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Chapter 222 – Spies, Space, and Speed
🕑 Added 2025-03-20 03:02:46 +0000 UTCA/N 3/19/25: Bonus chapter 2 of 2. Thank you all so much for your support!
Fu Qingshan sat in his hiding spot near the road outside the main entrance to Sixth Flawless Flowing City. He’d meticulously pulled branches and leaves around himself, and the technique he used to mask his qi was at Mastery. Additionally, his sect supplied a treasure that further concealed his presence.
With his spyglass, he could see the road, but even though he was only in the middle of the Foundation Establishment realm, no one aside from a Golden Core cultivator specializing in detection or a Nascent Soul would ever be able to see or detect him.
Day after day, week after week, month after month, he spent all his duty hours alone in that location or one similar. Which was exactly how he liked it. No one bothered him. He could cultivate or read or do whatever he wanted as long as he kept watch with his spiritual sense.
Best of all, he earned lots of contribution points for performing his crucial task.
As the grandson of a sect elder, he’d been tested on the fourteenth anniversary of his birth, and he’d expected nothing less than an A+ rank as was his right as the young master of his house. When he’d tested as only a D-, he’d been crushed. He went to his grandfather, fully anticipating being disowned.
Instead, Grandfather had given Fu Qingshan sage advice. “Grandson, as fruit of my lineage, your spiritual roots qualify you, barely, for admission into our Jade Chameleon Sect, but you will never amount to much. Put aside thoughts of being an unbeatable warrior or formations master or alchemy expert. Find something that is useful to the sect that few people can or will do and specialize in that thing. In that way, you’ll bring honor to yourself and our family.”
Fu Qingshan had taken that guidance to heart. After three and a half years in the Qi Gathering realm and over twenty as a Foundation Establishment cultivator, he’d mastered many, many techniques. And all of them worked together to make him the best in the sect at hiding, detecting messages flying past, intercepting and copying those messages, and sending them on their way with no one the wiser.
He could barely swing a sword without injuring himself. His ability to cultivate was lacking. None of the pavilions wanted him as a member. But in the area of spying on messages sent by other factions, he was an expert, and that service he performed for the sect was deemed critical by the elders.
In the last year, not a single message going in or out of the city while he was on duty had slipped past him. Well, to the best of his knowledge or as best anyone in his sect could determine, anyway. It was possible that someone had a message technique with enough stealth to avoid his detection. He doubted it, though.
His grandfather had recently honored him at a family dinner, and it had felt so good to be the one on the receiving end of that praise instead of his idiot cousin. So what if she had B roots? Had she been assigned a critical mission like he had?
No. No, she hadn’t.
He would always remember the look on her face that night, at least partially because he kept picturing it over and over and over at every opportunity. And as he continued reminiscing about that evening, he pulsed out his senses every minute or so until he finally detected … something.
Like his every other skill, he’d honed his spiritual sense to detect the minute qi fluctuations typical of messages. So specialized was he that he couldn’t tell a Qi Gathering cultivator from a Golden Core.
Well, that example might have been a bit of an exaggeration but not much of one.
A message approaching the city, though? He could pick one of those up a mile away.
The blip he detected was strange, though. It appeared, disappeared, and appeared again closer to him, repeating that pattern over and over. And it moved faster than any message he’d ever sensed.
Besides those two anomalies, the signature of the blip definitely felt like a message.
Fu Qingshan determined that his best course of action was to treat the moving object as if it were a legitimate target. Better to do that and discover it was something else entirely than to ignore it and let a message past.
As it neared, he finally spotted it through his spyglass—a blue origami dragon, if an oddly shaped one.
He reached out with his capture technique, one he’d reached Mastery in years ago. One that never failed. As his qi extended toward the dragon, however, the slip of blue folded paper disappeared.
Fu Qingshan bolted upright, ruining the camouflage provided by the branches around him, but he no longer cared about being discovered. The only thing that mattered was not letting the message get away.
There. The dragon reappeared a couple hundred yards farther down the road, and he quickly sent out his qi again. Before it could reach, though, the message disappeared again, and the next time it reappeared, it was already inside the wall.
He’d missed one. And who knew how important whatever was written on that dragon was? The whole sect was in an uproar over recent events. Now was the absolute worst time possible to miss a message.
It wasn’t his fault, though. Someone must have known he was there. A message that traveled that fast and used Spatial qi to teleport? Who could afford the expense of such a thing. They’d surely designed the technique specifically to counter his ability.
Grandfather would be so disappointed. Fu Qingshan could only hope that his cousin wasn’t around to hear about his failure.
###
Kang Ya-Ting sipped from a cup of tea, one of his favorite blends, as he contemplated the current political situation. Everyone was lying low, waiting for someone else to make a move, to err. Word of Fatty Ren joining the Rising Tide Sect had, of course, caused quite a stir, moving the Swift Blizzard Sect slightly toward the Jade Chameleons and the Emperor’s faction slightly toward the side of the alliance between Chao Su and the Poison Claw Sect.
The whole situation was becoming fraught. A single wrong move might cause an all-out sect war. And right now, no one wanted to be the one to make that mistake.
As he tried to determine the best way for his sect to come out on top in such a scenario, the weirdest thing happened. A blue origami dragon appeared right in front of him. One moment it wasn’t there. The next, it was.
Messages were typically stopped by the formations surrounding his cultivation room and funneled to his assistant. Of course, most messages didn’t utilize Spatial qi.
“Chao Su,” he muttered. “It has to be.”
Kang Ya-Ting reached out for the dragon, and it landed in his hand. As soon as it did, the paper unfolded itself. It also deposited a second sheet of folded blue paper into his palm.
Apparently, Chao Su’s message required a response.
Friend Kang,
I find myself having a hard time making a decision and wondered if you might advise me.
The sect is of need of a few trifling materials that might be found for purchase in Sixth Flawless Flowing City, but I am unfortunately needed here to take care of a number of projects. My disciples, Yang Xiu and Yang Ru, have volunteered, along with your granddaughter, to run this minor errand for me.
On one hand, the task would be good for the juniors, giving them experience in finding items, negotiating prices, etc. Skills they will need later in their careers.
Frankly, though, I worry about their safety. This old man is having a difficult time thinking of ones so young as anything but children requiring protection. With the regrettable situation that occurred between me and the Jade Chameleon Sect, I worry that they might encounter overwhelming force during their journey.
Don’t get me wrong; my juniors can handle themselves against opponents similar in realm, but I’d hate to see them have to fight against a large group of opponents or a cultivator who was much higher than them in realm.
What are your thoughts on this matter?
I thank you for any guidance you may provide.
- Friend Su
P.S. Please use the message paper that I provided for your response.
As always, Chao Su proved himself not to be simple with his every action. Kang Ya-Ting couldn’t wait to discover what trifling materials the enigmatic sect leader might require. They were sure to be something quite interesting if he was considering sending his prize disciples into danger to obtain them.
For once, though, Kang Ya-Ting didn’t feel there were hidden meanings in the rest of the letter. From what he knew of Chao Su, the man really did feel strongly for his disciples and would risk much to keep them safe.
The other interesting part of the note was the end. Why did Chao Su insist that his message paper be used? Did he believe the Poison Claw Sect’s messages to be compromised?
If so, that portended dire things. The elder in charge of espionage had guaranteed that messages sent via their technique could not be intersected. If Chao Su believed otherwise, though, perhaps the elder spymaster was mistaken. Which meant a lot of important information might be in the hands of their enemies. Most of the truly crucial missives were, of course, encoded, but enough wasn’t that such a leak could be very damaging indeed.
Kang Ya-Ting would have to inform Elder Dai, the branch sect leader, of his suspicions. But first, he’d respond to Chao Su’s message.
Friend Su,
No formal declaration of war has been made by the Jade Chameleon Sect against the Rising Tide Sect. Absent that declaration, rules of the city demand that your sect members not be attacked by overwhelming force while inside the walls. Likewise, such an attack would be a huge loss of face for the Jade Chameleon Sect.
An attack like you fear on your disciples would make them appear desperate, a huge further hit to their face. If news of such an attack got out, any faint hopes they have of finding an alliance would fade to nothing.
The situation in the city is not, by any means, safe for your disciples. If the Jade Chameleons discover your disciples’ presence, they will be attacked by a reasonable force of like realmed cultivators and taunted by higher realms. If your disciples give into those taunts, any aggressive action will give the higher realmed cultivators cause to attack.
Should you choose to proceed, I highly recommend that you assign Kang Lin charge over your disciples while they are on the mission. She will understand the situation and not give into anger or temptation. With your authority backing her, your disciples will hopefully see reason and follow her lead.
Though the danger is present, there is a reasonable chance that your disciples can accomplish their task without suffering a defeat. The Poison Claw Sect will support them and you in any way that we can, but I can neither recommend that you proceed nor that you abandon the mission. Only you can make that determination.
Best to you,
- Friend Kang
Kang Ya-Ting sighed. He had no issue sending his granddaughter into such a situation. Losing her would be … painful, but as a cultivator, she had to learn to take care of herself in challenging circumstances. It was the same with Chao Su’s prize disciples. If they could not navigate a difficult state of affairs, were they really even prize disciples in the first place?
###
Benton received a response less than an hour after sending the message to Kang Ya-Ting. The space messenger dragons really were overpowered in the speed category compared to what everyone else used. Which was why Benton sent the paper for the reply. Otherwise, he would have had to wait hours to hear back.
Now that he’d read the response, though, he was just as unsure about his decision as he had been.
Well, that wasn’t strictly true. Kang Ya-Ting’s words regarding the societal rules governing the situation helped as did the assurances that the Poison Claw Sect would assist to the degree possible.
Still, Yang Xiu and Yang Ru would be headed into a potentially deadly situation. Benton hated to risk their lives like that, no matter the importance of their mission or the opportunities for experience that it provided. On the other hand, a parent had to shoo their little birdies out of the nest at some point.
Should he send them or not?
