Chapter 93 - Leaving Years of her Life (2/2)
Looting a corpse... The corpse of an ally or a friend would be a big taboo unless the circ.u.mstances were a matter of life and death, however Elder Zhu could not be considered an ally anymore by neither her nor Fen Wudao.
The young man was the first to reach the Elder's mangled body and his bag of holding. After peering through its contents with his divine sense, he emitted a single condition.
”You can't take any artefacts. They were all linked to Zhu Yunhai and although they are now masterless, the Elders must have ways to find you through them.”
Shin Sumi shook her head, ”I am not interested in those. I simply want to see what kind of techniques he had.”
Making her way to the bag of holding, Shin Sumi held her hand open, materializing the bag's contents onto her palm one by one. Nuan was quick to appear, resting on Shin Sumi's shoulder, seemingly intrigued by her master's actions.
On the interior though, Shin Sumi was very proud of Nuan. The little Lion Bat had read her thoughts.
”Take a look, little Nuan, I'm sure you'll find that very interesting” she thought silently.
In under two minutes, Shin Sumi had read the few scrolls and spiritual jades that interested her, making sure Nuan had done so as well.
Next to her, Fen Wudao was silent. He didn't even consider the Lion Bat's presence, simply looking at his Junior Sister. He understood what she wanted to do but even for somebody of her talent, learning techniques by a single glance was impossible. Or maybe she was just looking for inspiration.
”That is what I thought,” said Shin Sumi getting up from her crouching position, ”all of these are too high of a level for me. If only I had a few days to try and learn something... Oh well, it was worth a try.”
Convincing enough, she thought. Hopefully Nuan had time to absorb all of the techniques for her to refine later.
Shin Sumi was about to depart from the Affairs Pavilion and bid farewell to her Ghost Brother, leaving the sect for who knew how long. Only before she did so, she realized one last thing.
”Hummm Senior Brother? Would you mind leaving early?”
Fen Wudao's eyebrows lifted, curious. Did she want him to leave so she could forgo his advice and loot the dead Elder some more? Maybe some artefact had caught her eye?
”Actually I think it's best if you leave now as well, we don't want any trou-
-I agree but my robes... I need to change before I leave, so...”
”This is goodbye then... From then on you will have to face the Sky Earth Sect alone, Seventh Sister. I wish you a good journey and success in your mission, the Ghost Pavilion is relying on you.”
Getting his footing straight and his emotions in order, Fen Wudao flushed the red from his face as he gave Shin Sumi a last few words of encouragement. Exchanging a deep bow with her, he then hopped onto his silver winged arrow, leaving in a discrete streak across the sky.
Shin Sumi changed robes quickly and efficiently. What would have happened, had she not realized it? Any disciple from the lower valley crossing paths with her would have seen her torn garments covered in her own blood.
But now, she was looking like Shin Sumi, like any female disciple of the lower valley, completely anonymous.
She exited the Affairs Pavilion quietly, making use of the fact that no disciple was around to get some distance between her and Elder Zhu's residence by using her Liquid Realm speed, which made her look like a blur to any Honorary Disciple her divine sense could have missed.
Soon, Shin Sumi was at the gates of the lower valley. If her calculations were correct, the barrier in the Affairs Pavilion was about to break open.
She gave a quick glance back at the lower valley. She remembered vividly the first time she saw the Immortal paradise, as it seemed to her at the time.
Her first day in the sect, she remembered thinking about how big it was, and yet now with her powers she could run through it faster than any mortal ever could.
”Now is not the time to reminisce. I need to leave the whole sect before somebody decides to lock down all access to the valleys.”
Shin Sumi disappeared under the third gate, the highest one. Between the second and the third was where the magical Foggy Maze was located, in order to test newcomers on their ability to sense Shinsoo.
Thankfully, the identification jade inside her bag of holding ensures that she didn't have to go through the maze this time.
It was one of her worries but Fen Wudao had cleared it for her. The maze sensed who came through, but there was no way for the Elders to know who the maze recognized, fortunately.
Only the Patriarch had this kind of knowledge, and Shin Sumi knew he would ascertain it was Bai Fulong who last left the lower valley.
Cloaking her presence with a temporary Hiding Formation, she quickly passed the plaza where the talent test stone was located. The disciple in charge didn't even notice somebody had gone through.
There was now only one gate left before the open world. Once she was at the end of the stairs, she would be at the foot of the Blue Fire mountain range.
This time Shin Sumi didn't look back towards the sect. She had spent four years in the sect, whereas the mortal kingdoms seemed like a distant memory.
The fourteen years old girl who Fen Wudao brought here only had one thought at the time, leaving East Seaside Village and becoming a librarian with her Second Uncle in the big city.
Unfortunately for her dreams, she had learned that reading books was not enough to become a cultivator. Fighting, training, killing... The life of a cultivator was tumultuous.
”To think that I couldn't become a librarian and read books my entire life because of you, Nuan. The irony of the Heavens, you ARE a book. And a cute little Lion Bat of course.”
The more Shin Sumi progressed down the stairs, the more she could feel the ambient Shinsoo diminish in quality and quantity.
At the foot of the stairs, the air felt so muddy to her that it almost caused a physical pain. Having bathed in the Shinsoo from a cultivation sect for so long, the normal Shinsoo levels of the mortal realms were absurdly low.
It took quite a while for her to get accustomed to it, by which point the Blue Fire mountain range's peaks were distant and disappearing from her sight in the clouds.
From high hills, the nature around her turned to luxurious forests. At long last, Shin Sumi had been advancing for almost an hour when she spotted a man-made trail on the ground.
”If I follow this trail to the west, I am bound to find paths and roads. It will lead me to mortal cities.”
Shin Sumi honestly wished she hadn't fallen asleep on her first trip with Fen Wudao. Maybe she would have been able to recognize which direction they came from. No matter her level of cultivation, Shin Sumi was in a location completely unknown to her.
Was her home village far? She only knew it bordered the Silver Sea and that the Blue Fire mountain range was at the east of it.
The forest path was getting a bit bigger, with traces of horse hooves in the dirt, when Shin Sumi suddenly stopped. A few hundred meters ahead, two presence had appeared in her divine sense.