Hidden moth

Chapter 314 Success Lies in Taking the First Step

As they walked out of the Ancestral Hall, Zhao Sanjin waved his hand and said, "I'll leave you here!"

The group bowed and clasped their hands in unison, saying, "Respectfully bidding farewell to Ancestor Zhao!"

Zhao Sanjin darted across the stone archway and stood on the stone bridge, glancing back into the distance. He Kao happened to look up in that direction and briefly met Zhao Zu's gaze. Suddenly, his vision blurred…

When he came to his senses, he found himself in another mountain wilderness, unable to distinguish whether it was a real scene or an illusion.

Upon closer inspection, he realized that the environment here was quite familiar to him. It was the valley in the Bashan Medicinal Garden that was full of Phoenix Feathers. In the center of the valley were two Dragon Bone Branches, each over ten feet tall, both of which were already mature medicinal herbs.

This must be a scene from some point in the past.

It felt like time travel... but he was, after all, a fifth-level cultivator, and he immediately realized what was happening. At this moment, he wasn't traversing space; it was a communication between his primordial spirits, which meant Zhao Sanjin was using some kind of powerful divine ability.

In this situation, Zhao Sanjin stood beside him, looking towards the valley, and said, "Don't be nervous, I mean you no harm. I just want to talk to you alone. Is this where you were ambushed by assassins?"

He Kao quickly turned to the side and replied, "Yes, the details are exactly as Elder Jiang described."

Zhao Sanjin: "Zheng Yisi doesn't know I've arrived, so you don't need to tell him. If there's a suitable opportunity, please ask him for me—does he still remember the saying, 'Only cultivation continues, and this is my wish'?"

He Kao: "Zheng Yisi, is he your grand-disciple and Zhao Ci's master?"

Zhao Sanjin: "Yes, it's him."

He Kao: "What constitutes a suitable opportunity?"

Zhao Sanjin: "Whenever you think is appropriate, that's when it will be."

He Kao: "Okay, I've got it." He had a vague idea of ​​Zhao Sanjin's intention. This sentence might be a hint to Zheng Yisi, but Zhao Sanjin did not want to show up to see Zheng Yisi.

Zhao Sanjin turned to look at him and said, "I want to say both apology and thanks! You are special, you give me an indescribable feeling, maybe this is fate."

I owe you a favor from yesterday, and I'm afraid I'll owe you another one tomorrow. So today, only you need to see my school badge clearly to know; please don't tell anyone else.

These words were somewhat inexplicable, and they must have been implying something. Just as He Kao was about to speak, his vision blurred again, and when he looked up again, he was "back" in the Startling Flower Cave.

He, Jiang Daozhen, and Guo Qianhuai were standing in front of the Ancestral Hall, bowing and watching Zhao Sanjin leave.

Zhao Sanjin walked across the stone archway onto the stone bridge, turned back in the distance, and made eye contact with him. Then he turned around, took off, and disappeared from sight.

Zhao Sanjin flew away, and the scene just now seemed as if it had never happened.

“He didn’t use any flying artifact. He already possesses this ability at the eighth level of cultivation. Today, I finally witnessed it with my own eyes.” Seeing He Kao still standing there in a daze, Jiang Daozhen patted him on the shoulder and said.

Wei Luo's voice rang out: "Master, once you break through to the eighth level of cultivation, will you be able to fly too?"

Jiang Daozhen: "We'll have to actually break through to the eighth rank first."

He Kao seemed a little slow to react, and only then did he dazedly ask, "Esteemed elders, did you see the school badge on Zhao Zu's chest?"

Guo Qianhuai asked in bewilderment, "School badge? What school badge? I couldn't even see his clothes clearly!"

Jiang Daozhen frowned and said, "I didn't see the details clearly either, but the style looks like a school uniform, and there seems to be a pattern on the left chest, which should be the school badge... It's a pity that I can't see it clearly, it looks like there's a thin layer of censorship."

Thin code? That's a rather old term; it seems he's quite experienced. But He Kao didn't dare say anything more. It seemed that, as Zhao Sanjin said, only he had clearly seen the other person's school uniform and school badge.

This was a clue that Zhao Zu deliberately left for him. Based on this clue, he should be able to find out which school it was, and then find out Zhao Sanjin's current identity...

At this moment, Jiang Daozhen called out, "Xiao Kao, come with me to the Ancestral Hall now to collect the Pure Yang Pill and the matching Peony. According to regulations, you need to collect it in person."

"You'll stay in the Awakening Flower Cave for a while afterward. When you leave, claim you've finished taking the elixir to avoid further trouble."

Jiang Daozhen couldn't fly, and he even walked at the speed of an ordinary person. He walked through the basin towards the entrance of the cave, with He Kao following behind him.

Zhao Zu had just realized that Jiang Daozhen was undergoing a complete transformation, but in that situation, He Kao couldn't use his divine sense to investigate Jiang Daozhen's condition.

Upon closer inspection, he discovered that Jiang Daozhen did indeed have some issues. To be precise, his life force was somewhat abnormal, elusive, and neither human nor non-human... As for the specifics, his cultivation level was far from sufficient to understand.

As they entered the valley between the two mountains, the winding path became increasingly rugged. He Kao finally couldn't help but ask, "You're undergoing a complete transformation, what exactly does it feel like?"

Jiang Daozhen countered, "Why don't you ask me—how did I attain the Bone Transformation Tribulation?"

He Kao: "So how did you take this step?"

Jiang Daozhen then countered with, "What do you think?"

Communicating with this great fortune teller can sometimes feel like a slow, laggy experience, as if the bandwidth is limited or the internet speed is insufficient. This is because he doesn't usually say things out loud, and you always have to guess.

He Kao already had experience with this, and knew that it didn't matter if he guessed wrong, because he could give hints through affirmative or negative answers.

So he asked, "The recent series of arrangements targeting the Xiaomeng, were they the advancement ceremony you designed?"

Jiang Daozhen: "At my level, there are no fixed rules for cultivation, but it is acceptable for you to understand it in such a vulgar way. Because the cultivation level of the Spiritual Rhinoceros Technique must be verified by actual events."

He Kao: "Taking down Master Danqiu and his disciples and finding the Eight Trigrams Purple Gold Furnace will be the opportunity for you to break through your cultivation barrier?"

Jiang Daozhen: "You could say that, but it was just a starting point. If we have to talk about an advancement ceremony, then that's not the main point."

He Kao: "What is it?"

Jiang Daozhen's face hardened: "What do you think?"

He Kao slapped his forehead. He really shouldn't have asked that. After thinking for a moment, he tentatively asked, "The announcement from the Clan Court?"

Jiang Daozhen finally showed a satisfied expression and nodded, saying, "That's right! So, in your opinion, why did the Clan Law Hall issue such an announcement, what impact will it have on the Free Alliance, and what should be done next?"

He Kao guessed correctly. Jiang Daozhen's main scheme was the announcement issued by the Clan Law Hall... Before this, many disciples of the Arts Sect were completely unaware of the existence of the Free Alliance, or rather, they did not understand this organization.

There have always been many independent cultivators scattered outside the sects of magic, but the sects have never paid them any attention, let alone targeted them for suppression. The reason is simple: as long as they can break through to a higher level of cultivation, they can sense the call of the grotto-heaven and thus return to the sect.

Even many high-ranking figures in the current martial arts world have this background.

The Spell Sect has never actively regarded the Free Alliance as an enemy, but the Free Alliance is different; they have always regarded the Spell Sect as a hypothetical enemy.

Due to the influence of the grotto-heaven, the high-level sorcerers in the Free Alliance must know about the existence of the sorcery sect, but they lack a deep enough understanding of it, and many of them live in information cocoons.

Since the summoning of the grotto heavens was unavoidable, the higher-ups of the Free Alliance created a whole system of cognition, demonizing the Sect Law Hall and the various sects of magic, and telling their members that the Free Alliance and the sects of magic were inherently hostile.

In their propaganda, the Spell Sect is evil, constantly persecuting and oppressing the disciples of the Free Alliance, and everything the Spell Sect possesses should belong to the Free Alliance.

This kind of awareness should be cultivated from the very first day of accepting apprentices, teaching them to take it upon themselves to overturn the traditional art.

A further tactic employed by the higher-ups of the Free Alliance was to cultivate trusted disciples who, under the guise of receiving summons from the grotto-heavens, would conceal their identities and infiltrate the sect...

The recent actions of the Xiaomeng against the Shumen seem sudden, but upon closer examination, they are not unexpected. At least Jiang Daozhen had anticipated that they were driven by multiple factors.

First, the Xiaomeng believed that it was strong enough and had enough internal intelligence to take action.

Even if it cannot overthrow the sect in one fell swoop, it can at least severely damage the sect, achieve the major result of seizing the Jinghua Cave, strike at the authority of the Zongfa Hall and cause it to collapse, and destroy the sect's future hope, such as eliminating Mei Guyu.

On the other hand, a deeper reason is that due to the progress of the times and the changing trends of the world, especially the changes made by the Zongfa Hall in response to the times, the development model of Xiaomeng has become unsustainable and its foundation has been shaken.

If the Free Alliance is not to collapse, its leaders must find a way to destroy the Clan Law Hall and overthrow the Technique Sect.

However, most of the other members of the Free Alliance were innocent; they had neither committed any crimes nor done anything wrong to the Magic Sect.

To give a concrete example, consider He Kao. If he hadn't met Jiang Daozhen and others, he would have been completely unaware of the existence of the magic sect from a young age. Instead, a senior member of the Xiaomeng discovered that he was a promising talent and took him as a disciple to teach him magic techniques.

So, would He Kao refuse? No normal person would refuse; who wouldn't yearn to possess the legendary magical abilities? So, He Kao would become a sorcerer of the Free Alliance... But was he wrong?
Geng Yanxin is an infiltrator of the Xiaomeng. He has been exposed, but how many others are still at large? And how should the Zongfa Hall deal with the even larger number of Xiaomeng disciples?
The announcement from the ancestral hall is the answer, and it's a blatant and overt scheme.

Its core principle is to disregard the sorcerer's origins and only assess their conduct. Even sorcerers from the Free Alliance will not be punished if they have not committed any crimes.

The sorcerers of the Free Alliance can still return to the sect, the only requirement being that they must no longer conceal their origins. Those Free Alliance disciples who have already infiltrated the sect must confess their identities to the sect.

While an announcement is a good thing, it needs the right timing and background. More importantly, there needs to be a way to ensure that as many disciples of the Free Alliance as possible can see it.

If the information doesn't get out, or if it gets out but no one believes it, it's ineffective. But if these two things are done, it can deal a devastating blow to the Xiaomeng...

That was He Kao's answer. After finishing, he asked, "How many points would my analysis be?"

Jiang Daozhen smiled and said, "Since it's an open strategy, it's meant to be clear to everyone. You've already hit the nail on the head eight or nine parts. As for the remaining one or two parts, that depends on how it's implemented."

A lot has happened during this period, and some details have not yet been made public. Within each sect, there are agents of the Free Alliance who have admitted their identities and are currently being investigated by the Sect Law Hall. Most of them have not done anything wrong.

Another group of people fled upon hearing the news; they were probably all people who had done bad things.

In fact, the focus of the Sect Law Hall's punishments is on disciples trained by the sects themselves who have been bribed by the Free Alliance to betray their sects. This time, a number of them have been investigated and most of them have been taken down.

Your two key points are correct: first, the information must be disseminated; second, people must believe it. If you were in charge of the decision, what do you think the clan hall should do?

He Kao: "Those who voluntarily admit their identities are very important. Although they come from the Xiaomeng, they have not violated any prohibitions and can still be accepted by the sect. The Zongfa Hall does not punish them in any way."

They themselves are examples; they can use their respective channels to spread this news back to the Xiaomeng. This is an opportunity to make a name for themselves; the wider the message is spread and the more people understand and believe it, the greater their contribution will be.

"Isn't there still a batch of Pure Yang Pills? We could use a few as rewards. The list of rewards this time doesn't need to be made public..."

Jiang Daozhen nodded with satisfaction and said, "Your opinion is largely consistent with the current decision of the Clan Law Hall. If you can become an elder of the Clan Law Hall in the future, you will be considered qualified."

He Kao quickly replied modestly, "Compared to you and all the other elders, I am still far from being worthy of your respect!"

Jiang Daozhen: "Don't be smug or impatient. I'm not talking about now, just the future. Since you've said that, then I can tell you some things."

Through Peter Jiao's confession, and Elder Kang and Elder Ye's on-site investigation in the North America area, the Clan Law Hall has made contact with a high-ranking member of the Free Alliance.

The other party was willing to make this great contribution by conveying the information that the Zongfa Hall wanted to publicize to all members of the Xiaomeng through various means.

But he also set several conditions. Given his level of cultivation, these conditions are tantamount to oaths. To fulfill his conditions, you, Yin'e, will likely have to take responsibility for some things.”

He Kaonong guessed that Elder Jiang had intended to test him, but he didn't expect that after passing the test, he would be given a task. He could only ask, "What conditions did they offer, and what do they need me to do?"

Jiang Daozhen: "Why don't you ask who the other person is?"

He Kao: "Will you tell me, sir?"

Jiang Daozhen: "This person's identity is top secret. If it is accidentally leaked, it could endanger his entire family's lives. Unless he is willing to tell you himself, I will never tell you, not even to you."

He had three conditions. First, the ancestral hall had to guarantee that the contents of the announcement and all subsequent information provided were true and accurate.

Secondly, the safety of him and his family must be guaranteed.

Thirdly, if he fulfills his promise, he wants at least two Pure Yang Pills.

As for your task, it's simply to take what he wants there and bring back what he gives. It's safest to leave this kind of message and item delivery to Hidden Moth.

Specific contact and rendezvous methods will be provided separately for each operation.

He Kao nodded readily: "No problem, I'll wait for your instructions!" As he spoke, he secretly sighed in his heart, realizing that what he could think of, Elder Jiang and the Clan Law Hall had already been doing for a long time.

**
(End of this chapter)