Chapter 13 Sword Character Immortal Palace (1/2)
By this time, Lyu Liang had left Siji Village, nevertheless, the map of Wufang Territory was still of great use to Lyu Liang.
There were five smaller nations within Wufang Territory, namely the nations of Tianshui, Sishui, Qilian, Jiepan and Chilei. Siji Village was actually situated in the insignificant nation of Diqiu at the border of Wufang Territory. There were very few sects within this nation and the strongest of them was lead by a master who had only attained the middle-stage of Nascent Soul.
The most powerful forces within the Wufang Territory was a subdivision of the ”Immortal Allies”, the most powerful force in Mortal Realm. The ”Immortal Allies” was a powerful force which started around 10 thousand years ago. It was formed from the nine Great Luo Celestial in the Mortal Realm. It had subdivisions in the various territories. Not only was it the strongest protecting force in the Mortal Realm, but it was also the department of justice which maintained the balance and peace between the various nations. It was precisely because of the constraints under this Immortal Allies that there was room for smaller nations such as Diqiu to exist.
The focus of the Immortal Allies was the dealings between nations. Basically they did not meddle with matters pertaining to the conflicts between different clans and sects in general. The Immortal Allies division in Wufang Territory was not under the jurisdiction of any particular nation. Although its headquarters was within the nation of Tianshui, it was merely for convenience of use of space.
The most powerful sect of Wufang Territory was also stationed in the nation of Tianshui and it was none other than the ”Xuan Nyu Sect”. It was said that the sect was founded by a powerful female supreme of the human clan who was also one of the contributors in Immortal Allies. From the day the sect was started, she had set the rules for the sect to recruit only talented females, regardless of which clan she came from. Males were strictly prohibited from entering even their gates, with exception of a few prominent male supremes. Until this day, the sect was considered the most powerful suzerain among all the sects in Wufang Territory. Lyu Liang did not research further into this information. There was no point in him trying to get in even if it was the most powerful among the Mortal Realm!
The second most powerful sect was also in the nation of Tianshui and Lyu Liang found out that it possessed all the conditions he was looking for. The name of the sect was Sword Character Immortal Palace, which meant the sect was especially skilled in their sword and characters. It only takes in mortal humans, regardless of gender. The most challenging part of joining the sect was the stringent entry selection. It was rumored that the sect only recruit members once in 10 years and usually there would be numerous candidates who came for the selection, but only around 10 of them would eventually be selected. Apparently, the criteria was extremely difficult to meet. The founder of the sect was in fact a powerful figure in the Immortal Allies and it was said that this powerful figure was a very severe man and was exceptionally demanding on the disciples' Spiritual Root quality and character. From the time the sect was founded, it had always stood by the principle that rather than having many low-quality disciples, they would have fewer but higher quality disciples.
The highest presence in Sword Character Immortal Palace was naturally the Great Luo Celestial, who was also part of Immortal Allies. However, he did not usually concern himself with the matters of the sect, but was merely there by name. The overall leader of the sect at this time was Hunyuan Sword Immortal, who was also a powerful figure, who was a Great Luo Celestial who had attained the Peak standard. There were eight powerful figures of immortal standard, subordinated to him and they were collectively called ”Eight Great Immortals”. With this proportion, the sect was a superior force in the entire Mortal Realm, given the high concentration of powerful figures.
The destination Lyu Liang was flying to at this moment was the nation of Tianshui and his goal was to enter Sword Character Immortal Palace. He was mainly relying on his sword fighting skills to make a living so basically this sect was his first choice. With respect to the third most powerful sect in Wufang Territory, it infuriated Lyu Liang even when he looked at its name. It was none other than the Blood Divine Sector, which had been blacklisted by Lyu Liang in his mind.
As for the rest of the sects that were ranked lower, Lyu Liang thought it was not worth his consideration. He was still reasonably confident of his abilities. After flying for almost a month, he finally bumped into a wave of cultivators for the first time since he left the village. They were a pair of Tao partners. Through them, Lyu Liang received a piece of good news, which was that the Sword Character Immortal Palace would be conducting the entrance selection, which happened once every decade, in three months' time! Going by his current progress, Lyu Liang would arrive at the nation of Tianshui in a month's time, which meant he would have plenty of preparation time!
The pair of Tao partners came from the nation of Chilei; the man's name was Li Zidao and the woman's name was Li Yun'er. Both of them had attained the Peak of Qi Refining and they had come to try their luck this time. When they saw how Lyu Liang's looked like an honest lad who came from a farmer's family, they had a special affinity to him and they invited Lyu Liang to accompany them on their journey.
Xuanyuan Mantra was similar to Devil Reshaping Technique in that it consisted of the method to cultivating aura. Throughout his entire journey, Lyu Liang had been controlling his cultivation at the Peak of Qi Refining. As for the Devil Qi, he did not allow any of it to leak out.
Lyu Liang was happy to comply as he did not think they would be able to see through him. After flying for a month, they arrived at the nation of Tianshui one month and a half before the recruitment ceremony. As they approached the nation of Tianshui, they met with more and more cultivators which consisted of most candidates who had reached Foundation Establishment and Qi Refining stage. They were likely heading to the Sword Character Immortal Palace.
Once they entered the Tianshui, Lyu Liang and the pair of cultivators went their separate ways, because there was this part of him he did not want to be revealed. Moreover, he had wanted to go around the place before the recruitment ceremony to see if he might stumble upon something he could buy which could be helpful to him.
Lyu Liang asked around and without much effort, he found the most famous market place in Tianshui where he gathered information as well as acquired treasures. It was truly worth making a trip to that market place. Lyu Liang did not waste any time in getting there.
The market place was as good as how people described it to be, being crowded with many people, among whom were many cultivators in the stages of Qi Refining and Foundation Establishment. Since Lyu Liang had achieved the early-stage of Gold Core in terms of his Divine Sense. Those cultivator's whose level of cultivation he was unable to discern would have at least achieved the stage of Nascent Soul and above.
Apart from the larger-scale shops along the streets, there were numerous smaller individual stalls the cultivators freely traded with. The busy scene reminded Lyu Liang of the seasonal market in Qingluo Town he used to frequent.
After asking around, Lyu Liang entered a building named ”Tianshui Court” which was said to Tianshui's most well-known shop. The moment Lyu Liang entered the building, he was immediately drawn to a loud sound.
”Come over quickly! Come over quickly! Here's the manual for the entrance test to Sword Character Immortal Palace's recruitment ceremony! Don't miss it! Selling for 500 lower grade Primordial Stones!” While Lyu Liang could hear the voice, he could not see the person shouting because the entire place was crowded with cultivators.
Some of them were complaining that the manual was too expensive. One could use the 500 lower grade Primordial Stones to buy a magic treasure for Middle-stage Qi Refining! However, those people complaining were among the crowd, trying to get to manual!