The Sect Leader System

Chapter 360: Duty Versus Heart

Jin LiJuan’s life had certainly changed. Outwardly, anyway. Inwardly, she was confused and conflicted by all the differences. For one thing, she was no longer practically invisible. Back at the sect, very few of her sect mates had noticed her existence.

Since she’d started fighting in the tournament, everyone not only knew who she was, but they went out of their way to talk to her. It was … weird. She didn’t think of herself as anyone special.

The feeling was made even worse because her newfound fame arose from her winning matches, but none of that was her doing. Ganzou, Leizhenzi, and Oogway did all the work. She just watched.

Which made her feel kind of bad.

On the other hand, Pan Jiang had taught her about fighting in a team. Most cultivators fought solo, and even when they grouped up, it was just that—a group of solo cultivators. To truly make a team work, each person had to know their role and do it to the best of their ability.

If there was one lesson she’d learned from the mistake that had almost cost her life, it was the importance of following orders. Once the team told her what she needed to do, doing that task well became her only goal.

Her job was to protect herself.

If she was forced unconscious or surrendered, the team lost. Thus, the absolute best thing she could do for her team was to keep herself safe. Most of the time that meant simply standing and allowing her shield to take hits. Which at first seemed like a really bad idea given how small her qi pool was. Sparring and much practice, however, had proved to her that Master’s technique was really efficient.

Standing still felt a little stupid to her, but she’d asked if she should try to move around and dodge. Oogway said he could protect her easier if she stayed in one place. So she stood and let herself be hit.

Pan Jiang had told her that, even if she didn’t feel like she was doing anything, really she was. He’d said that he was proud of her. So even when she felt like an imposter for taking credit for winning, she knew she was actually doing her best for the team even if she wasn’t taking an active role.

That day, though, would be her very last match. Win or lose, it would be over. And she was looking forward to it. Everyone, including Master, had told her she’d done the sect proud. Senior Brother and Senior Sister had even rushed back from whatever important mission they had to see her last fight.

Leizhenzi, of course, really wanted to win, but that was his personality. He’d be sad for about five minutes if they lost before he got over it. Oogway truly didn’t care either way. Or he said he didn’t. Jin LiJuan thought that he actually had a lot of fun during the matches even if he wouldn’t admit it.

Ganzou … Ganzou was proud of what they’d done. He received as much attention in the compound as she did with everyone wanting to pet him. He even let most of them. She didn’t think the end result really mattered all that much to him.

It was good not to feel any pressure to win. Though that didn’t mean the team wouldn’t give it their best shot.

It did mean that, when she and Ganzou walked onto the arena floor, she felt no pressure. Actually, she found all the boos and cheers to be quite funny. That was just noise, though, which she ignored.

She cupped her hands and bowed to both the official and her opponent, a young woman from the Swift Blizzard Sect, who sneered at them and didn’t return the gesture. The snub was fine with Jin LiJuan. Having the respect of her own sect mates was more than she ever imagined she’d get, and she frankly didn’t care about the other sects.

At the official’s direction, the opponents separated to opposite sides of the arena floor, and Jin LiJuan pulsed a tiny bit of qi into the beast bag. Oogway appeared in front of her.

An announcer called out the names of all the participants, including the spirit beasts—which was nice; her team enjoyed being recognized—and then it was time to fight.

Jin LiJuan waited to see what the Swift Blizzard would do, expecting her to either dash forward or shoot a ranged attack like all the previous opponents. Instead, the young woman did neither, just standing there waiting.

Leizhenzi and Ganzou looked at each other, and each gave the equivalent of a shrug. Together, they dashed across the sand.

Jin LiJuan eyed her opponent warily, expecting some kind of trick. Even with Oogway’s technique for intercepting attacks, many cultivators had found ways past him. Pan Jiang had said that a good strategy against them would be to draw Leizhenzi and Ganzou away from her and then sneak attack somehow.

The Swift Blizzard apparently had some other strategy in mind. She engaged the two charging her with a sword

The fight was brutal, each side giving and receiving vicious blows. The young woman was definitely tougher than she looked, with Ganzou’s claws and Leizhenzi’s attacks being repelled by her shield. And faster, too. Her blade danced from thunderbird to wolf slashing two to three times for every hit she took.

The spirit beasts had natural qi barriers instead of a technique. Those typically weren’t as strong as cultivator’s shields, but they were more efficient and didn’t drain their entire qi pool.

The first sign of real trouble came when Ganzou whined after one strike, and blood dripped to the sand from one of his front legs.

Jin LiJuan’s eyes went wide as she realized the young woman’s strategy—divide and conquer. If she could knock out the main attackers, she’d just have to whittle down Oogway’s defenses before beating one little girl.

Obviously, Jin LiJuan still did nothing. After all, both Leizhenzi and Ganzou were powerful spirit beasts, and she trusted her team. And her job was not to get hit, so she needed to stay away from their opponent. The attack on her team could actually be a feint to draw her out.

The woman turned her attention to Leizhenzi, attacking him with a flurry of slashes and thrusts. Surprisingly, she drew blood.

Jin LiJuan was shocked. None of their opponents yet had penetrated even one attacking spirit beast’s qi barriers, let alone both.

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Leizhenzi, in the time she’d known him, had never been injured, and he’d sparred a lot with the other members of the team and hunted many powerful spirit beasts as they sought to get Ganzou enough cores to get him to rank six.

Seeing his own blood appeared to affect him more than she thought it would. He flew as high as the arena’s shield would let him get before unleashing his primary ranged attack on their opponent.

The woman had turned her attention to Ganzou as soon as Leizhenzi had retreated, launching blow after blow. The wolf did his best to get away, but she kept up with him, her pursuit not significantly disrupting her attacks.

As Leizhenzi’s thunderbolt hurtled toward her faster than Jin LiJuan’s eye could follow, the woman sidestepped it, moving instantaneously just as she was about to be struck.

Jin LiJuan was definitely not an expert on cultivator combat, but to her untrained eye, the woman’s movement was quite odd. Jerky. Like her body had been forced to the side against her will.

She continued her assault on Ganzou as if nothing had happened, striking him with her blade multiple times. Each produced a line of blood.

Things were not looking good. Ganzou was tough, but nothing he’d ever faced had left him so bloody.

Leizhenzi kept trying to hit her with thunderbolts, but she dodged each one with that same weird motion. Since his main attack wasn’t working, he tried his screech, the one that had burst Jin LiJuan’s eardrums when they’d first met. The concentrated sound wave didn’t appear to affect the woman at all, though.

Except when she was actively defending herself from the ranged attacks, she kept hitting Ganzou, who stopped running and turned to face her. He growled and lunged impossibly fast at her, trying to bite her leg.

She dodged his teeth the same as she did the thunderbolts, punishing him with a massive blow to his shoulders when he missed.

Ganzou let out a long, whimpering howl. Jin LiJuan had never seen him in so much pain.

A rational part of her mind told her to stay the course, to keep back. The woman was empowering her sword for each strike. She used a technique each time she evaded a thunderbolt.

Once she defeated Ganzou, she’d have to keep dodging Leizhenzi’s attacks and get past Oogway’s defenses and defeat Master’s shield technique to take down Jin LiJuan.

Unless the woman’s qi pool was many times larger than that of the average top talented sect member’s, she’d run dry long before she could beat all four of them.

Besides, Ganzou’s life wasn’t in danger. He couldn’t actually be hurt too badly with the arena’s arrays in operation.

But he felt every blow as if it were real. He was suffering.

Jin LiJuan’s duty was to stay in place. She’d learned the value of doing her duty, no matter the personal cost.

Remain in place. Win the match.

But Ganzou was suffering.

Her duty.

Her bonded.

Jin LiJuan never made a conscious decision to move, but the next thing she knew, she raced across the sand with her sword drawn.

Oogway had apparently been paying a lot more attention to the action happening across the sand than to his protectee who had been standing stationary behind him because she made it past him before he reacted, calling out to her.

Tortoises, while slow moving, lived on land and had legs. Oogway was a turtle, a reptile that lived in water. Not only was he slow, but his flippers hindered his progress on land even more than if had been a tortoise.

Jin LiJuan’s legs may have been short, but she possessed the strength and speed of both the peak Foundation Establishment realm and peak Silver Body Cultivation.

Oogway had a technique that greatly sped his movement, but using that technique required two conditions to be met—it must be used to intercede between a target and someone attacking that target and the distance traveled must be small. The first of those conditions was not currently in effect as their opponent was not focused on Jin LiJuan. The second failed because Oogway was too far away, and by the time she reached the fight, she would be as well.

All that to say that there was no way for the turtle to place himself between Jin LiJuan and danger.

Leizhenzi clearly saw what was happening, but he made no move to fly back down to the floor, instead increasing the number of thunderbolts he sent. Even a spirit beast with a strong bloodline didn’t have infinite qi, though, and Jin LiJuan knew he’d reach his limit soon.

She also knew that, as much as she wanted to protect her bonded, it was stupid to rush in without a plan. Her mind spun.

She only had three techniques. The first, Quiet Mind, had no combat applications as far as she knew. The second, her Upgraded Strong Oak Sword Art would be a help, but seeing her opponent beating both Ganzou and Leizhenzi, Jin LiJuan knew it wouldn’t be enough. Her third, Ensnare would have been helpful, but it required a plant to enhance. She couldn’t just make one out of qi.

A thought struck her. If she had a plant on her, it would be perfectly legal to use because only items that used formations, aside from storage devices, were prohibited unless the combatant personally made them.

Normally, she wouldn’t just carry around plants with her because, as everyone knew, spatial rings couldn’t store living objects. Except the beast bag that Master made for Oogway was way more advanced than most storage devices. Not only could it store plants, it contained a habitat full of them—mosses, lilies, flowers, and … trees.

She just needed a way to deliver them where she needed them.

“Leizhenzi!” she yelled. “Catch. Three.”

With her strength, it was easy for her to withdraw a small tree from the bag and toss it high into the air. After ensuring that Leizhenzi caught it, she did it twice more.

Luckily, the thunderbird was pretty smart and well experienced with his partner’s techniques. He knew exactly what to do.

As she approached their opponent, he redoubled his efforts, launching five thunderbolts in quick succession, likely expending most, if not all, of his qi. The attacks distracted her enough that Jin LiJuan’s initial sword strikes, though blocked, weren’t completely defeated by the superior swordswoman.

She actually had to pay attention not to get hit.

Everything hinged on what happened next. Jin LiJuan suspected—well, hoped really—that the woman’s dodges were the result of an automatic technique that only reacted to fast attacks.

If so, when Leizhenzi plopped the trees down behind her, the technique wouldn’t trigger. And if she were distracted, maybe she wouldn’t even notice.

It worked!

Jin LiJuan’s bladework was good enough to keep the woman’s attention, and she didn’t react to the trees thudding softly onto the sand behind her.

A minor problem arose in that Jin LiJuan had to set up her final attack by securing the trees’ roots. Which meant not concentrating on the fight for a few moments. As she drove tendrils of qi to dig deep from the ends of each of the trees’ roots to anchor them to the ground, the woman made good use of the distraction, landing several blows.

Jin LiJuan’s shield easily handled the brief onslaught, though.

“Now!” Jin LiJuan yelled.

She couldn’t afford to look at Leizhenzi, but after months of working together as a team, she trusted that he knew exactly what was needed and would attack via dive. At the same time, she attacked with every bit of skill, speed, and power she possessed.

The woman was forced to take several steps back. She didn’t see the trees behind her until it was too late.

Jin LiJuan activated Ensnare. All three trees reached out and wrapped around the woman, the slow branches not fast enough to trigger her evasion technique. One ensnared each arm, and the final circled around her waist.

Wood qi strengthened the branches, making them unbreakable even for a peak Foundation Establishment cultivator.

For a moment, anyway. The technique wasn’t super strong, and it was intended as a distraction, not a way to imprison an opponent.

But a moment was all Jin LiJuan needed. Her sword found the woman’s undefended neck three times. Simultaneously, Leizhenzi bit the woman’s head.

Her shield popped.

The match was over.

Jin LiJuan and her team had won. Not that she cared. She rushed to Ganzou, falling to her knees beside him and hugging him tightly.

Benton had never been so proud of anyone in his life. That wasn’t because Jin LiJuan and her menagerie had won, though he had been impressed by the girl’s quick thinking with the trees.

No, he was proud because of her growth. The little girl who hated spirit beasts, the same little girl who had struggled not to kill that wolf when he was but a cub, now risked everything to protect him.

Moisture welled, and Benton had to wipe at his eyes.

Before he could do anything to congratulate Jin LiJuan, though, he sensed a beacon from a contingency ring. From an old contingency ring. And it was close.

The ambush. Finally.