The Battle Maiden Sect once again greeted Mira, Rhydian, and Hana. The massive, towering mountains housing the Sect came into view as they flew over the entrance. Numerous disciples noticed her return and waved at her, but she ignored them and kept flying.
Mira brought Hana back to her residence. The young girl was still shaken from her experience in the forest, and the fact that they flew so fast didn't help.
After settling Hana down in her room, Mira gave her a soft nod.
"Rest up, Hana. Tomorrow, I'm going to put that idle body to use." Mira said, tucking the girl into her bed even though it wasn't night yet.
Hana's eyes widened in shock, which immediately morphed into fear when she processed Mira's words, but before she could say anything, Mira was already gone.
"AHHH! GOD! What did I do to deserve this?!" She cried out in a pained voice, suddenly not tired anymore.
Unfortunately, Mira's words were akin to god's. There was no escaping once she made up her mind to do something. Rather, doing so would only make things worse.
Hana collapsed onto the bed, her eyes hazy, wondering if maybe she should've taken her chances when Rhydian and Mira were about to fight.
***
With a chuckle, Mira left her residence. She knew Hana had misunderstood her words, but she didn't feel the need to clarify things.
Next on her agenda was a visit to the Sect Master, Aelina. Accompanied by Rhydian, Mira began her ascent up the mountain where the Sect Master's residence was located.
As they climbed, several of the Sect Elders spotted them. Recognizing Mira, they gave respectful nods without halting her progress. Everyone in the Sect knew of Mira's unique privilege to see the Sect Master whenever she wished.
Although they thought Aelina was giving Mira a bit too many privileges, what could they do? Mira's strength and talent was unquestionable. She also seemed to have some sort of deal with the Sect Master, so it only made sense.
If Aelina really didn't want Mira showing up unannounced, she'd say something.
Upon reaching the summit, Mira paused, taking a moment to gaze at the view. The Battle Maiden Sect sprawled beneath them, nestled amongst the towering mountains and lush forests.
Mira sighed, shaking off her nostalgic feelings. The Ancient Beast Mountain Range was always a spectacular sight.
On seeing Mira and the towering Rhydian, Aelina's brows arched in curiosity. "You've returned, Mira," she greeted with a slight smile. "And I see you've brought company."
"That's my pet," Mira said indifferently, only to receive displeased grunt from the wolf woman.
"Rhy…dian," Rhydian said while pointing at herself. She didn't like the word "pet", especially not when it came out of Mira's mouth. While Mira was technically her "mother" and "master", she felt like she wasn't in any way inferior to her.
"Ah~ I see. You're the wolf that Mira always brings with her. Congratulations on your breakthrough," Aelina smiled and shook Rhydian's hand, who returned the smile, but inwardly, she was shocked.
'What's with this strength? No, before that, when did this wolf reach Rank 8? Was it always so easy for beasts to cultivate?' Mira wasn't gone for very long. It shouldn't have been possible for Rhydian to jump nearly a whole Realm in that short amount of time.
'...What sort of beast is this?' For some reason, Aelina felt like it was better if she didn't know, so she didn't ask. It's not like Mira would answer if she did.
"Did you have a nice vacation?" Aelina asked, attempting to change the subject.
Mira nodded, her expression not changing, "I managed to obtain some useful information."
Aelina almost facepalmed, not expecting that answer but hearing the seriousness in her voice, she understood that Mira wasn't playing around.
Motioning with her hand to continue, Aelina brought the two of them to her courtyard, where a made suddenly appeared, set the table, and prepared tea for them.
'Maid?' Mira looked at the new woman with eyes full of curiosity, 'I didn't know she had maids. Better yet, where did she even come from?'
Even now, she hardly felt the woman's presence.
After the tea was made, the "maid" disappeared as if she was never there.
'Interesting. It seems Aelina has more secrets than she lets on.'
Noticing that Mira's attention was elsewhere, Aelina chuckled, "Don't worry about her. She's just a little shy."
"Anyways, what sort of information did you have for me?"
Mira snapped her head back to the Sect Master and sat down across from her alongside Rhydian. "It seems the beasts are on the move."
For the first time, Aelina's smile faded. She stared straight into Mira's eyes and asked, "What do you mean?"
Taking a sip of the tea, Mira answered, "I was just in Vorandis…" She then went on to tell Aelina about what happened, how she incited chaos in the city, how they purged those beasts, and how they were collecting items, knowledge, and information from the humans. She even told her about her results with the Celestial Nectar and other Blood Essences.
"Hmmm~ That is concerning," Aelina muttered thoughtfully. But Mira could tell that she had relaxed a bit. However, she had no idea what went through her mind.
After a few moments of silence, Aelina looked up at Mira and asked, "...What do you think we should do about this?"
"I think we should take action!" Mira declared. "The other powers have probably thought that we've grown weak after our war with the Crimson Slayer Sect. This'll be a good chance to stir things up and show that even now, we aren't to be fucked with."
What she said was only half true. Mira knew that, as a whole, this wasn't the best choice, but it wasn't far from how she really felt. The Beast Clans were clearly up to something, or else that Rank 9 beast at Vorandis would've never shown up, and there wouldn't have been so many of them sneaking around in a human city. She felt it was in their best interest to get rid of any potential spies right now.
Other than that, she just really wanted to fight some more. More fights meant more enemies, and more enemies meant more deaths, and more deaths meant she could kill without worry. Which subsequently meant her cultivation would rise faster.
"That's certainly a decent idea, but I think there's a better way to handle this situation," Aelina said after giving it some thought, a creepy smile etching on her face.
"You said that you're able to improve the quality of a Bloodline with that Celestial Nectar, right?" She asked, to which Mira nodded.
"But to do that, we need more of the same species of beasts, right?" This time Mira shook her head.
"More testing needs to be done in that regard, but you're right. We will need much more beast Blood Essences nonetheless." She answered.
"For what we're planning… we'd need an almost unimaginable amount of beasts. It'd be impossible for us, the Battle Maiden Sect, alone to come up with that in a short amount of time. Not to mention, we'd instantly become public enemy number one." Aelina said, and Mira agreed.
If they were to run around the Western continent slaying beasts, not only would they enrage the Beast Clans, but the human Sects as well. Many people's livelihoods came from killing and selling beasts. Hell, between that and mining Spirit Stones, hardly anything else came close to the amount of revenue and jobs produced aside from herb picking.
Those were the foundation of any Sect, after all. Alchemy, Cultivation, Arrays, Body Tempering, etc., all these things required something from at least one of those. They'd disturb the flow of income if they went out, killing millions of 'resources'.
"...And since we don't want, or need, to draw all the attention to ourselves, it'd be better for us to 'spread the love,' so to speak," Aelina stated with a sly smile.
"Spread the love? You mean, you want to drag other Sects into this mess?" Mira clarified.
Certainly, that was a good idea, but-
"Hahaha~" Aelina burst out laughing, "No, no. We won't be 'dragging' anyone into this 'mess'. We'll merely be informing them that they have spies in their midst who are stealing their knowledge and technology and using it for themselves. Then, maybe as an incentive to look into it, we'll offer to buy those corpses and reward those who have killed or sold a certain number of beasts."
"But… won't people be suspicious? It'd be weird if we just told other Sects this information for free. They might think there's a hidden use for those Beast Corpses and horde them. They may even charge us a premium, knowing that they're valuable to us. This is a big move to make following a war, after all. People aren't going to move simply because we told them to." Mira rebutted. It was a good plan, but there were too many holes that even someone like her could see.
"Hmmm~ You're right. We need to justify our actions while also giving the other powers a good enough reason to slaughter millions of beasts, then turn around and sell their corpses to us. We have to make it seem like we're doing them a favor while also playing the victim…" Aelina fell into thought, but her words were already terrifying enough.
Of course, this was just a means to an end. Obtaining so many beast corpses and experimenting with Blood Essence was merely a side-stop to Aelina's real goal.
Chaos.
If she could turn the entire Continent into a battlefield, spreading the beast's attention thin, her plan to take over the Ancient Beast Mountain Range and loot everything of value to strengthen herself and her Sect would be much easier to accomplish.
Then maybe, just maybe, she could enter the Central Continent.
She didn't give two shits about this Continent or its inhabitants. They were all there to be used by her, to make her life easier.
'So, how can I make them dance to my tune this time?' Aelina pondered, going through all kinds of scenarios in her mind before it suddenly hit her.
"That's it!" She exclaimed, her smile widening as she proceeded to share her plan with Mira through Voice Transmission.
After a while, the two of them smiled at one another and started chuckling like a couple of imps.
"Hehehehe~ That might work."
"Fufufu~ I know, right? Seeing is believing, after all."
Meanwhile, Rhydian just sat to the side, chugging glass after glass of tea while shaking her head at their nonsense.
'Humans…'
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