57 Chapter 57 – Lei Shu Academy disciples

After making his decision, he immediately moved fast and entered deep into the Snowcape Demon Mountain.

He traveled through the night in the mountain. Since he is suppressing his aura completely, it is easy for him to travel through the mountain as long as he moves cautiously and avoid the demon beasts.

At dawn, the surrounding started changing and the ground was covered with snow. He moved around for a while and found an abandoned cave after searching for a while. He ate some dried meat and started thinking about the sects in the Lei Shu Kingdom now that Lei Shu academy is out of the question for him.

There are four sects in the kingdom that existed for a long time: Yellow Stone Sword Sect, Phantom Fans Gate, Poison Demons Sect, and Black Hand Sect. Two righteous sect and two evil sect. Each sect has their own strong point, but weak or average in the rest. For example, Yellow Stone sword Sect accepted mainly sword cultivators but it is not good in rest of the field and only considered average.

Until thousand years ago, four sects controlled the kingdom and the imperial family of Lei Shu Kingdom was only in name and held no power in the country. Righteous sect and Evil sect opposed each other and had conflicts occasionally. But every time any conflict arose, the ones who were most affected are imperial family, nobles and commoners of various cities.

Thousand years ago, under the order of King of Lei Shu Kingdom, the heads of the ten noble families formed the Lei Shu academy in absolute secret. The very first students of the academy were all part of imperial family and noble families, and were trained rigorously for ten whole years.

After ten years of training, Lei Shu academy started their true purpose and attacked the subordinate small sects and families that belonged to the four sects posing as other sect. The conflict between the sects increased in time due to the influence of the academy and it became an all out war.

Sect leaders of the four sect sensed something was amiss and started investigating, but by the time they found the truth of the matter,it was caused by Lei Shu academy which appeared form nowhere, they had lost a lot of power in the war. In anger, four sects came together to attack the Lei Shu academy but both sides lost a lot in the battle and the battle came to a deadlock situation. It was at that time, the imperial army moved under the order of the king and attacked the four sects. Sect leaders also realized their situation is not good and immediately ordered their sect to retreat, closed their sect gates and went into seclusion.

Since then, Lei Shu academy and the imperial academy gained full control of the kingdom. But they also didn't attack the four sects to completely eradicate them. Even though the academy gained a lot of power, the four sects existed for a long time and they are not sure they can completely eradicate the four sects without any serious loss.

Since then, both Lei Shu academy and the four sects kept increasing their power in secret to eradicate the other side.

After recalling the information he learned from the books, he thought "I can't join the evil sect in any way; my only option is to join one of the righteous sect."

Phantom Fans Sect specialized in training speed; they mainly accepted disciples with Darkness and Wind elemental roots whereas Yellow Stone Sword Sect didn't have any elemental root requirements as long as their sword cultivation is good.

Zhu Xuan is more inclined towards the sword sect since he also want to train in the sword diligently from the moment he saw Zhu Lang releasing his sword Qi and experiencing personally how powerful it was. But the problem is how to join them when he is not even sure where to find them.

He also wanted to ask Shen Long few questions regarding his current predicament, but Shen Long clearly told him unless it is very important not to contact him and Zhu Xuan can only talk to him whenever there is a mission.

He sighed and stood up to continue his travel. After he entered snow regions of the mountain, he came across many Qi gathering stage demon beasts. With his current strength, he has no problem fighting with Qi gathering initial stage demon beasts that just formed their beast cores. He needs to be careful with only Qi gathering middle stage and higher level demon beasts.

For the next two days, he fought many demon beasts like Snow monkeys, iron horned wolves constantly. He only used his sword techniques, Sky slash sword technique and Flowing moon sword technique to improve his sword cultivation.

He noticed peculiar things when practicing the two techniques in the battle. Flowing moon sword technique is easy to learn when you practiced it at night, though he still couldn't understand the relation between water technique and night practice. Similarly, Sky slash technique didn't only have sharpness from metal Qi, but some other concept integrated, which if can be practiced fully can slash through air pushing them away,creating an illusion like it is cutting through the sky.

He thought the techniques are simple since he started learning it, but as he fought with them these few days he realized, they may not be as simple as he thought and sighed in sadness that he doesn't have a teacher to learn properly and help him in his cultivation.

On the third day, he already reached close to the peak of the mountain and the demon beasts here moved in packs so he could only move slowly with caution. With his current speed, he will be able to reach Caifu city in ten days.

While he was moving towards the peak, he heard sound of fighting in the distance. He moved towards the direction of the sound and found ten people fighting a pack of iron horned wolves double their number, and one person sitting on a rock observing the battle. He looked like he was in his twenties and his cultivation is surprisingly at Qi gathering peak stage, whereas the ten people fighting are between Qi gathering initial and middle stage.

He observed closely and found they all have Lei Shu academy symbols on their clothes. He understood they must be from the academy and training in the mountain, but was not sure why they are training in Snowcape Demon Mountain when they can train better at the academy and the nearby mountain range.

Zhu Xuan looked at the battle and was in a dilemma. He didn't want anything to do with them and immediately leave, but also want to go talk to them since he want to learn more information about the academy, especially about Zhu Lang and also if possible any information regarding what happened years ago about his father.

While he was contemplating, the young man sitting in the rock suddenly turned and looked at the direction Zhu Xuan was hiding and slowly spoke "Friend, you have been observing for a while. Don't you think it is time for you to come out?"

Zhu Xuan sighed and came out while revealing his cultivation. He didn't want them to think that he is an enemy and attack them. He also didn't expect the young man would notice him even though he moved so carefully towards them. Everyone who is fighting also looked at the person coming out from his hiding, but noticing he is only at the body purification stage they relaxed and continued their battle with the demon beasts.

Zhu Xuan cupped his hands and said "Forgive me Young master. I was just passing through here and heard the sound of battle so I came to take a look."

Wu Qian Ren looked at Zhu Xuan with suspicion and asked "How come you are near the peak of the mountain with your cultivation? Why were you travelling alone?"

Zhu Xuan casually came up with a lie and spoke fast "Replying to young master, I'm from Caifu city. I come to mountain to search for resources with few people to sell in the city regularly. This time we came to protect the youngster of a clan while he is training, but we were suddenly chased by a Qi gathering middle stage beast and all of us were separated during the escape. So I'm planning to quickly cross the mountain to reach the city sooner to inform the clan so that they can save the rest."

Wu Qian Ren contemplated for a second and asked "Then why don't you join us? We are also planning to cross the peak and go to the other side and it will be safer for you to cross the peak with us."

Zhu Xuan thought that it is a good opportunity for him to gain information from them and also agreed after some hesitation, cupped his hand and said "Thank you Young master for allowing me to join your team"

While these two were discussing, the rest finished their fight and removed the demon core from the beasts. They were confused why Wu Qian Ren would ask this suspicious person to join their team but they didn't voice anything in front of him.

Wu Qian Ren also suspected Zhu Xuan. This time their team is here for an important matter, and Zhu Xuan being here at this time is quite suspicious. Moreover, looking at him he only looked like he is at fifteen or sixteen years old, but he is already at the tenth stage of body purification stage which only increased his suspicion.

So he decided to let him join the team to observe him, instead of letting him go and inform someone else about their location. He could also kill him but Wu Qian Ren is a righteous person who doesn't kill people for no reason so he decided to observe him first and decide what to do with him later.

Thus Zhu Xuan joined the team of Lei Shu Academy disciples and started travelling with them.