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Chapter 209 – Dominant
🕑 Added 2025-03-04 01:49:40 +0000 UTCA/N 3/3/25: That moment when you're trying to get a chapter posted and you keep adding and changing and deleting and revising...
Fatty Ren balanced awkwardly on the flying sword—his flying sword—as he made his way straight toward Sixth Flawless Flowing City, thanking his lucky stars that Sect Leader Chao Su had sought a consultation for a favor before simply departing to the city on his own.
That would have been a disaster.
When he had mentioned going there to, of all things, buy furniture, Fatty Ren had nearly choked. For a sect leader to do such a menial task on his own would be a huge loss of face. The new sect, like any sect trying to get started, began on shaky ground, and while it was okay for a leader to be a bit eccentric, it was not alright for him to act like a servant.
Sure, fly to the city to destroy something, to deliver vengeance, and while you’re there, casually do some shopping. That was fine. It showed strength, like laying waste to an entire sect branch was just another thing to tick off a list.
But to go to the city for the sole purpose of shopping? Such a mission was beneath the dignity of a sect leader.
Upon hearing the plan, Fatty Ren had had to think fast, which was not one of his strengths. Luckily, the sect leader bought the story about not further upsetting the Jade Chameleon Sect by showing his face near the spot of their defeat.
The best untruths were the ones that had the benefit of being partially true. That lesson was one of the first ones Fatty Ren had learned in his old sect.
Of course, telling the truth was even better as it left no lie to be found out, but there was no way to give the sect leader the actual reason without sounding insulting. Maybe even without actually being insulting.
Things had turned out fine, though. Even better than Fatty Ren could have hoped. For one, sending a Golden Core cultivator, even a newly minted one, to run such an errand showed strength. For another, it allowed him to begin showing his usefulness as a sect member. The resources expended on him, from the cultivation method to the techniques to the flying sword to the opportunity to take the trial, were priceless, so the sooner he could demonstrate his value, the better.
He may not be as talented as Chao Su’s top disciples, but none of them were Golden Core. None of them could make the trip so quickly.
Honestly, hearing the sect leader’s plan to perform such menial task himself had shaken Fatty Ren’s confidence in his new sect for a moment. But only for a brief moment. Between a Trials Pagoda that could push a cultivator past a bottleneck and top heaven grade cultivation methods and techniques, he definitely wanted to be a part of whatever Chao Su was building.
Still, the complete disregard the sect leader showed to decorum was cause for some concern, and Fatty Ren had to spend quite some time thinking about the reasons behind the move.
From the perspective of an old monster like Chao Su, what did it matter if some weak Nascent Souls thought you were strange for doing the shopping yourself? True strength was doing what you wanted when you wanted and not caring what anyone else thought.
An act that for anyone else would demonstrate weakness only showed Chao Su’s strength!
The problem was that the other sects didn’t truly understand yet just how powerful the sect leader was, and until they did, it would be much better to observe the rules. To play politics.
Fatty Ren was just going to have to do his best to watch out for any problems that may arise. After all, twenty years of being Town Lord had taught him some things about dealing with the Big Three.
The other thing that had at first shaken his belief in his new sect was when he’d been asked to recruit tras— been asked to recruit less talented people. After consideration, though, he realized that the sect wasn’t as different from other sects as he’d believed.
Did the sect leader truly value a peasant with an F talent as highly as one from a noble background with a C or even higher?
No. No, he didn’t. Not at all.
There were some sect members with low talent in leadership positions, but Fatty Ren was pretty sure that was just because the sect didn’t have enough members with better spiritual roots yet. After all, every sect member who did have good roots was also considered a leader, exactly as he would have expected.
In fact, the whole letting E and F roots join the sect made a lot of sense. An established sect already had scores of Foundation Establishment cultivators doing the majority of the grunt work in each of the pavilions. The Rising Tide Sect needed those cultivators as well.
For most sects, even those just starting out, pouring any resources at all into E and F cultivators would be the height of stupidity. The vast majority of those people would only reach mid Qi Gathering at best. A tiny percentage would advance to Foundation Establishment, but the amount of food and pills and training time it would take to have enough people make the attempt would be ruinous compared to the small gains made.
None of those conditions applied to Chao Su, though. He had the Trials Pagoda and top heaven grade cultivation methods and techniques. It would not surprise Fatty Ren if literally every low talent sect member made it to the middle of Foundation Establishment and mastered several useful techniques over their lifetimes.
The sect leader was making logical use of his resources.
Fatty Ren was almost positive the kindly old grandfather persona was all an act to hide that he was a cultivator who was as shrewd as they came. Almost positive wasn’t positive, though. Until he had proof, he’d treat all the sect members, especially Chao Su’s favorites, like they were the most important elder in a Big Three sect.
Thinking about Chao Su’s methods being taken to their logical conclusion didn’t just reassure Fatty Ren that the Rising Tide Sect would be just fine. No. It convinced him that the sect would eventually dominate all sects on the continent, maybe even the world.
With no limit on the number of Foundation Establishment cultivators that could be produced, the sect would outproduce everyone, and that wealth would bring talented individuals by the drove. Providing top tier recruits with top tier cultivation methods and techniques and giving them access to the Trial Pagoda to propel them past bottlenecks meant that every D rank and above was more likely than not to advance to Golden Core. And the more Golden Cores a sect produced, the more Nascent Souls they ended up with, especially when bottlenecks were no issue.
Whether through luck of skill, Fatty Ren had found a really good thing. He just had to work to keep it.
Out of sight of the city well before he reached the city gates, he descended to the ground, stored his flying sword in his spatial ring, and walked the rest of the way while trying to figure a way around a particularly difficult problem—he had no idea where any shops were, much less ones where he could get the quality merchandise he needed.
He sighed. Though he’d been to the city many times, that had been more than two decades ago, and even then, he’d only visited other sects. Not for the first time, he wished that the Righteous Rain Sect had kept a sect branch in the city.
Their main grounds in Vermilion Incomparable Rain Town were so near that the elders had decided the expense of a branch wasn’t worth the gain. Instead, they’d went all out in furnishing their main grounds and invited the representatives from the other Big Four Sects to visit there.
If not for their frugality, many more than five sect members would have survived that night.
Such thoughts didn’t help with his immediate problem, though, which was how to find stores from which to purchase the long list of items requested by the sect leader. And not only that, but to find a way to convert spirit coins to silver taels where necessary.
Fatty Ren had only the vaguest notion where to begin, and that was a problem because he had promised to return to the village the next day. Which left him with only one solution—ask Kang Ya-Ting of the Poison Claw Sect for help.
That answer came with its own problem, though. Fatty Ren was once again a representative of a sect. And sect members couldn’t ask other sects for help without both losing face and obligating their sect to a debt.
The good thing was that acting as the Town Lord wasn’t all that different than representing a sect. Though the Big Three had pledged support for him after the destruction of the Righteous Rain Sect, he still had some experience not accepting debt he didn’t want to pay, so he knew the best way to avoid it was to make it seem like you were the one doing the other guy a favor.
He bypassed the line at the gate and, seeking to attract as little notice as possible, registered himself as a Town Lord. From there, he went directly to the Poison Claw Sect branch and asked for the elder. Given his status as a member of the City Lord’s faction, he was quickly granted access.
“Greetings, Lord Fatty Ren. Welcome. And congratulations of your advancement to Golden Core.”
“Gratitude, Elder Kang Ya-Ting.”
The pleasantries lasted for a while as they each drank a cup of tea. Fatty Ren talked up the elder’s granddaughter, not even having to feign praise as the girl had made a positive impression upon her visit to Vermilion Incomparable Rain Town. Kang Ya-Ting in turn discussed recent gossip, a lot of which involved the Rising Tide Sect.
Fatty Ren kept silent about his membership, and eventually the niceties wound down, with the elder got politely asking the purpose of the visit.
“This one is in the city to complete a mission for my new sect leader, Chao Su, and have come to you as a courtesy so that my movements do not generate further problems for you.”
Kang Ya-Ting didn’t appear surprised by the news. “Of course. This one appreciates the information. Best not to be taken by surprise by a move by our ally, the Rising Tide Sect.”
Fatty Ren cupped his hands.
“May this one enquire as to the nature of the mission?” Kang Ya-Ting said. “The destruction of any additional part of the city is not imminent, is it?”
Fatty Ren chuckled. “This lowly one is newly ascended to Golden Core and does not possess nearly the power of the unfathomable Chao Su. So no, nothing as exciting as that. In fact, my mission is quite ordinary. The sect leader sent me to buy furniture and practice weapons suitable for those in the Foundation Establishment realm.”
So far, so good. He’d framed the visit as a courtesy and only mentioned his task after being asked about it specifically.
The elder got a speculative look on his face. “When you checked in at the gate, did you do so as the Town Lord?”
“I did.”
“No mention of your new sect affiliation?” Kang Ya-Ting said.
“None at all.”
“And you came straight here?”
There were two ways for the Poison Claw Sect to play the situation. One, openly declare Fatty Ren’s new allegiance and task, letting his status as a Golden Core cultivator convey the strength of the Rising Tide Sect. Or two, try to minimize Fatty Ren’s presence in the town.
From the questions, Kang Ya-Ting had apparently decided upon the latter. Which was just fine with Fatty Ren even if he didn’t completely understand the reason for the decision.
“I did not talk to a single person as I walked through the town,” Fatty Ren said, “and I made sure to get off my flying sword well prior to reaching the city wall.”
Kang Ya-Ting smiled slightly. “I was thinking. You’re probably tired from your trip, and it would do my juniors well to experience purchasing items necessary for establishing a sect. A mutually beneficial arrangement might be for me to have my people do your shopping for you.”
Another common feature of sect life was avoiding saying what one actually meant.
“If that is what the elder wishes,” Fatty Ren said, “I take no issue with that plan.”
Both sides ended up happy, and neither owed a debt to the other. Politics could be complicated, but they served an important purpose.
The end result was fantastic for him. While he ate, napped, and cultivated, juniors from the Poison Claw Sect took his spirit coins and purchased everything on the list he’d been provided. It was the easiest sect mission he’d ever completed.
Not that he’d tell Sect Leader Chao Su that particular detail.
Comments
RedFaux
Nah, Chaonten would appreciate it
