“Our new ally has been working hard, I knew he was strong but I wasn’t expecting him to be so proficient in battle tactics and warfare. Was this the last one?”

“Yes Patriarch, all of the invading armies have been forced to retreat and we managed to capture a large number of enemy combatants, they are being tight-lipped but with time we expect to reveal their true origin and what they are planning.”

“Mmm… good, what about our ‘friend’ the Golden Dragon?”

“After he defended the cities from the initial invasions he was seen going past our defensive land, it seems that he was either trying to scout out the areas that were claimed by the Phoenix Empire or…”

“Is he trying to single-handedly win this war? Perhaps his youthful appearance wasn’t just a trick… he might be inexperienced, how many elders can we spare to aid him?”

“Not that many, our people are having trouble mending the defensive formations that had been damaged during the enemy offensive, it will take us several weeks to mend them. Only then we can start assembling a punitive force to strike back!”

“But Patriarch, would that be wise? Our elders and juniors are tired. We wouldn’t have been able to defend ourselves without the Golden Dragon’s help, what if we suffer a defeat instead? Wouldn’t all the work go to waste?”

“Leader Zhong you bastard, even at this point you would curl up your tail and shiver in fear?”

“Leader Shen, this has nothing to do with fear, I am being logical, how could we offer our people on a platter to that Emerald Phoenix Empire? This is not the time to move yet, we need to interrogate the prisoners, find out about their strategic formations and what they want.”

“Leader Zhong isn’t wrong… we don’t have enough information, we should send in the spies first before making our move.”

“You…”

Sun Shen the Moon Lily faction leader along with the rest were in a meeting. All of them were discussing the situation at their borders and how Zhang Dong was affecting them. Ever since his first appearance, most of the enemy forces had been driven back. They had managed to capture some of their masters and weapons. These were in the process of being analyzed which complicated things.

Just like the last time the council was divided. One side wanted to use this opportunity and push into the regions that they had to give up to the Emerald Phoenix Empire. The other group on the other hand wanted to take this chance to wait. This had given them precious time and they would rather analyze the situation before going in further.

“If the Golden Dragon didn’t aid us and acted, then all of our border cities would have been overrun by now! This is not the time to wait but the time to act! Our enemies are scattered and will need time to evaluate the situation, if we strike they won’t be able to defend themselves!”

“Leader Shen brings up a good point but what if these forces were just a scouting party, what if we get decimated instead? Our cities are well fortified but we don’t have a strong attacking force!”

“But there is no time, we have to…”

The whole area erupted as the old masters continued to argue. It didn’t seem that they would be making any type of decision anytime soon. There was one person disappointed in this turn of events.

‘I guess I won’t be getting any more backup.’

Zhang Dong sat on a large tree branch while listening to the old men and women bickering with each other. It was another equal split between the ten factions as if his influence never mattered. Even when that fortune-telling faction was not neutral anymore, another one became opposite to it when the time to make another decision came. It was as if without him being there, it was impossible for them to make an important decision.

‘Could this be the world setting or an overseer at work? Could it only be possible for them to be moved whenever the Main Character was there?’

Zhang Dong couldn’t help himself from seeing game characteristics in the behavior of the people. He wasn’t sure but it was impossible to not become paranoid due to his knowledge of the people working in the background. There was a possibility of interference and when it came to games backup usually arrived when all was said and done. The same was true now as he wasn’t expecting to get any help unless he somehow made it true by his own power.

‘Hm, I’ve come this far, turning around now would make all that work go to waste, wished they listened to Sun Shen and trusted me more.’

Thanks to his system he could hear what the group were discussing. Sun Shen’s approval rating had been over sixty percent which allowed the use of spirit points. With them, he could hear the council discussing things even when being hundreds of thousands of kilometers away from their location. He was hoping for some backup but they were stalling their decision with continued bickering.

“But now that I’m here it would be bad to leave…”

He had come to the Heavenly Crane Sect not only to help out people but also to enhance his army. The area he was in once belonged to the Sun Lily faction which was known for its spirit metal mines. After making sure that the borders were safe he could with a clear conscience take his reward. If he liberated these lands then the Heavenly Crane Sect would probably try to lower the metal haul but with this place still being under the Emerald Phoenix Empire’s clutches, he had some wiggle room to take his cut.

“Hah… look at me becoming this greedy but I guess I can use these metals more than these people that can’t even make a decision to help their citizens, they clearly know that these people are ruthless.”

Zhang Dong gave out a sigh while looking out into the distance. There he saw a smaller settlement that contained around thirty thousand people. What made them unique was that all of them were very weak. No martial artists above the Qi condensation level of three existed and he knew the reason for it.

‘The rumors were a bit overblown but they weren’t that far off…’

This was a true war, something a person from his previous world could mostly only read up in books or see on television. With his superior senses, he could sense it, a large gathering of corpses had been buried near his location, a mass grave.

‘They must have buried all the cultivators that lived here and then covered it up with soil…’

The job was sloppy and after some rain parts of the soil uncovered partially decomposing bodies. Some beasts that lived outside were already scavenging the remains and eating up whatever they could. The only good news here was that they didn’t outright murder the entire population. The non-combatants were spared and in the city, anyone that was weak was given some type of chance to survive.

There was nothing he could do about the situation here anymore. The people here had died a while back and there was no way of bringing them back. Now he had to focus on the problem at hand and the people that were still alive. They were left alone in the city with a few hundred cultivators from the Emerald Phoenix Empire. There weren’t that many but they were at least at the Martial Master level which was more than enough to handle these untrained Qi condensation commoners.

‘They killed anyone that could resist them and enslaved the population, they don’t see these people as human…’

Secret grounds and different pocket dimensions existed in this world. Many times they were rumored to be created by long-dead immortals and acted as trial grounds for the worthy. After capturing some of the people from the opposition at least this fact he did confirm.

‘Perhaps they think that this whole Azure Empire is just an elaborate test made by some powerful immortal millions of years ago, a special place to gain power every thousand of years ago.’

Immortals were like gods in the cultivation world. It wouldn’t be strange for the people living here to assume that they were capable of creating life or something very similar. Perhaps to them, this was nothing more than a facade, a battleground created for their people to gain power and show that they were worthy of claiming some kind of old relic.

‘If that is what they think then it will be hard to reason with them, they might take it as some kind of trial… do they believe that we are some automatons or something?’

Zhang Dong looked at the dead bodies in the badly covered grave but couldn’t see anything out of the ordinary. At least the people that were here weren’t tempered with and their bodies had regular injuries. Demonic cultivators liked using people's bodies as resources but these cultivators were more aligned with orthodox sects like his. They would probably not budge on the moral side either which left overwhelming them with superior might.

“Well then, I should probably make my move…”

If it was the old him he would probably charge into the city and rescue everyone. It wouldn’t be that hard, the strongest person here was only a Martial Saint. All the other powerful masters had retreated to evaluate the situation that he had caused at the border. There was a problem, even if he killed every cultivator there the people wouldn’t really have anything to go to. He would need to somehow transport them out of here or create something that could do it instead of him.

“You’ll have to wait a bit, but don’t worry, I’ll set you all free and you’ll be able to bury your people in peace.”

While the people were captured they were in no immediate danger. The enemies probably needed some slaves to keep the city running and to use it as some type of outpost. Instead of giving away that he was roaming these lands, he had a better idea.

‘If the people from the Heavenly Crane Sect won’t help me and if my own people are busy fighting with those fish people… I just need to make another force, I can’t be everywhere but if I have some backup…’

Further inside at the outskirts of the city there was one location that he was after. It was where a large mine that contained various spirit metals was located. There were many things that he could make with those materials and instead of creating weapons or armor for his troops he had another idea.

“If I don’t have soldiers, I’ll just make them…”