They said beauty was the downfall of heroes.
Damian Baines had always considered that saying somewhat dramatic... then he met Mu Qingyao.
On Earth, humanity had spent an embarrassing amount of time debating which fantasy race produced the most attractive men and women.
The arguments had crossed nationality, gender, race, religion, politics, and every other boundary that normally made people hate one another, because apparently humanity could always unite around the important questions.
Elves?
Catgirls?
Wolf girls?
Dragon women?
Demons?
Aliens?
Slimes?
Hehe, especially slimes.
The internet, in full display of its evil and greedy nature, had spared nothing.
Naturally, once Eastern fantasy became more popular, another battlefield emerged.
Western fantasy beauties versus Eastern fantasy beauties.
Elves were matched against the legendary jade beauties who could cause kingdoms to fall.
Beastgirls were compared against transformed Spirit Beasts and True Spirits.
Dryads, succubi, and other dangerously seductive fantasy races were thrown against Hehuan Sect enchantresses and Joyous Yin-Yang demonesses.
After millions of comments, arguments, memes, and questionable illustrations, the general consensus had usually been that neither side held an overwhelming advantage.
Western fantasy possessed better cultural representation and generally more developed personalities.
Eastern fantasy possessed descriptions so exaggerated that a woman removing her veil could apparently cause three Young Masters, seven clan heirs, and an entire auction house to lose their minds.
Damian had now seen both.
And he could confidently state that...
Earth was wrong!
The gap was not even close!!
Don’t get it wrong, Julia was genuinely breathtaking.
The elf possessed a beautiful face, long legs, wide hips, and a fleshy backside that compensated so thoroughly for her relatively flat chest that many adult men would happily dedicate poetry to the lower half of her body.
Selene and Ophelia were even more dangerous in completely different ways.
Yet not one of them had caused Damian to simply stare upon first meeting them like some perverted teenage virgin discovering women for the first time.
Mu Qingyao had.
And the ridiculous part?
She was dressed more conservatively than all three!
"E-Elder Mu!" Jian Rui’s horrified voice finally broke the spell.
The four Outer Hall disciples scrambled upright despite having been cowering outside the destroyed chamber moments earlier, quickly straightening themselves before cupping their fists.
"Greetings, Elder Mu!"
Damian blinked.
’Elder?’
That finally dragged his eyes away from the woman, who regarded the four with a warm smile.
"You may relax, young ones. Thank you for taking care of our guest. From the looks of things, you have done considerably more than was originally expected of you," she praised gently.
Her voice was soft and sonorous, carrying none of the sharp authority Damian expected from someone addressed as an Elder.
He immediately felt somewhat embarrassed.
What the hell had gotten into him?
Damian had dated women before and had even spent a night or two with a few.
He was not some sheltered idiot who malfunctioned whenever a beautiful woman showed an ankle.
For half a second, he even wondered whether Mu Qingyao practiced some kind of charm technique, but his instincts rejected the possibility.
There was no strange manipulation of spiritual energy around his thoughts, no magical compulsion, and no pressure against his Mental Energy.
She was simply just that charming in person.
’Dangerous.’ Damian placed a tag on her immediately, becoming more cautious.
Mu Feng could no longer restrain himself anymore, the middle-aged man hurrying forward and bowing deeply.
"Friend Damian, I am truly sorry for this blunder! Due to my careless actions, I have placed you in grave danger!"
Damian stared at him speechlessly.
’Buddy, I have had absolutely no idea what the heck you are apologizing for.’
One moment, the fellow had purchased three potions, and the next, he vanished.
After that, Damian got attacked by an assassin.
If Mu Feng genuinely caused this somehow, then a little context between Step One and Step Three would be greatly appreciated.
His face apparently betrayed enough of those thoughts for Mu Qingyao to notice, and a tiny smile appeared at the corner of her lips.
’Interesting,’ the woman thought with an internal chuckle.
This Damian fellow did not seem particularly skilled at hiding his natural reactions, and that was surprisingly rare.
In the cultivation world, anyone who accumulated even modest power eventually learned to wear masks.
Smile when angry, remain calm when afraid, hide greed, conceal affection, pretend weakness, and even more so, pretend strength.
Mu Qingyao herself had learned years ago to suppress emotional reactions and maintain a consistently gentle, refined exterior.
After all, her father possessed countless enemies, so anything she revealed could become something used against him.
Eventually, the mask simply became normal.
Seeing Damian openly stare at her, then become visibly embarrassed by his own behavior, followed by his almost comically confused reaction toward Mu Feng’s apology, was strangely refreshing.
Perhaps even a little cute.
Mu Qingyao stepped forward and cupped her hands.
"Hello, dear friend. My name is Mu Qingyao. If you like, you may simply call me Yao."
Several Evergreen cultivators stiffened, their eyes widening in shock.
Even Mu Feng glanced at her, startled that the young miss would go so far, but then thought of Damian’s value and felt it was not enough.
Damian did not care about the significance and simply returned the greeting.
"Well, Miss Yao, I am Damian Baines, a practitioner of a special system from afar. I came here at the recommendation of these four lads, found the Evergreen Sect’s environment very much to my taste, and intend to settle down for some business," Damian introduced amiably.
Then he folded his arms and glanced toward the pile of ash outside the broken wall.
"Your... ’servant’... apparently had different ideas."
Mu Feng frowned. "Servant?"
He turned toward Jian Rui. "Who attacked Fellow Daoist Damian?"
Jian Rui swallowed. "Lady... Lady Ning."
Mu Feng’s face went white. "WHAT?!"
"She entered carrying refreshments. Senior Damian noticed something was wrong and ordered us outside before she attacked," Jian Rui rapidly explained.
Mu Feng disappeared.
WHOOSH!
Damian blinked and folded his arms again. "Tsk, what a fast fellow."
Mu Qingyao’s expression had changed as well, but she remained behind.
She crouched beside the blackened remains, her fingers hovering above the ash.
A thin strand of emerald spiritual energy emerged and sieved through them, causing the ashes to shift.
Mu Qingyao frowned for a moment at what she was sensing, then her eyes widened in disbelief.
"This..."
"What now?" Damian asked with a raised eyebrow.
She carefully withdrew her hand and shook her head. "Ning Ruomei was not here."
Damian raised an eyebrow. "Hard to believe when I watched her try to remove my throat."
"Indeed, this body did make the attempt, but it was not her true body," Qingyao clarified grimly.
Damian stared at the ashes again. "Let me guess... a corpse puppet?"
"A Refined Corpse Puppet to be exact. It is a Nightmare Corpse Sect technique that allows a cultivator to refine a corpse into a puppet, modify its appearance, and control it through embedded spiritual imprints. Some more sophisticated variants can even imitate speech, habits, and superficial cultivation characteristics," Mu Qingyao explained.
Damian’s expression became ugly. "So the real Lady Ning..."
"Is still somewhere within the Sect, unless she has already escaped," Mu Qingyao confirmed with a wry smile.
Wonderful.
It turns out their infiltration problem was somehow worse than he thought.
Mu Qingyao continued examining the remains, then she hesitated for a moment.
"Friend Damian, may I ask you something?" she asked in a slow voice.
Damian glanced at her and nodded. "Go ahead."
"Where did you obtain your Yang Fire?" Mu Qingyao inquired after taking a deep breath.
Damian looked confused. "My what?"
"The flame you used to destroy this puppet," Mu Qingyao clarified.
"Oh, <Burning Hands>? It is simply a normal fire spell from my system of practice." Damian tilted his head.
Mu Qingyao’s breath hitched, and her gaze towards Damian changed.
A lot more respect entered it, but so too did caution and wariness.
"It’s... normal?" she repeated with disbelief.
"For those like me, yes," Damian reiterated while crossing his legs.
Mu Qingyao glanced at the ash with a difficult look. "Friend Damian... ordinary flame cultivators cannot achieve this."
Damian’s interest sharpened. "How so?"
"If simple fire techniques possessed such overwhelming restraint against Corpse Qi, the Evergreen Sect and Azure Water Sect would have invested everything into recruiting Fire Spirit Root cultivators generations ago," Qingyao explained.
"Fire certainly restrains some Yin and corpse-aligned methods, but the difference is nowhere near what happened here."
Damian immediately recalled Lady Ning burning.
Her wood Qi made the flame stronger, and her death Qi made it even more dramatically stronger.
At least a 3x boost?
Perhaps even more under the right circumstances.
Mu Qingyao looked at him carefully.
"The flame you used contains something unusually pure. It carries traces resembling natural heavenly law. There is very little contamination from personal cultivation."
Damian froze as everything clicked for him.
Mu Feng, and the reactor.
How cultivators absorbed spiritual energy into themselves, by refining and filtering it, thereby stripping away certain properties while strengthening others.
The result being their Qi becoming personal, branded by their techniques and existence.
Valorian Mages did almost the exact opposite.
They did not usually drag mana into their bodies, refine it permanently, and turn it into Damian Mana or Selene Mana.
They manipulated the natural product, they structured it through formulas, compressed, directed, and combined it to make fire.
But the underlying energy remained incredibly close to the world’s natural state.
His <Burning Hands> was essentially all-natural fire magic, with no preservatives!
Damian almost laughed.
Perhaps that was why death Qi reacted so disastrously.
Whatever qualities natural spiritual energy possessed that opposed Shengyuan’s corrupted corpse energies had not been refined away.
"Heavenly Dao..." Damian murmured.
That sounded excessive.
Still, not entirely inaccurate.
If Valorian magic manipulated natural supernatural energy directly, then from a cultivator’s perspective, it probably did resemble borrowing directly from heaven and earth.
His thoughts wandered.
’Then what about lightning?’
The cantrip <Shocking Grasp> and the level 1 <Witch Bolt>.
If he learned those spells and brought the resulting natural magical lightning into Shengyuan...
Could he imitate the properties of Heavenly Tribulation lightning?
Damian’s eyes slowly brightened.
Now that sounded interesting.
Mu Qingyao watched his expression carefully before bringing matters back to the immediate concern.
"Friend Damian, perhaps we should continue this discussion somewhere less... damaged."
Damian glanced around.
Indeed, a quarter of the guest chamber had been scorched, and one wall no longer existed.
"...Fair."
Several minutes later, they relocated to another private chamber, and as expected, a pot of fresh tea arrived.
Also, almost amusingly, nobody allowed servant disciples anywhere near the room this time.
Mu Qingyao sat opposite Damian while several guards remained outside.
"Uncle Mu informed me about the goods you presented. May I inspect them personally?" she began.
"Certainly." Damian didn’t see the problem as he brought out the samples again.
Mana Crystal, Spell Scroll, several ’mortal’ items, and finally, the potions.
Mu Qingyao barely cared about the first few products, but when the three coloured bottles appeared, however, her entire focus shifted.
Her fingers lightly touched the Healing Vial.
"How many of these can you currently provide?" she asked carefully.
Damian considered his stock. "Immediately? Around fifteen of each without causing myself problems."
Mu Qingyao’s heartbeat quickened. "And with an established business relationship?"
Damian scratched his chin. "Fifty to a hundred of each should be realistic initially. Potentially more once supply becomes stable."
Mu Qingyao stared at him with a mixture of horror and disbelief.
Fifty... to a hundred....
Of each?
She had expected perhaps several bottles per month from some eccentric master alchemist!
Her composure nearly broke.
"Can... can you truly provide that quantity?"
"Probably. I would need to confirm things with my suppliers before promising exact figures," Damian remained noncommittal about it.
"Of course." Mu Qingyao inhaled slowly.
Then asked the question that truly mattered to her. "Do... any stronger versions exist?"
Damian leaned back. "Of the Healing Vial?"
"For all three," Mu Qingyao let her greed take over and asked.
Damian thought about Valoria’s item system, which had Common, Uncommon, Rare, Epic, Legendary, Divine.
If Common Healing Potions already worked this well... surely there had to be Uncommon types for level 5 to level 10? And then Rare ones for level 11 to level 15?
"Most likely," Damian admitted.
"But the price increase between quality grades can become substantial. I would need to cross-check availability and costs with my suppliers." He once again remained noncommittal.
"Please feel free to take your time, Friend Damian," Mu Qingyao answered immediately.
Damian raised an eyebrow.
Mu Qingyao’s emerald eyes remained fixed upon him.
"If stronger versions exist and can achieve proportionally greater effects, the Evergreen Sect can swallow everything you spit out."
Silence.
Damian’s eyebrow rose higher with faint amusement, and seeing his look, Mu Qingyao froze, a faint redness touching her cheeks.
She chided herself for relaxing too much in Damian’s presence.
Damian smiled slightly.
Interesting, this elegant ’Elder’ Mu could slip too.
More importantly, he had begun noticing something.
This Mu Qingyao was noticeably more at ease than when she first arrived, not merely because the assassin had died nor because Damian was cooperating amiably, but because his goods had relieved something.
A burden, and a heavy one too.
By this point, even a wild goblin would realize that the reaction to those potions went far beyond normal commercial interest.
First, Deacon Mu had sprinted away like a lunatic, then Mu Qingyao had personally arrived with armed Qi Condensation guards.
A glorified Sect Elder was now promising to purchase effectively unlimited quantities before they had even discussed pricing.
Clearly, there was some form of information discrepancy here, and it was a rather large one.
Damian folded his hands and chuckled internally.
Previously, Mu Feng had casually tested him with Spirit Sense earlier, which was fair game in Damian’s book.
But two could play that game, and he wasn’t going to be led on just because of a pretty face.
Damian subtly leaned upon his <Persuasion> Specialization, his expression shifting as his friendly smile disappeared.
"What an unfortunate situation this has been."
Mu Qingyao paused, wondering what the issue was now.
Damian sighed deeply. "I travel into unfamiliar territory, help four Evergreen disciples, come to your Sect intending peaceful commerce, reveal products that clearly possess substantial value, and then I am attacked inside the very guest hall where I was told I would be protected."
Mu Qingyao’s expression stiffened, her heart sinking to her stomach at the sudden switch-up.
Damian continued before she could answer.
"Then everyone appears extremely interested in purchasing my goods, but nobody tells me why. Previously, Deacon Mu tested my cultivation without permission, but for the sake of business, I let it go. Right after that, an assassin tests whether my neck separates from my shoulders quite well, but I handled it myself and even saved the lives of your disciples."
Damian shook his head. "And now, you ask how much medicine I can supply? Do you think I am stupid or ignorant not to notice that there is a very extraordinary situation occurring in your sect, especially with the billowing Death Qi in important areas?"
Jian Rui and the others, still lingering near the side of the room, gradually lowered their heads.
When Damian phrased it like that...
Their Sect indeed sounded awful.
Damian gave Mu Qingyao a deep look.
"I have been quite cooperative, Miss Yao. Yet from where I am sitting, the Evergreen Sect seems very comfortable benefitting from my ignorance."
Mu Qingyao bit her lower lip, and sighed deeply.
Indeed, she should have known better.
From the start, they had only viewed things from their own point of need and completely treated Damian as a tool, a means to an end.
In crude business this might be fine, but someone like Damian was better befriended than alienated, and their actions were quickly heading down the path of completely alienating him.
Indeed, information was leverage when it came to negotiation, but that was only in a situation of equals, and here... they were not equal to Damian by any measurement.
The Azure Water Sect were suffering from the exact same problem they were and would likely pay any price to have Damian set up there and establish his business, so what leverage did they have over him?
Mu Qingyao understood that the Sect’s internal condition should not be casually revealed to an unknown foreign cultivator, especially not during wartime.
However, Damian was brutally right. After he had nearly been assassinated under Evergreen hospitality, continuing to conceal everything while asking for preferential access to his medicine would be beyond shameless.
Mu Qingyao closed her eyes briefly and when they opened again, her decision had been made.
"Very well, Lord Damian."
The loss of ’Friend’ and the addition of ’Lord’ did not sound colder.
If anything, it sounded more personal.
"There are circumstances you deserve to understand before we discuss anything else."
Damian’s posture straightened.
Mu Qingyao looked toward the door, confirmed the formations around the chamber were active, and then began to speak.
What she told him next left Damian completely shocked.