Path of the Sect Leader

Chapter 14: A Future Still Shrouded

Time slips through a cultivator’s fingers like sand when he sits in meditation. Several days blurred past inside the Ethereal Wood Wind Shuttle before a Chu clansman finally knocked.

“Destination reached. Follow me.”

Qi Xiu snapped everyone into motion. Crates were shouldered, bundles cinched tight. Zhang Shishi took point with the heavy prayer mat strapped to his back; Qi Xiu and Zhan Yuan hoisted the massive wooden chest between them.

They braced for another gauntlet of sneers, yet the guide led them not toward the main gate but a discreet side hatch reserved for honored guests. To reach it they still had to cross half the common decks. The same cultivators who had mocked them days earlier now caught sight of the Chu escort and the VIP exit. Smirks froze, then melted into thoughtful reassessment. A few even cupped hands in hasty salute.

Qi Xiu, hands occupied, could only offer awkward smiles in return.

He shot Zhang Shishi a sidelong glance. Both men’s stomachs tightened.

We know exactly how much our broken sect is worth. Why this sudden respect?

The higher they climbed, the more the other passengers’ attitudes flipped from contempt to cautious curiosity. By the time they emerged onto the shuttle’s roof, Qi Xiu’s heart was hanging by a thread again.

Fierce astral winds screamed across the open deck, yet a pale-green barrier turned the gale into no more than a cool breeze and painted the air with rainbow shards. The shuttle hadn’t slowed; it still streaked southward at terrifying speed.

Zhang Shishi nudged him hard. “Foundation Establishment!” he hissed.

Only then did Qi Xiu notice the petite girl waiting ahead.

She couldn’t have been older than nineteen, standing lightly on the back of a sleek emerald spirit crane. Lemon-yellow palace robes, dainty pointed boots, hair in a simple bun, face bare of powder. A pouty cherry mouth and eyes still round with lingering youth made her look more like someone’s runaway little sister than a cultivator who had forged her foundation.

A Foundation Establishment genius before twenty. Even accounting for the slowed aging, that was monstrous talent.

Envy, awe, and a pinch of bitterness twisted in Qi Xiu’s gut. He hurried forward, bowing as deeply as the chest allowed.

The girl’s brows arched at the wooden crate. “Why carry it by hand? Don’t you have storage bags?”

Qi Xiu explained their single, overstuffed pouch. A helpless shrug finished the tale.

She giggled, bright as silver bells. “I thought you were guarding some heaven-defying treasure that can’t touch dimensional space!”

With a flick of her wide sleeve, a ribbon of yellow light swept over the chest and every other bulky item, swallowing them whole. “Up you come. We’re already overshooting.”

She patted the crane’s neck. The bird gave the ragged Chuqin group a withering look, clearly offended at being asked to ferry refugees, but folded its wings and crouched. Ten nervous cultivators scrambled aboard.

The moment they cleared the shuttle’s barrier, the crane shot forward like a green arrow, diving almost vertically until it leveled out at the altitude most Qi Refinement cultivators flew their swords. Then it blazed south.

Below, an endless sea of ancient emerald canopy rushed past so fast the trees blurred into a single living river.

The girl glanced back at their stunned faces and laughed again. “Welcome to the real Southern Border.”

She introduced herself simply as Chu twelfth branch, no full name offered, and began to speak of the land.

“The ancestor who claimed this territory is Chu Hongshang, early Nascent Soul, once a disciple of Qi Yun Peak like your founders. Decades ago she led a small pioneering war, ripped this domain from the jaws of primordial beasts, and planted her flag. To honor her roots she named the sect Southern Chu Gate.

Unfortunately the ancestor never took a dao companion and has no direct heirs. Our branch is thin on blood. Add endless jungle, poison mists, and spirit beasts that eat Foundation cultivators for breakfast, and mortals refuse to settle here. Growth has been… slow.”

Only recently had Chu Hongshang flown north herself, knelt before old ancestor Chu Zhen, and begged for warm bodies. Hence this mass migration.

“Your mortal Qin clansmen will follow,” she added cheerfully. “Seven months by caravan. They’ll plant their villages right beside whatever new mountain gate we give you. Same old vassal relationship, new scenery.”

At the mention of their future mountain gate, her smile turned sly.

“It’s… spacious,” she said. “Location leaves something to be desired. Hope you won’t mind too much.”

Mind? Qi Xiu nearly laughed aloud. “Senior overthinks. Southern Chu Gate has granted us rebirth. Beggars do not haggle over the flavor of the rice that keeps them alive. If we complained, we would be worse than beasts.”

“Good answer,” she said, eyes curving. “Keep that attitude and you’ll do fine.”

Emboldened by her lack of arrogance, Qi Xiu risked the question burning in his chest. “This junior truly does not understand. Ten Qi Refinement nobodies with not a single merit to our names, why does Southern Chu Gate treat us like honored guests?”

She tapped her lips, mischief dancing. “You’ll see when we land.”

The answer that wasn’t an answer only deepened the knot in his stomach. Whatever waited below, it was not the peaceful backwater he had imagined.

Half an hour later the endless canopy began to thin. The land dipped into a wide valley where black water oozed between skeletal trees, releasing a stench even the high winds couldn’t fully whip away.

The spirit crane banked, beginning its descent toward the dark marsh.

Qi Xiu gripped the feathers tighter, knuckles white.

Somewhere down there, in poison air and starving earth, lay the future of Chuqin Sect.