CHAPTER 140: SONG YAN

Ah well, the answer was not something he could magically divine from nothing. He didn’t know enough about the Infinite Slaughter System and how it even worked or why it was given to him, minus its occasional bits of messaging where it encourages him to slaughter for no grander purpose than slaughtering itself.

Li Ling put it out of his mind for now and focused on his current pressing task, rushing to the area surrounding the number 5 marketplace. In a matter of minutes, he appeared above the established market which had a similar structure to the one that came before, but the density of power was raised once more.

Now, there were more than double the Foundation Establishment practitioners from before, with 60% in the early stage, 30% in the mid stage, and the remainder in the late stage, forming the ’great clans’ who ruled the marketplace below the Qing Shan Sect. Li Ling raised an eyebrow as he sensed what was definitely a Core Formation early stage presence, curling his lips in amusement as his payout might finally break through a hundred thousand Slaughter Points for the first time.

Immediately, he pointed upwards and formed the full-power Meteor, which began to rapidly fall downward toward his target.

Yet it was exactly at this moment that two very important things occurred.

Firstly, a shadow shot out from the edge of the marketplace at speeds that even Li Ling struggled to follow, charging toward the incoming Meteor and colliding with it head-on in what formed a thunderous explosion that shook the air itself. Yet the result was that the Meteor that had been bearing down on the number 5 Qing Shan marketplace was destroyed, not even leaving any debris behind, while the shadow was completely unharmed.

Meanwhile, Li Ling, who formed the Meteor, immediately felt his silent danger sense from his Purple Mansion begin to sound the alarm crazily, informing him of a threat that he could not possibly deal with at this point in time, with the same severity and power as what he felt when he first unlocked this sense.

The young man frowned as he slowly brought his upraised finger down, glancing to the right where the shadow that had rushed to destroy his Meteor slowly descended until it was level with him, revealing itself to be a giant winged serpent with a single horn upon its head, radiating the aura of the fourth realm.

Atop its head, seated cross-legged with a playful smile, was a young man with curly brown hair, a relatively handsome visage, and casual green and brown robes with a symbol that showed his affiliation.

"Qing Shan Sect..." Li Ling muttered aloud, seemingly unhappy by this discovery.

The young man chuckled amiably. "Indeed. My name is Song Yan, Deputy Mountain Suppression Elder of the Qing Shan Sect. A pleasure to make your acquaintance, Fellow Daoist Li Ling."

Li Ling raised an eyebrow. "You were waiting for me?"

Song Yan seemed to be in no rush to take Li Ling down and retained his cheerful, friendly demeanor as he responded. "Spot on, Fellow Daoist Li! I have been stationed here for just about a fortnight, and to be honest with you, I was beginning to tire of it!"

Looking at his expression of grievance, one would think he had been bullied somehow, but Li Ling paid little attention to the man himself and rather to his words.

Waiting for over a fortnight? More than two weeks? But he had only started slaughtering the markets just less than half an hour ago, and two weeks ago he had just...

Seeing Li Ling’s sharply risen eyebrows in realization, Song Yan laughed with merriment and confirmed his thoughts. "That’s right, I was sent here to wait for your inevitable return after you escaped from the number 9 marketplace and joined the Six Paths Demon Sect!"

Li Ling looked at him seriously. "Hmm, you must have found out from Luo Roumei then."

Song Yan didn’t deny it, simply relaxing on the head of his spirit beast with a lazy posture. "Indeed. She managed to send a message back along with her speculations about your future actions when you ambushed her group, just before we forever lost connection with her."

"Oh? And what were her speculations about my future actions?" Li Ling asked with a thin smile.

"That girl is quite clever, you see, able to see through human hearts quite well. Then again, most of her race are like that, so you have to take it on the chin this time, Fellow Daoist." Song Yan responded with amusement, clearly enjoying this chat immensely.

He didn’t delay with the revelation, though, clearly wanting Li Ling to know and understand how he had been outplayed. "According to her, your most likely objective after joining the Six Paths Demon Sect would be to accumulate power to a point you thought sufficient and then strike back at us in the shadows to harvest resources for your growth."

Song Yan stroked the head of his mount idly, speaking wistfully. "After all, who doesn’t know of the fast cultivation of your amoral demons? However, that speed is precipitated on the back of risk as well as a huge amount of evil resources. You may be able to bear the risk, but where will you get the resources from?"

Li Ling smiled casually. "The sect produces its own resources aplenty, so could I not just sustain myself from there? Maybe by taking on tasks and accumulating sect credits to grow?"

Song Yan looked at Li Ling strangely, as if he was staring at an idiot. "I mean, that is possible, yeah. But only a normal person with a normal brain would perform such a stable operation, and all your actions so far have proven that you are completely unstable and impulsive, taking risks without caring about the repercussion or the consequences."

"I mean, destroying the entirety of the Boundless Joy Sect’s market? When we heard it, we celebrated with joy for sure and laughed at them, but you should know that establishing markets for them is ten times harder than it is for us." Song Yan continued while gripping his forehead and shaking it in lament, as if regretting Li Ling’s stupidity.

"No, Fellow Daoist. You were always going to hold a grudge against our sect irrationally despite being the initial aggressor, and you would act on it before you actually had the power to overturn the sect, believing that you could always take us down conveniently in the future." Song Yan pointed out with a shrug, as if stating the obvious.

Li Ling folded his arms. "Okay then, you had the divine foresight and immaculate wisdom to predict my carelessness and arrogance. Why number 5 market, though? Why not stop me right at Green Hill City or the number 9 marketplace?"

Song Yan nodded with satisfaction, pleased that Li Ling was finally asking the right questions. "For that, it’s quite simple."

He dramatically raised his hand to the sky, as if supplicating the heavens for an answer. "Righteous and demonic... what are they? Are all righteous cultivators good people? Are all demonic cultivators bad people?"

"These are basic questions even a child asks, much less us who live in the jungle of cultivation itself. In the end, all parties understand that the titles and labels are only there for convenience and for general identification, but are not absolute."

Song Yan sighed. "Your initial crimes are not enough for our Qing Shan Sect to justify killing you to the Six Paths Demon Sect, especially given your risen cultivation. I was sent here to wait for ten years, presuming you would come back at the peak of the third realm looking for resources to break through to the fourth realm."

"The amount of resources required for that breakthrough is truly heartrending, and I say this from experience myself. To do that, you would need to kill a huge number of mortals and cultivators to fulfill your desires, and given your history of exterminating marketplaces plus your grievance with the number 9 marketplace, everything set itself up nicely." Song Yan concluded with a deep bow to the east, as if thanking the souls of those who died for their hard work.

Li Ling, in the meantime, felt his lips twitching, feeling a bit amused yet tired. Luo Roumei had shown this mentality previously, but he thought it had just been her since she was, as Song Yan said, quite intelligent, not to mention that she was under his control at the time.

But well, it turns out that it wasn’t just her, it was her entire sect that was like this. This caused Li Ling to understand his lapse in judgment because he had seen Jian Chen and thought that indeed, that was how all righteous fellows should be.

But no, Jian Chen was from the Bright Sword Sect, who prided themselves on being morally good and honest. Meanwhile, the Qing Shan Sect were only called ’righteous’ because they didn’t particularly do evil or need to do evil, being more neutral in alignment.