Modern Patriarch

Chapter 100: Duyi and Xiaoli

Yao Shen shook his head and halted the momentum contained behind his strike before it struck the armor plate.

Sighing, he stepped back from the forge and channeled a surge of Water Qi, quenching the partially forged armor. It was quite enlightening and equally humbling to see the drop in his own forging skill without Vondars guiding presence.

A few days prior, the Dwarf Spirit had informed him that he would be going into secluded cultivation to ponder upon the five inventions that he had imparted onto him in their trade. Yao Shen had expected it, of course, but even then he could not help but be slightly intimidated at the thought of what an ancient blacksmith whose total experience could be counted in millenia, not centuries, was capable of.

The deal was made though and Yao Shen had no intention of going back on his word. Their relationship was a delicate one to begin with and Yao Shen held no allusions in his heart that could lead him to believe himself capable of dispelling the hatred Vondar held towards Human Cultivators alone.

Vondar the Scholar was key not only to Yao Shen, but the Modern Sect itself. Any attempt to force or lie to him would likely backfire gloriously and he had no method of preventing a soul from self-destructing if it wished to- not even his Bell Relic could accomplish that.

He had to be careful moving forward, knowing how to thread the line between obtaining benefits from Vondar and over-extending himself, leading to the creation of tools and weaponry that had the potential to corrupt and destroy Ioneas society.

The wise Dwarfs absence though, was not the reason for his lacking focus.

Yao Shen had told Shadows story only twice before and it had been to his other two disciples, Duyi and Xiaoli. Each time, he had felt a profound sadness that, as Yao Shen now discovered, manifested in the form of vibrant clouds that alternated between an inky, all-consuming blackness and a radiant, eye-piercing silver. Almost as if the emotion itself was unsure if Yao Shen was proud of the decision he had made that day or if he was ashamed for not having arrived sooner, not having done more.

It was futile, self-reproaching conjecture and it held no meaning. Yao Shen knew that, yet when he told the story for the third time, he once again found himself confronted with that vexing emotion.

Would Shadow have been better off if Yao Shen arrived on time and slaughtered all the Demons before they killed a single villager? Almost definitely.

And yet, her talent would eventually be discovered.

A talent that could topple the hegemonic sects. A talent that you either claimed for yourself or destroyed before others could get their hands on it.

The Nascent Soul Yao Shen could not have protected Shadow from the forces of the Azlak Plains.

The Soul Emperor Yao Shen could, but even then, Shadow could never be allowed to reveal the full extent of her talent.

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Not until she was strong enough to beat him.

But perhaps, the more important question was, if he would be willing to accept a version of the future where he never met Shadow.

It was a question that hurt even to visualize. It was asking a father if he would be content in a world where he could never meet their daughter again.

The very heavens would collapse and crumble at his feet before Yao Shen allowed it to happen.

However, between his duties as Patriarch and his own need to keep up with his cultivation, Yao Shen felt like he hadnt done enough for his first disciple. His daughter.

He had tried, of course. Many times.

It hurt, each time Shadow unleashed the darkness in her heart upon a squadron of invading cheers. Her peers cheered, the Guardians watched on, impressed and the Elders observed with mild jealousy while Yao Shen lamented.

This was not the future he wanted for Shadow.

Yanyue, Yao Shen hoped, would be the catalyst for the change he had been unable to instill in Shadow.

To remind her that it was okay to be vulnerable among family, it was okay to want more from life besides the death of others and most of all, that it was okay to cry.

If Yanyue had not been so affected by Shadows past, he would have told her about Duyi and Xiaoli too. Thankfully, those stories were far more amusing than they were melancholic.

His second disciple Duyi, was a walking example of one of the greatest flaws of the Sect system. In truth, he had been far too talented a disciple for the legacy families to let go of, let alone study under the tutelage of back then, a newly ascended Nascent Soul Cultivator.

In fact, he had been recruited under the wing of one legacy family, before being told to turn his legacy family crest in and leave. The same had happened with the Zhu Family, the sly assassins never ones to miss an opportunity. However, Duyi was perhaps one of the few cultivators in the history of the Zhu family that had insulted the matriarch and walked out of the manor unscathed.

The fact of the matter was, Duyi was simply too talented to kill. He also had not crossed any lines worthy of receiving such a vicious treatment.

No, he had a simple requirement. The first was that he would only bow to his master. The second? His master had to be capable of defeating him through the use of body cultivation alone.

As a Core Formation Disciple, Duyi forced a former Patriarch of one of the Legacy Families to resort to utilizing his Qi.

Meili Zhu had not even bothered accepting a duel, not wishing to risk the dishonor in case she was injured in the fight. The Master of the Faceless could not be so much so as scratched by a Core Formation Disciple, otherwise the reputation she had so meticulously built, the visceral terror mere mention of her name was capable of inspiring, would all fade away and render her political arsenal impotent.

Yao Shen was only the one with little to lose and much to gain. Albeit, he was also the only one that did not seek to gain a powerful disciple, only to save a talented yet audacious cultivator from reaching an untimely end. Sooner or later, Duyi would have crossed the line.

Instead he cost Yao Shen a broken rib and a mouthful of blood, even as he evaded a telegraphed punch without his divine sense, viciously clawed onto his arm with both his relatively slender arms before lifting him in the air and slamming him onto the ground.

That was the day Duyi had become his disciple.

As amusing as that day has been, Xiaoli was the one that had truly surprised him in a most vexing way.

It was not every day that you found a cultivator seeking political asylum under your roof because he stole the formula of an enhanced Foundation Establishment pill from Zhiquang Yi, after all.