laugh or they might be the next one suffering such teasing. Sage held in his laughter and quickly moved on to the big news.

“I made an offer to the Chong Clan. They’re facing a war of attrition in the underground tunnels. The last of the Fu Clan are sacrificing themselves to overload Formation Arrays. The Chong Clan is paying a steep price for every one of the Fu Clan they kill. I offered our services.”

Juxing, Sage’s first son and a general of the Lang Clan, did not seem pleased by this news. He frowned, “Father, why would you offer to sacrifice our people? Doesn’t the Chong Clan not want to share the major part of the glory and spoils? Isn’t this a steep price to gain their favor?”

Yating, Sage’s second son, a merchant, and also the Lang Patriarch, was not so quick to judge. He smiled slightly, “If the job is that difficult, then the pay must be equally lucrative. What will we get in return?”

Sage looked around the room and smiled widely, “In return for our blood, the Lang Clan will take control of Ten Thousand Wave Province.”

He paused and enjoyed the stunned silence before expounding on the details, “They’re deliberating over it right now. One Clan cannot run two provinces at once, and if they tried the other first rate powers will team up against them in the dark. One way or another, someone will install a puppet in charge of Ten Thousand Wave, Lucky Star, or both if the Chong Clan isn’t careful.”

Sage explained the rest of the argument he made, specifically so that Yating would be aware of how he tried to persuade them. It would be useful to help reinforce their argument in the future or for Yating to make alterations if need be. He didn’t bother to apologize for making such a wild offer, but he knew how powerful the Lang Clan was now so controlling a single city was very easy for them now. The vast majority of Sage’s children, grandchildren and even great grandchildren were all Core Formation Cultivators. If only Sage and his wives were counted, then the Lang Clan would only barely be worthy of the title of first rate power.

The exact number of Nascent Souls that every first rate power had was an important secret, but they had to have more than one. The Holy Flame Sect had five or six, the Fu Clan had eight, the Chong Clan used to have twelve, and the Mount Song Sword Sect had at least nine. From the information he gathered a half dozen was the average amount. The Chong Clan and Mount Song Sword Sect were both unusually powerful. One because of their internal factional struggle and the other because they were part of a greater alliance that spanned multiple Kingdoms. The Chong Clan was already reduced down to eight Nascent Souls after losing Jinxi Jao, Jinxi Po and the two losses from this war. Sage was pretty sure that he and his wives would need to be included in order for the Chong Clan to have a chance of controlling two provinces.

None of the current Chong factions had any more Nascent Souls than the Lang Clan did, so there was no overwhelmingly powerful faction that could make the argument that they should be the new head of a new clan. The Xie used to have four, and the Wa three. Compared to the two Wu and one each for Xiyi and Jinxi, they had something of a majority when teaming up. Now that one of the Xie and Wa were dead, the seven to four imbalance was now a five to four. Sage also guessed that if he didn’t try to take Ten Thousand Wave that a few hidden Nascent Souls would show up in the Chong Clan to make it five to five and force the clan to split in two. Sage pointed this out to the Lang Clan Council so they could come up with ways to convince the Chong Clan that doing so was a bad idea.

How can we show off our strength without being completely blatant?