"We were successful," Xue Wei said tentatively. He waved his hand and the snow jade box appeared in his palm.
"Let us discuss the reward," he continued confidently.
"Initially, we were promised riches and honor when we agreed to go on this mission... but what we really want is to be able to leave this city alive," he said with brutal honesty. Wan Qiang’s eyes shone brightly in response.
"You are trading the Seven Star Nightflower for your lives?" he asked curiously. Xue Wei nodded his head.
"If I knew that this would happen, then I would not have returned to fulfill my promise, but I cannot change the past and now I am here. I have responsibility for my friends as well and I cannot allow them to be implicated."
"Outrageous!" one of the elders exclaimed in anger. "You killed human experts like they were weeds during the tournament! Someone like you is not worthy of living in this era where we humans stand united!"
"If you didn’t want anyone to die, then why did you encourage us to kill one another?" Xue Wei retorted. He did not sneer, nor did his killing intent flare up, but a cold gleam shone in his eyes. He felt aloof from the world, but in the way an emperor feels upon being slighted by his inferior.
Xue Wei could see that this elder was willing to kill him no matter what he said, but he had to try and convince the other elders that it was not his fault.
"We did it to allow the younger generation to feel the pressure of life-and-death crises, but for you to actually go the extra mile and kill them – it is unacceptable!"
"It is not my fault they were as weak as paper tigers, unable to persist against a single attack from me," Xue Wei said with a shrug of his shoulders. "If they cannot handle even me, how would they ever be able to handle a Primordial Beast? Instead of sending them to their slaughter where their corpses will be mauled and destroyed, I did them a favor."
What Xue Wei said was extreme. Calling it a favor to kill them was a little over the top, but the other side could say nothing. The elder knew how dangerous Primordial Beasts were, so what Xue Wei had said was not completely ungrounded.
"Elder Gao." Wan Qiang spoke with a smile on his face, but there was a chilling undertone in his voice. Xue Wei could feel a sudden increase in the air pressure descending in the room.
"This young man has just gone on a long mission for our sake. For us, he entered a danger zone to get his hands on a herb we needed. Without his help, we would have been powerless and without the herb."
"Now that he has produced such outstanding achievements, you do not want to praise him and reward him, but instead cannot wait to rip him to shreds? Could this be because of your relationship with the Crimson Sunshine Sect, which lost members to him?"
Elder Gao frowned. "No, it is not like that, Elder Wan," he assured him, but he could not help but curse in his mind. According to what Wan Qiang had said, he really was doing something vile. If anyone else had said that they wanted to kill this young man, they would turn into ungrateful bastards. No one wished to be seen as such.
Wan Qiang nodded his head. "Young man, you have done us a great service," he said, ignoring the ugly expressions on a handful of the elders. "I will guarantee that you and your friends will be able to leave this fortress alive, and I will personally accompany you until you leave the Skyward Empire," he said.
The fact that he was going to such lengths for Xue Wei caused mass-confusion among the elders. This was especially so for Xue Wei himself, who was already on alert when it came to Wan Qiang, but right now he could not refuse the offer.
Otherwise, he and his friends would die faster than he could blink if the elders were allowed to act out their hostility.
"This young one appreciates Elder Wan's efforts and magnanimity. We are very grateful for Elder Wan's care and consideration."
Under usual circumstances, Xue Wei would have said something along the lines of carving the gratitude into his heart and remembering it, but considering it was a transaction, he felt that he had already done his part by giving them the Seven Star Nightflower.
Not to mention, he did not wish to actually owe this Elder Wan anything. He was simply too mysterious.
Elder Wan seemed to have guessed his thoughts, but instead of feeling insulted, the smile on his lips grew larger. He was definitely pleased with Xue Wei being stingy.
"Well, in that case, you and your friends are welcome to stay in my manor until we’re ready to leave. At that time, I will follow you."
"However, you have to wait a week until then," Wan Qiang said. "I have something I need to do with the Seven Star Nightflower, which will take a week's time."
"We can wait a week," Xue Wei said with a nod. Wan Qiang gestured with his hand and a servant stepped out from the corner of the room.
"Lead my guests to my manor. If anything is to happen to them, I will eradicate everyone in the entire Black Iron Fortress as a tribute to their souls, innocent or not!" Wan Qiang warned the servant, but his words were mainly directed at the elders.
What they heard made their faces twitch, and they did not know exactly how to react, but the threat was very effective. None of them dared to move even an inch.
Like that, the group settled into Wan Qiang's manor. Although they had a room each, all next to one another, they gathered in Xue Wei's room to discuss what had happened.
"It is indeed odd," Wang Xiaoyun said with a frown on her face. "That man has absolutely no reason to treat you the way he does, but he still acts as if you were his own son or disciple. He is even willing to massacre a whole town to keep us safe, or rather, you, Wei."
"I told you from the start that he seems to have some sort of goodwill towards me, but I am rather uncomfortable because of this," Xue Wei admitted. "I don't know what he wants from me, but an expert of his strength cannot simply accept me for who I am when he does not know me. Although we are to stay here for a week, we will leave as soon as the week is over."
"It is not as bad as you might think," Bai Tianyi suddenly said from the sideline. "I would suggest you spend this time creating some formations. We can sell some of the formations on our way towards the center of the continent, and others we can use when we encounter trouble. Formations have always sold well. Even if their price is not outstanding, they could always bring in some money."
"That sounds good!" Xue Wei instantly agreed. He knew that although they had some wealth now thanks to the tournament and the ring he had looted from the Moon Prince, he had to provide for four people and their cultivation. This was truly a bottomless pit that he had to fill.
Xue Wei instantly sat down and scoured his memories for any worthwhile formations. He finally decided on offensive formations that could be used in battles.
He scribbled them down on formation paper. He had found a lot of paper made especially for formations in the Moon Prince's storage ring. He began to inscribe his spiritual energy onto the papers.
Formations did not require any sort of materials. They could be inscribed on everything, but usually, for offensive formations, the things that they were inscribed on would break after the formation had been used.
Since this was the case, one had to be careful with what they inscribed the formation on. They also had to ensure that the surface was large enough to contain the entire formation.
Every formation was an entangled mess of runes that entwined into one another and looked like snakes and mazes.
Each and every rune was imbued with spiritual energy, and as long as someone had enough spiritual energy, they could create formations. However, the formations were in no way easy to make.
Xue Wei soon found that he could quite easily make the Spiritual Energy Bombs, so he quit after counting fifty. Fifty was without a doubt a good amount, and he did not think he would need more than that.
After that, he began inscribing the Paralyzing Formation, a formation that when activated with Qi would stun one’s target for a moment. However, in a life-and-death battle, a moment could easily be the difference between winning and losing.
When he began inscribing this formation, Xue Wei was leisurely and did not think it would become too much of an issue. Just as he thought it was going too well, things took a turn for the worse. As he inscribed the fifth rune, he found that his spiritual energy was being drained at a rapid speed.
He managed to get halfway through the formation when he realized that all his Spiritual Energy had been drained. The formation was now useless as only half of it had been inscribed, and there was no ‘finishing it later’ when it came to formations.
Xue Wei finally learned that although he could handle the Spiritual Energy Bomb easily, the other formations were not as easy. He sat down, closed his eyes, and began to rest his mind, replenishing his spiritual energy.
After an hour, he had recovered his spiritual energy. He began inscribing the Paralyzation Formation on a piece of formation paper again.
Formation paper was a bit thicker than normal paper and it was yellow. It resembled a paper talisman in many ways. However, instead of being rectangular, the formation papers were square or round depending on the kind of formation that was placed upon it.
Seeing that Xue Wei had focused fully on the formations, Wang Xiaoyun, Hei Gou, and Bai Tianyi returned to their own rooms and tended to their own devices.
They could not waste any time whatsoever. All of them understood that they were from the outskirts of the continent. Even if they were considered geniuses there, they knew that the geniuses from the outskirts were as common as stars in the sky at the center of the continent. They were nothing special, so they would only suffer terribly later on if they slacked now.
While Xue Wei had fully diverted his focus to the inscriptions he was making, his body continued to cultivate by itself, refining the heaven-and-earth essence into Qi. The cumulative effect caused his control over his spiritual energy to increase rapidly.
Not only was his control increasing, the amount of spiritual energy he could command was also increasing. However, he had not had his breakthrough yet, but he had an idea that when he did, he would be able to gain strength like nothing he had wielded before.