“Mistress! A card from the mission hall has arrived!” one of the servants said walking into the room that her and the two children were in.

The servant didn’t even look at the, currently, completely exhausted children because it knew that they were doing some form of training with Bo Rei and she would leave a person to drown in a puddle of their own sweat if they slacked for too long without her permission.

“Let me see.” She said and the servant quickly walked over and handed over the letter and was dismissed.

She read it quickly, “What is it mother?” Ning asked after opening his eyes once he heard the sound of the door close.

“To Zhao Rinrin and Bo Ning,

Due to the fact that you have yet to perform and missions in two months, the Mission hall has assigned you an obligatory mission required to do as a service for the sect.” She said and pulled out another letter, “The participating party should report to the mission hall within one hour's time after receiving this letter of notice.

‘Mission: Several village destruction.

There has been a recent series of villages under the protection of the sect. All villages are ransacked and all the bodies were taken, the mission entails you to find who or what performed these acts. Should the culprits be within strength range, disciples must execute orders of kill on sight should it be human or beast. Should the culprit be beyond the capability of the group, report effective immediately.

Difficulty: 2.5 (unknown if culprit is above Houtian)

Reward: 100 Spirit Essence stones, 200 contribution points (should the mission increase in difficulty the reward will be increased in proportion.)’

Participating part: Leader: Dai Ran, participants: Bo Shi, Bo Ning, Zhao Rinrinr, Zhao Ru Lei, Guo Tian, Huo Su.”

“Ah! We forgot to do missions! Damn it!” Rinrin complained. “If we hadn’t been training so hard we could have done easier stuff!”

“Wait? Brother Shi as well… oh right he entered the inner sect thanks to mothers help.” Ning said.

“Ning, I know you and the family don’t get along but try not to have too many headbuts with him. I already disciplined him against treating you poorly like before. The same can be said about the family.” Bo Rei said.

“As long as brother doesn’t do anything against me it is fine.” Ning said coldly having no good memories of his older brothers. “Did eldest brother already enter the outer sect?” Ning asked.

“Yes but he is still in the outer sect which is fine for his talent. He would be a good next clan head instead of your father or uncles. You should also go visit your grandfather once Ning.” She said.

“I guess I should visit grandfather soon.” Ning pondered on this and sighed before sitting up and looking at his sweat covered body. “I need a bath and to recover so I will be going to take care of that and will go meditate until the time to go.” Ning said.

“I’ll go take care of myself since I can’t leave the sect looking so plain.” Rinrin said and quickly got up before running off.

With the two gone Bo Rei sighed smiling and looked at the scrolls. Most were very low leveled but there was no new one because of the skill she was teaching them. If it was any common talent they would have to take at least 10 or 20 years to learn it but the children, in the last 12 hours were able to learn how to make more than half the spirit runes with their energies and spiritual infused without letting much leak.

At this time the servant returned, “Mistress, a young man by the name of Bo Shi has appeared saying he is the young master’s blood brother and your son. Should we let him in?” Mu Yu Xin asked.

“Oh? Shi is here? Why?” She asked.

“He did not say.” She said.

“Alright I will go see him.” She said and stood up and went to the waiting room.

As she arrived she found that he was already inside waiting and when he saw her he smiled brightly. Bo Shi was 15 years old, he was already growing into his strong features but was leaner than a few of his cousins. He is a Qi practitioner and currently he was Low Success Houtian this was below the average for the inner sect disciple but him being a pill refiners personal disciple covers for that. Also he only reached houtian after arriving here.

“Mother, it is good to see you again.” He said.

“It is good to see you. I wonder what brings you here?” She asked.

“A senior deacon had once argued with little brother and his mistress saying no one can get a Qi flame and can make pills within 4 years of starting at the very least. When he learned that brother was already making pills he arranged some higher quality herbs as an apology but found it was inappropriate for him to appear so he asked me.” He said.

“Can I see the herbs?” She asked.

He happily nodded and took a spatial pouch and dropped the items, which were in several baskets, before her.

Bo Rei looked around and for several herbs her eyes shined before they narrowed and looked at him, “Little Shi… did you take any of them?” She asked.

“No mother.” He said quickly.

“Shi…” Bo Rei narrowed her eyes and he began to sweat. “Bo Shi… if you do not pull them out now I will no longer teach you any hidden secrets that I possess.” She said.

His eyes widened, after learning from her the refining arts, he knew his mother wasn’t as simple as she put on before. He quickly pulled out several very high quality Demon fruits which pill refiners could still process and make for Demon Dao Beasts.

Her eyes landed on them and they narrowed. “I’ll tell you now, if you are by chance hiding even one herb it will lead to disaster.” She said and bent close and whispered, “These herbs were all poisoned with normally untraceable poison which would cause a deadly explosion. Do not try anything.” She said.

He opened his eyes extremely wide and took out one finally herb which was a flower with seven different colored pedals.

“Do you have a medical garden yet?” Bo Rei asked.

“No, master said that since I was his personal disciple he would get me a cultivated High grade Mortal Rank on with a Low grade Common rank Medical Mountain. It would already have herbs filled in but most would be young.” Bo Shi said.

“Okay, when you get it come meet mama and I will gift you seeds from good herbs like these and will help you make that little garden something even that old master jealous but just don’t tell him okay.” She said and smiled.

He nodded and smiled wryly, he looked down with regret when he saw the Level 12 mortal rank herbs. These were rare yet someone actually poisoned the herbs just to get at his brother and maybe even have himself become collateral damage for greed. He narrowed his eyes, “I won’t let that deacon get away with it. He even targeted me.” Bo Shi said.

“Don’t do anything son, let him feel comfortable, just tell me about his profile and his name and I will take care of it.” She said.

With a nod Bo Shi passed all the information before he went his way.

Finally Bo Rei looked down with a solemn expression, “So they want to use Devil’s Bite against both my genius boys? Hehe someone must be begging for death at this moment.” Her voice sounded coldly before she reached out her hand and a small icy blue flame appeared on her fingertips and slowly spread over all the baskets. “Let’s first get rid of the useless material.” She muttered and did a movement with her hands and all the herbs burnt to ashes yet within those ashes several dozen small perfectly preserved seeds were found.

With a few waves of her hand, these seeds slowly formed separate piles according to what herb they are and finally the Level 12 mortal rank herb landed on her hand. “Such a shame that this bastard wasted a seven petal rainbow flower. Since he gave it, I shall not be polite since he handed it over. Still…” She looked at the piles, “To think he was able to gather so many elemental type herbs. There is at least one for each element. If these were planted properly I could even set up a nature arrey using the flowers to slowly focus a medical garden’s energy flow. Wait that won’t work, not yet. Ning needs 5 medical mountains and that spirit mountain. I think I can wait. I will set up the two mountains then.” She smiled and called a servant to get small leather bags for her and she stored each seed in the bags and named them properly before she walked to Ning’s bath. “Ning, let me borrow the Medical garden for a bit, I need to do a few things.” She said.

Ning, who was soaking looked up. “Alright mother.” he said and lifted his hand. Soon a twisting cloud appeared before it split and the bonsai in a pot appeared and floated over.

She quickly left and entered the garden after arriving inside one of the cultivation rooms. There was nearly five times the energy in here when compared to outside. This was for what she needed.

Inside the garden she looked at the three hills. One was over 100 meters but the radius was around 30 meters and had high cliffs. Clouds were forming near the peak and with one look at the mountains craggy appearance she could see countless perfect places for several seeds.

Closing her eyes, she spread her Spiritual Sense for a moment before nodding. With the current 150 acres, she could start to arrange the mountains properly. “Considering they have an Ice, Earth and Wind. I have the choice of Water, Earth and Wind Mountains I can change these two into.” She muttered and looked at the mountains.

The other ungraded mountain had already raised to 35 meters but was only 20 meters in radius and only caused the ground to form small valleys between it where small streams descended towards a small flowing river at the bottom.

She closed her eyes and touched the ground. A strange ripple passed through the garden’s land and the orchards and herb fields began to move around. The spirit mountains moved to the center of the garden but remained a small hill while the two medical mountains moved outwards. The previously circular land began to shrink as the land was stretched seemingly forming islands.

Sweat covered Bo Rei’s head but she ended when the land was properly separated into three islands but there was a small land bridge. The residents of the garden were shocked at what was happening inside the space but eventually someone spotted Bo Rei who was concentrating and doing something to the ground and they figured it was this mysterious mistress of theirs own was doing this.

When she finally finished the land looked like a boomerang shape. If one were to think of it properly, it was instead, a star shape that had only two arms. These specific arms were the left leg and the right arm. If one were to look at the relationship of a the five basic elements, the lower left arm and upper left arm would represent Water and Air respectively. The way that this is known is because Bo Rei knew which way was ‘north’ inside the medical garden which allowed her to set up the mountains in this specific manner.

When she was done she took to the air but looked back to the servants, “Do not worry, it is simply a small arrangement for my children.” She said and flew off.

The largest mountain, with the cloudy peak and standing above 100 meters, now stood on an island of its own. The 30 meter wide base had several dozen more meters of radius around it filled with the herbs that had once been spread out.

She flew to the peak and touched the peak and felt the Spirit Vein. “This children, the vein has grown quite nicely with the three elements they possess. This boy has grown to be as long as half my arm and is half as thick. This is perfect let's change your elemental balance to Water.” She smiled gleefully as she touched the ground and the spirit root lifted up and in the air she began to write into the air. A strange light appeared and formed countless characters before forming a rune which showed a harmonious balance. Not one but countless were drawn and each one would flow into the spirit vein and after ten minutes she finished and the white glowing root turned blue before sinking once more.

The mountain shook a bit and clouds began to form. The mountain began to shrink and stopped at 75 meters but the base had grown to 40 meters and formed several large basins around the mountains and the plateau formed a small pond with an elevated stalagmite with an opening and suddenly water gushed out and began to fill the pond with shimmering water.

“Oh, this is a higher quality spirit vein already. For it to make a spirit water vein is so great!” She giggled. She looked at the water, “the spirit water will do those ice beasts of theirs wonders.” She muttered and looked as it filled quickly and rushed down the small pathways and began to trickle down and several small springs had formed near the top and flowed down forming a slowly growing flow and started to flow down to the basins.

Bo Rei began to fly around and dropped several dozen seeds all over to mountain before going to the next. “Let's change this to wind.” She grinned.

When she finished and she let out a deep breath. This had tired her out a lot since her cultivation wasn’t so high yet.

The 35 meter tall mountain shrank down to 25 meters in height but suddenly the ground rumbled as large stone pillars and some curving ones forming a loop sprang out.

WHOOSH!

Suddenly a strong wind began to pick up and these winds passed through the mountain but it wasn’t especially strong but this was while the mountain was still small.

Bo Rei, similarly, planted wind element seeds all around before she flew to the central island and planted herbs without elemental necessity.

“There, as long as they keep refining this they will eventually have the perfect training ground if this lady has anything to do with it.” She grinned and after admiring her work she exited.

***

“For some reason I think we seem to always end up grouped up.” Guo Tian said.

“Its because we appeared at the same or similar time.” Ning said.

Ru Lei was near Rinrin and leaned in, “So, how far have you gone with brother Ning?” She asked in a hushed tone.

“W-w-w-w-what are you talking about!?” Rinrin said completely blushing.

“You know~! Couple cultivating~!” She said grinning like a cat. “You know Guo Tian already has me sit on his lap and he hugs me. Even though he is young his muscles feel nice against my back!” She said.

“V-vulgar! Lewd!” Rinrin blushed even brighter.

“How far have you gone?” A sudden voice called. The two looked at a slightly blushing young girl with bright red hair. She was 14 years old with a currently a smaller than average figure. Her hair and eyes were both red. This was Huo Su, she was one of the mentioned young girls who the Huo clan had offered Ning to become his concubine. On her shoulder was a small Red snake and on her right shoulder was a very small emerald green winged tiger.

“You’re Huo Su right?” Rinrin asked.

The girl nodded.

“If I remember correctly, I heard you were the girl the Huo Clan wanted to become one of Ning’s concubine, namely his first.” Ru Lei said.

The girl quickly blushed making her entire head red.

“So… what… what is Dao Couple cultivation like?” She asked.

The two girls looked at each other. They could clearly see the girl who looked younger then them had much less experience.

“Well… Ning and I are only at the hand’s stage but the flow of energy feels like a large dam breaking and it feels like it burns my body every time.” Rinrin said blushing.

“For me, I already passed the hand stage and even arms. I sit… with really thin night dress on his lap…” Ru Lei’s voice disappeared at this point. Even if she could say she reached that point she didn’t have the courage to explain it in detail so she moved in close and pulled them both and whispered.

The two blushed brightly. “I-I wonder… if Ning would accept me…” She muttered.

“Um… you have to ask him but… isn’t that snake a fire element Profound Beast?” Rinrin asked.

“Yes, this is Si and this is Ran.” She pointed to the two cute Dao Beasts. The Snake was Si and the tiger was Ran. “Si is a Flame Python and Ran is a Winged Hurricane Tiger. Both are Profound Beasts.” She said.

Rinrin could only smile wryly. She was sure that if she had married Ning first the fire Dao Beast of Initial Heavenly Dan would have been given. Those were still possible to find but to find a High Success Heavenly Dan potential Fire element Dao Beast isn’t so easy. At this stage the clan only has so much. In truth after reaching Heavenly Dan potential, most people would do their best filling up spaces with other Initial Heavenly Dan potential beasts.

During the infancy stage they would carefully raise the beasts with unique potential expanding pills and techniques and building a massive foundation meant to surpass the common race potential. Others would leave to travel the world in search of caretakers from higher nations with greater potential looking for Dao Beasts as well as to improve their cultivation.

“You can probably cultivate only your Winged Tiger with Ning until he obtains a Fire Element Dao Beast.” Rinrin said wryly.

The little girl looked downhearted towards this and looked and Ning who was talking with Guo Tian. In the mission hall besides these three there was also Bo Shi who was alongside them but the leader had yet to arrive.

In Ning’s side he looked at his brother, “So how come you are going with us? I mean… aren’t you the weakest?” Ning asked.

“I was told by master that I am a supporting role to provide pills and healing knowledge. I have learned several basic poison extracting methods and can make up to level 2 mortal rank pills.” Bo Shi said. “He said there may be possible situations where poison is infecting the area so I should be of aid in such situations.” He said.

SWOOSH!

At this moment a large gust of wind came from the door and when the six looked they saw a young man with glasses and cold expression wearing an inner sect robe but above it was a Law enforcement coat. Below him was a strange artifact which looked like a staff but at one end was a strangely flame shaped head which was glowing.

Instantly the six felt cold and stood up, “We greet senior disciple brother Dai Ran.” He looked them over and his eyes stopped on each of them. “You, the Initial Houtian, you are Bo Shi correct?” He asked.

“Yes sir!” Shi said.

“Alright, you are in charge of pills. You should not attempt to fight and should remain in the back. When we walk you stay in the middle. I have promised your elder I would take care of you.” He said. “As for you all, beware because it's unknown the situation, there were scouts that went out several days ago but they all went missing. Men were killed but women are gone without a trace.” He said. “Now mount your beasts and we shall go immediately, the place is 3 days flight away.” He said and moved outside.

The riders each pulled out their beasts and after some debating who had the largest but fastest beast it ended up being Tora who was fastest and could fit them all. He was Peak Houtian already and measured 7 meters and they could sit in two lines because his back was already two and a half meters wide.

Sitting atop the Flying fish they left towards the southwest in direction of the mission with the senior Dai ran on his strange staff flying as fast as Tora but with more leisure.